Coffee 1-21-12

Good morning. Step in out of the cold & have a good hot cup of coffee. Have a bagel & share a story.

It's one degree out & the AA is purring happily. It has choked back it's power all year waiting to be able to stretch it's legs. Finally it's got it's red dress on & the blue trim looks good during the dance. We had an outfire in the barn this week. I dunno... the stoker just quit pushing coal. At first I thought it had blown the motor, but, I tickled the rheostat & it's been fine ever since. Maybe we lost power for a moment & it stalled when starting on batteries?

My AHS buddy is adding a draft inducer to see if it will help with his puff back issue. He phoned me on Thursday. "I haven't had a single puff back since I installed the inducer!". Then he went on to say "I think I'll wire it up this afternoon in case I ever need to turn it on". Oh man! His luck lasted 24 hours. He did get it wired up yesterday. We'll know in a few days if it helped.

Hope you all stay warm & have a good weekend.

PS, Temporary Avatar change just to show the "new pup". This is Corky. Big dog, little brain. LOL Our other dog , Keeoh, is alive & well.

Coffee tastes great Freddy, but I'm not going to eat no lil rabbit chaser. Oh wait, you said bagel, I thought beagle for a moment there. It's ok, cataracts come off Feb 7 & Feb 28. Dog's got some Irish in it?? Yep, they're lovable, but kinda high strung. Gotta go get my other 2 new tires on the the fancy truck. We had fresh snow last night, I'll find out how much on the drive into Town. Gotta run. Have a good week end all.

Morning Freddy. Thanks for the coffee and bagel. Sorry to hear you had to break out a second match. Must have had a hiccup.

An inch or so of snow overnight. They tell us next is freezing rain. I love the snow but hate the ice. I've got to drive about an hour south this morning so I'm hoping to drive out of it. Oh, and the rest of the storm is heading your way. sorry.

Big football games this weekend. Of course I'll be cheering for the Ravens over the Brady bunch. I hear we are 7 pt. underdogs. I think it's going to be a helluva game. So will the Giants/49's.

Boiler is chugging along. I love having the remote temp monitor. My circulator fan jusy cycled so the boiler is in recovery.

Corky looks comfy. Looks like an Irish setter except for the white feet. Hope eveyone has a nice weekend.

Morning Freddy,

That new lap dog looks perfect! Reminds me of the the last "small" puppy we got from the shelter for the express purpose of being a lap dog - 25lbs at the time. Once we got the parasites and other health issues cleared up he grew a couple of inches and is up to 60lbs but still the lap dog my son wanted.

I've been running all week doing this and that for the upcoming wedding - 1 week to go. Time will really fly this next week.
We got about 1/2 inch of snow last night but it's only 29*. The roads have been treated so for those of us who need to go out life will go but hopefully everyone else will stay home.

My search for a small parlor stove goes on. I saw one that had promise in Roanoke but the elderly owner was asking too much for the condition it was in. It is a sad situation due to her health but sometimes no matter how much you want to help you just can't afford to. I'll keep looking, it won't get installed until fall anyway.

I hope everyone has coal either in the house or at the door, I hear from Philly north is going to get walloped throughout the weekend. Take care everyone and be safe, Lisa

Morning all. Coffee is hot, temps in the mid Teens outside, we got about 2-3"+ or so. I guess i need to make the rounds around the neighborhood and shovel/snowblow all my neighbors. They are retired and don't like to go out unless they have too. Plus we are young ones (45) in the neighborhood. It's great!

Plows just went thru, so I can clean the ends of the driveway now.....

Probalby work out in the garage for a while, need to build a chip separator for my dust collector for my woodworking....should be a fun project......the wife is going Antique shopping with her brothers...probably be gone all day!

Stay Warm.

Freddy:

This morning I will take a couple cups of the java. I'm trying to cut down on the pop for awhile. Forget the blanket to keep warm, you have a small furnace on your lap. In my younger days I had a chow/lab who weighed 200lbs, not fat pure muscle. He was heavy on weight and average on brain with a very mild temper. He would go running with me no matter how many miles I was doing for the day. On long runs of more then ten miles I always thought he was a pain since I had to share my water with him. We were usually not near a water source for him to get his own drink. He earned his keep and his own water bottle the day we were twelve miles into our run and he saved my life from an attacking wild dog. My dog (buddy) took only about thirty seconds to kill the large wild dog. Tired and scraped he and I sat under a nearby tree for him to rest and I gave him all of my water to drink. Not bad for a dog who was already sixteen years old.

We have a balmy 3.5F this a.m. Funny it was suppose to be down near -8F according to the liars on t.v. Today is another busy day in the shop. I am hoping to get the work I need done by early this afternoon so my wife and I can get in our long run and I can get the snowmobile out for a nice long ride. I'm optimistic! Lost power this week for almost five hours. I wasn't going to turn on the generator, however, I noticed the temp on the stove was climbing a little too high for my liking without the distribution fan running.

I received a call from my father yesterday who is burning a stoker I installed this summer to tell me he lost fire. I was immediately thinking burned out motor, however, he told me he mistakenly turned off the stoker in the breaker panel. He had to learn how to restart his stoker with me on the phone giving directions. He will not make that mistake twice. I would stay longer, however, I really need to get in the shop, I hear the snowmobile and my sneakers calling me. Ihope everyone has a safe and warm weekend.

The snowman

Good morning everyone,thanks for the coffee and can you please pass the cream cheese .temps in the low 20's ,3"snow and 45* on Sunday (sorry I"m a winter person)ran out of UAE on Thursday and I"m now burning Mammoth what the hell was I thinking when I bought that s--- so now I"m mixing it with Blaschak to help me get a better burn so at least the trying new coal game is over it's UAE from now on.Everyone take care, be safe, and .Keepaeyeonit

P.S Greg,thanks for the info I"ll keep you posted on what I"m going to do.

Good mornin' Freddy and to everyone else having breakfast. Love the bagels, hope you don't mind if I smother mine with ceamed cheese and blackberry preserves, ( home made ). Looks like you're in Corky's chair. Beautiful animals just want to be loved, and fed ,and walked, and the center of attention, and played with, and taken out, and, and, alright their just like kids. Included a photo of my 2 boys. Just one note, my neighbor had oil delivered 3 times and the last time was the day I used the last bag of coal from my first 1.2 ton.

Morning Coal burners. It's 3 degrees here on the coast of Maine. We had a dusting (2-3") of snow yesterday but it's on top of a sheet of ice. Putting my trash out was a trip. Should have laced up my old hockey skates.
Well, I nice cup of Bokar and an onion bagel later, the Herald is ripping at 600 and the cookstove about 350 and climbing on the oven door. House was 68 this morning which is fine with me in these temps. I might pop the Jotul Alagash on to help out for a couple hours and use some of that same 50 gal of propane I put in October. Can't tell you how much I love coming down in the morning to warm kitchen! Used to be, "suit up" run down and grab kindling and paper and get that cookstove going. Make the coffee and bagel and get back up into bed till that cooker heats up some. Now, its T-shirt weather year round. Ease into slippers, and mosey on down, open the dampers and trow in a few scoops, go about my bizz, and by the time I got coffee and fed the yappin cat, everythings back to cruise and so am I! Life's good!

PS: Nice Pup Freddie! Mich/Ant, your dog looks like the Travelor's Insurence dog! Very cool. Here's a pix of Boomer, rest his soul.
He loved those "frizbee's".

Back from the tire shop--damn these new ones handle nice. Yep, I'm up for some more coffee. Horses are fed, dogs are still crazy in the snow. Life is good on the hill. m.a.-which is your biological & KAEOI --soooo, you like winter do ya?? me too. snowman, lucky on that one my friend, & I bet it won't happen again. Us older guys tend not to make the same mistake twice, but God knows there are more down the road.

Morning all.... its 78f inside, and 60f outside. The DVC500 is turned back to idle. Raining cats & dogs all night.

Speakin of dogs, hey Freddy, you'll never experience a cold, 3-Dog-Night, anymore. With the size of that dog, just one will keep ya warm!
Our dog started having bad hip/joint problems over the past year. The vet said he tested negative for Lyme. He does have a little German Shepard in him, so he must've inherited their bad hips. We have been giving him Glucosimene for about 8 months now. There was no inprovement after the first 6 months, so we switched dosage. Over the last 2 months, he began RUNNING up and down the stairs, instead of tripping and falling! He is playing Tug-O-War again. he can sit for a treat, and jump up on his rear legs to get it! He is even playing "Catch-That-Cat" with our cat.
That glucosimene made him 5 years younger!

Our kids have had a stomach virus all week, something they brought home from school. My son puked all over his classroom.
Even our dog caught it a day ago! He needs to get outside, about every 2 hours. No accidents yet.

For the record, there is a company called "Springtime" and the specific product is "Joint Health" it has done wonders on all my dogs over the years for existing & preventive hip problems--they have all lived to be 12--15 yrs old & most have continued to act/run around like puppy's thier whole lives. GOOGLE it. I know for a fact it works & is a lot cheaper then what the Vet used to rip me off for.

Thanks for the tips on joint health. I'm sure as Corky ages he will have hip issues. We bought him as a pure bred Australian shepherd, but, well.... I don't think so! Aussie's top out around 85 pounds & Corky passed 106 some time back. I can no longer hold him to get on the scales. We're guessing there was some hanky panky in the barn yard the day he was conceived. Lot's of guesses, but we'll never know what he really is, other than good natured and follows the one rule: Stay in your boundary. He chases cycles & joggers up and down the road, but always stays 20 feet from the pavement. That's about all I ask of a dog...well...and no biting humans.

Snowman...glad you had your buddy with you when that wild dog attacked, Geepers, hate to think what would have happened without him. Not every dog is helpful in that way. I'm sure if Corky were in the same circumstance all I would see would be his big butt getting smaller & smaller. He's such a chicken!

Tis a good crowd around the coffee pot. Glad you call could make it!

Good coffee Fred, we had about 5" here. Watched my wife slide down the hill on a sleigh this am, a first for her as we never got enough snow in GA, or had a good enough hill like we do here. I ran a snowblower for the first time this am on the driveway. Cute little toy. We also adopted a Rott-Sheaperd mix early last week. About one year old and 80 lbs. Life is good.
Cracker