CE Wills

    Hey everybody. Looks like we have let another year go by without doing a lot of things we want to do. Bummer.     Has this been a terrible Christmas season for movies? I can't recall when there has been a holiday season with so few good movies. My wife and I went out to eat today and had planned on going to the show. There was, however, no show I wanted to see and she didn't want to see what was available either. It worked out okay, though. When we got home there was a great movie on TV.     The Long Kiss Goodnight is funny, sexy and action packed. It is edgy. In short, the guy who wrote it writes like me. The film  stars Geena Davis as a lady who has amnesia but has built a new life as a school teacher, wife and mother. Samuel L. Jackson stars as a private detective who is trying to help her discover her past. They find out the hard way that she was a spy and an assassin for her government. They also find out, the hard way, that a number of people want her dead. What fol

    This game was one which I refused to download for a while, even though it was on sale for 99 cents. I thought that it looked boring and narrow. Boy, was I wrong! This game totally kicks butt. It is one of those rare games that will actually give you an adrenaline rush. It is that intense. The developers, EA Games, have recently updated the app to include two main avenues of play. You can either be the cops or the racers who are trying to evade the cops. As a racer you have to deal with cops trying to hit you and make you crash, cops buzzing you with helicopters, oncoming traffic, tack strips spread across the road and roadblocks. In the cop mode you are a cop and you are trying to stop a reckless racer by any means, fair or foul. As a racer you can use nitrous oxide for increased speed, overdrive capability and oil slicks. You also can jam the cops communication with a jamming unit. Like almost all games these days, it gets harder as you go along. I prefer my games to be a bit easi

    I just finished reading an article by Ray Aguilera in the January issue of Mac I Life magazine. The writer is talking about a new device which sounds quite interesting, the Applevision. This is an actual television, 65 inches, as opposed to the set-top box that is called Apple TV. The set-top box merely allows you to stream stuff from your I-Pad to your TV. I just ordered one of those for $99 and it should arrive today.     As I said, the Applevision is an actual TV and has many new features. For instance, it has a camera and microphone. An infrared camera continuously sweeps your living room and responds to movements in a fashion similar to the new Kinect system for X-Box 360. The Applevision will recognize people when they enter the room, turning on the default home screen or programming for your kids or wife. Mr. Aguilera calls it a touchscreen in the air because you make gestures to play games etc. Of course you can stream movies, surf the web and it is, in general, pretty coo

    Hey, everyone. What a relief that Christmas is over, huh? I don't think it was meant to be the way it is.     I started thinking about the so-called good 'ole days today. My wife says that at her house, they would take a left-over biscuit and shine their shoes before church. I one-upped her by saying, "Oh, yeah? I ate the biscuit when everyone got finished with it. And I was grateful for it." Truly, though, you can and people did, shine their shoes with a biscuit. Hey, they were greasy little buggers.     Speaking of greasy little buggers, I remember when everyone had wells and were very conservative about water, particularly those of us who had to crank a handle up and down to get a bucket of water. There was no daily bath. (No showers in those days, mate.) About twice a week we took a bath and here's the recipe: The oldest kid took a bath first, then the next oldest etc. You can see why younger siblings hated the older. Bathing in their used water did not

    Hey, everyone. Merry Christmas. This game is the most talked about new game for quite some time. It uses some new technology to give you truly awesome graphics. The graphics are a whole 'nother level. Really impressive. You are battling your way through an old castle against some impressive baddies. You are trying to reach the inner sanctum of a megalomaniac with a god complex. Your desire in this is for revenge because the dude killed your old man.     I don't really go for sword fighting games for the simple reason that they are not my style of games. If you like that genre this is almost a 'must buy'. That's really an overused term in gaming, don't you think? It's not as overused as addictive, though.     I'd rate this game as: five stars for graphics.                                   : four stars for story                                   : three stars for game play, for myself. If you like this genre, game play would be rated four stars. L

    Hey, everyone. I'm having a nice Christmas today, thus far. I got a cool songbook for Christmas. It's got Neil Diamond's greatest hits in an E-Z Play format. This is a format for the less gifted among us which features the letter for the notes in a circle. This makes it easier to play songs that are new to you, hence the name.     My love for Neil's music goes away back. I had most of these songs on an 8-track tape, back before I got married. These 8-tracks were a means of listening to music just after the invention of the wheel, by the way. Neil Diamond was a terrific songwriter as well as a live performer and occasional actor. If you are not familiar with his work, may I recommend the following songs? 1. Forever In Blue Jeans . My wife's favorite and the one I had to play immediately this morning. It's sort of an anthem for the common man. 2. I Am, I Said . 3. Cracklin' Rosie 4. Sweet Caroline 5. Kentucky Woman 6. Song Sung Blue 7. Girl, You&#

    Hey, everyone. I thought I'd update an earlier post about apps you should get for your brand new Christmas device from Apple. You might need a little help spending your Christmas money. The app store is one of the great things about having an I-Pad. A central, convenient and relatively cheap place to buy toys is hard to beat. Just ask all the folks spending $50 for x-box games. I've jotted down a few apps and games you might like. Keep in mind that the I-Phone version of the same game will cost about one third of the price of the I-Pad game and will play just fine. Also, the prices go up and down with sales, so don't get mad at me, okay? 1. Stanza- the best app for books, probably. It has listings of free books, enough to keep you busy for years. There's a version for your PC as well. 2.Plants vs. Zombies-99 cents. The best game on the store, plus no blood and gore. 3.Angry Birds-99 cents. One of the most popular games in the world. The HD version will cost you a

    It was a couple of months since he had seen them. The little boy that wasn't big enough to walk when he left would surely be toddling now. The young man had been in boot camp for a couple of months and had been sent straight to advanced training from there. He missed the black-haired beauty that was his wife. He missed her so badly that it hurt deep inside him. She wasn't much more than a kid, herself.     When he got to his new post, he got a weekend pass and went home to get his wife and baby. The baby didn't really seem to know him but it was wonderful to hold the two of them in his arms. There were some tears all around.     They drove hundreds of miles, in the dead of winter, in their old rattletrap Chevrolet. He had taken the sides off an old washing machine and placed the metal in the floorboards so less cold air would blow in through the holes. He was late getting back to base and got in some trouble.     When they arrived in the frigid town where his new bas

    Recently I was lurking around the app store and caught EA Games putting a lot of their games on sale. I snatched up a racing game for 99 cents. It's called Need For Speed Shift and it's awesome. Call it five stars out of five, four stars out of four; whatever you want. Just don't call it an opportunity missed to get a great game. In a time when the word bargain is overused and almost non-existent in reality, this is a bargain.     Here's the recipe. The graphics are wonderful and the gameplay and controls are awesome. I'm very grateful for the excellent tutorial with this game. I'm a little slow on the uptake these days. This game teaches us how to play their game and how to race!     About six months ago I bought Real Racing for I-Pad. It's a great game but I had a hard time getting started with it. I was inexperienced with modern games and I didn't know about starting a career. As a result, I merely played Quick Race which caused me to miss a lo

    Do you remember the series of Die Hard movies which starred Bruce Willis? I loved this series. In the latest of these, Bruce sought the help of a guy who lived in his mother's basement and called himself 'The Warlock'. Bruce laughed at him because he called the basement 'The Sanctuary' or something like that. I fear that I am becoming this man.     I may call it the green retreat instead of the sanctuary but I'm certainly becoming a geek. In the last two weeks I have put about a dozen new games on my I-Pad. Last night I caught my reflection in the glass of my I-Pad as I was playing Brothers-In-Arms 2, Global Front. I saw a stranger, an intense looking introvert with a cold stare.     Should one be concerned if he has an app that stars a Talking Tom Cat which mimics every word you say, drinks milk and purrs when you rub his belly?     I hate to run but I think Bruce Willis is landing a helicopter on the front yard! From the sanctuary author's green r

    Do you remember the song Proud Mary? When Ike and  Tina Turner did it, she said, "We never do anything nice and easy". Well, that's the way games and poker are around my house. There are some pretty competitive people and it can get interesting. This blog post is meant to describe such a night.     Several years ago I sat at a big table playing poker. The game was five-card draw with dueces wild. There was an interesting mix of players. There were older players with the look of the wolf in their eyes, veterans of many games. There were the casual players who played more for fun but could become ruthless if crossed. There were males and females, young and old, and at least one man who had played in some tournaments, including a regional for the World Series of Poker. There was not a single one among them who did not have the burning desire to win the bragging rights for the night.     Then there were two other players who came to us and said, "Teach us how to

    There's a big frost this morning. The sky is blue and the low temperature overnight was in the teens. My wife is baking a ham and a turkey for a get-together and the house smells the better for it. Several deer have wandered by in the woods, trying to find something to nibble on. We haven't been seeing a lot of deer the last few months because the creek had dried up. Now, however, the creek has water and the critters are around once more. The thing is, they're always around, but you don't see them. The creek is full of water from melted snow and the water is certainly cold. I remember as a kid, we would drink water from the creeks and not think about it. Now there seems to be a national paranoia about drinking water purity. True, there are bacteria that one cannot see but I find it to be deplorable that we have become a generation of people dependent on bottled and canned goods. Here in the USA we have largely forgotten skills like canning vegetables, making preserv

    Hey, everyone. It's a late night thing again. I got out of bed to read a bit. My wife had picked up a copy of Rolling Stone for me because I wanted to read the John Lennon interview. I just finished it as I sat here in the study where the light is better. It's between five and six in the morning.     I enjoyed the article very much and there was an article that Yoko Lennon wrote which described their last days together. I enjoyed both articles very much. It's funny, looking back. I never thought about the two of them facing the racial intolerance thing due to the mixed racial marriage. This is odd because I remember John's song, The Ballad Of John And Yoko which describes the lack of acceptance from people and governments. Especially as a young person, I never really thought about people other than as a person and I never thought of myself as a white guy, just as a guy. Besides, the males of my generation always thought of Japanese and Chinese women as incredibly

    Hey, everyone. I've been relaxing after a tough day. I like to read Google News and I selected sections that I like which do not appear on the standard version. For instance, I like a section called I-Pad and I-Phone Games. Then, when I see an interesting article, I check it out. Today I noticed that EA Sports, a big game developer, was running a sale on the app store. They have marked down all their titles, which are normally quite pricey by app store standards. So I bought 4 new games to amuse myself with. They were all 99 cents.     1. Madden NFL 11     2.Battlefield: Bad Company 2     3. Reckless Racing     4.Need For Speed Shift     It's really too early to give a fair review on them but my first impressions are as follows; Need For Speed Shift is a good deal for the 99 cents. Very cool graphics and game play, plus it's not hard to get started on. I'm not a good player and there are some games that I give up on out of frustration as I try to get a feel fo

    I don't wax too enthusiastic as a rule for the simple reason that people or things that you get too crazy about invariably let you down in some way.     However, let me recommend you get an I-Pad. Best Buy will let you get one and take a year or 18 months to pay for it. You may say, "I'm older and not a computer person at all". Bingo! You're just the person who will enjoy it the most.     My many blogs on the subject (14) have talked at length about its versatility and features. My point tonight is that it will probably change some of your lifetime habits, especially recreational habits. It will cut your television watching in half. What a blessing it would be for the sick and shut-in; the crippled. How nice for anyone to have a new hobby, something of interest to get excited about. It's nice to be able to find some common ground with the younger folks in your life, who are plugged in and are tech savvy.     I feel that the I-Pad can be therapeutic for

    Hey, everyone. It was 5 degrees this morning and there was about 6 inches of snow on the ground. The wind has died down since yesterday. Our water is still frozen and I've decided to go to Lowe's and buy a heater to put under the house and thaw the pipes. I hope they don't burst. By the way, the pipes burst because the water shrinks as it gets colder, allowing more water in. Then, as it heats up you need to have a couple of faucets open to allow for the expansion. If you don't, the expanding water has no place to go.     We took a bit of time off from the weather related chores to hike through the woods and look at tracks. Snow makes an amateur tracker into a good one, if you catch my drift. It's really fun when you can plainly see what is going on. We found a myriad of rabbit tracks and squirrel tracks. There was an abundance of deer tracks, both male and female. The doe has more of a triangular track while the buck leaves two parallel  marks side by side with

    Hey everyone. We've had a bit of a storm here. Over the last two days there has been about six inches of snow, more than that in drifts. Odd to have drifts here, although I'm used to them in Kansas. The wind has been fierce and the low was 12 degrees. Our water froze, which is a drag.     Well, the power is not out, which you probably guessed from the fact that I'm blogging. It's a good day to play games on the I-Pad or read a book. I think I need to move to a milder climate, preferably the beach. At least the Falcons won and they are now 11-2 on the season. For you folks that live overseas, the Falcons are a pro football team.     I have to go as duty calls. I need to get a kerosene heater out, just in case.     From the white place, I'm CE Wills. PS: You may notice that I've went through my posts and placed labels on them. That means that you can look out to the right and find posts about nature(33), or posts about mountain lions (3). You'll enjoy

    Hello. (I thought I'd change the greeting). As threatened, I went to see The Tourist today. It stars Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp. Johnny plays a clueless tourist, an American math teacher who meets a mysterious woman on a train. She is using the stranger to fool some law enforcement types. They wind up in a hotel together in Venice, Italy. By the way, I very much enjoyed the shots of this lovely town. It made me want to go there. Jolie's character begins to fall for the math teacher as opposed to her more dangerous consort for whom she has done the machinations which have enveloped the innocent tourist. After almost being killed, being arrested and being entirely out of his depth, the teacher falls for the seductress and she falls for him. There are a few little plot twists late in the show.      Rather than fill the movie with special effects and mindless action scenes and violence, the director chose to be a bit more subtle. The movie had moments that spoke so well t

    Hey, everyone. Its been cold here at the green retreat. Lows have been around 12 degrees and highs around 25. We had another light snow also.     This morning I was playing the keyboard and enjoying my coffee. I played some songs by the Bee-Gees and Neil Diamond. The Bee-Gees have been a terrific group for a lot of years. Did you know that they have had a top ten hit in 5 separate decades? That's pretty amazing in the fickle world of musical tastes. I love their old song called To Love Somebody . I also like Stayin' Alive, I Started A Joke and a bunch of others. Then I started playing some Simon and Garfunkel and talked my wife into a duet. We did Homeward Bound, Still Crazy After All These Years, Sound Of Silence and I Am A Rock. It was fun. Hey, do you ever hear a song and instantly get a picture in your mind? When I played Scarborough Fair I could see Ben Braddock (Dustin Hoffman) driving his red car up to see Elaine Robinson. I"m talking about the scene from The

    It was a magnificent beast. He must have weighed close to 4 tons and was 15 feet in length. The massive head was probably 15 feet above the ground. It could move with the speed of an express train and its ferocity was unmatched by anything I had ever seen.     The creature had a fan shaped ridge on its back, quite pronounced, and it was amphibious. When wounded, like it was now, its first instinct was to flee to the water. It could stay under for a long time, then arise from the depths to wreak havoc again.     At the moment I was following its blood trail through the woods. The trees were not too close together but there were enough of them to block your view and give you that creepy feeling of imminent peril. The splotches of blood wound through the forest along the edge of cliffs. To my right and 50 feet below me was a sandy beach.     To follow the blood trail of a wounded carnivore is one of the most nerve-wracking things imaginable. Especially one as big as a spinosaurus.

    For those of us who are a little older, we have lost another familiar friend. Don Meredith, former Dallas Cowboy and Monday Night Football commentator, has died. In a world where people in the public eye go to great lengths to construct a plastic persona, Dandy Don was fun, natural and very cool. He made Howard Cosell more fun and I really believe the two men were like the biblical verse, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens the countenance of his friend. In a word, they were good for each other.     Who else would have had the nerve to sing ' Turn out the lights, the party's over' on national TV when the game was decided every week? Only Don Meredith. Don was one of that rare breed who dared to be different. Even the media atmosphere could not roll him and stamp him and sale him on a plastic tray. I recall how Elvis was ridiculed for his clothes and hair in high school. Yes, he was ridiculed for his music for many years as well. Those who dare to be different can

    It started snowing during the night and by this morning it was around freezing with a northwest wind, snow flurries and about a  half-inch of snow on the ground. Gloomy and overcast, it was not an ideal day to mess around outside. However, if you let the weather dictate your activities you are not going to get very far in this life. Come to think of it, I haven't gotten very far anyway.     I went out and checked the air in the tires of both vehicles. When the weather changes the pressure in your tires changes. I added air to the tires and did a few other chores outdoors. Then I ate breakfast, a bacon and egg sandwich and some milk.     My wife and I walked to the creek and looked around for tracks. We saw signs of where a bear had been rooting around and saw some tracks that were so tenuous that we could not determine what might have made them. We returned home with semi-frozen toes and lit a fire in the fireplace. Then we started rearranging the living room so we could put

    Hey, everyone. My wife and I ventured out today and made the trek to civilization. We had lunch and a movie. The movie was Faster with Dwayne Johnson( The Rock) in the starring role. Dwayne plays a guy who gets out of prison and is intent on revenge for the killing of his brother. When he starts killing people, one of the culprits hires a hit man to take him out. I don't know his name but the young guy who plays the hit man does an outstanding job.     Billy Bob Thornton also does a good job as a crooked cop on the edge of retirement, and frankly, on the edge in general. The movie is top notch and is well-acted and well-directed. I think that Dwayne Johnson has been the victim of some bad scripts in the past as he honed his acting talents. He does an exceptional job in this movie and I rate it three and a half stars out of four. True, it is more of a guy movie than a lot of the ladies would like but my wife rates it three stars out of four for the ladies.     I don't kno

    Hey, everyone. I had a nice day today. I was off and feeling kind of lazy. We ate a big breakfast. My wife fixed bacon, biscuits and gravy, potatoes with peppers, and a fried egg. I drank milk and orange juice. Then we took a nice walk in the woods. I was glad to see there was still water in the creek from the recent rains. My wife found a tiny little deer track in the mud. When we got back to the house I played the keyboard and we sang a bunch of songs. Very relaxing. We took an afternoon nap which refreshed me. Then I went out and split some big chunks of firewood with the ax. The wood was red oak which is very aromatic. My wife refers to it, very charmingly, as 'butt oak' because of its peculiar odor. Don't ask, OK?     Later in the evening we sat around and watched a couple of sorry movies on TV. We're planning on getting out tomorrow and going to see the latest movie starring 'The Rock'. That's Dwayne Johnson, for all of you people who, like me, ar

    Hey, everyone. Last night I was driving on a lonely mountain road. Several deer jumped out in front of me and I really plowed into one. I had no warning, of course. If the deer had called me first I could have taken another road. At any rate, I hit the deer and watched it spinning in the air as it went by the left side of my car. It was really a weird sight and seemed to be in slow motion. The deer was dead. My car is drivable but has damage to the front bumper, grill and hood. I'll never forget the view of that deer as it went twirling past my window.      On my preceding post I did a review of Carnivores, Dinosaur Hunter. A nice lady from Tatem Games left a comment about the post, for which I am very grateful. If you have time, check out her comment. I was especially interested to know that they are coming out with a sequel called Carnivores, Ice Age. I'll be sure to buy that one. By the way, I killed a Velociraptor on the game last night. I did it like this. I hunted

    Hey, everyone. I promised I would update you about a game called Brothers In Arms 2, Global Front. I bought it Sunday for 99 cents. It took me a while to figure out how to play it. Sometimes I lack the patience to learn a game, which leads to a harsh review that is unwarranted. This game is awesome and I highly recommend it. The graphics are wonderful and the action is intense enough to make you lay down your I-Pad and say,  "Whew!" It's a World War 2 shooter game that takes you through battles all over the world as you follow Sgt. Neissman through thick and thin, mostly thin.      I thought I'd update you on my new favorite game, Carnivore, Dinosaur Hunter. As I have progressed in this game it just keeps getting better. New hunting areas and weapons are unlocked. The hunts are amazing in detail. If you wound an animal you can follow its blood trail. When you get enough points built up to start hunting dangerous animals like the velociraptor and allosaurus it get

    Hey, everyone. Yet another busy day here in the mountains. We had some heavy rain during the day with creeks overflowing their banks. Then there was a drastic temperature drop around midnight with snow and a low of 26 degrees.     For all the Angry Birds fans out there, I noticed an article that stated that a Christmas version of the game is coming out in early December. The people who bought the Halloween version will get the Christmas version free. Hard to believe that millions of people, who are not farmers, would get excited over pigs wearing Santa hats. But this is a strange land and we are dedicated to fun.     With the Super Bowl only a few months away, I thought I'd tell you about the Super Bowl I never saw. I don't mean that I've went to them all; I just watch them on TV. Back in the 80's my family and I were living in Kansas. It was January. I was on a temporary job and I was concerned that I'd have to return to the eastern U.S. before I saw the Gran

Hey, everyone. I've been busy with a new novelette. The title is The Amulet Covenant. It's my first excursion into the science fiction genre. I wrote the majority of it months ago but I just finished it in October. It's a light read, not intended for a Nobel Prize. It is entertaining and will give you a few hours of escape reading.     The hero, Ryan Latch is manipulated into going to an alien planet by an attractive woman. Once there, he discovers that he is needed to save a sterile and dying race. When he meets The Vampire Queen of the Vanis all other plans and interests vanish. It's fast-paced and funny. I hope you like it. Here's a link to the book page on Smashwords. It will be about two weeks before it appears on I-Books, Sony, Kobo, Barnes and Noble,etc. http://smashwords.com/b/31593 From the author's green retreat, I'm CE Wills PS. This book contains adult content.

    It was an odd evening here at the green retreat. Ever wonder what life might be like as you get old? Try this on for size. After working outside all day and doing the post about the wrens, we settled in for the evening. My wife cooked some home-made donuts. Then we ate the donuts with some Cheetos. We drank a bottle of champagne with them. Experimenting with different foods and how they taste with champagne is a late-night snack option that we enjoy.     While we snacked, we watched an Elvis documentary. I always enjoy Elvis shows and this was no exception. Do you remember what you were doing when you heard about his death? He died not many days before my Father. I was about to be discharged from the military. It really was a huge story. As great a generation as the World War Two generation was, I think that they had become a little too tightly wrapped. That's probably why my generation, the baby boomers, tended to resent authority and long for freedom. I think that people lik

    Hey, everyone. It's been a cool day in the mountains with a high of 42 degrees. I dumped a truckload of firewood in the front yard. It was in chunks and the plan was to use a wheel barrow to get it around back and stack it neatly at the edge of the woods. Well, I didn't get finished, which is fine. Shortly before dark I was walking by the window and saw two Carolina wrens jumping around on the pile of wood.     The wrens are awfully cute. They like to hop along the ground. They are small birds, brown and white, with a little bit of yellow color. They like to live under porches or decks, in an old tire sometimes. They are so chubby that they are almost perfectly round, like a ball with legs.     So these two wrens, a couple I suppose, were hopping in and out of the caverns created by the wood being piled up, one chunk tossed upon another. So I told my wife that they were searching for a condo. She began to watch them and quickly decided that they were hopping around on the

    Hey, everyone. In any generation, the number of truly outstanding entertainers can be counted on the fingers of one hand. For instance, how many people can boast of ten or twelve really great songs? You know, top forty or top ten songs. For this reason and more, I think Johnny Rivers has never gotten his due. If you don't know his music head over to I-Tunes and grab some. I believe the dude was from California but he sounded like he was from the deep south. (Sounds like Credence Clearwater Revival in that regard)      A few years ago, my wife and I drove to Cherokee, North Carolina and saw Johnny in concert. He was appearing at a Casino there, Harrah's, I believe. His warm-up band was an Elvis imitator who specialized in the young Elvis, pre-sequined suits. I don't remember the guy's name, which probably speaks well of his impersonation. At any rate, he was quite good. I think his name was Travis something.     When Johnny Rivers came on I was having a huge time.

    I took some time off from my labors today and watched some football. I thought I'd share a few thoughts. First of all, I hate to see Brett Farve's life going down the tubes like this. That's probably putting it strongly. His life, compared to most people's, is probably going pretty good. I wish he had retired before this year started. Even though I don't like the Packers, I've always liked Brett. The deal with the alleged texts to the lady reporter is distressing to him and his family, I'm sure. To get embarassed by Green Bay today had to be a bitter pill to swallow. I hope he goes ahead and retires tommorow. It looks as though he may be suspended anyway. In my opinion he is one of the top ten quarterbacks in NFL history.      Tough day for Vince Young. By all accounts a bad thumb injury on his throwing hand, a tiff with his coach, threw his shoulder pads into the stands etc. What most of us don't understand is that fame is like a magnifying glass.

    Hey everybody. The title sounds like an 80's rock band, right? I saw an odd sight last night. I had gotten a bit of cabin fever(for those overseas viewers, that means I'd been indoors too long). It was midnight and I walked outside to stroll around a bit. Then I saw something large running across the yard, which startled me. It was a coyote chasing birds around, hoping for a midnight snack, I suppose. Let me digress for just a moment to tell you about these birds. We have these funny birds that hang around in the south. They are called kiwis by the locals. They like to run along the ground in these bursts of speed. They are gray with white bars under their wings. When they have chicks they will try to lead you away from their nest by cheeping and running away from the nest, very cute. Sometimes when I'm mowing they just freak out and they're running all over.      One night, late, I was watching out the front door and I saw something really cool about these birds.

    Hey, everyone. Animals certainly do some interesting things. The other day I was at work. I looked outside to check the weather and saw something white weaving an erratic path across the parking lot. I blinked, trying to make out what it was. The object went over in the grass, next to the fence, and stopped.     I went over toward the white object and saw it was a tin can. When I got a little closer I heard the most pitiful whimpering coming from the can. Then I saw that a little puppy had gotten his head stuck in a dog food can. No telling how far the little guy had wandered in the darkness caused by the can. Now he had manifestly given up and was lying in the grass, a miserable little dude, without hope.     His body, other than his head, which I could not see at all, was so small I could have lain it in my hand and it would have reached from the tip of my fingers to my wrist. He was stocky and healthy-looking. He was a mottled, dark brown color.     In his haste to get the la

    Hey, everyone. It's a rainy day here in the southeast, thank goodness. We desperately need the water. I have a lot going on right now and I've had to concentrate on activities besides the old blog.     So, the Beatles are finally on I-Tunes. Excellent. I had a bunch of their songs that I had bought as CD'S and transferred over to my I-Pod. It would be a snap to pick out 50 good songs by these guys. The other night I watched a DVD of Help! It was a really bad movie but I loved seeing the Fab Four when they were young again. Very pleasant memories and yes, just a bit melancholy. It was great seeing John Lennon young and healthy, cutting up and having fun. Seeing a young George Harrison made me think of a story I heard. Paul took George into his home and nursed him during George's terminal illness. I think Paul is a good dude.     I noticed that Tom Clancy has a new book coming out shortly. Early in his career he was my favorite author. Then he started letting other

    Many years ago, I was in New Jersey. I was due to report for a contract engineering job the next morning and was spending the night at a cheap motel.     At two o'clock in the morning someone started pounding on my door, waking me from a sound sleep. A cautious man, I answered the door with my pistol against my right leg. There were two drunk ladies standing there.     They looked at me and noticed the gun, I'm sure.They both were smiling and in a good mood. One of them spoke up.     "Hi. Is John here?"     "No one here by that name."     She waved a hand toward a bar which lay just across the parking lot behind her.     "We met a guy at the bar who invited us to his room; Room 22." She pointed to the number on the door. "See, Room 22?"     Her logic was unassailable, I'm sure, to her. To me, it merely meant a delay in getting back to sleep.      Her friend said, "Hey, honey, maybe you want to party?"     "

    A few years ago I was in the Nashville area, traveling on Interstate 40. It was a trip that I didn't want to make, to get some training. I stopped at a rest area and I parked next to a new Mercedes and started toward the rest rooms. It's really a nice rest area, as much as a rest area can be nice. There's big shade trees, a nice lawn and all that.     Then I see this guy under a big tree. He's got a stick and he's reaching up with it, trying to bend a limb down to the point where he can reach it. Without thinking, I walk over, jump up and grab it for him. He grabs the limb and breaks off a twig with a couple of leaves on it. He says thanks and I say you're welcome.     I'm looking at the dude. He's in his fifties, superbly fit and a good-looking guy. His hair is longish and sandy blond/brown. He shows no expression when he talks. He's inscrutable, yet he seems like such a good guy, just reserved. Then I think, "Man, this is Bjorn Borg.&quo

    Hey. everyone. I was walking in the woods today and saw more signs that a bear is hanging about. I found another nice track at the base of a different sourwood tree and saw where the big guy was digging for grubs around a fallen tree. All this reminded me of a somewhat gross but interesting fact about bears.     Around this time of year when they feel the call of nature to hibernate, they seek out a lot of weird things to eat. I'm talking about leaves, pine needles, bark. Their goal is to plug up the digestive track with this stuff so they don't have any excrement during hibernation. I'm sure they don't sit around and think this up but rather it is an instinctive thing.    At any rate, in the spring, when they awaken, they discharge this plug. It is sometimes two foot long or more, quite massive and decidedly gross. Several times in the spring, here at the green retreat, I have come across these plugs. Trust me, it will freak you out. It's like, oh my gosh, wh

    We do things in this life that we don't anticipate doing. One summer night in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, I was at a concert. We had been to an outdoor concert at Dick Clark's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. We walked through the museum, which was cool. Then we sat in the amphitheater and watched the Beach Boys, which was good. I had seen them at the Kansas State Fair once before this. It was a great place to go, with families eating dinner on a quilt spread on the ground and all that. But I digress.     The night in Pigeon Forge, when we returned to our hotel there was an odd thing going on. This Elvis impersonator was in the parking lot at the side of the swimming pool. He had a sequined suit with high collar similar to the king's Hawaii concert. He had a tape machine for his music tracks and was singing all those great tunes. He interacted with the audience, flirted with the women and had a lot of fun. My wife and I were about 40 feet away at the door of our room so I popp

    Hey, everyone. I have to tell you about a really cool little game for I-Pad, I-Phone, I-Etc. The name is Doodle Hangman by Ensenasoft. Much like the traditional thing from your school days but you have this cute little animated guy who gets really stressed when you keep making mistakes. As his body parts appear he at first is nonchalant, like he has complete confidence in your ability. (foolish) Then he starts to sweat. Tears flow and eventually he calls you a loser before the trap door opens. There's a free version which is great. I just bought the paid version for 99 cents. I'd have felt bad if I hadn't. People who put out a cool product should be rewarded.     May I make a suggestion for those of you who are hoping for an I-Pad for Christmas? It's better to go ahead and spring for the 32 gig. The 16 gig is enough for a lot of people and that's what I have. Lately, though, I've been trying so many games that I'm nearing the limits for storage. I'

    Hey everyone. Today we went to see a movie entitled Due Date with Robert Downy Jr. I enjoyed it very much. The plot goes like this. Downy's character is on a business trip. He is eager to get home in time to see his first child be born. Because of a really strange guy, he gets booted off his flight and is left stranded in Atlanta. Then his only recourse is to accept a ride from the same weird guy, all the way to LA. The movie is hilarious. I can't recommend that you take kids to it because the movie is adults only for sure. I would rate this show as at least three stars out of four.     Several times last night I heard some noises outside. I was not too surprised to see tracks on my deck in the sleet and snow. (a very modest amount of sleet and snow) The tracks were round like a dog's but showed no claws, so it wasn't a dog, wolf or coyote. It was most likely a bobcat. The tracks were good-sized, about two inches in diameter. The previous day my wife had pointed ou