Grinders Island

What? Winter?? Cold?? Quoting Batman

2012-02-10T08:08:00.000-06:00

Has anybody seen my winter gloves? It's been so long since I wore my WARM gloves that I can't find them. HMMMMMMMM And for anybody that cares southern Wisconsin is actually ABOVE average in precipitation this winter . . . AS PREDICTED!!! We will just forget about the prediction of slightly colder then average.
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The Republicans are trying to pass a bill that would make it legal to take home brew off your property to share. Currently the DOR has deemed it illegal to share home brew with your neighbor. Many homebrew competitions have been canceled in Wisconsin because it's a $10,000 fine to carry a bottle of home brew off your yard. This is a problem for many home brew clubs as it is illegal to share.

On a Federal level we're all good but in Wisconsin the Department of Revenue says no no - "after the event in India where like 15 people died from illegal moonshine it's way to dangerous to make home brew". I don't think they understand that beer was originally made thousands of years ago because it was the one that thing humans could drink that WOULD NOT KILL YOU!

There is absolutist nothing that can survive in home brew that can kill you. Nothing can survive in the combination of alcohol and low PH. It's why beer was invented in the first place.

But remember, the DOR also felt making movies in Wisconsin was a bad thing.

SO - now Republicans are trying to pass Bill 395 that would make it OK to do what we have been doing for decades. The Tavern League is dead set against Bill 395.

I was reading in Beer Advocate about more more and more communities are having small brewery's open, not unlike Hydro Street Brewing in Columbus. America is starting to be like France with wine. Local, small breweries making enough for the community. Slowly chipping away at the mega brewery's that are now owned by non-americans (Bud).
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You know - seriously - if I had understood the Columbus water before I moved here I seriously doubt I would have moved here. The water is so terrible. Who in the past decided to dump Baking Soda into our water and call it good??? Can our water dudes fix this???

I have a copy of the Sun Prairie (SP) water. WOW - that is nice water.

Sodium - Cbus 106ppm SP - 4ppm
Calcium - Cbus 19ppm SP 66ppm

I've been asking others around the U.S. what there water is and there are a number of communities that also soften there water but our? It's the worst in America . . so far. No one, that I have seen so far, has more sodium in their drinking water.

NOTE - since I put the question out we are not the WORST!! Actually Carmen Indiana is the worst so far with 250 ppm sodium. The installed RO water systems. So while I do not have to have water softeners I might get a RO water system (about $200).
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Working on shots of the Auditorium and it seems there is Audi burn out. HOWEVER - I still think there is hope. I have said all along that there is a majority of people that live in Columbus (normally not people that grew up in Columbus) that are excited about what Columbus can be!

These people see a future. To quote Batman (don't ask) "Tomorrow is one dream away. Don't look at the past and stop looking at the present, instead look at the future . .. if we ask ourselves . . .what can be . . .what will be . . tomorrow, then we are asking the right question. Because to hope, to dream, to predict is to shape the city yourself."

So lets not let renovating the Auditorium fall by the wayside.


Columbus Auditorium

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Cold - no worries - this is just a dash of winter - the next 7 days will STILL be above average . . on average. Once this cold flows south we will have warmer weather flow back over us and Canada and Alaska is still way above average - there is no REAL cold weather north of us. Europe is where all the cold is . . . VERY cold.

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Now I must prepare to brew - as Oaked, Dead and Arrogant will be brewed today.

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Cute photo of the day

Caydance and Josh

Caydance and Josh at a Down Syndrome walk.

The Auditorium

2012-02-09T08:10:00.000-06:00

Locked up and closed to the world for 60 years, no heat, no electricity. The last performance on stage was 1934 before the city government, who wanted a new high school, condemned the building before it's time. Now to expensive to renovate for today's standards and to beautiful to demolish it sits empty and quiet in Columbus Wisconsin.

I've started working on a new set of images for Hydro Street Brewing (HSB) and this set will be of the inside of the Auditorium. This is the very first image I've worked on, I have not even looked at the "good" ones yet that I took, or at least the ones I was excited over when I visualized it through the view finder.

Sandye (who's birthday is today) and Aaron of HSB want to get people interested in The Audi again so I thought I would help. Only 30 more shots to go!

BTW - Aaron's new Scottish Ale at HSB is very very good. He changed the yeast from the last Scotch and WOW - it's a big tasty beer at 7.9% but you don't taste the alcohol (but you do feel it).

I was going to brew up my Creamy Dreamy for HSB but every time I mentioned it Aaron would turn this greenish color. It's really a very good beer but resembles Miller and Bud . . .more like Spotted Cow. Aaron said if people liked it he might be forced to brew it. hmmmmmm . . . you certainly would not want to brew something people love LOL The thing is that the beer has rice and corn in it as adjuncts (not unlike Bud).

SPEAKING OF BUD - I'm STILL laughing at spelling Dunkleweise and blogger saying "DO YOU MEAN BUDWEISER"? Did Bud pay off Blogger?

My next beer is called Oaked Arrogant Deadman-ageddon. A big bad American Strong Ale weighing in at 7.2% ABV (with new water).
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At this moment we are experiencing the 5th warmest winter in Wisconsin history. I think they should measure how warm winters are by how many people fall through the ice. Maybe keep track on when the first and last ice fishermen falls through??

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If you watch American Idol and DVR'd last night episode you missed "The Accident".

Fast forward to about the 1 minute mark, you can tell she is getting dizzy or faint. Once off the stage she is down for the count. No word on what happened yet.

http://youtu.be/nGe41IS3njs

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DIRECT TV owners - now you can get Pandora radio for free. If you do not know what Pandora is (it's awesome) it's a radio station that YOU develop. For instance, you make a station called . . Led Zepplin and the station starts to develop a playlist just for you. You can thumbs up and thumbs down songs and every time you do that it learns more about your tastes and tweaks it's play list.

At the moment I seven stations, The Blues (it's very good with blues) Jethro Tull, Sirenia (orchestral gothic death rock from the Netherlands), Blackmores Night (you really have to hear these guys to understand how unique that are . . . .in fact . .

http://youtu.be/B9cw2nFjmzY

and Lacuna Coil, Pink Floyd.
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Nuff said - I have to call Charter now and ream them a new one for doubling our Internet fee a month after I negotiated a lower price. Perhaps they thought I was only talking about a one month deal.

have a day.

Rod

Finition de l'eau

2012-02-08T09:23:00.000-06:00

What if Santorum won three States and nobody really cared!

What of M.I.A gave the finger to 100 million people and . . . everybody yawned!

What if the government bailed out the auto industry and then Republicans blamed the Democrats when ACTUALLY - the Republicans were the ones that started the auto bail out. So now we have Obama taking credit AND the blame for the bail out.

I was called a liberal on Facebook by a friend - I suppose I could be that but seriously, if Republicans actually had their act together I might lean more there way but WOW - bumbling buffoons.

Look at Norway! They LOVE their government, a government that actually works together for a common good. Not this constant tug-o-war. Norway has high taxes but those taxes go towards good. Like mass transit where many cities no longer have cars above ground.

Then I'm concerned about this whole electromagnetic pulse thing. If some third world country wanted to really crush the world they would take out satellites and kill the internet. No internet America comes to a scream halt as all banks would fail.

If I was President I would make AMERICA in to a 3rd world country to save us! If 3rd world countries were elevated into 1st world countries . . THEN . . they would not be against us! WE would be in control.

Simple!! Yes - you may say it - I am brilliant!

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My final findings on the Columbus water when it comes to brewing is boring unless you are a brewer.

Bottom line - if you brew in Columbus you are totally screwed. I've showed the brewing salts report to many well known brewers across America and to a man they pretty much say -"WOW - that totally sucks to be a brewer in Columbus Wisconsin", followed with "is there ANY WAY you can get a different water source? "

Sadly . . no.

They took out calcium and replaced it with sodium. The exact opposite of what is needed for brewing and there is basically no way to fix it unless you have different water.

You can add minerals but with every one you add you also increase sodium, that horrible taste in the water. (BTW - I'm not anti Columbus Water and Light, it was not their idea . . .but who's bright idea was it anyway).

So - what can a brewer do?

First of all stop trying to create the perfect water. The goal is to get a PH of 5.2ish but that number is like using one number for your cholesterol. We know there is much more to cholesterol then just one number and mash PH is the same.

Adding minerals to lower your PH will effect other minerals. So if you are a brewer in Columbus you now know our water has almost zero good minerals and a lot of bad minerals. What we have to do is dilute and after that . . .it's simple.

Remember, we don't want to recreate someone else's water, we want to make good beer with OUR water.

We have

Total Alkalinity 248

Sodium 106ppm (above 70 makes beer sweeter)

sulfate 4ppm (50 is the minimum for any beer, sulfate accentuates hop bitterness)

chloride 4ppm (accentuates flavor and fullness 0-250 is needed)

calcium 19ppm (50 is the minimum and it is needed in EVERY aspect of brewing)

magnesium11 ppm (a yeast nutrient, we're ok on this one)

So for an All Grain Brewer (I'll get to Mini Mashers in a bit) what has to be done is to dilute with RO Water of Distilled Water to get rid of the sodium and then add back the good stuff. Oh I forgot - let your brew water sit overnight to get rid of the chlorine, Columbus has 0.29ppm chlorine, Sun Prairie has 0.22ppm which is not a lot different then Columbus but still get rid of it. It's corrosive to stainless steel.

If you dilute 1:1 with RO or DI the sodium goes to 53 and is more in range, you REALLY want to have the least amount of sodium as you can get so the more you dilute the better. Once you dilute then you can easely add back what you need in two easy steps.

Base Line average after dilution.

Add 1 tsp of calcium chloride to each 5 gallons of water treated. Add 2% sauermalz malt. OK - I had to look up sauermalz. Sauermalz is an acid malt and used in small quantities gives very very little taste but will lower the mash pH which leads to a better working mash, intensified fermentation, lighter color, improved flavor stability, and a "well-rounded" beer flavor.

Deviate from the baseline as follows:

For beers that use roasted malt (Stout, porter): Skip the sauermalz.

For Light Ale add 1 tsp gypsum as well as 1 tsp calcium chloride and sauermalz (will NOT add sour taste at low levels).

For very minerally beers (IPAs) Double the calcium chloride and the gypsum.

Follow the above and you will not brew a dumper - HOWEVER - brewing is an art and once you see the difference then you can start to tweak the formula. It's easy

For mini mashers that use extract it's different. Extract has it's own minerals from wherever the extract was created. However I feel you can still tweak for a better beer. Sun Prairie I would not worry that much.

What I will be doing is this.

When I want to brew a Pale Ale, IPA or any lighter brew I will use 100% Distilled water or RO water. No Columbus water will touch this beer. RO might be better as it does have some minerals in it. I'll have to add some Calcium Chloride to increase the Calcium though and I might experiment on a tiny amount of sauermalz. I don't think Cannery carry's that!

Otherwise I'll experiment with amounts of water. I don't want all of that sodium in my brew. The extract will have all the good minerals in it already in the boil but not the mash - thus Calcium Chloride.
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OK - on to chores - headlight, the search for Calcium Chloride and photos of the inside of the Auditorium this afternoon.

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HEY - notice DIRECT TV now has Pandora!! Awesome!!!

Columbus Water for brewers.

2012-02-07T09:28:00.003-06:00

For brewers.

The water in Columbus has never gotten very high ratings from the water drinkers in Columbus and since I've been obsessing on the water of late I've found some interesting things!

For one thing the concerns about the high amount of chlorine in our water are unfounded! Yes there is chlorine but not that much, only 0.29ppm. When compared to Tucson AZ which has between 1.00 and 1.25ppm. You know like the BAD Chlorine where you can smell the water in the next room? (Sun Prairie is 0.22ish).

I believe the reason Cbus has bad tasting water is the high amount of Sodium which is at 106ppm. Our water is high in both bicarbonates and sodium. In other words it's as if we added baking soda to all of our water. This is why it tastes so . . . flat and not that clean refreshing tastes.

In beer the sodium accentuates sweetness. This is why all my brews always seem to be a little sweeter then I expected. The Dunkleweise (spelling checker said "do you mean Budweiser" - seriously? sigh) at Hydro Street, while good does seem a tiny bit sweet (although this is the lowest amount of IBUs I've ever had in a beer . . which is a measure of hops)! We shall see what the judges say as I'm entering it in a contest.

The sodium is there because it replaced the calcium at some point which is very low. Calcium is needed for clarity, flavor and stability in beer and yeast really need calcium.

SO - at this point.

Not a lot of Chlorine in our water - however a LOT of sodium that has replaced calcium which is needed it beer.

Many brewers are overly concerned with PH when they really should be looking deeper. PH is like a one number Cholesterol reading. In order to FIX it you need to dive deeper into the problem. In our case it's lack of calcium and too much sodium.

Letting water sit overnight will get out any chlorine.

So you would THINK that adding calcium would be easy - gypsum is the normal way t go but to get THAT much calcium into the water would make it horrible tasting. So we are now looking into adding lactic acid instead.

If interested - this is a map of water hardness (CaCO3). We are at 248ppm

The investigation continues! Sorry sorry - I can't stop thinking about water . . . I gotta pee.
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Anybody watch DownTON Abby (not DonTOWN Abby which I though it was).

SNL had a faux advertisement about it and now I feel I need to watch it . . . not gonna do it. My plate is full. Hell on Wheels keeps getting better and better, Person of Interest also keeps getting better.

Did I mention how much sodium is on our water? The Bicarbonates are REALLY high! Not even good for dark beer - have to figure that one out! SHUT UP STEP AWAY FROM THE REPORT!!!

OK - I have to get real work done today!

OUT

Chlorine is evil and creates Chlorophenols

2012-02-06T08:21:00.000-06:00

I just gotta post this.

Friday night as I was swilling down campfire Porter like there was no tomorrow at Hydro Street Brewery a "shall remain nameless" individual whispered into my ear that I should drive north of town and check out a pro-Walker sign.

I don't want to get all like political or anything but I find it interesting that Walker is lawyering up with big name lawyers and "voluntarily" meeting with the Milwaukee County DA in charge with the John Dow investigation.
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This last week I have been obsessing over the water in Columbus. Not the bad things but I was interested in the flavor minerals in the water and how they help/hinder brewing. What I found is that Columbus water is very very close to Dublin Ireland. A little more sodium is the only real difference. This also means that it's REALLY hard to make a wonderful IPA because the minerals reject hops in lighter color beer, HOWEVER this also means our water is WONDERFUL for Stouts and Porters.

It's so freaking hard is crazy 7.7PH out of the tap but we don't care about that. It's the PH in the mash that we need to bring down which is crazy hard to do (Ale Asylum let's there water sit overnight before brewing.

I'll give this report to Cbus Water and Light for their records, it's something they do not test. Here are the results of the main things brewers look for. While you can make beer with normal water, award winning brews need help.

Sodium 106ppm - this much sodium will accentuate the sweetness in the malt. It's not a bad number.

Calcium(Ca) 19ppm - horribly low for brewing, Calcium promotes clarity and flavor in beer and yeast need calcium. 50ppm is the bottom end for brewing.

Magnesium(Mg) 11ppm - like calcium 11ppm is fine.

Ca and Mg will give you the Effective Hardness of your water.

Using the above numbers you can find the Alkalinity and yada yada - I used the below chart for finding what has top be done and frankly - it's a lost cause for making incredible lighter color brews.

HOWEVER - there is all of that Chlorine. We all know that chlorine can be boiled off. However in brewing, unless you boil the water BEFORE you mash the wort (soak the malt in 150 degree water) the Chlorine will produce Chlorophenols which is a serious defect in the beer giving beer a band-aid like flavor or that "home brew" taste.

Another problem with Chlorine is that it attacks Stainless Steel and will corrode it like saltwater on iron. VERY VERY bad for Stainless Steel.

Bottom line - if you are a brewer stay away from all chlorine and use a water filter that get's it out of your water.
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Super Bowl half time. I thought Madonna was great. Well done and who cares that M.I.A gave the finger (did anyone actually see it??). But think about the future - in 20 years who will be the half time show. Steven Tyler is like 83 right but who knows.

What 30 year old rock band will be on stage for Super Bowl LXVI . . .Nickleback? I can't stand seeing acts like the The Who and Roger Daltry with reading glasses and a cane "rocking out".

The best advertisement it seems was the Clint Eastwood ad. There were funnier ones but the one where everyone just sort of stops and listens was Clint. This was a +7 million dollar ad.

http://youtu.be/hRZ6rKlw65A

But there are a group of ad's that I have not seen. They are by Subaru and I love every one.

http://youtu.be/UwnCujrTCRA

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JIMMY THE STICK - YEAR 17

2012-02-02T09:47:00.000-06:00

No earth Quacks recently.

Jimmy the Stick - Year 17

Seventeen Years ago my buddy Steve McDowell and I were talking about groundhog day and how we felt that PROPERLY the groundhog did not have a clue about the sun. Why not save money and have an inanimate object observe the sun instead. Less upkeep.

So I went out looking for an appropriate inanimate object and found. JIMMY THE STICK.

Unlike Jimmy the Ground hog which is actually Jimmy the 7th I believe. JIMMY THE STICK is the original. That's right my friends, I have been with Jimmy the Stick LONGER then I've been married to DJ (I did not tell her about Jimmy way back then).

Jimmy has had adventures. He went to Las Vegas in the trunk (I forgot about him on that one). He was almost held by servicemen for a photo (they backed down at the final moment . . . .national security I believe). Last year I put him out and we had the Ground Hog day Blizzard and we did not find him for 7 days! Over the years he has become slightly brittle and yea - he lost a stem a few years ago but he's a trooper.

This year he wanted to have some friends so who would be better friends then our little feathered Brown Chipping Sparrows! They know all about twigs.

Jimmy did NOT see his shadow. This means an early spring. There is actually some science behind Jimmy. You see if Jimmy DOES see his shadow that would mean that we are probably cold and dry which would indicate that the jet stream is below us and winter is still in control.

Clouds mean wetter air which indicates that we are in a more Westerly flow of air and the jet stream is north.

The good news is that there is NO extra cold weather north west of us. Even Alaska is predicted warmer then normal weather for the next 10 days. Europe is FRIGID, that is where all the cold weather is. Everywhere you look over there it's cold. Warsaw, high of 5, Oslo, high of 4, Moscow, high if 4, Berlin high of 18. Fairbanks is suppose to be up to like 12 today which is above average. Their RECORD highs are in the middle 30s.

We should be about 4 or 5 degrees above average for the next 10 days.
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DJ blurted out last weekend saying "I think that flu shot is really working, I'm the only one in our family to not to catch a cold recently".

SPOILER!!!!

Remember the scene in Bridesmaid? One of the funniest most disgusting scenes that almost made me pee my pants!

http://youtu.be/Jrb7_XIIbhI

Yea - I guess the flu shot didn't work as advertised for DJ.

I hope my shot does better!
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Speaking of movies - I can not WAIT for this one to come out on HBO. Produced by Tom Hanks.

http://youtu.be/IPhh7mch5zo

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Grand Opening at Hydro Street Brewing. If you go I have an untasted Dunkleweizen on tap that day (DunkleGrinder). I brewed it for a quick turnaround. I'm entering it into a Dunkle contest. I'm not expecting ANY ribbons as I had never brewed a dunkle before (Dark Wheat beer) and since it's under forced carbonation I have not had a chance to taste the final product.

We have only had one blue ribbon winner in the Sun Prairie Wort Hogs (SPWH) so a goal this year is to get more ribbons. Can't win if we don't enter. Since the Madison Home Brew Club no longer actually talks about brewing (more Great Taste of the Midwest organization) SPWH is the only club around where we actually talk about brewing.

I'm still waiting for the water report from Nebraska which will tell us how much of the flavor minerals we have in the water and how to adjust the chemistry.

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OH - no jury duty - DANG IT - They settled the case. I was going to get papers for my OWN law suit. Now I have to do a little extra work.

Have a great foggy Thursday.

Rod

Spam-a-lot

2012-01-31T11:25:00.002-06:00

If I combined all of my spam I get in one night this is what I could do.

I could be a flat bellied X-Ray Technician using my new discounted per eye lasik vision and be dating married big beautiful Asian singles while taking my free viagra and buying as much TRON (it's about to break out) with my winnings from an investment of only $1 which was made into thousands and I will need to get more bank accounts now.

SWEET!!!!!
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I saw a thing on the tube about these people that voted for Obama but now don't like him because he has done nothing to the economy.

sigh.

I seem to remember EVERYONE saying "This is not going to be a quick fix". But then like 4 months later those same people (well, some of the same) were complaining that the economy was stagnant and Obama was not doing enough!

I'm not 100% pro Obama, there are somethings I disapprove of. His canceling of space exploration is totally bogus. Russia and China are the only space explorers now. The thing that he misses is that it's not WHAT we find in space, it's the kids that want to be scientists BECAUSE we go into space.

Not just space scientists but all of the science's. There is no excitement in "learning" anymore. His canceling the space program was very republican of him.
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OH - I keep forgetting - Columbus is getting a ShopKo Home Town Store. It will carry 70% of what "normal" ShopKo's have. Columbus will be the 6th Home Town store. It will be erected across from the Travel Center. Watch for the erection soon! The more erections Columbus has the happier we will all be!

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Feel the earth quack (earth quack?? LOL) last night?? I could hardly stand up! That 2.4 was ROCKING THE HOUSE!! Actually I did not feel it and as far as I know Blake did not warn me of the coming near disaster.

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WOW - I just saw that our building will become a lock down fortress. The cafeteria will be closed to anyone NOT having a special access card. It's part of the "Safety Modernization Project". I wonder if I try to get in with no card the guys in the floor length black leather coats will stand on my neck asking me who won the World Series!

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Jury Duty Thursday!!

END!

Good Bye Carmen Gonzalez!

2012-01-30T09:17:00.000-06:00

WOW - who watched the Pro Bowl - how exciting was THAT. I just wish there was less tackling. They should make it Flag Pro Bowl.
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I was pigging some beer and got a phone call from some South African, or at least it sounded like a South African and he was asking for Rod Mel ote. I said he was working but could take a message. HE said I needed to email Carmen Gonzelaz so they could make arrangements for pickign up the art work.

Yea - right, of course you are. After I hung up I went and emailed "Carmen" and told them that I knew they were scamming me since email #3 and that they were pretty famous on the internet. I also ask if that was Carmen I talked to and her voice was much lower then I had been imagining.

Congratulations!!

Odd. I have not heard from them since.
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Hydro Street Brewery had their Mug Club event and the place was packed and happy. DJ and I went there yesterday and had their BBQ Chicken Pizza on bruschetta bread and it really really good.

While there I took a photo of a girl that was enjoying some rootbeer.

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I was looking through some older files and found a shot of the Train Station. This is the first iteration and I think I'm going to go a different direction on the next iteration. So remember this one so you can compare with #2.

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Check this out. Stair at the red dot on the models nose for 30 seconds. Then look at a blank wall and blink a few times! What do you see.

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I'm laughing at Newt! Lots of people are trying to figure out why Newt is free falling in the polls and there are all sorts of theories. But the main one is . . .HE IS NEWT!!! All of a sudden people see that he is what they thought he is. He won the last election because he yelled at the media but now when he is yelling at EVERYBODY he's just a loose cannon. Between creating a moon base to invading Iran, YIKES!!!!

BUT WAIT! ORDER NOW AND YOU CAN GET.

In 2009 Newt wanted to shoot lasers at the North Koreans.

In 2002 he wanted to launch "orbital death rays".

In 1996 he sponsored a bill called "The Drug Importer Death Penalty Act of 1996" which would have given life sentences to anyone convicted of bringing more than two ounces or so of pot into the U.S.

In 1984 he wanted to reduce crime with "space mirrors".

IN 2008 he wanted to let terrorists attack us. The more successful the Bush administration has been at foiling bad guys, said Gingrich in 2008, "the less proof there is that we're in danger" and the less vigilant Americans are. Newt's fix? Allow an attack to get through "every once in a while... just to remind us."

Newt worries a lot about "a nuclear blast high above the United States that would instantly throw the nation into a dark age. Actually I worry about that myself!

Make the moon America's 51st state - Back when he was in the House, Newt "authored a bill that would allow a lunar colony to apply for statehood once it reached 13,000 residents,".

Newt would make a most interesting President.

Carmen Makes Her Move

2012-01-26T07:25:00.000-06:00

Game on. The Police are now involved.

From Bill Carter - ZF Movers and Logistics INC

Hi Rod Melotte ,

Thanks for your email . I will like to inform you that we will be taking care of the insurance , tax , packaging and shipping of the artworks ( two 20x30 inch canvas prints ). My agent will take care of every other details.

I will also like you to confirm your phone number and the pick up address so we can make all necessary arrangement for the pick up between 3 and 4 pm Friday, January 27. Pls Confirm if the time is OK.

From my best friend Carmen

Hi ,
I got the attached email from the movers today. Try and make shipping
arrangement with them and keep me posted with updates. I will also
like you to acknowledge this email as soon as possible. Thanks.

Carmen.

Printed out all the emails with the check and FedEx package. Delivered to my buddy the chief of police.

He handed it off to the dude that SHOULD be the chief (at least he lives in Columbus) and the investigation moves north to Minneapolis. Seems the check came from a real bank - HOWEVER - the bank never issued the check and this was the first they had heard of it. Now they have their team looking into the scam. I was told the people this REALLY hurts are the banks (can this be confirmed?) . So we have a real check from a real bank that did NOT issue the check.

What typically happens is that for some unexplained reason the movers will not get to my house to take the prints. They are waiting for my check to them and will stall until they get it.

In the mean time I'm all happy and am telling them the check is in the mail.
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For anyone who did not see TV last night DJ and I were on the news last night in a piece about Hydro Street Brewery.

http://video.channel3000.com/watch.php?id=39803

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Obama explained.

A couple of my tea partyish friends were all upset about Obama cancelling the Keystone Pipeline that was suppose to go from Canada to Houston. Seems all of the talking right heads on FOX were calling him names and a job killer and so forth. Here is the real story that they seem to leave out. I got some of this from a guy that worked on a pipeline.

First of all the pipeline would create at MOST 1500 temporary jobs. Pipelines are very low maintenance. The "oil" if you can call it that would go to Houston where the refinery's are up and running and after being process it would be shipped to China.

None of that oil was going to Americans and you will notice that after the pipeline was cancelled - OUR oil prices actually went DOWN.

BUT WAIT!! THERE IS MORE.

It was not even oil, more like low grade sludge. Very bad stuff and if there was a leak, an environmental nightmare. It's the filthiest petroleum there is. If there was any sort of leak as the sludge moved through Nebraska it would poison the only aquifer Nebraska has. They get ALL of their water from one aquifer.

So why is their such a stink? Because Obama wanted to find an alternate route after the election. The Republicans thought that by forcing Obama to make a decision he would look bad. They were hoping that WHEN he canceled it gas would zoom and they could point fingers.

Once again - the Republicans show they are clueless on how to win elections. Not only do they run a bad county but when they play dirty, THEY ARE BAD AT IT.

This is why Walker will lose. The Republicans are not in touch with the rest of the human race.

Six years ago I was making $10 grand a year playing low stakes online poker and another $2 grand playing online blackjack as a bonus whore. Had been doing it for a number of years.

Then the conservative right decided that this was evil so 10 Republicans banded together and in a 2000 page anti-terrorist bill, at the LAST MINUTE put in 1 one page addendum making it illegal for banks to handle gambling money.

Long story shorter. This killed a LOT of online gambling ( for a few months), hurt the economy with all of the spin off businesses, and about 10 million poker players stopped playing poker. (Walker stuff is coming, wait for it).

WELL - I believe about 5 million of those guys NEVER voted, yet NOW they are REALLY pissed off. Now they had a reason to vote. Who do you think that voted AGAINST? . . . .not one of those senators and congressmen won and the Democrats took over the house and Senate because of that. The races were actually pretty close which should have been locks for the Republicans.

What Walker does not or has never realized is that he pissed off a LOT of people and many of them never vote. Plus many of those have spouses that also never vote. Guess who they will vote AGAINST.

I did not watch the State of the State speech last night. I got an email from him touting all the great things he has done and I was SHOCKED.

He said "The results of my reforms are now being seen. School tax levies dropped for the first time in six years while keeping our average classroom size lower than the national average."

All lies. Class sizes are smaller??? WHAT - not according to actual numbers.

According to the Wisconsin Association of School District Administrators- nine of every 10 students attend districts that had net staffing losses in at least one area, like teachers or administrators – and four-of-every-10 youngsters attend districts where elementary class sizes grew this fall. 334 teachers were laid off.

According to WI Taxpayers Alliance and I have their spreadsheet - The average school district tax rate went UP 14%. The Columbus tax rate (which is pretty high already compared to other districts) only went UP 12.7% By the way under Doyle's administration they actually did drop.(not that I was a Doyle fan at all).

Perhaps we need to pass the the "highly qualified voter law" where citizens must pass a test on locating verifiable research to uphold or debunk a candidate's statement of fact.

Both sides twist the facts but at least Democrats just don't make crap up! I would not mind being a republican with some of their ideas but MAN - they are total buffoons at times.

Both sides have good and bad ideas - I don't agree with Obama on many things but at least I know he would not totally botch things up. Hell, Newt wants to go to war with Iran, INVADE - REGIME CHANGE. And he promised to have a moon colony by 2020. WOW - where's THAT money coming from Newt? Seriously??

He said, "By the end of my second term, we will have the first permanent base on the moon. And it will be American,". YEA BABY USA! USA! USA!
----------------------------

BTW - you can call me Juror #345!! BRING IT!!!

The Scam Continues - with a twist

2012-01-25T08:13:00.000-06:00

So as I was promised FedEx delivered a package yesterday not with the $516 that I was charging Carmen but for $3000.

I then got an email from Carmen - I guess it was a mistake and her husband sent the wrong amount. She sincerely apologized and requested that I take what I was owed and send the rest back to her husband.

I said accidents do happen during moves and that I would take out the $616 owed (notice I gave myself an extra $100) and I would send the rest back and at what address should I send the returning money.

Hopefully they think "I'm" trying to scam THEM!!

Your move Carmen!
---------------------------------------
GHOSTS!

Can a house be haunted if it's only 6 years old?

In yet another bit of strangeness I was getting ready for bed and as I walked into the bathroom I heard water running. I guess the toilet must have just flushed or something, or the little ball thing was stuck....whatever. I flushed, walked out and 10 minutes later I heard water running still. hmmmm toilet is fine . . . . hmmmmm I went into the basement and I heard the water . . .wait a minute . . . that is the pipe that goes outside.

I get my shoes on, grab a flash light and go outside and I see my outside faucet is running and is about 1/3 open - WTF??? I look for any footprints and see nothing. I THINK it was only running for one day? I need CSI Columbus to come and look at this!


Leaker hose wrapped over the faucet.

The ONLY thing I can think of is that the little hose that was draped over the faucet froze in the freezing fog. then since that area is a wind tunnel (normally about 10 to 15 mph stronger then the surrounding area . . I measure it) maybe the wind caught the hose and twisted the faucet???

This goes along with odd streaks of lights in the bedroom, like a car driving by except all of our shades are pulled. Or the fireplace coming on all by itself at night, or the ghost peeing on our rug.

Speaking of water - thanks Doug for the water report but I could not find what I needed. I believe that report deals with contaminants, pesticides and bacteria while I need Secondary or Aesthetic Standards that have to do with taste and pH. The principle ions needed are:

Calcium (Ca+2)
Magnesium(Mg+2)
Bicarbonate(HCO3-1)
Sulfate(SO4-2)
Sodium(Na+1)
Chloride(Cl-1)
--------------------------------------------------------------

WOW - one thing you do NOT want to watch just before bedtime is an Amelia Earhart special. They pretty much know exactly where her plane went down. The island is the problem. THE ISLAND FROM HELL!!

Here is the problem - the entire island is alive with billions and billions of land crabs of all sizes. If you are injured in any way of even lay down to sleep the crabs will view you as tasty water and within minutes will be nibbling on your toes, millions of them. It's like a horror movie. They will eat an entire human and scatter the bones in one night!

NOT a good thing to watch just before bedtime. The showed what happens to a dead pig over night. And BTW - Amelia was not a very good pilot in the first place liking fame over training.
--------------------------------------------

Could not get to sleep anyway last night, Blake was pacing for an hour (ghosts?) and my iPad kept whistling to me saying I had an email. This is why my mom does not want email. She does not want to be awaken at night with "YOU'VE GOT MAIL porno". Five years ago I said that was ridicules. You had to log in to see your email. . . . well . . . .not anymore I guess.

So I got up to turn my iPad sound down and looked to see what all the emails were about. Seems all of these forums were wishing me a happy birthday such as the 2+2 poker forum (I'm banned) HAPPY BIRTHDAY (FU 2+2) and the Home Theater Forum (Banned for life, I was innocent - really I was, all I did was disagree with the forum owner . . . you know me . . I never complain about things . . BANNED FOR LIFE) . . . and the Home Brew forum and a few others that I'm not banned from.

-----------------------

Prince Fielder - wow 216 million, slightly less per year then Pujols! One thing to watch is the difference between Miller Park and Comerica Park. Both are above average when it comes to home runs but for some reason Comerica Park is one of the hardest parks to get walks in while Miller Park is one of the easiest.

Also - at least Prince will get less exorcise being a DH. We will see how he takes not playing in the field every day.

I look forward to the Brewers this next year - they should do well. After all while they lost Fielder the competition lost Pujols! We will also have Greinke all year, "we" will have much better fielding and will have Gomez who I like a lot. Morgon is fun but he is a poor fielder. We won't have Slumpy McGoo either.

Can't wait for spring.

Have a great Wednesday.

I got a letter from Carmen Gonzalez

2012-01-24T09:12:00.001-06:00

NOTE - BE CAREFUL WITH TEXTING IN YOUR CAR!

I was at a stop light yesterday and WHILE STOPPED - Texted adubya saying "I'm on my way" but sice nI did not have my reading glasses on and was in a hurry I missed a few letters BUT, iPhone corrected my misspellings and instead typed "I'm so gay". sigh!!
-------------------------

Got this this morning from my art loving friend.
----------------
Hi Rod ,

Hope this message finds you well. Thanks so much for your patient regarding the transaction . It has been a very difficult time with a lot of things on the plate (we have been so busy scamming other artists).

Anyway , i will like to inform you that the payment was sent by my husband assistant yesterday via FedEx and he was advise that you will receive it today so try and be on the look out for it. The tracking number is 898746748131.

I will also like you to have our address ,you can add it to your mailing list. I will like to hear about your future works and art shows. Our address in the states is...

1102 Lafayette Street
Cape May ,NJ 08204 (this is The Primrose Inn) I think I will just draw random 4 inch line on a map and send it there.

While our new address in UK is....

41 Queen's Gate Terrace
LONDON , SW7 5PN
UK

Meanwhile, i sent your contact info to the Moving agency that will be handling the shipment of all our house decors and he promise to get in touch with you. Try and make shipping arrangement with them and keep me updated with details.

I will look forward to hearing from you soon as you receive this email so i can be sure we are on the same page. Thanks for your patient.

Best Regards,
Carmen.

What could POSSIBLY go wrong!!!
---------------------------------------------
I was looking at some old folders as I wanted to try a new technique (which ultimately failed) and I found a image that had been overlooked. It was taken a little before I shot the Sunset/Loan Tree image and because it was not spectacular I just shoved under the rug (as they say). Or shoved under my plate like boiled cabbage that my mom once insisted I eat (my dog would not even eat it). Note to self - hiding things under plates does not work.

So here is the forgotten shot.

-------------------------------

MILO!!!!!

No matter how irritating our pets are they do have a rhythm. I know that my 14 year old cogie wakes up at 10:30 at night and is wide awake and ready to play. I know he also likes to wake up a 3:30 in the morning and go pee on the carpeting. I know that Milo, IN WINTER, will not meow ALL FREAKING NIGHT to go out like he does in spring and fall.

However last night in the middle of the night he is meowing in the livingroom. Odd, he never does that in winter. I could tell he was walking around that side of the house and he was meowing LOUDLY.

Stupid cat, and we went back to sleep.

Blake sleeps the whole night (thank you lord) and wakes up at 5:30 (15 minutes before we get up) to go pee on the carpeting so I get up let him out and as I go down the hallway something is odd. The house is warm.

I walk into the living room and the gas fireplace is roaring away. Since it was not on last night WE did not turn it on. WAIT A MINUTE. The remote for the fireplace is on top of the blanky that Milo sleeps on. HE TURNED IT ON DOING HIS LOVE DANCE ON HIS BLANKY!

MEOW!! UMMMM FIRE! THE FIRE IS ON, HELLO?? THE FIRE IS ON!! WAKE UP! MEOW!!
----------------------------------------

The more I play around with Pinterest the more I like it. I have a board called Artwork I LOVE. Not like, not cute puppys but a few things I LOVE!!

This is one of the 5 pieces I have in my collection so far. It has to be pretty special (for me) to get on that board).

Any of you on Pinterest check out Linda McHardy's collection of 96 boards!
-----------------------------------------------------------

The Baltimore Ravens last play! WHY did they not call a timeout before the failed Field Goal attempt. Why rush it. The play clock was running down and was at 1 second with 14 seconds left to play in the game. They had one timeout left. WHY RUSH!!!!
------------------------------------------------------------

I don't think we have seen the final winner in the GOP yet and there are some strong rumors that we will have a brokered GOP convention, one at which a late-entry candidate might be picked such as Jeb Bush, Mitch Daniels or Paul Ryan. The GOP elite are not happy at all with Newt and Mitt Kerry . . oops Romney!

If Romney is struggeling and the only alternative is Newt! That is a total nightmare for the GOP.

Bottom line is the Republicans are in very very deep doo doo and are complaining that Super Pac's have way to much influence on elections (hmmmm was it not their idea to create Super Pacs?). Obama is said to have over ONE BILLION DOLLARS in Super Pac money waiting to be released! What the Republicans forget (or don't understand) is that while they say they are the best party for finance . . . the Democrats actually have more money! Weird.

Cheers
Rod

Pintrest

2012-01-23T07:19:00.000-06:00

It's come to my attention that some of you might have thought I got scammed. No no - no art scam for me. . . . PERHAPS computer fix-it scam which you will notice I have not said a word about because . . . it's an ongoing thing having to do with certain individuals here in Columbus - it's about to come to a head soon and I'm pretty sure I'll be shouting from the roof . . . . as soon as a judge makes a decision! I don't get mad . . . I go to court.
-----------------------------------------
Anyway.

It took me over 5 minutes to figure out why that new social networking site Pintrest was so addictive. sigh.

If you have not been there I believe Pintrest was designed to be a sort of clipboard for ideas. For instance, you are preparing for a wedding and want to have all of your ideas in one online page. Also you would like others to comment on the choices.

Now others can see your choices, make comments and take your photos and put them on THEIR page of ideas and the pyramid begins. So now there are thousands of pages with millions of photos of just cool stuff. It's a virtual pinboard of everything you can think of.

Personally I look at gardening, landscaping, art, photography and I JUST searched for beer and wow, it's so totally awesome. This is a shot of the beer page. The weird thing YOU NEVER REACH THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE!!!

For lack of anything else I did a search on The Game of Thrones and found this photo of Daenery. I want a pet dragon!!!! Milo would have so much fun . . . until all his hair was burned off I suppose.

In other news - Giants/Patriots . . .SNORE!!! The Giants are this years Packers aren't they. WOW - I could care less who wins.
---------------------------
Hey - I'm getting my water tested - if anybody is interested in the mineral content I'll be letting you know. All the Water Company will tell me is how much arsenic is in the water and other bad things. I guess they don't have a clue what is REALLY in the water.

I'm trying to get Hydro Street Brewery to use filtered water for their beer. After all, water is the main ingredient in beer and out of the tap Columbus water totally sucks, just tastes bad. I use filtered water for all of my beer and it comes out tasting clean and not . . . stagee (not an actual word).

--------------------------

And then there is Newt! WOW - I won't say Newt's win was a game changer for the GOP but it does make Florida a little more interesting. It is also shows how volatile the polls are in the GOP race this year!

The GOP is really in a sticky wicket! Romney who COULD beat Obama if not for his Mormonizm (do you really think the Christian right want a candidate that COULD have 19 wives if he wanted too?) and Newt who wanted an open marriage with wife #2 because well . . . . maybe he wanted to be a Mormon also? and this who Freddie Mac thing and he's a proven loser with so much baggage it 's crazy.

And there is this

How about an Amish for President. I think it would be cool to see a White House with no electricity. Secret Service watching over buggies and so forth, we would have . . horseandbuggycades! The White House would become The Plain Gray House. Air Force One would have one of those fluorescent orange triangles on it's tail fin . . . . as it was being pulled down the highway by a team of horses.

I really, REALLY like the Amish . . . . . but I don't think I could vote for one for President.

Cheers
Rod

Mrs.Carmen Gonzalez/Pack N Box Movers and Logistics ARTIST SCAM

2012-01-19T11:05:00.001-06:00

Before I get into MY exciting day yesterday - this is a warning for all artists and spread the word. I receive the following emails!

Hope this message finds you well. I saw these creatives works on your web site and i will like you to get back with more details if they are still available for purchase.

Sunset in Wisconsin and Jester

I will appreciate an urgent reply.

Best Regards,

Carmen Gonzalez.

I replied they were available . . .then

Hi Rod ,

Thanks so much for your response to my query about those creative works. I will like to proceed with the purchase of both pieces ( 20x30 1.75 inch Gallery Wrap ) . Can you pls get back what inspire you to make the pieces.

I will look forward to hearing from you soon.

Best Regards,
Carmen.

I replied . . .then . . .

Hi Rod ,

Good to hear back from you. Yes,i will like to proceed with the
purchase of both works. I think they are lovely works and i hope to
give them good home.

I am presently away in Cancun for my twin sister's wedding even
though it comes at a time when i was preparing for a big move and also
expecting a baby but it means so much to her. I should be back in few
days.

Meanwhile,i will like you to forward your mailing address and phone
number so i can inform my husband still shutling between our home in
New Jersey and London on where to forward the payment . He has just
been transfer to head the IT section of their head Office in London.

I can also forward your contact info to the local cartage company that
will be moving all our house decors so they can get in touch with you
to arrange shipping details. They can arrange FedEx pick up of the
artworks from your studio.

I will look forward to hearing from you so i can know how best to
proceed. Cheers.

Best Regards,
Carmen.

OK - starting to sound fishy right??

Hi , (No Rod this time?? I feel hurt)

Hope this message finds you well. I am very sorry that i couldn't get
in touch immediately. I was hospitalized in Cancun immediately after
my twin sister's wedding. I almost had miscarriage but thank God, i am
now feeling better and can't wait to have my baby and settle down.

I am not sure if my husband has been able to forward the payment to
our address. I will check with him and get back to you later today OR
tomorrow. Anyway, i have forwarded your contact info to the Moving
agency that will be handling the shipment of all our house decors.
They promise to get in touch with you today. Try and arrange the
shipping details with them. I will like an update from you as soon as
you hear from the movers.

Try and get back as soon as you receive this email so i can be sure
weare on the same page. Thanks for your patient.

Best Regards,
Carmen.

Whew - I'm glad she is better LOL BUT WAIT - I get an email from Bill now!!

Hi,

I have received communication from Mrs.Carmen Gonzalez that we should work with you to ship some artworks with her other house decors to her new house in London , UK when you two are through with the transaction,as she advise.

I will like you to get back with the kind and nature of the things she want to ship.I will like to have your studio address ,so i can make arrangement with any nearby Agent that will be coming for the pick up once you and Mrs.Gonzalez are through with the transactions. Thanks.

I will appreciate your earlier reply .

Regards,
Bill Carter.

Pack N Box Movers and Logistics LTD
B12, THE BUSINESS CENTRE
504 Ridgeway Road,
London, SW9 7EX
UK.
T: 0870 863 9866
F: 0870 863 9867

Here is what happens. Carmen sends a check to me for not only MY artwork but so I can pay the shipping. So there is an extra $1000 in the check that I need to pay Pack N Box Movers and Logistics who are NOT a real company.

Then once everything is sent their check bounces! I'm out artwork and $1000. BEWARE - SPREAD THE WORD!!!
-----------------------------------------
Meanwhile - flashing backwords!

Yesterday I'm out and about getting things done and it seems the shoes I'm wearing are particularly slick.

I get home and get some poop off the sidewalk (Blake in the winter refuses to put his peeee-near** in the snow so sidewalk it is) and slip a little. So I went and got my big container of dog and earth friendly salt. As I round the corner my legs fly WAY up over my head and I'm actually looking at my feet against the clouds!

I come down and spring up like a yo-yo with not my "well being" in question but . . . . did anybody see that!! Then I remember . . .did I save the salt???? Yes, I start to replay the incident and I remember making sure that big heavy container of minerals was high and dry!!! Well done. SAVE THE SALT.

I don't think anybody saw me so I start to put salt everywhere.(note from today - no harm was done and my body feels like it never happened . . . too weird).

I'll probably see it on You Tube soon and Lettermen will want to interview me.

**peeee-near There was an episode on New Girl which has the capability to be REAL funny and sometimes not. . . but anyway there were issues with the word . . .

http://youtu.be/xXcuvs4fW9c

------------------------

That's my late story for today.

"As for me on the 1st of hill"

2012-01-17T08:02:00.000-06:00

I took the famous "I have a dream" from Martin Luther King's Address and translated it into Japanese. Then I took THAT and translated it back to English.

The original

“I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit together at the table of brotherhood.”

And the translated version.

"As for me on the 1st of hill whose Georgia is red, it possesses the dream where the son of the owner of the son of the slave before and the slave before can sit down together in the table of same trade union."

Sweet!!
-------------------------------------------------------
If you are looking outside today remember - it's only 30 days until pitchers and catchers report for sprint training!!!

But yea - we are no longer in a Positive Arctic Oscillation and are in a normal winter pattern. Looking at the temperature anomaly map below you can see a lot of the cold arctic air is starting to slip south from its Alaskan resting area. The blue area is a colder then normal air mass and as you know these sort of things seem to run north west to east. sad.

This is the current situation and these are for the 17th to the 24th period.

------------------------------------------------
Seems the GOP is complaining about the Supreme Court and how they created Super Pacs and how corporations can now give millions and millions of dollars to candidates. Wait a minute. Didn't they create the Super Pacs to beat Obama?? And now they are complaining because it's not fair??

This is going to get REALLY REALLY ugly when the real election starts up. Obama has a few Super Pacs all lined up in defense of his title.

Steve Colbert has created his own legal Super Pac and his ad's are now running in South Carolina. It might be funny but it's also sad. You see you can say anything you want in a political ad. You don't even have to be close to honest. Political ads are protected by the 1st Amendment.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

You can not sell a round loaf of bread and call it square, that would be illegal. But you can run ads like this with no problems on TV. He is trying to show how stupid this whole "corporations are people" thing that the Supreme Court passed

http://youtu.be/Aix7tQMdJ3s

Then there is the whole Columbus Journal, the "news"paper of Columbus. Did you know there were more then 6 cases of vandalism at the Columbus Recall office? Nails in the driveway (I found one in my tire) locks being super glued, and so on. While the Cbus police are out giving parking tickets downtown buildings are being vandalized, windows being busted at Hydro Street and not only are the police ignoring the problem the newspaper does not even report the problems. Yet, they are in the police reports for all to see.

Columbus had one the the best Recall offices in Wisconsin, it was the talk of the effort but only one tiny mention in the newspaper.   sigh.    I like Paul but you would think when real news happens, something truly historical in our own town, even if it was politically on the left, it would be reported.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

ANYWAY - back to fun things. I guess I'll put my bike away for a little while and watch more TV.

We watched Alcatraz last night. I really liked the show. The premise is that in 1963 all of the inmates of Alkatraz were transferred . . . . but were they??? All of a sudden they are coming back to the here and now and a sprightly young blond, Hurley from LOST and the dude from Jurassic Park are trying to find them one at a time before they kill again.

We also watched the movie "Bridsmaids" and I thought it was really good. There were some parts that DJ could hardly breath from laughing and I had tears in my eyes!!

http://youtu.be/gj8H__MvM54

--------------------------------------------------

Tonight at Hydro Street is Drinking Game City Council Night.   Watched the City Council on there TV and play City Council Bingo.   They have collected hundreds of phrases and buzz words the CC like to say and made bingo cards.   It'll be a hoot.
----------------------------------------------------

Packers - I have to think that the reason the Packers loss was a combination of the week off and the death in the family. Troy Aikman confirmed this yesterday when he said that he went into the Packers Locker room Saturday and it was very quiet and subdued. Most of the Packers had never been to a funeral before. It was a two week ordeal and a horrible death.   Kid falls through the ice on a river and it took a week to find the body under the ice and then the funeral days before the big game. WOW!

And you wonder why the offense was off???

Anyway - I hope you all made it safe to work today.

Rod

Cheers
Rod

White Boy Rap and Jury Duty

2012-01-11T09:16:00.000-06:00

White Boy Rap

Ahem, ahem
Me mother has gone to church,
She told me not to play with you
Because you're in the dirt,

It isn't because you're dirty,
It isn't because you clean,
It's because you got the whooping cough
And eat margarine

-------------------------------

Up the long latter
And down the show rope

To hell with king Billy
And God bless the pope.

If that doesn't do it
We'll tear 'em in two
And send them to hell
With the red, white and blue.
---
OK - either I'm about to have a stroke or my mammoth brain is recalling things from the way way past. I'm betting on a stroke. I have no idea why I thought of those two things this morning.I'm a little scared.
-----------------------------------------

I got an email a few days ago from a woman who spoke broken engrish. She loved a few of my "paintings" and wanted to purchase a couple. I sent her the price list and she ordered a couple and I tossed in the words "free shipping" because I knew that people like that and it's not THAT expensive.

She agreed and I should ship the canvas images to New Jersey and then London!! WHAT???? LONDON ENGLAND?

At least MY part is only to New Jersey. I'm going to have to up my max payment on my CC processing and think I'm going to wait until things have cleared before I do any real sending. How do I send FedEx anyway, is there a FedEx store?? Last tiem I shopped somethign to Denver and the UPS box ALONE cost $60!!

---------------------------------------

I got a notice that I'm on call for 5 days of jury duty next month. $20 large a day and 48.5 cents per mile. SWEET!!!!! I've always wanted to be on a jury. Does anyone know where I can get one of those white wigs they wear in Europe? I think that would show how I'm taking this seriously.

I was just told that when someone was being hanged they had a black thing that would go on top of the white wig. That would be so cool.

I was reading how to be a good juror.

1. Listen carefully.    Does this mean I can't have my iPad when in trial??
2. Keep an open mind.    I've been told my mind is so open it echoes!!
3. Control your emotions. HEY - if I start to weep uncontrollably . . .should I raise my hand?
4. Do not discuss the case. Well, except for my blog right? HELLO!!
5. Do not read, view or listen to media accounts. I actually don't understand that sentence.
6. Do not talk with anyone related to the case.    Define related, like a brother? spouse?.
7. Do not investigate on your own.   Except for asking questions during the trial of course!
8. Report problems to the court.   IF I lose the court WiFi password, THAT would be a problem.
9. Report emergencies to the court. FIRE FIRE RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!!
10. Be on time.

I am so ready to be on a jury!!!
--------------------------------

Now I must complete my HIPPA training!

Cheers
Rod

Beezow Doo-Doo Zopittybop-Bop-Bop, John 3:16

2012-01-10T08:18:00.001-06:00

What if they had a Championship College Football Game . . .an nobody cared. Wha! it's been like two months since the NCAA season closed and the NFL Playoffs are here. Who cares about college football.
-----------------------------
Remember all the way back to yesterday when I mentioned the only cold air around was in Alaska? A Facebook friend of mine lives in Alaska and she said it was -20 yesterday. Then I see on the news that Cordova Alaska is having some snow issues. Seems they have recieved 18 feet of snow this year so far . . .EIGHTEEN FEET!!!

That seems rather excessive to me. In the last 2 weeks they have had 10 feet of snow! BUT WEIGHT (pun intended, sorry balderdash). Last weekend they had rain drenching storms which added a lot of weight to buildings which are now collapsing.

But, back to us, the high Thursday will be 22, man this winter sucks!
-----------------------------------------------------------

And then there is this whole Beezow Doo-Doo Zopittybop-Bop-Bop thing.   If I would have known that all I had to do was change my name a little to get attention I would done so long ago. WHO KNEW!!!

http://youtu.be/VTh-ep4c6ns

Rod-ikka-Schnim-ikka-Schnam-ikka-Schnopp? hmmmm just does not have that ring to it, but if you wish to call me that go for it.

----------------------------------------------

Then there is this Tim Tebow. sigh! In college he would put 3.16 under his eyes from John 3.16 - For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

That would be MUCH too long to put on your face so he just put 3.16. Well, in the miracle game last Sunday he threw for 316 yards and had an average reception of 31.6 yards per completed pass.

Personally if I was a football player I would have put 14:51-52 under each eye coming from Mark 14:51-52 from the New American Standard Bible. A young man was following Him, wearing nothing but a linen sheet over his naked body; and they seized him. But he pulled free of the linen sheet and escaped naked.

Thus creating the very first streaker! That's sort of football related isn't it?

OR perhaps Ezekiel 23:19-20 from the New International Version. Yet she increased her prostitution, remembering the days of her youth when she engaged in prostitution in the land of Egypt. She lusted after their genitals as large as those of donkeys, and their seminal emission was as strong as that of stallions.

Whoa!! Wait just a minute here. Let me know when this one is being discussed in church and I'll be there. Have they been holding out the good parts? Seems when I went to church it was a little more boring.

Just say'in.
------------------------------------------

Many of you have seen this photo (in retrospect no one has seen this photo but . . . I digress) but since there are multiple universes I better post it here also. You see some friends are on Facebook, some friends are on my photo blog, some are on my business Facebook page and some are here. I try to separate business from this place because I know I can irritate people, piss them off, make lewd and rude comments and so forth . . sometimes. It's a free for all.

This is a shot of sunset over Lake Monona. It's formatted as a 12x36 vertical pano.   I was heading to the Harmony Bar and came up on Olbrich Park. Stopped for about 15 minutes and waited for just the right moment.    Then ran around like a banshee looking for the best angle for what I was envisioning.

Have a nice Tuesday!

Rod

Gov. Walker, putting the CON back in WisCONsin

2012-01-09T08:21:00.000-06:00

We were sitting around late the other night, DJ was drifting in and out in slumber and flipping around I was a movie with Robert Downey Jr and just put it on . . whatever . . . not really paying attention until I heard something funny "Why is you father in a coffee can? Downey said and the reply was "BECAUSE HE'S DEAD PETER!".

I started laughing and this woke DJ up and we watched what was one of the funniest movies I have seen in a while. We have watched it 2 times now and it's actually funnier the 2nd time as there are jokes inside jokes.

The movie us DUE DATE. Check it out!

http://youtu.be/VPw7iHhP5zk

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I hope everybody was Tebowing last night after Jesus, once again, guided the worst quarterback in the NFL to yet another miracle victory. Was this the 5th miracle comeback of the year since he was installed as quarterback? I mean come on, they start this guy because after looking around they could not fine ANYBODY else.

Last night game was the shortest Overtime game in NFL history. It was also the 1st game in NFL history to not have one kickoff return.

Next week the Packers play the Giants in Green Bay Sunday. Temps should be in the lower to mid 20s and the Packers are 9 point favorites.

Speaking of weather. So far this January the average high is 38.6 with the average low 20.4. Obviously a tad high for this time of year.

In December we were 8.4 degrees above the average high and 7.2 degrees above the average low. The winter of 11-12 continues to be . . . awesome.    4.4 inches of snow so far. The record lowest amount of snow was 4.1 inches in 1901-02. The second lowest was 12.7 inches in 1967-68.

We should have 3 more days of near record weather, then cooling down for a few days Thursday and Friday then back into the 30s.   No real snow is expected.

So where is the cold air anyway and why are we having this weather. It's because of a Positive Arctic Oscillation a yamaka of cold air on top of the world. It sort of slides around and this year we have been lucky.

The cold air is in Alaska at the moment, Canada is very warm so at the moment there is no REAL cold air mass headed our way. Looking around the world for temperature variants . . .

Mexico is colder then normal and China is FREAKING cold along with Australia and the entire South American Continent . So you know when someone is having warm weather someone else has to be getting the cold.    This is going to be really interesting how the rest of the winter goes. Will there be payback? A cold spring??

------------------------------------------------

Hydro Street Brewery continues to do very well and I'm surprised that the food area is not as I had expected. I was expecting your normal grill food but Sandye is putting together some real real good menu selections everyday. Check out the Sunday Brunch Menu.

I got an email Sunday morning saying "Rod, we ran out of everything last night". Well, that is not a BAD thing but it is a learning experience. They were not expecting to serve 79 dinners and most are repeat customers. They had to get more half barrels of local brew as their beer is still a few weeks away.

GRAND OPENING for Hydro Street Brewery is Saturday February 4th with the 1st Mug Club event January 28th.

------------------------------

I have no idea what to say about the arrests of former Walker employees.

Embezzlement of money donated to help relatives of veterans the families of disabled or killed veterans . . wow . . .that just seems wrong to me but perhaps I'm just a tree hugging liberal. And then the "innocent" dude who was just doing his own thing and not part of the big investigation when . . .looky here what we found on his computer . . now he is charged with child enticement.

The USA Today had two big pro-Walker articles about how his getting rid of all Unions is not a bad thing but come on. The recall is not a one issue thing. It's many many many corrupt things.

He misled voters about his true agenda and intentions.
He gutted Wisconsin’s public education system.
He's intent on destroying decades of environmental protections.
He is is dismantling the health care system for women, seniors, children and poor working families.
He's intentionally created a chaotic environment of political rewards and punishments that subverts the democratic process.
He is systematically disenfranchising whole demographic groups, suppressing the voice and votes of seniors, poor, students, laborers.

He's part of a national, radical, reactionary group of people (Rove, Koch brothers, Heritage Foundation) intent on remaking America into a survival of the fittest, big business dominated, extreme-wealth protecting nation at all costs.

I'm not against all Republicans. I do not really care normally but talk about tearing a state in half!

DON'T GET ME STARTED!!

Cheers
Rod

Weird Week

2012-01-06T09:40:00.004-06:00

It's been a weird week. Monday was a holiday and we slept in for a change. Well, if you call getting up at 5:00 to let Blake out and going back to bed "sleeping in". Dang Blake is on a schedule!

Tuesday I blogged and went to work. While at work I got this tiny throat thing going on. You know when your throat gets a little weird, stuffed up feeling? Got worse all day and all night and BAM - I was down for the count Wednesday - BLAH!!! Slept a lot of the day but I felt I was getting better.

About 5:00 I get an email from my Madison boss asking if I can come in Thursday at 9:00 for a special meeting in Madison.   I also had a trip to Fort Atkinson to help my mom fix her TV and to help with her Christmas present a Nook Touch. She was having issues!

I get to work and am all set for the meeting and look on my calendar to see what room and see . . .IT'S IN TWO WEEKS!!! crap - Thank You Madison boss. So I go to moms early. Fix her TV (The switch on the remote was set to AUX2 and not TV and the Nook . . .sigh . . .

Here is the thing with The Nook. It has an incredibly slow operating system. If you are doing one thing and want to do another, relax, it will take time. It's like when you are on a computer and all of a sudden you are 7 clicks ahead of the operating system and you keep clicking like it will go faster but all you are doing is adding MORE stuff.

So in a Nook, you are reading a book. You go to the menu to open another book. . . . BUT WAIT, Nook has to close one book which it seems takes time and then it has to think about opening another book and all that time you are swiping , pushing, poking swiping more and nothing is happening and all that time Nook is remembering all those things and laughing at you because IT'S STILL CLOSING THE ORIGINAL BOOK!

Pretty soon you are pissed off and say f*ck this thing and move on to something else because Nook is broken and useless.   10 minutes later you go back and it works GREAT!! OH - and they don't tell you that SOME places you tap and SOME places you swipe and if you swipe you need to swipe NOT the whole screen because then it won't work.

Then last night I start to get the chills . . . . . sigh . . . my nose is stuffed up a little and I can't breath and for some reason DJ keeps kicking me to roll over in bed. I get up at 3:00 because Blake is pacing around and it seems he needs to throw-up which he does outside. I wonder why he never throws up the SECOND time he eats his food!   I go to let him in and he's gone. (BTW - yesterday was his 14th birthday)

1/2 hour later he has climbed up back deck deck and is wondering why no one is letting him in. It's now 4 in the morning and I go back to bed but I can't sleep because I'm trying to be quiet so I don't get kicked. Plus I read a complaint about the Brewery in an email from a serial complainer's 4th email to me and of course I answered him FOR THE LAST TIME.

So that is my week. It's brew day today. I'm feeling better but the NyQuil is making me sluggish a little (but it's a nice sluggish, like a hard slap in the face with a big soft cloud pillow . . . I love you Mr. NyQuil).

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BTW - from a Republican friend "I believe Mitt Romney is the John Kerry of the 2012 elections".    I also think that.

OH - from my email SPAM folder - I don't know why my mom is afraid of email

Photos of Black Singles in Your City! (we only have one and I don't want a picture of him)

Jamie Lynn is a bigger slut than Britney - (and I care why?)

Lucky men use it (good for them)

Meet 50 plus Singles (50 plus what? size 50?)

Cheers
Rod

What could possibly go wrong

2012-01-03T09:43:00.000-06:00

A note on Dave Allwardt - Seems he had a complete kidney shutdown and is on dialysis.
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I feel so much safer now knowing that DOJ has received 65,000 applications for conceal and carry permits! What could possibly go wrong. At least I know that when the United States Army, under Obama, decides to "take back America", Wisconsin will have a fighting chance.

In other news, I'm glad I don't have to shovel my sidewalks after a snow. The City of Columbus did nothing this weekend and we had cars that could not make it up the hill on Vista Circle because of pure ice on the roads. I figure since cars could not make it up the hill they could not give me a ticket for having a slippery sidewalk.
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There are 40,000 new laws in America, I'm looking for a link so I can see what they are so I don't do anything against any of the 40,000.

I know in Utah there re no more "happy hours".

In Colorado if you are under 11 years old and suffer a head injury you MUST sit out a play (bunch of wimps in Colorado it seems)!

In Illinois motorcyclists stopped at a red light may proceed through if it fails to change to green after a reasonable length of time (I can't see that being problematic at some point).

In Tennessee it is now illegal to fire a gun into an occupied home (glad they cleared up THAT misunderstanding).

In Saudi Arabia (the 53rd State)ONLY woman are allowed to sell lingerie. This has actually been in effect since 2006 but not enforced. Woman were not allowed to work where male's and female's could congregate at the same time.
-----------------

LOOK OUT!!!! The Quadrabtids (pronounced KWA-dran-tids) meteor shower will happen tomorrow morning about 1:30 with perhaps 100 per hour and one per minute at the very least! Sky's will be clear tonight so if you are up . . . . . . The thing with The Quads is that they only last 2 hours and then GONE!!!

The shower comes from the remnants of comet 2003EH1 which broke up about 500 years ago. They will hit the atmosphere at 90,000 mph and burn up about 50 miles up.
----------------

Couple things - Matt Flynn is a GREAT Quarterback when playing a team in exhibition mode and vanilla defense. Let's not put TOO much into the football game and I wonder if all of Flynn's records should have an *asterisk next to them.

Badgers went up against a quick trick play high school style offense and lost as they played their more grown-up pro style game. Yea they lost but I would rather lose in the Rose Bowl Game presented by Vizio then win the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl. Or be Ohio State and lose in the Taxslayer.com Gator Bowl. Of course the question is, would I rather WIN the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl (Illinois)?

Northwestern lost the Meineke Car Care of Texas Bowl so . . . . .

It was a fun exciting game and very entertaining. I'm glad I'm a fair weather Bucky fan. I prefer to see players once they get good, in the pros!

Cheers
Rod

A non-linear narrative.

2011-12-30T10:34:00.001-06:00

Non-linear narrative? A certain otherness?

hmmmmm - I think that describes my blog!

I gotta contact Columbus Power and Light and mildly complain about their electrical sub station that has all of a sudden appeared outside out windows.

Before the aliens landed we had nice dark sky and could seethe Milky Way every night. Now since the space crafted landed we get this every night. As you can see the light pretty much blast away the stars. Can some one contact Cbus Power and Light and tell then they are wasting electricity?

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I was at Hydro Street Brewery last night "helping" figure out the burner situation for brewing and . . . .wait, I'm having a non-linear moment. . . . . .if anybody knows where we can get a stock pot range let me know, they automagically hook up to Natural gas and would be perfect!

ANYWAY - the atmosphere there was outstanding and I was having some deja vu moments but . . .from where! Then I realized later that it was from some pubs we went to on St. John in the Virgin Islands. There were two guys playing a fiddle and guitar, laughter and drinking in a very relaxed homey setting. A wonderful mixture of people.

The Brewery is doing wonderful with zero advertising (except from me and Facebook (which is also me)). I've put on the binders for advertising and have not BEGUN to get the word out yet. The place is hopping every night. For example , they go through 50 pounds of potatoes a night with their awesome home cut fries along with over a barrel of beer.

They have had to supplement their beers with a few from House of Brews and now have Tyranena on tap to help fill the void. Aaron the brewmaster said all 10 taps should be operational with HSB brew by February when the grand opening is.

Hydro Street Brewery Co and Eatery

In case you are wondering the grill is open . . . . . ALL THE TIME!!! And they will be open News Year Eve.

On a side note I made Nut Brown Doggie Beer Biscuits that will be available at HSB. And look for Grinders Island Brews on tap in the future! Although brewing will be done at HSB headquarters.

In case you are wondering those two areas in the front of the brewery are earmarked for a hydroponic herd garden.

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BTW - it's funny the crap Walker is getting now that the truth came out about "his" expansion of Badger Care. OOPS - I guess he forgot to tell everyone that he was ORDERED to expand it as opposed to out of the kindness of his heard (which he originally claimed).

No wonder he has told people he HATES Madison. all of that truthfulness get's in his way!
----------------------------

Have a great New Years Weekend and be careful.

Rod

Need more Gas

2011-12-28T08:04:00.001-06:00

Man - trying convert a propane burner to a natural gas burner is harder then expected. Three plumbers said it is impossible but looking at the burner websites they have special attachments and in fact MY burner which DJ gave me for Christmas a few years ago is actually set up FOR natural gas.

You see the problem is that "we" have a huge natural gas grill and we want to brew under the range hood. Propane seems like it would be the easiest way but even with outstanding ventilation maybe it's against the law????? So since there is natural gas why not use that for the burners. hmmmmm
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Here is something I found yesterday .

I was actually surprised how fast I got this Beer Stereogram - just crossed my eyes a little and BAM there it was. I asked my optometrist about these after looking at a book of Stereogram's and then not being able to read any thing for about an hour. He said the are very GOOD for your eyes and likened them to exercising your eyes. (not exorcise which is like spinning your head around - I caught that one balderdash) The eyes get tired and thus, no reading.Like when you work out and you feel all weak.

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Clear night last night so I decided to try some star photos. I took this last night - 30 seconds at f400 3.6 with a super wide lens. I'll try again with a different lens - HOWEVER - even with the electric company blasting light at me from over the ridge I was able to get a nice shot. I think I could have gotten the Milky Way but for the Electric Company.

Betelgeuse (arrow)- Classified as a red supergiant, Betelgeuse is one of the largest and most luminous stars known.

Looking South about 10:00

Supergiant's are the largest stars in the universe in terms of volume. If Betelgeuse were at the center of our Solar System instead of ol' Sol, its surface would extend past the asteroid belt possibly to the orbit of Jupiter and beyond, wholly engulfing Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars. Holy CRAP!!

That is why determining how far away it is is difficult! It is believed to be about 640 light years away and it's thought to be only 10 million years old, but has evolved rapidly because of its high mass.

Yea it's orange and there is a reason which is way to boring for me to type.

OH - the super bright star below the moon these days is Venus.
---------------------------------

Comedy's on TV are sometimes funny but normally very very few are actually LOL funny and how many times do you really want to watch a rerun of a comedy - not very often. But there is a show on now that DJ and I have had actual LOL and tears in the eyes funny!

New Girl just keeps getting better. This is from the 1st episode.

Hydro Street Brewery Menu

2011-12-27T08:58:00.002-06:00

Note - I'm looking for a water quality report for Columbus or Sun Prairie - anybody know where I can get one?? Not what chemicals are in the water but what minerals!
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Below is the current Hydro Street Brewery and Eatery menu. Just thought I would post it. The potatoes are awesome and even though I had a burger on day two and Sandye was still learning the grill it was really good. Being a former grill cook at three restaurants there is a learning curve to every new grill. Where is the hot spot where is the cool area and how hot is the anyway!

Aaron is having some brewing problems with hooking up a natural gas line to his propane burner for brewing but HOPEFULLY that will be resolved today.

As for buisness, they are doing very well for zero advertising and are going through about a barrel of beer every day and my guess is that will at least double in summer. I suspect that while most profits have come from beer so far the grill will start to make some good money (I'm thinking at least 60%). And BTW - I'm an investor. If you would like to invest talk to Sandye (tell them Rod sent you). I believe what they offer is a good deal.

A seriously perfect location, excellent CHEERS type atmosphere, good food, good beer and the two people running the place (on zero sleep it seems) really have their act together, MUCH more then I personally could do. It's a labor of love. If they had sat back and had contractors do all the work, forget it. But building a business with your own two hands, that's different.

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WOW nice December weather-wize if you are not a winter lover. This will go down as one of the warmest Decembers on record. We have had only five days with highs below freezing this month and are 4.3 degrees above the average high and 7.8 degrees above the average low.

Snowfall? We have had a total of 3.8 inches of snow compared to an average of 17.0. Yet, we are above the average in precipitation.

As for frost depth. Dane County has 1 inch!
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I got a call from a customer wanting some shots of Bascom Hall. I had a couple but had not done anything with them. The woman liked what she saw at Sweet Lips Gallery so I knew I could not have a normal photo.

Bascom Hall

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Here is an insanely gross article. Read at your own risk

Sanju Bhagat, 36, of Nagpur, India, had been teased his whole life because of the giant bulge in his belly, which made him look like he was "nine months pregnant." One night in 1999, he was rushed to the hospital in pain, and doctors decided to operate on what they suspected was a "giant tumor," says ABC News. But according to Dr. Ajay Mehta, what they found was much more frightening. "To my surprise and horror," says Mehta, "I could shake hands with somebody inside." Indeed, there was a "strange, half-formed creature that had feet and hands." Bhagat suffered from a rare medical condition in which the fetus of his twin brother became trapped inside him while he was still in his mother's womb, surviving for decades as a parasite by leaching blood, complete with an "umbilical cord-like structure."

OH MY GOD! I feel I need to take a shower now!
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OK - how about getting some cute back in your brain.

Here is Caydance at Christmas.

Caydence, baby Syd, Jenny and DJ

And one of baby Sydney (why always put "baby" in front, will people think that Sydney is just a very short adult)?

Here is Syd flopping around on the floor. HOOO HOOO HOOOO!!

Have a great Tuesday!

Rod

Alternate ROW parking in City parking lots! BS!!!!

2011-12-22T08:02:00.003-06:00

For all my work buddies I have some sad news - Dave Allwardt collapsed a few days ago and is in the hospital until further notice. Some sort of recurring infection and other complications with his weight. It's all I know but according to his wife he is in bad shape. Let's pass on some warm thoughts for him.

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SNOW - Columbus received 1.5 inches of snow last night with 0.09 inches of precipitation. Like humans my dog was totally excited about this event but I'm sure the "fun" will wear off shortly.

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ahhh - NEVER MIND!

I said my peace

Hydro Street Brewery is Open for Bigness!

2011-12-21T09:30:00.003-06:00

The day started out poorly Tuesday. You see Tuesday was the day of the big building inspections and when I stopped in I found Sandye and Aaron not in their normal stressed out chipper mood but more in a stressed out dragging slightly grumpy moving slow mood.

Seems the night before the big day they ordered food from another established establishment in Columbus and some tomatoes seemed a little . . . "off" as they touched their taste buds. But being hungry they continued to eat. Bad idea.

Of course that was the night after two assumed drunken love birds who could barely walk crashed through their big front window. Ahh the life of a brewpub owner. At least some bars in Columbus allow their customers to get falling down drunk as Columbus finest are busy keeping track of when yard signs go up!

All went well and at 4:30 the doors officially opened.

unnamed male - First Patron

The above photo is of an unnamed male who was the very first customer. Unconfirmed rumors were that he had been camping out for 3 days waiting to taste the sweet nectar of Hydro Brew. Sadly, Aaron the brewmaster, was at home doing what people do when they eat bad tomatoes so Sandye had no wingman and the grill was closed. Daughter Oakly(sp?) in the background was on hand acting like bouncer/custodian/helper person.

At the unadvertised soft opening where only the 400 million facebook people knew about the opening, a nice sized crowd appeared out of nowhere to the delight of everybody involved. 40s music played in the background and beer and laughter were bouncing off the walls. Fantastic atmosphere!

Doc from the Capri came in and he and I talked a while. AND OF COURSE he say "So your Rod Melotte" (this is being said entirely all too often) which once again put me on guard. Seems he has a large photo of mine in the Capri which was given to him. He said a friend purchased it in Portage at the Trails End Supper Club and gave it to him as a gift.

Here is a photo of the Capri that is hanging in Hydro Street Brewery and Eatery AND at The Capri.


The Capri

Did you know that that in the late 1800's people would store their wood stoves above the Capri in the summer?. They had to hoist the stoves up with a pulley system and there would a a few dozen iron wood stoves up there. Weird.

Have a great shortest day of the year

Rod

Lots of snow . . .but not this year . . .YET!

2011-12-20T08:24:00.001-06:00

Troy Aikman was in Chicago to announce a football game one weekend when he noticed a special telephone near the Bears bench. He asked a nearby player what it was used for and was told it was a hotline to God. Troy asked if he could use it. The player told him, "Sure, but it will cost you $100.00."

Troy scratched his head, then thought, what the heck. I could use some help picking games. He pulled out his wallet and paid the $100.00. Troy’s picks were perfect that week.

The next week, Troy was in Texas when he noticed that same kind of phone on the Cowboys' bench. He asked what the telephone was for and was told "It's a hotline to God. If you want to use it, it will cost you $500.00."

Recalling last weekend, Troy pulled out his wallet and made the call. Troy’s picks were perfect again that week!

The next weekend Troy was in Green Bay at Lambeau Field when he noticed the same kind of phone by the Packers' bench. He asked Aaron Rodgers "Is that the hotline to God?" Aaron said, "Yes, but it will cost you 35 cents".

Troy looked incredulously at Aaron and said, "Wait a second, I just paid $100.00 in Chicago and $500.00 in Texas to use the same phone to God. Why does Green Bay only charge 35 cents?"

Aaron looked at Troy and replied, "In Green Bay, it's a local call"
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Tomorrow is the solstice, the shortest day of the year and the day we start are long slow climb to summer. The earth is the closest to the sun but also tilting 23.5 degrees away from ol' Sol.

This December, at the moment, is the 7th warmest December in history. There is no frost in the ground yet and I doubt we will have a white Christmas which is not really that unusual. In fact a white Christmas only happens 4 out of 7 times but we have had five in a row.

Since 1970, 71% of winters in Madison have had official snowfall totals of over 40 inches, with the most recent 30 year average of nearly 50 inches even after you eliminate the recent 100 inch winter.

Between 1900 and 1970, only 30% of winters had snowfall over 40 inches. The average was only about 35 inches per winter.

Between 1900-1970, there were 8 streaks of more than 3 winters in a row with snowfall under 35". There were no streaks of 3 or more winters with over 40". There has only been one such streak under 35" since 1970 but 4 streaks of 5 winters or more over 40".

Bottom line - we get a lot more snow now then we did when we were growing up (if you were born in the 50s and 60s).
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Totally Geeked out!

2011-12-19T08:34:00.003-06:00

So the City of Columbus website says

"Have you got a question for someone "at City Hall"?

Got a suggestion?

Or a complaint?

Well.... here's your chance.... Just click on Request Tracker

to get in touch with someone in city government who can (and will) respond."

Odd - I've registered twice and have gotten zero response!

Here is the crazy thing the Police Department does. They say that you can not park on EITHER side of the street on snow emergencies (3 inches or more snow), (even though everyone wants alternate side parking but they do not complain to their Aldermen) HOWEVER - out of the kindness of their hearts you are free to park in the City Parking lots - HOWEVER - there - you have to figure out what row because it's ALTERNATE ROW PARKING ALL THE TIME in the FREAKING PARKING LOT and you can get a $30 ticket.

How anal is THAT! Yet - no one complains to their Aldermen. Seems Alderman have a pretty easy job since no one ever tells them what they want.

If you want to tell your Aldermen something here is a map so you can figure out who to complain too.

So now you know where you are - here is who to complain too!

Columbus Aldermen
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Packers - the only reason I'm sad is that the Pack still so not have home field through out the playoffs! I don't mind if they lost - almost happy actually. NOW they can concentrate on the big picture. The Superbowl. Injuries are mounting up in some critical areas, the front "O" line.

I gotta give credit to the Chiefs - they played a really good game. OH - The field goal kicker that scored all the points is Mr. Irrelevant - He was the very last guy drafted in the draft!

OH - The Patriots vs. Tebow - Did you see after the game when the woman was interviewing Brady and her first question to Brady was ABOUT TEBOW LOL
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Sort of rushed today as I'm heading to the Brewery for the hanging!

I have to rent a hammer drill to get through the reinforced tungsten walls for getting a little nail for hanging a few more images! Then I'll let them have their ultra important inspections and MAYBE MAYBE Hydro Street Brewery will be open at some point tomorrow!

SO - I gotta get going. (actually coffee is ready and I have to get some food in me).

And Christmas? I received an iPad early - WOW - I am in total geek heaven. If you go to the Weather Channel App you can see the entire world weather systems in almost real time from space - WOW - BUT WAIT. You can zoom in more and more and more and more until you can see DJs car parked next to Jenny and Josh's house!!! GEEK OUT!!!!!

You can go from this

To this - and all points inbetween

Geek me out the door!!!

I remember when there was a technology lull. For a while there was a time when hardware could not keep up with the software. Memory was still expensive. Then there were developments in hardware and outstanding software caught up. Now with the advent of game consoles like PS3 and Xbox and software is no longer stuck with so many versions of operating system they can go wild.

I believe we are on the cusp of some major life changing developments in how the world interacts. With SO MUCH free knowledge available at you finger tips we are bound to reap benefits.

I downloaded a travel magazine (for free) and I can touch the screen and BAM - I can instantly see where they are.

When I got my very first computer job for the State of Wisconsin my keyboard (seriously - this is 100% true) - my keyboard had no "1" and no "0" I had to use a capitol "I" and a capital "O".

I could go on and on - I probably will this week LOL.

Cheers
Rod

You guys are snorting incense to get high? really?

2011-12-16T09:40:00.004-06:00

I follow a blog called Stuck in Costumes written by Trey Ratcliff. He is sort of my mentor in photography. He posts one photo a day which started me thinking "I" should do that so my photo a day blog is located at

http://melottephotoimagery.blogspot.com/

ANYWAY - he mentioned Glacier National Park which BAM - stirred some memories of when I hitch hiked out to Glacier. Does anybody hitch any more??

I had never hitched in my life until I decided to hitch out west. I put my thumb out and for 12 hours - nothing - zip. Was I doing it wrong??? I ended up camping overnight exactly where I had started. The next day I decided to start walking and a cop pulled over and gave me a lift to the next exit. It was a Sunday morning and a family coming from church picked me up and I got a ride to Beloit.

In Beloit a couple of dudes picked me up and said they were going to California to sell drugs! SWEET - this will be interesting!!! But first they had to rob their sisters house in Illinois to get more money. So after THAT was over we were on the road and about 10:00 at night they whipped out these big sticks of incense and started inhaling . . . . .WHAT??? incense?? Really? I'm sitting in the back seat and the guys in charge are getting off in incense??

I lived through the night and decided I wanted to get a different ride. I "loaned" them $5 for gas (I guess they did not get away with much cash) and stuck my thumb out.

A guy comes to a SCREECHING HALT! Seems he was AWOL from the Military and speeding across country for some reason. I hopped in and BAM - we were cruising 90mph until a cop pulls him over. Next thing I know we are down at the jail house and he is giving me a big box of k-rations and wishing me luck.

So many stories from that trip. The woman who wanted me to move to Alaska with her, the elderly gay guy that wanted to be "friends" and my hand never left my large knife I had on my leg. The neighbor that stopped and said "Rod?? is that you?" "Mrs Petrie"??? Bears mauling campers in Glacier the day before I get there. Being chased by hotel personnel for camping on their lawn. Pitching my tent at night on a field of cactus. Hiding under boxes so the Yogi Bear Campground would not charge me for camping.

Man I wish I had a blog back then.
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AMYWAY - I had a Columbus Economic Development meeting at Hydro Street Brewery yesterday. I've been helping them get ready as I have 30 feet of their wall under my jurisdiction for my images. We were meet and greeting people and a guy comes up and says "So you're Rod Melotte" and as normal this could be good or bad. I say "yes I am" and he says "I'm Daniel Meister". The named ringed a bell but so many people know me but I don't know them I just pretended I knew who he was.

Wait . . . he starts talking about how it's good that people have opposing views and then it hits me. HE'S THE CHIEF OF POLICE!!! OH NO!!!!!!

As some of you may know, on Facebook the Chief and I don't always see eye to eye on some things and I do ever so much like to throw gas in any fire I see (right or wrong - I love flames). And here he is shaking my hand and sizing me up!

It all went well (as far as I know) and we agreed to disagree and he said there are some posts he has to delete which made me feel better since he never deleted MY posts so I can't be the worst! So all of you that thought I was facebooking from jail last night I was not.

Back to Hydro - soft opening is scheduled for Tuesday if all goes well.

Once the beer pipeline is in full production they will have 10 taps, plus bottled craft beer, local wine and local distilled liqueur. A full grill (12 foot, 700 lb range hood) with deep fryers and all food made will be from local producers including a hydroponic garden in the front windows for herbs. Brewery is next the the grill because they need venting for the flames. 1 barrel system brewing twice a day. Mug club and a couple other clubs such as an experimental beer club. Almost everything was made by hand including tables and if not DIY it was purchased from Good Will or garage sales.

The 7th Wonder of Columbus

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And finally!

There is nothing better then a rainy day for taking photos. I was coming back from anti-malwaring DJs dad's computer (Vista Malware 2010 virus problem) and Market Street Diner had zero cars parked in front of it! SO - I stopped and took a few shots!

Have a great week - - - - wait - - I never talked about Walker. Did you know that 29,000 children no loner have health care because of him? Congratulations on getting 500,000 Recall votes on our way to 750,000.

Rod

Hydro update and FOX News mixes up Palin for Fey - OOPS!!

2011-12-14T08:00:00.002-06:00

My brother sent this - a new license plate he saw

Illinois – Where your governors make your license plates.
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The Republicans have a pretty big problem. Yesterday I said that someone besides Romney and Newt might emerge as the GOP candidate, so to continue that thought . . . . .

Romney - conservative voters don't like him because he is too middle of the road, not conservative enough. That is why he is losing in all the polls, he is not enough RIGHT. Newt on the other hand is liked by conservative voters but here is the problem.

Most Americans hate Newt. Independent voters LOATH him. There is no way in hell Newt can beat Obama. Romney has a much much better chance of beating Obama but . . . he is not liked. So the GOP's leading candidate with all of his skeletons in the closet is a sure loser in the BIG election.

Then there is this whole getting out of Iraq thing. I'm against it. We are leaving 16,000 school teachers and infrastructure workers and so forth to the protection of the Iraq Army? I know that all Obama is doing is fulfilling a Bush doctrine but leaving a rather large group of Americans without any U.S. protection seems like we're rolling the dice.

You might say leave Iraq to the Iraqis but they are on the worlds largest oil field that is right next to Iran who would love to control it. Iran COULD make our gas prices jump to $10 a gallon! It's all about the oil.

Of course if Cheney had HIS way we would have a regime change in Iran. He said yesterday that when Iran got our spy drone we should have bombed them. Yea - good call. They are the bad guys for downing our spy drone. sigh! OH - Newt also is all for a regime change in Iran.

OH - one thing about Newt! He vows to support a federal gay-marriage ban, vigorously opposes abortion, and wants to defund Planned Parenthood. Gingrich has been married three times and has copped to serial adultery in his past, has pledged to "uphold the institution of marriage through personal fidelity to my spouse and respect for the marital bonds of others." He's taken a "no-adultery pledge". I think his first two wives are saying - A LITTLE LATE FOR THAT ONE!!
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Hydro Street Brewing. Talk about a DIY Brewery, they should have their own reality show! Sandye and Aaron are doing an amazing job. Things are shaping up with inspections coming soon. I believe Monday (??) is still the official quiet opening as long as inspections go well.

I'll have eight Columbus images on their big wall but I had some problems yesterday. Seems part of their wall is made of reinforced depleted uranium or something. I was drilling away and at one point my drill, instead of going INTO the wall just stopped and just tickled it. Barely made a mark. WTF! Have to go to Plan B.

This is one of the images I'm putting up in the brewery

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Did you see FOX News now says that Kermit the Frog, Miss Piggy, and the rest of the Muppet gang are "actually part of a liberal media plot to "brainwash your kids against capitalism."". That muppet movie is opening all sorts of doors we don't want to have opened. For instance There is a pig engaging in an interspecies relationship with a frog. OH MY GOD!!!

And then there is FOX News who was reporting that Sarah Palin said she was 50/50 on entering the Presidential Race and then showed a clip with Tina Fey by accident.

Ummmmm . . .. that is Tina Fey on SNL!!! Fox is unreal! Not actually news at all, more entertainment that some people THINK is news!

Anybody else see how video games have REALLY gotten so much better in the last tear? WOW! Seriously dude!

It took Modern Warfare 3, 16 days to have ONE BILLION in sales!

And finally - which poster is better- Dark Knight Rises!

Or The Amazing Spiderman

Rod

Packers, Braun, Sandusky, GOP

2011-12-13T07:50:00.005-06:00

Happened again - lots of stuff to comment on Sunday night and all gone Monday morning.

Anyway - Jerry Sandusky -sigh - did he REALLY say that "if any other kids come forward I will turn myself in". WHAT?? Seriously? You do know that MIGHT sound bad right? And when asked if he liked little boys he said "I like boys AND girls". REALLY? Perhaps you should consult your lawyer from time to time.

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Ryan Braun - SHIT!! that is how I feel. I was with Elwood when DJ commented that Braun tested positive and honestly, I was in denial. TYPICALLY when something like this happens, news does not come out until there is a final hearing. But ESPN wanted to get the scoop and came out basically saying Braun is guilty until proven innocent. ESPN has become a tool. They sat on a tape of child molestation for 10 years (was it Sacramento?) saying "we did nothing legally wrong. How about morally wrong!!!!!

Braun - weirdness reins. His first test was higher then anybody has EVER tested. Twice the largest readings ever recorded. Braun head should would have been four times it's normal size.

I got bored

His second test - ZIP, NADA, NOTHING. Does that not seem weird? Yet ESPN took a poll and 83% of people taking the poll say their opinion of Braun has changed! GUILTY until proven innocent.

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Packers - BORING!! Being what arguably could be the best team in NFL history is boring! No one even talks about the Packers - it's like they are in a different league. OH - if only the Packers had Tim Tebow instead of Aaron Rogers. After all - Tebow has lead the Broncos in four straight 4th quarter comebacks! How many games has Rogers had comebacks in in the last 18 games - ONLY ONE!!! Wait. In the last 18 games the Packers have only been losing ONCE in the 4th quarter.

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Ohio - OOPS - GOP in Colorado really screw up!

In the Colorado redistricting battles the GOP attempted to go for it all and challenged the redistricting maps of the commission because they were not drawn the way the GOP preferred, totally pro Republican everywhere in the state.

The Democrats also presented an alternative but because of their laws, the Commission then proceeded to draw up a third map, which made the GOP howl because it is actually considered to be ruinous of the GOPs attempt to take over the legislature. So they went to court.

The GOP rejected the Dem alternative despite it being the 50-50 point in the opinion from a GOP perspective and they took it to the Colorado Supreme Court. The GOP filed an amateur hour brief and the Court then decided to impose the Commissions map rather than the Dem map, all because the GOP launched a legal challenge in the first place.

The GOP ability to win the state senate has evaporated and they might now lose seats now. The GOP continues to trip over themselves, and these guys want to lead our country?
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Once Upon a Time - what a great show that is! If you have not seen it it's pretty darn good.

Another good show is Hell on Wheels

I truly believe we are in the Golden age of TV programming. There are some really really good shows out there, Documentary's I have never seen such as what happened the 24 hours AFTER Pearl Harbor - fascinating!!

Plus - Thursday Night Football will start in week one next year - NFL 3 days a week!!!
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Will Mitt's $10,000 bet be the Howard Dean moment of the 2012 elections? I have mixed reaction. IF, IF Obama loses the election Romney would be my choice to run the gov (odd, he was the whack job candidate 3 years ago and now he is the most sane?) . HOWEVER - Newt? I think there are SO many skeletons in Newts closet he does not stand a chance of winning.

According to the FiveThirtyFive website which forecasts elections - " there is a small but nontrivial chance that the Republican nominee will be someone like Jeb Bush, Paul Ryan, Mitch Daniels, Tim Pawlenty or Chris Christie."

mmmmmmmm Jeb Bush!!!

Walker Ain't So Bad and C'mon Columbus Journal!!!

2011-12-09T08:32:00.000-06:00

So I was emailing and talking to my brother about Walker and I was not getting the type of response I was expecting. I started to get worried that he had gone over to the dark side with him being a high flying businessman with his own multi-layer company and so forth.

But then I realized . . . . he lives in Illinois.

About that same time I was playing online poker and a guy asked if Wisconsin was still going to RECALL our Governor and I said yea. Another guy pipes in and asks why and I said in a nutshell, corruption. He says "corruption?" "You guys don't even know what corruption is". He was from the Dominican Republic or something.

Anyway - thinking of my brother who is the Melotte of Melotte, Morse, Leonatti, Parker and his flat landness I realized we here in Wisconsin have it pretty easy. Look at Illinois and THEIR Government.

Since 1973 they have had FOUR Governors actually serve jail time and two others that were acquitted. One of those acquitted by a jury was rather odd as eight of those jury members, after the trial, received sweet State jobs. That almost sounds fishy doesn't it. In that trial the defense lawyer, a former Illinois Governor stated that "the governorship has the divine right of kings." Sounds like something the current Cheese Pharaoh would say.

William G. Stratton was Governor '53-'61 and was acquitted on tax evasion. Then his successor, Otto Kerner, Jr. was convicted of 17 counts of bribery, conspiracy, perjury, and income-tax charges and spent three years in jail. After getting out of jail he became a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.

His successor was Dan Walker who was involved in the Savings and Loan scandal and convicted of federal crimes related to fraudulent loans to himself. He was sentenced to seven years in prison.

BUT WAIT - THERE'S MORE

A decade went by and then George H. Ryan became governor and spent four years in office. He was convicted in 2006 of corruption related to his time as Illinois Secretary of State in the 1990s. Seems commercial driver's licenses were issued to unqualified truckers in exchange for bribes, and one of the truckers was involved in a crash that killed six children. He is still in prison.

And then there is our buddy Rod Blagojevich, George Ryan's successor. Rod will be spending the next 14 years doing hard time (yes, hard time, not the plushy jail time, if you are convicted for more the 10 years you get actual hard time in a real prison, plus, you spend the first few years doing the BAD jobs).

So in Wisconsin we can complain about Walker but don't complain to Illinois. Also - Illinois has no limit on how long a guy can be Governor. In fact 14 states have no gubernatorial term-limits.

‎315 E. James Street

Columbus Journal.

I'm really hoping the Columbus Journal will post an article about this recall. The local high school newspaper has had more news about this then the Columbus Journal. If the Cbus Journal is a true newspaper they should have both sides. After all they gave a Republican a 1/4 page article about why the budget needed to be put through, should not the OTHER side have the same rights?

I read the Journal every week and they seem to be looking for news, THIS IS NEWS! How many times in American history has there been a Recall . . . .well . . .California has had 32 but they are not of this world. There have only been two successful Governor recalls in American history. This is a first for Wisconsin and a newspaper has NO NEWS??

This IS news, you are a newspaper. You guys are being beaten by high-school kids. You want people to read your newspaper? this is a gift, this is news!! Sure 50% of the people that read the paper will not like the article but 50% will! Don't ignore, inform! or we can continue to look at more photos of people with big checks and where the next pancake breakfast will be or hospital news.

sigh!

Rod Melotte

Taking the "e" out of eMail

2011-12-08T07:44:00.005-06:00

Lots of stuff to say but a catastrophic cranberry juice incident has taken the "e" out of my keyboard. In order to type an "e" I have to POUND it. This is very aggravating.

So today I'll be brief with more tomorrow.

1. MISSING CAT. Have you seen this cat?

Lost somewhere near the downtown area. Her name is Nala. I don't have who to contact but if you do find her and if Joy Hall reads this give me a phone number to contact information.

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The Columbus Journal is refusing to give equal time to the RECALL people. All they want to do is express their views in an adult manner but it seems only Republicans can have their own column in the newspaper. I guess they don't want to have both sides expressing views.

More on this when I have an "e".

If you want to sign the RECALLS (I feel that that word should be all CAPS - why is that?) - 15 E. James street (the below building) is the place to go. Very friendly place and they will walk you through the process. NOTE - Columbus is a City, if you mark TOWN the signature will be tossed out!

They have gotten 1700+ signatures but few from Columbus which is really a slightly liberal town. No one knows about the place - PLEASE spread the word. I was there for about 15 minutes and 4 people stopped from all the small towns in the area because they drive past and see the signs but if you are not driving by you will not know it.

Clyman? Two Hancocks? but no Fort Atkinson!!

LIKE - Columbus-Fall River Grassroots Recall Walker on Facebook!

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Lastly - Walker signed a bill yesterday saying it is now legal to kill a human in Wisconsin. Not totally unlike Texas where you can legally kill girl scouts selling cookies if they ignore a the "no solicitor" sign (this actually happened).

Now the person has to be entering your house. When I lived in Madison a woman entered my house once on a hot summer morning about 7:00. Just walked in accidentally through the open screen door. I believe she was like real drunk . . . . I could have legally killed her! Awesome law!

Cheers
Rod

Burn'in down the house!

2011-12-05T07:49:00.000-06:00

Can you say 18 IN A ROW??

The Indianapolis colts and New England Patriots hold the record for longest winning streaks at 21. The Packers will break the all-time NFL Record IF they beat The Lions on New Years day.
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I had the opportunity to attend a house burning. Here in Columbus to help the fire department they have a random drawing every year and the family that get's the closest to the number has their house burned down. Now don't get upset as this spurs the economy and gives the fire department. It was one of Walkers ideas to create jobs.

JOSH - BEHIND YOU - LOOK BEHIND YOU!!!!

Who brought the marshmallows

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Friday night I went to The Harmony Bar in Madison a middle class working trendy left leaning CHEERS type place with awesome food. I was meeting some long lost friends. We had played on the same softball team for 21 years in the #2 league in Madison. The team was the thing that tied us all together and started 1976.

Well! As I was waiting a father brought in his maybe 5 year old and as they passed the pool table the kid stopped in his tracks, looked at the table and said "DADDY, WHAT IS THAT" Dad says "It's a pool table". "WHAT DOES IT DOO!!!"

a little while later dad with daughter and kid come out to look at the table.


"But, where do the balls GO!"

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So - since Cain has "suspended" his campaign (is this like hiatus?) the beneficiary seems to be Newt who is the greatest threat to the institution of marriage in human history. Let's see, he divorced his 1st wife on her death bed so he could marry his mistress, who he later cheated on and divorced so he could marry the current Mrs. Gingrich, his Tiffany's Princess, Callista.

MAKE HER STOP!!!!

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An Oldie but goody

BCS DECLARES GERMANY WINNER OF WORLD WAR II

USA Ranked 4th

After determining the Big-12 championship game participants, the BCS computers were put to work on other major contests and today the BCS declared Germany to be the winner of World War II.

"Germany put together an incredible number of victories beginning with the annexation of Austria and the Sudentenland and continuing into conference play with defeats of Poland,France, Norway,Sweden, Denmark, Belgium and the Netherlands. Their only home losses came against the USA and Russia; however considering their entire body of work--including an incredibly tough Strength of Schedule (SOS)-our computers deemed them worthy of the #1 ranking."

Questioned about the #4 ranking of the United States the BCS commissioner stated :The US only had two major victories--Japan and Germany. The computer models, unlike humans, aren't influenced by head-to-head contests--they consider each contest to be only a single, equally-weighted event."

German Chancellor Adolph Hitler said "Yes, we lost to the US; but we defeated #2 France in only six weeks." Herr Hitler has been criticized for seeking dramatic victories to earn "style points" to enhance Germany's rankings. Hitler protested "Our contest with Poland was in doubt until the final day and the conditions in Norway were incredibly challenging and demanded the application of additional forces."

The French ranking has also come under scrutiny. The BCS commented"France had a single loss against Germany and following a preseason #1 ranking, they only fell to # 2."

Japan was ranked #3 with victories including Manchuria, Borneo and the Philippines. United States coach Harry Truman was criticized for bad taste for scheduling a "politicking" during the halftime of the Germans bombing of Great Britain. A US fan also made the point that "The German's got too many style points for their sexy offense which continues to obliterate weaker opponents and show off their might after the battle is won. But what about defense ?
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Wisconsin was the only state with a statistically significant decline in employment

2011-12-01T08:23:00.005-06:00

Hey - you know those pro-Walker ads you are seeing on TV telling us how much good he has done for the school system? What they are not telling you as those teachers are from CHARTER schools which are not subject to all of these government rules (like teaching birth control and science). And in four states, Wisconsin included, a Charter School is a for-profit company. They can teach students anything they want with no restrictions but their main goal, is to make a profit.

Don't get me wrong - I'm actually not anti-Charter schools. But taking away from public schools to fund Private I believe is wrong.

OH - and a study came out looking at the Walker budget. There was a choice, lay off 1,500 government employees OR a 7.7% pay cut. Here are some numbers.

For a public sector worker making average wage/salary the loss of take-home pay is $3,949 or about 7.7%. This is what Walker did. Well, that 7.7% equals $1.42 billion of take-home pay that was removed from the Wisconsin economy. Of course laying off 1,500 employees, if each made $946,000 a year, then it would have been equal. Perhaps there are a number of public servants that make that much.

And according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics- "Wisconsin was the only state with a statistically significant decline in employment".

BUT - Walker says Wisconsin is finally back on track because of his leadership!

Well - he is getting help from Obama as the health care industry in Wisconsin has been one of the only leading sectors in jobs creation.

One of the big big problems with the economy as a whole is that people with college degrees have a typical 4.3% unemployment. The problem is non-college degree people who are11.5% unemployed.

Where are these jobs?? Overseas. Trek in Waterloo manufacture most of their bikes in Taiwan and China. Why not the U.S.??? People keep wanting jobs and then companies go overseas and call themselves American companies?

Trek - Waterloo

sigh. So really, when you "buy American" you really have to wonder WHAT is American. I certainly thought Trek was an American company. They sort of are I suppose. They just make most of their bikes NOT in America.

truth be told I have a Giant road bike which is made in Taiwan, Netherlands, and Mainland China.

Rod

The Event Boundary / Pabst and The Kurth

2011-11-30T08:01:00.000-06:00

Seriously - this JUST happened to me!
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Ever have something in your mind to do and you walk into a different room and immediately forget what you are there for? You are not alone and it happens to EVERYBODY. It's not that you are losing your short term memory. In fact it's the opposite. Your brain is too efficient.

There was a study done about this and there was a HUGE difference between a control group who had to exchange objects but stay in the same room and a group that had to go into a different room to exchange objects, same distance away.

It's called The Event Boundary. Passing through a door is an event boundary. Your brain separates episodes of activity and files them away, it's a trick it uses to keep things organized.

If you are in a room all activity is stored and when you walk through into a new room, your brain is SO efficient it starts a new "activity". It sticks the old thoughts into the old file and moves on! So when you "forget" and walk back into the old room you remember right? Your brain has opened that "activity" and you remember!!

Recalling the decision or activity that was made in a different room is difficult because it has been compartmentalized.

How awesome is that!!
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And then there is McRib - WHAT the hell is that made out of!! Want to know? REALLY?? Do you?? Hot Dogs are no longer made of bad things like the old days but McRib?? McRib is the new hot dog.

Can you say "restructured meat product"? Pig bits like tripe, heart, and scalded stomach and let's not forget azodicarbonamide, a flour-bleaching agent most commonly used in the manufacturing of foamed plastics like gym mats and the soles of shoes - I guess it sort of holds it all together.

It's unnutritious mush no bones about it (pun intended).
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And finally the Australian government has banned all adult pornography that features woman with small breasts! Seriously!
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I was walking to a burger dive in Madison for lunch yesterday and for some odd reason the Inn on the Park was looking mighty fine. No I did not have my beer goggles on. So on a spur of the moment, without looking to see if any beer trucks were around I took a shot.

At least the beer truck was Pabst Blue Ribbon which is now based in Los Angeles. and formally known as Best Select and then Pabst Select.

OH - Pabst NEVER won any blue ribbons (sorry balderdash). The one it CLAIMS to have won was in 1893 at the World's Colombian Exposition in Chicago. But many beer vendors say that the Expo never gave out a Blue Ribbon.

Sales of Pabst peaked in 1977, when they reached 18 million barrels.

BTW - the Kurth Breweries high point was 36,200 barrels a year in 1914 making it Americas largest Brewery. at the same time the Kurth also had Americas largest malting operation with a capacity of nearly three million bushels of barley.

I REALLY need to get a shot of The Kurth!! Perhaps tonight!

Cheers
Rod

The Omar Man + Packers vs. the Fort Atkinson Blackhawks

2011-11-29T09:23:00.005-06:00

First I must mention that there is a Star Trek documentary on the Science Network tonight called Star Trek Nation and talks about how Star Trek not only changed TV but society as a whole. It was created by Rod Roddenberry Gene's son. Might be good . . . or not!
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Farmers Almanac forecast for 28th - 30th for Great Lakes - Considerable cloudiness; increasingly windy with scattered rain and snow showers. WOW - going out on a limb there aren't they.

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Hydro Street Brewing update. WELL - I could not see what the big problem with putting a range hood up, I mean come on - I put mine in (or had someone else actually), in an hour!!!

WHO KNEW the hood would weigh 700 pounds!! Today is the day from what I hear. Too bad I'm working. TENTATIVE plans are opening December7th in a quite celebration.

While I was in town I noticed a cool old truck parked on West James. I had instant memory of The Omar Man. I did a quick google and it seems The Omar Man was in more towns then Fort Atkinson. The Omar Man was a door-to-door delivery man of fresh breads and other baked goods from Omar’s Bakery .

“I’m the Omar man, knocking at your door, if you taste my bread (mmmm boy), your gonna want more.”

ANYWAY - there was this truck parked and I went up to it and sure enough it was made in the late 50's. As I approached it I saw a sing on the side that read "Gram pas Bus Service". OH NOO!! this is the bus service that Columbus got??

A guy was inside and I started talking to him and it seems HIS bus service was going to be for Badger games and so forth. He had purchased some seats from an Antique store and was installing them. I felt the need for photos.

International Metro

The truck is an International Metro, one of the first step vans

For more photos go to my photo blog

http://melottephotoimagery.blogspot.com/
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OH - looks like we are in the prime time of the month to castrate farm animals!! SWEET!!!! Looks like it's get'r done night!

BTW - did you know the Green Bay Packers played the Fort Atkinson Blackhawks in 1934?

have a gray day!

Selective memories - Columbus Auditoruim.

2011-11-28T08:55:00.000-06:00

Obviously my Wisconsin basketball experience was traumatic since I have not blogged since the day after. . . . and there was some holiday also I guess.

The big news in Columbus, besides me missing the Holiday Parade (I did not know!!) is that there is now bus service linking Madison to Columbus and the Amtrak Station. Of course this will put Todd Frey out of bigness because he was going to offer carriage rides to and from Madison . . . a three hour ride (insert Gilligan's Island theme song - Todd would be _________________________ fill in the character).

But yes - for $14 a person you can get a ride from or to Madison.
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Did you know that Wal-Mart has extra people and almost all registers open at midnight on the 1st of the month? Seems many people living on food stamps wait outside Wal-Mart and as soon as they can confirm that their food stamps have arrived in their banks they go shopping. Wal-Mart officials say that they are quite busy at midnight on the 1st. WHO KNEW.

Then there is all of this cyber Monday broo-haha.

Just like all the people that say they were against going to war in Iraq when in reality 99% of Americans were all for attacking AT THAT TIME. I know because I was watching and told DJ to watch what happens in following years when they would all say NOOOOOO, I was against the war . . . anyway . . . . People always say - OH - you were pro war!! No - the thing was that EVERYBODY was so amp'd up that NOT going to war was almost viewed as anti-American. It was only later when things started to look shady that people started to pull away and say "OH - I was anti war".

ANYWAY - Cyber Monday is 100% prefabricated. I remember the very first year when people started to order things online. IT was scary and people were all like worried. Then year two came and 30% MORE people were buying online and then all of a sudden Cyber Monday was INVENTED.

The stories you hear about how Cyber Monday came about are all bunk. It was/is a marketing ploy invented by internet retailers. Not some cyber phenomena.
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I was in Fort Atkinson this weekend and decided to do some photo taking. One thing that Fort did while I was gone was create a really really nice River Walk. Steve Sobiak the Economic Development/Energy Sustainability Director of Columbus came out with a great plan for our river that was quickly poo poo'd by the non-thinking, stubborn, dull witted people of Columbus as way outside the box. I was at a econ meeting and a person actually, to me, insulted Steve, and his forward thinking views (although it was more in a joke form but it was an insult! . . I know "I" was insulted . . I guess it has ALWAYS stuck in my craw!). Did you know that a "craw" is the throat of a bird?

I wish I had that plan to show you. The main thing is that Fort's river walk is wonderful. Here is one photo of Fort's River walk looking towards the Main Street Bridge. This is from the spot where Jeff Judd and 2 friends hung Elwood over the railroad bridge by his feet when we were I believe juniors in high school. (the same spot where a child and his police rescuer-er drowned a few years earlier).

Main Street Bridge from the former railroad bridge

That area on the right was all industrial when I lived in Fort and the railroad bridge is now a very much used bike bridge.

One thing I found while walking around was . . well. a lot of empty store fronts (I would have to think a much higher percentage then Columbus) was a large iron sculpture where it looked like a couple upscale bars used to me. Too bad they went belly up.

Catfish Alley

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I don't typically send around stuff for people to watch unless I really think it is something special. This I believe is something very special.

It's a family in Slovenia (just above Italy) that put a video on youtube and BAM - 7,000,000 hits. I told Elwood about this 10 year old girl singing and how I was really taken by her . . . adult-ness, and he said "geez, I feel a little uncomfortable all of a sudden". We watched the video and his first word after it was over was WOW!!!!

http://youtu.be/y8w1fHfcqqE

Solvenia was part of the Roman Empire (I just found that interesting).
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Hydro Street Brewing looks to have a TENTATIVE SECRET opening December 7th . . . if all goes well (which seems to be a problem with inspections and so forth). A grand opening will come later when everything is up and running smoothly. Sandye(sp?) and Aaron from Hydro will also help in a movement to re-energize the "let's fix the Columbus Auditorium" which seems to have gone on the back burner again WHICH I will now start bringing to the fore front again.

I would LOVE to have another chance to photogize the inside of the Auditorium (hint hint). I got some ideas.

So that's it for the time being.

Have a great Cyber Monday!
Rod

My basketball experience

2011-11-23T09:41:00.001-06:00

So it looks like the citizens of Wisconsin will not be getting what they are not paying for. The Department of Corrections can not fill vacancies because people actually get more money on unemployment then to work for State Government.

As balderdash said in his comment "From this point forward the public sector will have a very hard time competing for jobs so you will get what you pay for. I know this as I worked both as a private contract to the state as well as a state employee. I also have left public service for the private sector gold."

A high up suit of Family Services said "why would anybody want to work for Government, lower pay, bad working conditions and no benefits. State government will be hiring the the bottom feeders in talent to run multi million dollar systems. Hope nothing goes wrong because all of the knowledge is gone that created those systems"

You know - If I had a choice between Bush and Walker to run Wisconsin? I would take Bush in a second. I was actually pro Iraq war but anti how it was run and I thought Bush was a buffoon but at least he was not outright flamboyantly corrupt.
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ANYWAY - I went to the Wisconsin basketball game last night and man was it exciting. At one point the game was on the line at 5 to 5 but then the Kangaroos went cold and shot 21% and Wisconsin snuck out with a 77-31 victory.

The thing that got me was just how boring the Kohl Center really is.


Kohl Center

Yea - it's sort of cool on the outside and it does have that ultra famous glass squigglier works on the walls in one area but it's basically a cement building with no real redeeming photo opportunities.

HOWEVER - after I slept on it perhaps I was just not feeling it last night. There are some shot's I would take if I went again.

Perhaps it was the fact that the crowd there and the game as it was was more like watching a opera with polite applause at times. It was so exciting that it looks to me like the most thrilling times for me to take photos was during time outs! WHAT UP WITH THAT!!!

BTW - the shot above? ULTRA WIDE ANGLE LENS BABY!!
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Hydro Street Brewing - STILL having problems getting the hood up for the grill. It's like the lynch pin, everything is waiting on that to be completed so inspections can take place.
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I doubt anybody will read this until Monday when people go back to work.

so have a wonderful Thanks Giving.

Rod

My biased views

2011-11-22T10:08:00.000-06:00

To answer Charlotte.

First - let's agree to disagree OK?

This whole pension thing and paying in. The State pension plan is 100% paid for by government employees. No matter what you hear - Not one penny comes from the citizens of Wisconsin. Not one penny! State employees make less money because they pay more into the pension plans. Exactly like private industry but private industry get higher pay but have poorer pension plans. I made $10 less per hour as a senior programmer in State Government then the exact same job in let's say Cuna or some other large insurance company. I made a choice, make less now for a better future because I was contribution to the pension fund.

Anybody that says we were not paying our fair share is just not telling the truth. Government employees get paid less, have less vacation time and less benefits then the same equivalent jobs in private industry. There are no Christmas parties or any parties of any kind, in 23 years I never got one year end bonus (many large companies gave out $1000 to $4000 bonuses this year). If you work 50 hours in a week you get paid for 40. I paid $200 a month for parking, how much do most people pay for parking at their job? (but that was my choice).

The problem is people compare Government employees to small business who have no benefits which is apples to oranges. If you compare a company with 30,000 employees you can not compare it to a company with 30 employees.

I golf with a Vice Principle for a school and he says what Walker is doing to education is horrific to the schools budgets. Walker believes that "average" is good enough and we can save money by being average.

And for the changes . . .what were those? I believe that Republicans are anti-change and pro failure. They don't WANT America to succeed. If America goes down the tubes they can blame our black President. His fault, he would not cave in to our demands. In the newest poll 67% of Americans believe that Obama has a better idea for creating jobs then Congress. Yet, congress blocks everyone of his ideas.

I truly believe Walker is one of the most corrupt politicians Wisconsin has ever had. I have no problem with Republican views. I just do not like how they say our way or noway. They would rather stagnate then cooperate.

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Back to reality - I was watching the game last night and one thing people never talk about when comparing Favre to Rogers.

Remember when you would watch Favre games and Driver would catch the ball and just get HAMMERED with a crushing tackle? We would all marvel and how he would get up again?

When was the last time you saw Rogers run someone into a head on tackle. There are no stats for this but it shows you just how good Rogers is .

Sign zee papers!! CAN WALKER

2011-11-21T08:08:00.000-06:00

Looking for a place to get rid of corrupt republicans? Go to the old Roberts Small Engine building at 315 E. James St and you can recall Walker, Kleefisch and Dr. Evil himself Scott Fitzgerald. A "Can Walker" food drive in conjunction with the petition signing. People can bring in a canned food donation for the Columbus/Fall River food pantry.

The place will be open until January.

I tell you - I really truly think Republicans IN government are stupid. I do not believe citizen republicans are that way and I actually agree with them on some issues but the ones that go into politics and sign a pledge to never EVER raise taxes no matter WHAT? Even if America goes to war or suffers a catastrophic event, they pledge to NEVER raise taxes. 90% of Republicans have signed this oath.

Know what happens if they go back on their word? They will no longer be in office as they will have millions of dollars pumped into their tea party opponents campaign. So basically Republicans IN GOVERNMENT can not actually think for themselves.
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Frey Carriage Company made JSOnilne last week. Congrats Todd.

I gotta laufe at some of the comments of the article

"Since Scooter is bent on taking us all back to the dark ages with him, these guys should be real busy."

The article can be found here

Frey Carriage Co. fills demand for horse-drawn carriages

And in case some of you do not remember what a horse looks like here is a photo I took of one of those beasts!

This is a horse

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I might have to write another letter to the editor soon. Seems the letters are all "Thank You" and so forth. No one wants to complain. For one thing so many people want opposite side parking solution in winter in Columbus but it seems the City Counsel and the people running Columbus think the citizens are not bright enough to handle it. This is a real problem and they really don't give a crap. time to start making waves.

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Hydro Street Brewing is getting closer to opening. The big stumbling block has been getting a hood installed. The local contractor that was hired to install it just never showed up. Guess he did not really need a job after all.

On December 15th the Columbus Business Roundtable will take place in Hydro Street. I do have one thing to say about that LAST Round Table. They advertised a "Continental Breakfast" but there was no juice. Doesn't a continental breakfast have to have juice? Otherwise it's just coffee and rolls! HEY - just keeping everyone honest here!

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Driving back from Sweep Gallery in Lake Mills I captured this sunset.

However I am now blind and am using teh keybioed on mamory! I tink im doing vell!

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I tried to buy an iPad from Craigslist - tried three times. Emailed as I was instructed - was told it was available, emailed back saying I'll buy it and got reply's . . . "Too Late - sold" WTF!!! Screw you Craiglists . . . list.

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Two Minnesota mechanical engineers were standing at the base of a flagpole, looking up.

A woman walks by and asks what they were doing.

"Ve're supposed to find da height of da flagpole," said Sven, "but ve don't haff a ladder."

The woman took a wrench from her purse, loosened a few bolts, and laid the pole down.

Then she took a tape measure from her pocketbook, took a measurement,

announced, "Eighteen feet, six inches," and walked away.

Ole shook his head and laughed. "Ain't dat just like a voman! Ve ask for da height and she gives us da length!"

Sven and Ole are currently serving in the United States Senate.

Stolen from my other blog

2011-11-16T10:15:00.000-06:00

So this is now my secondary blog as I've been updating the photo blog daily with a new photo - this is what went up yesterday for you guys missing out!! :-)
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I've had a number of requests for Camp Randall Stadium. At art fairs it seems a lot of my images stir memories, it's what I try to do and I believe that is what modern impressionism is all about.

So when at an art fair people will look at my art and all of a sudden access that part of their brain which contains memories and at that time of day and that setting seems to be GOOD memories. I'm asked . . . do you have any paintings of Madison? . . . .yes yes, these are ALWAYS called paintings which, in a way they are. . . anyway . . they always asked for Camp Randall.

If you have ever walked around the stadium you know it's a massive gray piece of cement. Night, shots would be nice (put that in MY memory bank). So I found a place for an inside shot. This is actually NINE photos stitched together and at the moment I give this a 3 out of 5 star rating only because of it's uniqueness/coolness.

I see a number of flaws (the sky is a real problem) that can be fixed when I start all over on it again . . .. or. . . I can go back with my NEW 10-20MM ULTRA WIDE ANGLE LENS. I had to sell my neighbors car to get it but he will never notice.

Looking it hmmmmm - yea - it's a do-over with a 5 star goal.

Click to enlarge

I'll post the color version which might actually be better . .. hmmmm . . opinions are always welcomed.

Rods Photo Blog
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Anybody buying Green Bay Packer Stock? Brilliant timing on this as who would NOT want to buy stock at the moment.

I attended a class/seminar for Social Networking last week and what I got out of it was that this is ONLY the beginning. The next 4 years you well see huge growth in Social Networking. Did you know that many colleges do not even give out email address anymore? Email is so old school and is on the way out. Texting is how people communicate now. Email is . . . . SLOW!!!

I was surprised at how many people are afraid of Social Networking. To many bad things can happen. What if someone says something bad about your company. WELL!!! They are going to ANYWAY so it's better to be online then NOT.

It was an interesting class but not very useful if a person is already online (LIKE Melotte Photo Imagery on Facebook).

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Watched Hell on Wheels - a new western on AMC and I liked it. Deadwood-ish, gritty but interesting. The star reminds me a little of the guy that plays the gun dude on Person of Interest.

Cheers

I Remember Nothing

2011-11-14T10:04:00.000-06:00

I'm all excited. One of my favorite new shows is called "Unforgettable" about a lady cop who remembers EVERYTHING. The reason I'm excited is because Marilu Henner (remember her in Taxi?) is one of six people in the world that actually do remember every second of every day of her life. Not like photographic memory where you remember scenes but these six people remember exactly the feelings, smells just like they are living that moment AGAIN and they can remember EVERY SECOND. It's called hyperthymesia, superior autobiographical memory.

The weird thing is that they created the show and did not know that the condition actually existed! Henner said she knew she could remember EVERYTHING when she was six but was not until she was 18 that she out out no one else had this condition.

It's amazing.

In an interview they were asked how it's done and they all said that it was like they would access a hard drive in their brain and replay it. One interviewer asked "what happened March 4th 1980" and they would go. "March 4th, 1980, it was a Friday, partly cloudy" (they ALWAYS said what day of the week) and then they would describe the day in detail.

ANYWAY - Marilu will co star on an episode and I find that so cool. A real superpower. Funny thing is that Marilu plays a woman with alzheimer's.
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DJ and I went to see the movie "Tower Heist" which was a pretty funny.

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Remember - looking for a daily good photo? Go to Rods new photo blog where I put up a new shot every day (almost)! No really - I'm trying - this makes me work and increases my skills every day . . . and I'm HOT BABY!!!

This is today's newest photo.

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I was watching this whole Penn State thing and people were all confused about Joe Paterno and like how he could not to anything wrong and all that. The thing is that we only know coaches because they are only coaches. Not a CLUE what there are really like. We don't know McCarthy or Bielema or really anybody so we can't say how there moral compass actually is.

On a different subject - Tim Tebow - the guy is AWESOME - he only has to complete 2 passes for a victory - much betetr then Rogers who needs to complete like 30 every game.

Packer defense - do we miss Collins any? YOU BET!! Remember last year when people would say - think how good the Packer offense would be if they had all their weapons. WELL? here you are!! Pretty damn good.

The Packers will fly 10,510 miles this year and at the moment their opponents are 130-126, so the schedule is neither hard nor soft.
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OK - nuff said for one day

Cheers

Go Packers!

It was a GREAT election night!

2011-11-09T10:17:00.000-06:00

It was NOT a good election day for the far right as they really took it on the chin.

After Jennifer Schilling stepped down (after winning a Republican recall) Jill Billings CRUSH the Republican candidate in Wisconsin for the Assembly. VICTORY

In Maine a Koch Bro Republicans wanted to repeal the right for same day registration for the right to vote with same day registration. Oddly the Republicans handed out fliers saying a vote against the Republicans was a vote FOR "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" groups. (I actually saw one of those fliers).

The voters voted 60% to keep same day voting! VICTORY

In Kentucky the Democrats won Governor and Attorney General VICTORY

OHIO - WELL DONE!! John Kaich (the Walker of Ohio) and his SB 5 which stripped collective bargaining rights from workers was CRUSHED!!!!! VICTORY

Mississippi - fetal conception personhood amendment went down surprisingly hard in Mississippi. The Republicans finally found an anti-abortion tactic so extreme it was crushed in a state wide referenda in a deeply dark Red Confederate state like Mississippi. his Amendment might potentially have resulted in a criminal investigation every time a woman miscarried a fertilized egg.

it was defeated 42% YES 58%

Mitt Romney endorsed the Voter ID Law in Maine, SB 5 in Ohio, and the odious fetal personhood Constitutional Amendment in Mississippi and all three were crushed by the voters.

The Republicans/TeaBaggers/Conservatives/Koch Brothers were routed lastnight in the North-East, the Mid-West, the Deep South and the West.
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OK - back in reality a couple more shots from Monday - this first one is of the United States Sugar Company in Madison. My shots are actually pretty colorful but I had to get this one out of the way.

And here is another shot of Olbrich Gardens.

Remember - if you are looking for more photos visit my photo blog

http://www.melottephotoimagery.blogspot.com/

Cheers
Rod

Columbus Cty Council vs. The Chief

2011-11-08T08:31:00.000-06:00

WOW - almost a week?

I was going to blog yesterday but I had a project I was working on which meant leaving home early. My goal was to get more shot of Madison. I've been asked numerous times for more more more of Madison. SO - since I knew today would be totally FUBR weather-wise I would tour MadCity looking for shots.

My MAIN goal was twilight shots of State Street. My timing was off a little and I ended up being totally bored about 3:30 waiting for sunfall which led me to a bar (Pauls) and a beer.

I'll have many photos on my photo blog www.melottephotoimagery.blogspot.com soon. I took a few hundred shots. Olbrich Gardens, the old Sugar Mill behind Olbrich Gardens, a hawk that was watching me, Camp Randall, Observatory Drive, Bascom Hall, more inside the Capitol, and State Street at night and Paul's which I got some REALLY cool shots.

Here is the very first I worked on.

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In Columbus news - - - I find it funny how the biggest turnout of the 20th Century at the City Council Meeting was because of new regulations when it comes to the bars in Columbus. There is a new point system in place for infractions.   Now I've talked to a few people about this and their disdain for the stupid point system (like 25 points for a fight out side the bar and so forth).

So at the meeting the council (who I believe are not dealing with reality a lot of the time) tried to calm the tar and feather masses and frankly . . I think made it WORSE!

The big meeting was because of a letter the chief sent out (this guy just needs to be quieted, every time he writes something it comes out stupid ie: marijuana is a gateway drug to heroin? . . and the guy does not even live in Columbus).

BASICALLY - if a bar gets to many points there is a hearing in front of the council. sigh! Then why have points in the first place. Seriously, it seems to me that SOMEONE is trying to justify their existence by making up more work. Instead of a number system how about a color codes. After three instances a bar would be in code RED and then they would have to go up in front of THE JURY.

The Chief said "I followed the ordnance" which is funny since he does not seem to actually READ certain ordnance's before they start putting up signs.

And speaking of the council - SO many people want alternate side parking in Columbus but the council see's no need for it?   Do they think that the people of Columbus are stupid and can not figure out on an odd number is? sigh!
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Packer Defense - let's put this in perspective. Last Sunday the Packers had a nice lead and the Pack went into a soft defense. Give up yards but do not give up a QUICK TD. Well . . . . they did give up yards and there was a quick TD but take away the onside kick the Pack would have had a easy win.

When you score a LOT of points you will give up more points just because you can play a softer game.
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I've talked to people in other towns and they are think Columbus is really killing fun for kids when it comes to Halloween. Sunday afternoon? Seriously?
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OH - congrats to Henry Elling the son of Henry Elling who is now the Columbus Ambassador and receives all the privileges that come with his title.
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The Cheesehead pharaoh, Walker, has namde teh tree that will go up in the State Capitol a CHRISTMAS TREE!! None of this holiday bull crap. That THAT Freedon of religion trolls! And in other news the Republicans have done away with the 4 hour training course for conceal and carry. No need for courses!   Also there is a law running through the system saying that teachers can now be fired if their students grades are below average. This is scaring the teachers so much that they are teaching better and grades have LEAPED to never heard of levels as if by miracle.

OK - I need breakfast!

Rod

Hydro held up by the State.

2011-11-02T08:24:00.000-05:00

Seems the Madison fire Department Drunk wants to make a law saying you can no longer cook while drunk. Reason is that in Madison there have been to many drunk cooking fires. OK - I can understand why they do not think drunk cooking is advisable but I also feel that when a persons house or apartment burns down giving them a $5000 fine will not really HELP.

They said that maybe putting a fine on drunk cooking will make people be more careful. Yea - I'm sure that will happen.
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Hydro Street Brewery ran into a small road block with paper work. Seems in order to sell your own beer you MUST sell someone else's beer also! My suggestion was Ale asylums Hopelicious (sp?). NOW they must resubmit the state brewery license. Their HOPE was to be open on this date but there is a small set back.

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MR. WIZARD SPEAKS

Cold front moving through this morning - NOT LIKE. November is suppose to be warmer then average but winter as a whole - colder and wetter because of La Nina - HOWEVER they can not take the Arctic Oscillation which is more short term.

A negative Arctic Oscillation is what happened a few years ago when it got so FREAKING cold. Since the early 1970s there has been a positive Arctic Oscillation

With positive Oscillation the higher pressure at midlatitudes drives ocean storms farther north, and changes in the circulation pattern bringing wetter weather to Alaska, Scotland and Scandinavia, as well as drier conditions to the western United States and the Mediterranean. In the positive phase, frigid winter air does not extend as far into the middle of North America as it would during the negative phase of the oscillation. This keeps much of the United States east of the Rocky Mountains warmer than normal, but leaves Greenland and Newfoundland colder than usual. Weather patterns in the negative phase are in general "opposite" to those of the positive phase, as illustrated below.

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This was a shot of the entrance way Knickerbocker Hotel where a friend of mine has his condo.

Have a great day
Rod

Your Move!

2011-11-01T10:24:00.000-05:00

So I was up late last night rooting against mt pick in a pool (if I lose I win the week as others had MORE points on their pick)and there was about a minute and a half to go. The wrong team was inside field goal territory and my team was going to win (which would make me lose) and frankly - I did not care WHO won.

So I started to have a conversation with myself. I should go to bed, it's late and the wrong team will win, but I should stay up because you never know what will happen, but who really cares anyway and I have spent way to much time thinking about it already.

So I go to bed and wake up this morning and look at the score . . .WHAT??? KANSAS CITY WON? BUT BUT HOW . . . . .

Seems the play AFTER I turned off TV the QB fumbled and with like zero time on the clock KC kicks a field goal. sigh!!!
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I've started up my photo blog Melotte Photo Imagery Blog    which will have photos and all sorts of cool links and tips for photographers and others that like . . . photos. I wanted to separate my photography from my social rants and other meaningless drivel.

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Sunday at 9:00 is a new show called Hell On Wheels - "Hell on Wheels tells the epic story of post-Civil War America, focusing on a Confederate soldier (Mount) who sets out to exact revenge on the Union soldiers who have killed his wife. His journey takes him west to Hell on Wheels, a dangerous, raucous, lawless melting pot of a town that travels with and services the construction of the first transcontinental railroad, an engineering feat unprecedented for its time. The series documents the railroad's engineering and construction as well as institutionalized greed and corruption, the immigrant experience, and the plight of newly emancipated African-Americans during Reconstruction. Hell on Wheels chronicles this potent turning point in our nation's history and how uncivilized the business of civilization can be."
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Looking to get back at all of that spam? Next time you get spam with a return envelope - stuff all the crap into that envelope and send it back. They get charged ONLY when it's sent in the mail. The heavier the envelope is the more it cost the spammers.    (insert evil laugh).

One more TV thing - Once Upon A Time - great show - I'm loving it!! "Your move!"

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WHAT Kim Kardashian got a divorce?? OMG!!!!   I was watching some talking head show and they were APPALLED!! Kim Kardashian is making A MOCKERY of the institution if marriage!!   Yea - and the talking head was interviewing Sulu from Star Trek about this earth shattering development !

HEY - you are making a MOCKERY of THE NEWS!!!

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At work today - gotta actually do something

Cheers

Columbus seems to be full of hand wringers

2011-10-31T08:55:00.000-05:00

OK - I'm going to come right out and say it. Halloween, in Columbus, on a Sunday afternoon, is just plain stupid. You are ruining it for kids and don't give me this BS about it being safe unless you are a hand wringing worrier who is looking for terrorists under cars and behind trees.

Our police chief probably wants to cancel halloween altogether but he lives in a completely different town so . . . . .

OH - BTW - Kids are NOT allowed to wear costumes to school!! What the fuck is wrong with Columbus!! The terrorists have won.

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Speaking of other weirdness - people are really getting upset over Columbus politics - WOW - there is something new. The big thing now is parking. You can not park on the street during snow. Alternate side parking would be the SMART thing to do but NOOOOOO! not in Columbus. Reason? no real reason at all to NOT have alternate side parking except for the lazy City Council who are afraid of making a decision.

Perhaps I need to make a Truth in Columbus Politic blog as I'm hearing a lot of excuses and double talking/switching stories to fit the arguments.

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Hey - my football systems are quietly having a great year 10-5 so far and I predicted Philly would crush the Cowboys.

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Giant Lego Man who floated to shore in Sarasota will be held for 90 days like any lost and found. So of you are missing him he's down in Florida.

And if you needed any other reason to NOT but Dominoes Pizza (besides the flavor and dough). Two managers of a Dominoes Pizza are being charged with arson after they burned down a Papa Johns in Florida. What's going on down there in Florida anyway.

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Ever see those trucks with the big white cylinders on 151? Those are the bases for the windmills that are being erected in Arizona. I recently too some shots of a few trucks

I was talking to the pilot car making sure it was OK to take photos (or at least making sure I would not be attacked for taking photos)and after I had permission I was snapping away. Justin the pilot drives up with the driver of the truck and WOW . . .the driver was drop dead handsome. Not the beer gut semi driver but a young, studly George Cloony kind of guy! I swear when he smiled a little gleam star blinked.

However - I was playing around with some shots and this came out. The more I look at it the more I love it. Great for a background on your computer.

So I've been taking this webinar ( short for Web-based Seminar, a presentation, lecture, workshop) from Trey Ratcliff and learning all sorts of things. One of the big things I learned lately is "diffraction" and "hyperfocal distance". Plus all sorts of wonderful things I can do in post processing. I'm photo pumped.

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OK - I'm tired already of the Madoff's and all of their TV play lately.

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I was driving back from Madison Saturday night after leaving Elwood off and turned on the radio to see how Wisconsin did. I switched to radio and the announcers seemed SO SO depressed. I did not know the score but these guys were like SO DOOM AND GLOOM. Still no score but they are going to interview Bret Bielema and Bret comes on and he is SO SO DEPRESSED. Still no score and I did not have a clue what happened. The 1st question is "how will you recover from this game" in a low monotoned depressing voice.

Oh well - Badgers are now ranked 40th in the BCS??
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I see Columbus WI made the USA today.   A driver died at the 151 Speedway. Looks like he passed out going around corner #1. Not an actual race death.

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With this new law saying we can carry guns. When can we fire them off anyway? New Years Eve of course but what about touchdowns? Elections? can we fire them off on election day? Just wondering.

Speaking of hamburgers. We went to Bubs Burgers Saturday on East Wash. Went in, sat down and a little Mexican waitress came up with menus . . . . .wait . . . . Mexican? ummmmmm . . . you don't sell burgers anymore? Seems Bub's is gone and it's now a Mexican place.

So we were in a hamburger mood and went to the Caribou Tavern on East Johnson. They still have WONDERFUL bar burgers.

Nuff
Cheers

A truck Panorama? WHY NOT!! But not now!

2011-10-28T08:18:00.001-05:00

Hope everyone is enjoying the ride in the stock market this month. Could be the best month since 1987. Seems the economy is doing very well and people are spending money. PLUS, overseas the big debt crisis (not unlike what the U.S. had a few years ago before Obama was elected) has been "fixed".

Probably won't last long as I suspect the Wall Street managers will start to take some profits for end month reports. However November and December are typically bullish anyway.

October is called the Bear Killer Month for a reason and is the #1 month in the year for buying cheap stocks. October is the 1st month of the most bullish quarter of the year - HOWEVER - stocks on Halloween is a rarely rises.

Bring on November which boast the biggest % gain on average of all months however the 1st part of November is typically full of downturns because of tax selling. BTW - want free money? Be fully invested the day before and the day after Thanksgiving.
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WOW - what a baseball game last night. I had home brew club but got home for the last 3 innings and WOW. talk about excitement. One of the great, all time World Series games and a finish I doubt I will ever see again! Texas - the first team EVER to blow 3 saves in one World Series game.
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I went to Rio to pick up some steaks and bacon at Jacobson's Sausage Shop which has OUTSTANDING produce and their Grilling Bacon is to die for!

As I left the clouds were so sweet with pop up rain storms I took a drive into the country and came across the Grassy Lake Wildlife Area. I stopped and took a few photos and turned onto Fur Farm Road. Saw a drive off and investigated and took this shot.

As I was driving home I spotted one of those LONG LONG tube trucks at the Visitor Center on 151. You know those trucks with the huge white cylinders? Those are 1/3 of the base of those wind mills (the ones Walker hates). So I stopped and took a panorama of the truck. I have not worked on it yet but I hope that comes out. I could not get the entire thing in my camera so . . panorama? why not! LOL

Have a great Packer-less weekend

Rod

The rich keep getting richer

2011-10-27T08:20:00.001-05:00

It's like Christmas. I received my new monitor yesterday and now I have to figure out how to calibrate it. hmmmm geez - I have so much more space on my desk. I can REALLY fill that extra space up with random crap now!! Look at the difference in size. Technology is wonderful.

Now I can have a monitor JUST for the weather station. Before when ever the station (www.columbuswiweather.com) went belly up I would have to unhook the monitor from one computer and hook it up to the other. There are no switches that will work for hooking up one monitor to THOSE two computers. Weird.   OH - all the geeks say there are but once I show them the plugs and connections and so forth they get this glassy look in their eyes.

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I keep having conversations with people about Walker and they can not see why State employees are so pissed off. Their argument goes something like "Well, WE don't have health care and pay $1000 a month".

I WANT to say - THAT IS YOUR CHOICE!! You decided to NOT work for a place that gives you health care. We took a job that pays less so we can have affordable health care. You decided to work for a smaller company with no health care - it was your choice.

This whole not getting a raise thing does have me baffled. Was anybody expecting to get a raise? Come on!   I laughed - State Employees got emails saying basically nothing but directing them to go to a website . . .except that website is blocked at DOC! LOL

Did you see that the richest 1% made 275% more money since 1979 while the middle class have 40% more money in the same time period.
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Facebook, ever hear of it? They are going to build a huge server farm near the Arctic Circle to take advantage of the climate. SWEET - how would you like to be relocated to 60 miles south of the Arctic Circle.

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There is a new show coming on November 6th on AMC called HELL ON WHEELS - Deadwood fans might like this gritty western.

Don't forget to record "Once Upon A Time" Sunday.

HEY - Survivor - WOW - I won't give anything away but as Jeff Probts said - BIGGEST, BOLDEST MOVE IN THE HISTORY OF SURVIVOR!!   I can not WAIT for next week.

Cheers
Rod

LaRussa and phones lines FAIL!!

2011-10-25T09:31:00.004-05:00

This just in - overnight New Orleans scored another touch down and now lead Indianapolis 99-7.

Peyton Manning was declared the leagues Most Valuable Player even though he has not played a down this year.
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As I wait for my new monitor I fear working on more photographs - HOWEVER - I was contacted from a couple in Green Bay looking for photos of Curly at Lambeau Field. I explained that I tried but could not get anything I really really loved - Curly has a weird background. BUT - I started working once again on the subject. Here is my latest effort.

In the same folder were the shots of Hyde's Mill and since Sweet Lips Gallery asked about perhaps a color rendition of the mill I went back to work to see if I could come up with anything.

Since the colors were not outstanding I went for a more gritty look. hmmmmm this actually looks a little duller on the monitors at work hmmmmm.

----------------------------------------------

Speaking of work - I put my stool sample on my bosses desk today - was not sure where I was suppose to drop it off. I heard something about that on TV - not really sure who it was meant for but I wanted to make sure I was up to code. . . . . I hope he does not mind. Was I suppose to label it?

---------------------------------------------

Got my 401K (deferred comp) quarterly report today - OUCH. Biggest dollar lost ever - BUT - not even close to biggest percentage loss. Biggest percent lose since the 1st quarter of 2009 but still 35% LESS then a couple quarters in 2003.

Still - October has been wonderful (up 9% so far) so it's all good. No worries.

----------------------------------------------------

Ever think Republicans don't want the economy to get better? Pretty obvious to me and I TRY to sit near the center. I keep seeing Facebook "friends" complaining that Obama is not doing anything to help the economy . . .wait . . . .isn't the Republican run House and or Senate stopping everything Obama tries to do? so nothing gets done?

Remember - they were the ones that felt doing nothing was the perfect answer when the American economy was truly tanking.

-----------------------------------------------

If you a chance to see the encore presentation watch "Once Upon A Time" Very very intriguing. From the creators of LOST. BTW - did you guys watching the show see all of the LOST connections? The time on to clock tower? 8:15 - same as the doomed flight in LOST. The smoke monster? Regina's address number of her home (108, appearing everywhere in LOST), the Geranimo Jackson bumper sticker?

I really liked the show - Premise - All of the fairy tale characters we remember are real. They lived in a far off land until an Evil Queen placed a curse upon them all; trapping them in our world as they live mundane lives for all of eternity. Only the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming can lift the curse and save the day. Too bad she doesn't believe in fairy tales...

Lots of flash backs to Fairy Tail time and flash forwards to our time.

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Hey - stating the obvious here but Aaron Roger's quarterback play this year is SICK. First time in NFL history that a QB has had 7 straight games above a 110 QB rating. He leads the NFL in TDs and polls are asking "Who is the 2nd best team in the NFL" and no one is even questioning who the best team is.

Brett Favre was heard saying he is surprised Rogers did not have 7 in a row before now!

-----------------------------------
Baseball game last night? Well - seems the phones rang in the Cards bullpen but no one heard them (seriously !!!) then when the phone was answered they got the wrong guy up in the bullpen. So when LaRussa goes to change pitchers - THE WRONG GUY COMES OUT!!! LOL Technology - FAIL OOPS

The 8th inning last night was one of the most mismanaged innings in world series history!! Totally FUBR I think Tony is going to have a stroke soon! I mean Tony says "What are you doing here" when he calls the wrong pitcher from the bullpen?

Cheers
Rod

Weekend update.

2011-10-24T08:06:00.001-05:00

What is this LinkedIn thing I keep getting invited to join. ????
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I'm in day 3-ish of a fall cold. Can't remember when the last time I had a cold (probably last month or something).
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This weekend I had the bright idea to go to the Liquidation Sale at the Alliant Energy Center. I was looking for a new monitor as I now realize that many of my photographs look much different in print or on other peoples monitors. So I thought I would see how that sale was . . . WOW. Total screw job.

First you pay $6 to park which was fine but THEN - it costs $8 just to get into the show. Well . . . . we had paid $6 already so both DJ and I paid up and were told we could go in and out as many times as we wanted . . . . .why would we do that? Because we had arm loads of good deals?

What a bunch to total garbage being sold by Russians (or people disguised as Russians). I looked at some monitors and they said they were all "new" but they looked like they had been pretty used. I wrote down the numbers of some Samsung monitors but could not find them on the internet.

They had "Coach" Bags for like $40 and you could get three pairs of "Oakly" sunglasses for $20. The only good thing that had were car stereo sub woofers and "new" laptops. I could have gotten a nice velvet Elvis rug I suppose or one of the hundreds scents selling for REALLY cheap.

Yea - total garbage rip-off. I ended up going online - doing research and getting a 20inch monitor from CompUSA.
-----------------------------------

I have the original safety deposit box doors from the F&M Bank and we're trying to figure out a way to sell them. I've contacted a couple of architectural antique websites but they ignore me. I've seen doors like this for sale on line for $50 (not sure if that SELL but I saw them listed). Each one is about 4 pounds and were picked out my Louis H Sullivan (the inventor of the skyscraper). They were installed in 1919 in The Farmers and Merchants Union Bank in Columbus, the LAST of Sullivan's Jewel Box Banks.

The proceeds of the sales will go towards the Historic Foundations restoring of Susan Stares images in the City Hall.
---------------------------
I see Walker is waging war on double dippers but I actually agree with him on this one. The bill wants to stop people retiring and then going back to their same jobs full time. It has nothing to do with people going back for less then half time.
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Train speeds are increasing in Columbus from 60 to 79mph. Did you know that "Motorists are required to yield to trains occupying railroad crossings"? Who knew!!
------------------------------------

I got into it last week with our police chief (who does not live in Columbus) about the big pot bust (19 grams) and he basically said that marijuana is the gateway drug to heroin. That chap who got busted with 19 grams (a little over 1/2 an ounce) (on facebook some "friends of friends" said when they were in school 19 grams meant you were out of pot) faces felony charges for drug-trafficking with the intent to deliver . . .which seems redundant, can you traffic drugs WITHOUT the intent to deliver? OR and a misdemeanor for having a pot pipe I guess in case the felony does not stick.

Now I'm all for busting people with large amounts of pot because one out of a maybe 500 hundred people will become addicted to pot which will make them lazy. But those same people if you took their pot away would PROBABLY become alcoholics and instead of sitting in front of TV being stoned they would be out driving around drunk going from bar to bar.
----------

The Odd Fellows are raising funds for another Honor Flight. This is a fantastic way to show our veterans we care. DJs dad was on an honor flight and he said it was one of the best days of his life. Seeing the smiles and tears on these veterans faces is so so worth it. The Odd Fellows are selling t-shirts for $15 Call (608) 438-2426 for more info.

-----------------

Turkey - with the huge earth quake in turkey I suspect there will be more movements of the plates in the next couple weeks. Always seems that when pressure is released at one place the earth needs to adjust so if I was in an area with earthquakes I would get my travel suitcase ready.

----------------------

I will not mention the Badgers. ouch!!!

OH - I see New Orleans just scored again - I think it's 92-0 now!

That's it.

Cheers
Rod

I am getting into BIG BIG trouble with THIS post!! RANT!!

2011-10-19T09:29:00.000-05:00

I'm turning into grumpy old man - HEY YOU KIDS - GET OFF MY LAWN!!

WELL YEA - DAAAA. MOVE THE SIGN!

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If I could buy stock in one word - I would by stock in "occupy". It seems to be the hot word these days and it should be cheap. Take a look at Google Ngram which tracks how many times a word is used in books and "occupy" has been on the decline for 140 years!!! I'm going to buy a lot.

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I like NASCAR but I don't follow NASCAR but I hear that they are making it harder to draft in this weekends race by messing with the cooling systems. You start to draft and your engine over heats - that is so cool how they can play with engines like that.

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A lot of people are all worried about the Brewers and losing Fielder. Me? I'm actually looking forward to next year. The Brewers will be a BETTER team I believe. Fielder is leaving, not like Attanasio or Melvin are leaving and from what I have read Attanasio had a very very good year in business. And in regards to Roenicke being out coached. Let's see, how long as LaRussa been a coach? LaRussa has WON 2,566 more games then Roeincke has actually COACHED!!
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OH - this weeks Bridgejumper games. 2-1 last week   6-3 overall this year and 458-297 lifetime ATS.

"C" games
Take Minnesota to cover +8 over the Packers
Take Jacksonville to cover +9 over Baltimore

"B" game

Take St. Louis +13.5 to cover whoever they are playing.

For entertainment ONLY!!!
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And finally - had an disagreement with the police chief over the Cbus HUGE crime bust of a teenager with 19 grams of pot (in Fall River actually, it took two police departments to catch the guy). The dude will go to prison for drug trafficking. Hey, as some people on facebook have been saying 19 grams of pot means you are out of pot! 19 grams is a misdemeanor and a $200 fine in Minnesota - a misdemeanor in Illinois, a misdemeanor in Michigan, a misdemeanor in Iowa, a misdemeanor in Indiana but the Cbus police want to send a teenager to prison for 3.5 years and a $10,000 fine.

The Columbus Police Department is doing a fine job for the most part but sometimes it's almost like they are trying to justify their existence by being hard.

Columbus is a wonderful community, low on crime for the most part but as the Chief said. People smoking pot become violent and developmentally disabled AND smoking marijuana leads to larger crimes. In fact the quote was "Robberies, thefts, burglaries and violent crimes are often associated with illegal drugs."   And then he said what of someone overdoses " . . . . . . .sigh!

Well, what about the drunks walking the streets downtown at bar time. Oh wait, binge drinking is not illegal. I guess THEY are OK. Whoever heard of alcohol making someone violent anyway.   And seriously, has anybody EVER seen someone that has just gotten high become violent?.   I know when I was in school (many moons ago) I was surrounded my high people and never saw one person turn violent. EVER.

I wonder how much that big bust of 19 grams cost the tax payers of Columbus.

Now I will wait to be pulled over for having my sticker on the wrong side of my license plate LOL   I'm done ranting. I'm not anti-Columbus Police. I'm anti-hard nosed police in a friendly community. Especially when they don't even LIVE in Columbus. I've met Columbus Police, I've helped them pick up hundreds of papers they dropped on the road my accident and I'm 99% on their side on MOST things. They are a good group for the most part but chest thumping because they took down a 19 gram teenage drug cartel and ruining a teenagers life?    . . . . . . . sigh

peace out

OH - I finished reading book 1 of The Game of Thrones - WOW - what a fantastic ending - OMG!!! Best book EVER!!    On to book 2!

Rod

This and That!

2011-10-17T10:27:00.001-05:00

I see Randy Hopper spent some time in jail this weekend for drunken driving - not sure if his 25 year old "friend" was also in jail. Maybe Walker bailed him out?? no no - I'm pretty sure Walker makes sure he never makes contact with people he screwed over.

------------------------------

Brewers - WOW - I'm thinking we now have a better chance to keep Fielder! MLB talking heads are mirroring my comments from a few months ago. I've always said the Brewers have a better chance then most people think.

As for the playoffs? Hey - LaRussa out managed 1st year head coach Roenicke and the Cards are just plane hot. Did anything ever NOT work for them? It was a fun ride and the Brewer fans classy.

-------------------------------

Look familiar? Leonardo DiCaprio is what I feel one of the best actors currently around. Not sure I'll see this one except on Netflix but . . . . .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vD99zwj-ZUg

-----------------------------------

I think in every pool I'm in I need to LOSE tonight in order to win!! I have the least amount of points on the Jets so if the Jets win I have the least amount to gain. GO DOLPHS!!!

--------------------------------

OH - planted 35 bulbs this weekend with Elwood. OMG!!!! They needed to be 6 inches deep and he was VERY VERY sure that if they were 5.9 inches deep they would all DIE!!! Took HOURS. Not 6.2 inches, not 5.9 inches. And mixing the bulb fertilizer? What exactly was 8 cubic feet? Gotta have the EXACT amount or . . . . THEY WILL DIE!!!

------------------------------------

AJ Hawks finger. I think I'm the only one that actually watches football at out house now. I'm surrounded by 5 others. Josh who now works 6 jobs and works 120 hours a week, plus works out 2 hours a day, never see's his kids anymore so he is playing with Caydance. Jenny who falls asleep because that is what mothers do when someone else can watch the kids for a while, and DJ who is playing with baby Syd. And there I am feeling guilty with my beer watching AJ Hawk give everybody the finger on TV. I try to talk about it but . . . hello? hello? anyone home? Just me watching? sigh Seriously though - I do understand priorities!

Packers play late next week against the Vikings!

Did you know that every time in Packer history they have gone 6-0 they have won the league Championship?

I have nothing more to say!

Cheers
Rod

Where did the Tea Party go.

2011-10-14T08:10:00.007-05:00

Feeling a little weird today. Reason is this is the first day since I quit working for "the man" that I do not have an art fair to prepare for. I've always had some big photo project/fair to be stressed over.

At least now I have a little time to LEARN. I want to learn ACCESS and Lightroom and have a 15 hour tutorial on HDR in the future. OH - I also have some individual photo projects and I SUPPOSE I could clean my room LOL. It's just that this is the first time in 6 months I can relax a little.
------------------------------

Hey - what ever happened to the Tea Party. Did they go away and sulk? Where are their high flying candidates? Romney certainly is not the choice of the conservative right. No Sarah Palin (too bad, THAT would have been so much fun), Michele Bachman's campaign imploded, Donald Trump? Ron Paul? Newt? And Rick Perry is leaking like a sieve.

The last man standing for the Republicans looks to me Romney who's health care plan actually inspired Obamacare. What will FOX do???

The Tea Party is dead or dieing. When in the debates they cheered at sending people to their deaths on death row (seriously? cheering killing a human? is that really the christian way?). Their anti-tax message and constant government-bashing YET wanting the government to create jobs is not working. And remember the elections? When ANYBODY was better then who was holding office and NOW we can get things done because THE TEA PARTY WON!! hmmmmmmmm seems we are still in the same boat, just being rowed by people who don't know how to handle an oar.

Then there is all of this Occupy Wall Street which seems to be the lefts version of the Tea Party full of zombie-costumed, "happily incoherent" anti–Wall Street protesters? What is their goal? How is victory achieved?
-----------------------------------------

OH - anybody wondering I have St. Louis covering 15 points over the Packers this Sunday. It's my "B" game but the "A" game is Atlanta -4 over Carolina - bet the farm on this one - seriously.

And speaking of last nights Brewer game. I get down on the balls and strikes calling of umpires as a good fan does. But I know it's a tough tough game for an ump. I HATE how baseball games now have that little box that shows where the pitch went. That box is how umpires get graded.

Last night the ump was horrific in the 1st inning but he got better as the game went on. It was pretty interesting to watch as his calls on curve balls went from being ridicules to much better and he made a GREAT call at home plate in the Hairston slide.

From Rich - here is the balls and strikes graph - awesome stuff.

What this tells me is that the box on TV is 100% meaningless as there were 4 balls WAY WAY outside that were called strikes that are not even on this chart.

The Brewers are back in the drivers seat and fans are climbing off the ledge. Brewer fans have never ever been to the top of the hill something always goes wrong and the last time it was again, the Cards, that stopped the run. So I understand that with every loss the mood goes all gloomy. Even the Cubs have more World Series they the Brewers.

BTW - Ax - 99mph? well played. And K-Rod - only one guy got on

LaRussa has used 45 pitchers in 9 games WOW!!!

Did you see the tigers got a natural cycle last night single, double, triple, Home Run last night!

Here is another attempt fall colors.

Have a great weekend - Rod

Brewers - sigh

2011-10-13T08:50:00.001-05:00

Wait a minute - did I miss the fall colors again this year?

Speaking of hot dogs. NOW we find out why that guy threw the hot dog at Tiger Woods as he was about to tee off (Tiger that is). He wanted to do something "courageous and epic". Well OF COURSE, if I wanted to do something "courageous and epic" that is the first thing I would think of.

The National Hot Dog and Sausage Council released a statement saying the incident was "reprehensible"!!!
----------------------------

Brewers? I mentioned on this blog last year that I was not really excited about the Cory Hart BIG contract. What happened to his speed??? He seems sluggish and slow this year. Does he have a gut? Nice catch Cory, cost the game . . .well . . so did Braun and Kotsey and Gallardo . . anyone else?! Wait - that is the entire outfield. Braun over ran the Kotsey dive in CF.

I don't normally question Roenicke but get Gomez - a GREAT outfielder, in center. Braun and Hart have like zero range and Morgon can not go back on a ball. St. Louis has a big outfield. sigh.

BUT - it's the playoffs - right now the Brewers have their backs against the wall but a win tonight and they have the advantage and are sitting pretty. BIG game tonight!

OH - the thing with Kotsey. Actually he would have made it back to 2nd but the dirt was wet and when he dove back there was no slide, BAM - stopped dead. Unless he was trying to tag 2nd base with his chin. I know his chin is large but I don't think it's big enough to not use his hands which seemed to be behind him. (actually it would have been pretty funny if the Brewers would have won).

--------------------------------

The water results are in from last hydro year - t osee how Columbus did check out this link of the Columbus Station Water Summery. Cbus had 31.69 inches of precip last year

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hmmmmm - that's all I got.

OH - anyone want a safety deposit box door from the F&M Bank? installed in 1919 in the Louis Sullivan (the father of the skyscraper) "jewel Box" bank. We're selling them to raise money for the Historic Preservation people. They each weight 4 pounds and he cool keys

Talk at ya later.

Rod

Fall Colors and Black & White and Hydro Street Brewery

2011-10-12T09:36:00.000-05:00

Well - it's been a while. Last week was get'r done week for the big art fair in Door County, wait . . .did I say ART FAIR? . . .no no it was a re-sellers dog puppet marshmallow shooter fair and a BIG one. Cars were backed up literally for 5 miles getting into Egg Harbor. In front of my canopy was a line of people 3 wide standing still on the sidewalk and I was a half mile from the main crowd.

The weather was awesome considering that two years ago it was snowing on that date. The colors were amazing - way way way better then down here (more on that later) and what did I see for colors for 10 hours a day?

Here was the odd thing. All but one $20 transaction was in cash. Everybody had cash. In two days I made about 20% less then a good one day show. BUT - we were in Door County so . . . it was fun. Another odd thing was I was all ready to sell these outstanding shots of Door County. Iconic images that people were really excited over but what sold? Everything BUT Door County. I actually started to bring out Madison shots that people loved. We had one person come by and proclaim "OH my - I HAVE that on my wall at home" as she looked at Rainy Day in Madison.

ANYWAY - I did not take one photo in Door County last weekend until I got to Limbaugh field on the way home.

There I took some requests for shots of Curly who stands next to Vince. Not the easiest guy to take with funky background.

And while doing these I was in some sort of B&W mood I guess.

and another one of Vince

---------------------------------------------

"Out of left field" - ever wonder where that saying came from? Cub fans should know - (BTW - a lot of Chicago people in Door County and MOST of them are pretty down on the Bears)!

"Out of left field" arose at the second West Side Park, home of the Chicago Cubs from 1893 to 1915. At times some of the insane would wonder into left field.

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Anybody see the Ken Burns documentary on prohibition? What got me was that the "dry's" were EXACTLY like the Tea Party. It seems because the "dry's" would not bend ONE INCH, they were so so stubborn that it turned people that WERE on their side to the other side.

--------------------------------------

OH - did you see that big accident on the set of "Resident Evil"? Seems 16 zombies fell from some platform and when paramedics arrived the first group were all like "OH MY GOD THIS IS HORRIFIC". They had problems because no one could tell exactly what the injuries were, THEY WERE ALL DEAD ALREADY LOL.
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Took a field trip yesterday to the Hyde Mill near Mount Horeb (oh yea - I have Hydro Street Brewery news also). Fall colors are DEAD. Barely any leaves on the trees at all.

but this is the one I really like

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Hydro Street Brewery - had a sit down and drink with the Sandye and Aaron and drank some smoked porter which was very good. They are waiting for the brewing permits and construction is moving along. There will be a mug club and food and all sorts of good things. Here is how it's looking at the moment. These two really have it together and it's exciting.

They will have a 1 barrel system (about 30 gallons) with 15 to 22 fermentors going at once. The big concern is the first few months as "we" expect the beer to be sold out from demand. There will be coming out parties for new styles and rating sheets for each brews. Very friendly and open and I suspect very busy.

This is a pretty big deal for Columbus. Can you see people eating at Napoli's and walking to Hydro Street for a brew? Oh man, this is a catalyst and will be such a huge boost to the downtown area. Columbus used to have the largest brewery with The Kurth and FINALLY we will have a brewery again.

No date has been set yet. Official papers are still running through the system.

This is getting long so I better stop.

Cheers

Rod

Brent Brent Brent - Gunslinger to Mudslinger

2011-10-05T07:48:00.000-05:00

Talk about passive-aggressive. In an interview Favre, of course, talked about himself when asked about Rogers. " the talent around him is even better than when I was there. So I’m really kind of surprised it took him so long."

Sort of like saying that Paul Goldschmidt's grand slam last night was good but . . . .I'm surprised he did not hit one sooner. Gee Brett, congratulations on retiring, I'm surprised you did not retire sooner.

Speaking of the Brewers - in the 3rd inning I said - get this guy out of there. Of course coach could not but I've seen Marcum pitch a lot this year and TO ME, his body language was screaming at me that he was not comfortable. I knew 100% that at some point he would blow up. I don't know what was happening between him and Lucroy and I have not found anyone talking about it but there was SOMETHING between those two guys.

BUT - didn't matter. Brewers only scores 1 run anyway. Tonight the Brewers go against a leftie and we should have Gomez in center (better fielding). Brewes do well against Saunders who is a flyball pitcher. But then again the D-backs do well against Wolf.

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For anyone wagering on Football I have a "B" game this week. Take Buffalo +1.5 at home against the Eagles.   Bridgejumper is 32-16 in these system games over the last 20 years!
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Rumors - What I don't like is that these rumors so far have always come true - the compensation for State Employees sick leave is sounding rather . . . dire. This should come out later this month and it ;s BUTT UGLY! Still rumors.

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I'm getting ready for the Pumpkin Patch Festival in Door County this weekend. busy busy.   I was at work yesterday at my old real job. Bigness as usual. I worked hard all day on a task and when I finally got past a big hurdle after 6 hours I was told . . OH, never mind we don't need that. sigh!

Oddly - the place was really quite . . . . was never that quiet when I was there . . . .hmmmmmm.

Ale Asylum is moving to a new place on Airport Road. They will be able to brew 40,000 barrels year can expand. Correctly they are in the 8,000 barrels a year.

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OH - remember Walkers call center to create jobs? It received 113 calls that got a recording. 39% of the calls were not called back within 24 hours and 0 jobs were created.
--------------------------------------------

Since I was looking at odds.   It's 50/50 for which party wins re-election and you know - I don't care. I'm not going to get all anal and ruin my life wringing my hands. Life is way to short to put a black cloud over my head in anger over who is President. As long as we are not in some stupid war (I was for the last war IF done correctly . . .which it was not - they should have taken Powell's advice).

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hmmmmm - just saw a Robin, I had not seen Robins for a while, they must be moving south again. I also was a Eastern Blue Bird the other day. The problem now is that when I fill up my feeder the chipping sparrows devour in in 4 hours. It's like they take a bath in the seeds.

Oh well.

I gotta run have a GREAT warm day

Rod

Greatest Weekend in Sports in Wisconsin History

2011-10-03T07:53:00.001-05:00

WOW - "we" ran the table. Two Brewer playoff games, one huge Wisconsin game and a typical Packer game.

Aaron Rogers did something no other QB in NFL history has ever done. Tossed for four TDs and ran two more in. No Packer team has ever scored 142 points in their 1st four games and for the 1st time in something like 40+ years the Packers are 4-0. Rogers had one of the greatest days EVER in NFL History!

Wisconsin is now up to #4 in the pools and the Brewers are on their way to playing St. Louis for the NL Championship because while the Phillies are great in season, they seem to be a poor playoff team.

Speaking of the Brewers, ESPN had an article about how the Brewers are the "Funnest" team in the Major Leagues

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Happy New Water Year. This is the time of year when the water table starts to fill up again. Evapotranspiration finally takes a back seat. Transpiration is the movement of water within a plant and the subsequent loss of water as vapor through the stomata in its leaves. Evapotranspiration is a very important part of the water cycle. A tree that contributes to evapotranspiration can be called an evapotranspirator. So you can say the fall colors in that group of evapotranspirator's is amazing and you will impress your friends. Now with evapotranspiration not happening as much rain water sinks into the ground.

-----

My yard as a ton of mushrooms! Did you know that the size of the mushroom is directly liked to how much food is in the soil? Mushrooms are not a bad thing and you should not worry. The are just feeding on stuff in the soil. No biggie.
-------------------

OH - Tony Romo. The Dallas nightmare. WOW - you think Bret Favre was a headache? Not even close. With Favre a typical game you would have 5 AMAZING throws and 2 bone head blunders every game. With Romo and the Cowboys you have 3 AMAZING throws and 4 bone head blunders. And his favorite QB is . . . . you guess it, Favre. Now you know why Favre was not hired to be a coach. Romo is Favre-lite.

When in doubt and the game on the line throw it as hard as you can into triple coverage. What can possibly go wrong.
--------------------------------

Have an amazing beautiful week! 80 degrees? Are you kidding me?

NO!

Cheers
Rod

Odds on Favs

2011-09-30T08:08:00.001-05:00

The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it comes stronger then their democratic state itself. That in it's essence is fascism - ownership of government by an individual, by a group. - FDR

I see Madison has been voted one of the top 10 cool places for 20-29 year olds. Why you ask? Well because of the normal jobs and so forth you have the "quirky, progressive and hyper-literate urban culture". What? hyper-literate urban culture? I'm not actually sure what that is. Overstimulated knowledge of literature?
------------------------------------------------

I visited the new brewery in Columbus, right across the street from the F&M Bank (sucks to be you "who's") . They have submitted all the paper work, have the liqueur license but the brewers license will take some time. On average it's taking 3 months to get the license as the government is understaffed and are forbidden to hire more (smaller government and all that).

They finally got their building permit and construction is now going at full tilt. I stopped in and took a photo of the hectic, almost crazed level of construction.

It won't be long now until Hyper Street . . . oops Hydro Street Brewery will be serving it's first pint of craft beer.
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Check out this panorama of Lake Geneva I stitched together.

Lake Geneva - about 150 degrees.

--------------------------------------------
I just went out to look at my rain gauge and found a beautiful Monarch Butterfly trapped in it. I put him on some "warm" rocks. We had 0.23 inches of horizontal rain yesterday. Sustained 30mpg winds last night about midnight. The house was a rockin.

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Brewers - I think one of the biggest reason the Brewers will win the series against AZ is the bullpen. KRod could be an MVP on the team. Not that he has pitched THAT well but just having him has solidified the bullpen. It's like he was the missing piece and all others now have their place.

The big question is will we see Slumpy McGoo or Hairston at 3B. It's sad when Counsell is totally out hitting Slumpy in September.

Let's look at both teams and see how they match up. I'll use RC27 for hitting (Runs Created per 27 outs) for the 2nd half of the year.

C Lucroy 3.59 Montero 6.06
1B Fielder 7.95 Goldschmidtz 5.52
2B Weeks 5.11 Hill 6.56
SS Betencourt 4.00 Bloomquest 4.01
3B Slumpy McGoo 3.23 Roberts 4.98
LF Braun 9.37 Parra 6.11
CF - Tony Plush 5.00 Young 4.08
RF - Hart 6.85 Upton 7.23

So the Brewers average 5.64 runs per game. The D'Backs 5.57

Pitching staffs the 2nd half Brewers have an ERA 3.08 D'Backs 3.48

Brewers win series 3-1 taking both at home and one on the road.

If you are wondering about Miller Park - this year Miller Park was 10th out of 30 for giving up the long ball. 6th in hits, 8th in doubles and 8th in triples and overall 10th in runs. Chase Field in Arizona is 5th in runs 10th in HRs, 5th in Hits, 5th in doubles and 6th in triples.

Hold on to your hats - two hitters parks.

Game one the Brewers are -139 to win and large favorites to win the series at -170. Brewers are +800 to with the World Series while the Phillies are +180

Phillies are -220 to with their 1st game and -290 to beat St. Louis!
---------------------------------------

Have a great weekend and let's go for the trifecta! Brewers, Badgers, Packers. And yea - I'm rooting for the Phillies! I hate St. Louis more then Philadelphia!

Here is an oddity - who had the BEST pitching outing of the year in the Majors? Chris Capuano! 9 innings, 2 hits, no runs no walks and 13 Ks and 122 pitches. WHO KNEW!!

rod

Whats a little dent anyway.

2011-09-29T08:10:00.000-05:00

I was a little off with my prediction. If you remember two weeks ago I predicted this

Brewers 95 - 67 .586 ----
Cards 88 - 74 .543 7 games behind!

and in reality the final outcome was

Brewers 96-66
Cards 90-72 6 games behind

I was close.

ESPN will be in Madison for the Game of the Day and tickets are at their all time highest price EVER (which is a redundant sentence) for the game. it is expected that there will be 40,000 Nebraska fans in Madison NOT going to the game. Madison will be a very crazy city Saturday. I bet there will be puke, or shall I say "tactical chunder" everywhere on State Street.
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Being a fashionista I love watching the new fashions that are being pushed on woman and I believe they totally suck. Have you seen what Boston Store, and all the other stores are pushing on us? Do they think we live in New York? 6 inch spike heels and just really weird things no one in Wisconsin or the Midwest would ever wear. Let's see how those heels hold up when it's -10 icy with 3 foot drifts.
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Check out this panorama of the International Boat Show that I stitched together. It's too big for this blog so I had to upload it to it's one page. Originally it 2 by 14 feet. Click on the image to enlarge it.

Rods Pano

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hmmmmmm - every night I remember things I need to say and every morning I have forgotten them. Seems I need to take notes at night!

One thing you need to watch today is the wind - it's going to get REALLY windy gusts up to 50. So this morning I went out and took some shots of the Sweet Autumn Clematis. These shots look a little fuzzy on this site hmmmm.

Remember we thought it was dead as it did not poke it's head out of the ground until the 1st week of June. Elwood and I had to make a small adjustment as we have 2 more. One is on the lattice work and if we went with the original plan we would not be able to get down the stairs.

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Check this out

Friend of mine ordered a specially made Manual, Black, Camaro (90% of Camaro's are Automatics). Took two months to get it. He got a call that it was FINALLY ready and was being shipped to him. Only a three hour trip. He get's it and it seems the delivery truck forgot that there was a chain loose and for three hours that chain was banging against the car. Those are nicks and dents from the chain.

I'm not sure if that little piece of plastic helped any. Yea - he is a little ticked off.

Columbus is the news.

Seems a American Funding Company, here in Cbus made like 3 million calls to the no-call list. OOPS!! so it needs to pay Wisconsin $175,000.

-----------------
That's all I got - I'll take notes tonight when I become brilliant

Rod

How Full Tilt Poker Screwed Poker Players Thanks to Republicans

2011-09-27T08:13:00.001-05:00

I actually went to my old work yesterday. They hired me back for like 1 day a week or whatever. So yesterday was the day I was trying to remember my old phone number and get passwords and remember to plug in LAN connections. One day a week ain't bad.

In fact it seems all the people Walker tried to get rid of are now double dipping. Schools are hiring back teachers because they can not find replacements and so forth. So instead of hiring new people to replace the old people, there are not enough trained new people.

BTW - did you see that it seems many of the jobs Walker said he created are actually OUTSIDE the State of Wisconsin? It's almost like he was not telling the truth or something.

But you can't get totally mad at Republicans (of course you can but follow along). 11 years ago Republicans were all anal about online poker because the Christian right Tea Partiers (before they were formally called Tea Party) believed poker was evil.

The Republicans wanted to shut down all online poker because it was not regulated. After passing a bill which basically DID shut it down online poker (and took $10,000 a year out of my pocket). They made it illegal for banks to accept poker money . . . like a bank could tell it was poker money. So what happened was that Neteller, a very very large AND SAFE bank in England was shut down to Americans.

So with only a few places still open to Americans we were forced to leave our money IN the online sites instead of transferring the money to safety. But recently it was getting harder to get money INTO the online sites (I had not tried to get money INTO a site since 2001 . . didn't have to it was always coming out).

WELL - It seems one major online site. Full Tilt WAS CROOKED. It was a giant ponzi scheme that the Republicans forced poker players to partake in.

The problem started with getting money INTO a poker room. Full Tilt could not get accept money into their accounts, HOWEVER, it wanted business, so it just SAID the money was in the accounts so people could play.

So Full Tilt had hundreds of millions of dollars in virtual money that people were playing with. When someone wanted to cash out they would us OTHER peoples money. Except all of a sudden everyone wanted their money. $300 million is owed to American players. Meanwhile the people running the company were pulling out tens of millions of dollars a month. In fact $444 million were paid to owners and partners while payouts were not being processed.

Lawyers say it was not a ponzi scheme . . . it was just bad management. PokerStars the rivel was having the same problem getting money from US players but instead of saying "yea we got it trust us" they said - "sorry no money no playing"

The whole problem as with all ponzi schemes is what happens when everybody wants their money at once.

So while Republicans sort of had the right idea saying money COULD be stolen, they totally screwed Americans with how they attempted to fix the problem. They actually CREATED the problem by closing all of the SAFE places to store money.

And these guys think they have a better idea on financials?
--------------------------------

Columbus had another 0.42 inches of rain yesterday and combined with the 0.72 inches the day before we are pretty soaked. Madison has had twice that amount. This LOW system has been siting over Wisconsin for about a week now and if you have been watching, a 50 wide 200 mile slash down the middle of Wisconsin has been some of the coldest weather in America.

Also of note is "weather forecast slippage". This is a really hard part of the year for forecasting. The battle between good and evil, summer and winter has begun. The week long predictions for the most part are pretty good but there has been nothing to push the low away. There is a cold front not even on the west coast yet that is now suppose to push it away. We will see.
-------------------

Ticket for the Nebraska/Wisconsin game are going for $400 a ticket on ebay. Did playing high school teams and technical schools really help UW prepare for Nebraska? This is a totally different animal. The College football world will be in Madison this weekend. The game of the week in America.

--------------------

Last weekend I was at the International Wooden Boat Show. This was the first time the show has ever been in Wisconsin and WOW, were there some amazing boats on Lake Geneva. Most were built in the 30s and 40. I walked around all day Saturday snapping photos and now have the task of preparing all 300 for viewing.

The boat above was the first boat to ever go 100mph. It was built in the early 30s Huge engines. The cool thing here is that the owner was able to fire up it's engines from this dock and have it on the trailer in 42 seconds. He demonstrated it. You can't tell from this shot but it's 33 feet long!

In fact that was one of the odd things. As he left the dock and turned left so we could see the broad side people gasped at it's length. They built boats very long back then. At the end of the day there was a boat parade with over 130 antique boats! AWESOME!!!

You can see more at Rod Melotte dot com, I'll be slowly putting more and more shots out there.

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Watched Pan Am last night - excellent show - not like anything else on TV and I liked it. Check it out or record it for something different.

Have a great day today!

Rod

I LIKE TV!!

2011-09-22T07:57:00.000-05:00

This weekend I'm attending the International Boat Show in Lake Geneva BUT DON'T WORRY - I'll be in front of the TV for the Packers!!

I've been reading a lot about Nick Collins injury - scary stuff. One report said "If you look at the replay tape carefully, you will see a slight bend in Collins' neck when he impacts Stewart. That type of involuntary motion to the neck, delivered by an impact at speed, can cause a narrowing of the spinal canal and permanently increase the risk of paralysis from a recurring injury".

I doubt we will ever see Nick Collins play football again which . . for HIM this is a good thing. The average life expectancy of an NFL player is 55 years. Collins is very very lucky he was not paralyzed.

Looking at the injury list is crazy with Packer/former Packers/Badger players

Lee Evans
Aaron Kampman (again)
Al Harris
Jim Leonhard
Josh Bidwell

Before people get all worried about the Packer defense. ALL the NFL teams are having trouble. This looks like Canadian football. Green Bay is ranked 20th in Defense efficiency right behind Minnesota after 2 games. The Bears are 17th. BUT the Packers are #2 on offense and actually #1 in rushing offense. #1 you ask? The reason is that when the Packers rush they ALWAYS achieve their goal. It's not quantity yard but quality yards.

The Bears? #29 on offense.
-------------------------------------

TV - I LIKE TV.

2 Broke Girls is pretty good with some peppy repartee' and an interesting story.

If you have a chance it's a nice comedy. I liked Unforgettable

New Girl - I have always liked Zooey Deschanel but for some reason the show did not make it for me - she was good and I'll have to watch episode #2 as pilots (not piglets) are always a little over the topish with acting.

I have not see Person of Interest or Terra Nova yet.

Of course the BIG news on TV is that this is the last week for All My Children and it's been interesting to see how they are all coming together and saying good bye to people that have been in our homes for 40 years!

One last TV thing - the rock group Cake. What a bunch of ass holes they are. I saw them on the Audience Channel and I tell ya - the lead singer is just a POS in my book.
-------------------------------

Have a great day.

Rod
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HARRRRRR!!

2011-09-19T08:21:00.000-05:00

HARRRR - It's international talk like a pirate day and as Cap'n Slappy says:

Thar be only three pirate jokes in the world. The biggest one is the one that ends with someone usin' "Arrr" in the punchline. Oh, sure, thar be plenty o' these, but they're all the same damn joke.

"What's the pirate movie rated? - Arrr!"
"What kind o' socks does a pirate wear? - Arrrrgyle!"
"What's the problem with the way a pirate speaks? - Arrrrticulation!"

The second joke is the one wear the pirate walks into the bar with a ships wheel attached to the front o' his trousers. The bartender asks, "What the hell is that ships wheel for?" The pirate says, "I don't know, but it's drivin' me nuts!" ARRRRRRR!

And finally. A little boy is trick or treatin' on Halloween by himself. He is dressed as a pirate. At one house, a friendly man asks him, "Where are your buccaneers?" The little boy responds, "On either side o' me 'buccan' head!" ARRRRRRR!!

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Then thar be Micheal Vick! He got slapped last night in the noggon and he be out with a concussion! Oddly no one is really sad about this.

Sad are the Packer Corner backs by giving up 800 yards this year so far. No worries - it's early.BUT - this is an extreme year for the NFL - look at Brady who is putting up video game numbers!
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The weather was good for half the weekend and Saturday we went on the Down Syndrome walk. Here is a shot of Caydence being herself. She had a great time even though she is getting over a cold.

A funny thing happened to Josh. He applied for Channel 15's Biggest Loser contest and got in (even though he is not 700 pounds or anything)

WELL - as told by him they are at the initial weight-in and get to meet their personal trainers. The first 4 contestants meet their trainers and they are buff guys that shake hands and ask normal questions. Then it's time for Josh's trainer.

Out steps this HUGE RIPPED WILD EYED AMAZON WOMAN. She looks him in the eye and says YOU, ME, WE ARE GOING TO WIN THIS THING, I'M GOING TO MAKE YOU HURT AND WHEN WE'RE DONE WORKING OUT TWO HOURS A DAY I'M GOING TO TAKE YOU GROCERY SHOPPING AND IF YOU DON'T KNOW HOW TO COOK THE FOOD I TELL YOU TO EAT I'LL TEACH YOU!

all said in a somewhat intimidating scary way.

Let's just say something about his work outs - his REST period, is running on a treadmill (seriously).

And BTW - I guess there is no food pyramid anymore? It's not a "Food Plate". this is the new "Food Pyramid".

Notice there is no spoon or knife and I can not find where the cake would go.
---------------------------------------------

Nice amount of rain yesterday and this morning. Columbus received 0.51 inches of good soaking rain. In another weird thing - we are at 59 degrees for 18 straight hours.

But here is so real news - the first prediction for snowfall has arrived. We are heading into the 2nd straight year of La Niña and the NOAA prediction, based on previous results from back to back La Niña's, is that we will have below average snow fall.

Here are the last six winters.

2005 - 47.9 inches
2006 - 55.1
2007 - 101.4
2008 - 72.0
2009 - 51.6
2010 - 73.1
2011 - 43.8
Average - 50.9

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I was in Milwaukee with Karl and Jody last Thursday and took a bunch of photos, here is one of a lion in front of the Bradley Foundation house.

also a statue shot which I loved because of what was behind it.

We all know who this is right?

And finally a Milwaukee street scene.

In my pools I have two pools where "in the long run" it would be nice for the Giants to lose tonight - but in one pool I need the Giants to win so I can win the week.

Have a great day!

Rod

Brewers - win going away!!

2011-09-16T08:38:00.004-05:00

THAT was close - I wrote a small blog yesterday before I took off to Milwaukee - I had made a comment about the laundromat burning down (at least that was the report I received) but now I hear a DRYER caught fire and it was extinguished with a fire extinguisher. That is MUCH different the the "laundromat is engulfed in flames".

We have a Cuisinart coffee maker which started spilling over the sides (I think I told you about this once but it's the prolog to another thought). I guess you have to soak the TOP of the carafe in warm soapy water every so often to clean it - ANYWAY before I found the simple fix we purchased an $8 drip coffee maker and while reading the instructions I was perplexed. Then I realized that THEY consider a cup of coffee to be like 6 ounces!! SIX OUNCES?? Why even bother!!
-------------------------
HEY - Survivor looked pretty good but I dislike Ozzie and like Coach much better. Also notice that Jeff Probts is now the Executive Producer. Why is this a big deal you say? Because in the last two Survivor's he has been the Executive Producer and in tribal council's he is allowed to steer the tribes in a certain direction.

For instance - this week John Cochran was on the block to be kicked out and Jeff steered conversations away from him and to Semhar, who was eventually kicked out. And I was happy. I noticed this a few times in the last season. Normally Jeff was pretty fair but all of a sudden I saw a change. THEN I noticed that he had become the Executive Producer. AHH HA!
-----
As I said I went to Milwaukee with Jody and Karl to see their condo. I took my camera (of course) and snapped away! I've never really walked around Milwaukee that much. I mean really explore. Seriously, what a nice city, at least in the downtown district (don't go north of 30th street).

So many people smiled at me an said high. Two older woman saw me and as I passed with my camera tripod and so forth, one said "nice equipment" I said "thanks" and then a few seconds later I said "OH, you mean my camera!". They ignored me.

It was cool for sure but in the sun it felt good. HOWEVER, Columbus was very very close to frost the other night! This would ALMOST have been a record for how soon we got frost. The record was 9/13 and on 9/14 there were patches of frost but not everywhere. We got to 34 degrees.

Back in Milwaukee the condo was nice. The condo/hotel had impressionistic prints all over in muted colors so I created the below shot. I don't know if colors in that era were muted OR they faded over time . . . whatever.

I had an hour to walk around by myself and then Jody and Karl showed me around a bunch. Had lunch at the Water Street Brewery. Here is the inside of the brewery.

As I said I liked downtown Milwaukee. I'm not going to put a lot of photos here because they can be copied to easily. If you want to see them LIKE Melotte Photo Imagery on Facebook OR email me to get on my email list as I send out photos periodically.

In baseball the GOOD news is that Detroit lost and FINALLY Jim Leyland can change his underwear! He was not changing until they lost. TWELVE DAYS MAN!!!

The Brewers - here is the rest of the schedule for the Brewers WITH the opposing teams winning PCT

Cinci .493
Cinci .493
Cinci .493 should win 1.73 games
Cubs .433
Cubs .433
Cubs .433 should win 1.92 games
Florida .447
Florida .447
Florida .447 should win 1.88 games
Pitts .453
Pitts .453
Pitts .453 should win 1.86 games

So the Brewers SHOULD win 7.39 games of their next 12 games - the Magic Number is 8

The Cards play

Philly .655
Philly .655
Philly .655
Philly .655 should win 1.22 games
NYMets .473
NYMets .473
NYMets .473 should win 1.71 games
Cubs .433
Cubs .433
Cubs .433 should win 1.83 games
Hou .342
Hou .342
Hou .342 should win 2.15 games

So the cards SHOULD win 6.91 of the next 13 games

Final Standings

Brewers 95 - 67 .586 ----
Cards 88 - 74 .543 7 games behind!

BTW - K-Rod - shut the f*ck up!! I guess you care MORE about YOU then winning! Would you rather play on a 4th place team as a closer or a first place team as a set-up!! DUDE - leave - you are a free agent and you just told everybody you don't care about the team - just yourself!

Rod

Survivor

2011-09-14T09:01:00.001-05:00

Few things before I get going to Madison.

SURVIVOR - season Premier is tonight on CBS - 8:00 featuring Coach and Ozzy - WHOO HOO! Also tonight is Big Brother 13 finale'.

A few photos of the The Pagami Creek fire in NE Minn (Boundary Waters) thanks to efudd.

Brewers - WHEW - Magic number is now 8 after Braun's walk off HR!! WHOO HOO!!

I have fallen in love with Black IPA's YUMMO!!!! New Holland and Dogzilla make outstanding Black IPAs. New Glarus has a new one, it's good but . . . .not as good as the much more expensive ones mentioned.

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I was doing my spread sheet for the art fair to see what sold and saw that there was a completely different set of prints sold. Of the 19 different prints only ONE was the same as what sold in Fitchburg - weird.

OK - sorry - gotta run.

Cheers
Rod

SMOKE

2011-09-13T11:16:00.002-05:00

The smoke you are smelling is from a HUGE forest fire in northern Minnesota way north of Duluth. it's BLUE here in Columbus.

This morning I was outside and the sky seemed weird, no clouds but weird hazy. Then about 10:00 I start smelling smoke and look outside - BLUE, wind from the north. Word is for a few days of blue-ness - you know what that means? AWESOME sunsets!!

Hey - you have to look at the bright side of things.
--------------------------

Football - last year opening weekend in football there were three 300 hard passers. This year? Thirteen 300 yard passers. Plus three kickoffs were returned for TDs. Most ever on opening day.

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Going to Milwaukee for some photos Thursday, I hope the smoke helps (as opposed to hurting).

I did not have anything to say but felt I should spread the word that if you have breathing problems in the past - JUST WAIT until this smoke hits you!

Just found something - since March 1st

I have and 1891 visitors (not page hits but actual bodies)from California read this blog - the 3rd most of any state.

582 from Germany
15 from Iran

Wyoming is the least amount from one State 19 (and I like Wyoming) I get more from Delaware then from Wyoming. I had more from Esfahan Iran then from Wyoming!

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This site really makes me want to take Amtrak cross country!

Lee Rantz Photography

Cheers!

Rod

The Aba Daba Honeymoon

2011-09-12T08:36:00.000-05:00

So far the featured games of the year (Monday Night football on Thursday and Monday Night Football on Sunday Night) have been outstanding nail biters. The Dallas game last night was SWEET. Even my Dallas friends say Dallas has great talent but STILL are dumb as doorknobs! They continually shoot themselves in the foot and once again - BAM.


Camp Randall 1914

I know nothing about the Wisconsin game this week but at the Art Fair people were telling me I MUST get photos of Camp Randall (did you know that Camp Randall was named Governor Alexander Randall, who later became Postmaster General of the United States.

The photo on the right is Camp Randall in 1914 - I'm pretty sure "Jump Around" would have been frowned upon. (The "Jump Around" tradition started on Saturday, October 10, 1998).

I believe on the photo they are all singing the 1914 hit song by Arthur Fields "The Aba Daba Honeymoon" the words are below:

’Way down in the Congoland
Lived a happy chimpanzee,
She loved a monkey with a long tail,
(Lordy, how she loved him!)
Each night he would find her there,
Swinging in the cocoanut tree,
And the monkey gay, at the break of day,
Lived to hear his Chimpie say:

“Aba, daba, daba, daba, daba, daba, dab,”
Said the Chimpie to the Monk,
“Baba, daba, daba, daba, daba, daba, dab,”
Said the Monkey to the Chimp.
All night long they’d chatter away,
All day long they were happy and gay,
Singing and swinging in their hunky, tonkey way.
“Aba, daba, daba, daba, daba, daba, dab,”
Means “Monk, I love but you,”
“Baba, daba, dab,” is monkeytalk,
means “Chimp, I love you too,”

WELL - I can see how that would put the crowd in a frenzy!!

I'm pretty sure it was not thew other hit song "Back Back Back to Indiana".

Funny thing about "Jump Around". On September 6, 2003 UW officials decided to cancel the "Jump Around" and Stadium security and the local police department had been informed of this decision. Yet no one told the students. When the 4th quarter started the students realized that there was no "Jump Around". Then the entire section sat down in protest, raises their middle fingers and started chanting "FUCK THE SOUND GUY FUCK THE SOUND GUY" Chanting and booing continued through the majority of the fourth quarter. (oh those crazy kids)

Two days later when engineers confirmed that the stadium would suffer no structural damage and after a huge petition was circulated the Chancellor announced that the "Jump Around" tradition would resume and all, once again, was right with the world.

------------------------------

Then there is the Brewers - never fear. The only thing to fear is the fact that against powerhouse pitching they have problems, but look, the Phillies did not really do that well either. All the games against the Cards and Phillies were low scoring. The Brewers will win the division and then in short 7 game series anything can happen.

--------------------------------

Art Fair in Sun Prairie was very good. 25% better then last year in sales (same weather, same spot, same Badger game, everything was the same). Oddly and ONCE AGAIN, what sold in Fitchburg (Vince) did not even get glances Saturday. I wonder if everyone was in a Badger mood. Another thing I have noticed is that strangers are knowing how I am. They come up and call me by name and I don't have a clue who they are. Anyway, all is much better then good on the Art Fair Circuit.

Another surprise was the submarine photos - who knew they would be an attraction. I did know that I was probably the only artist that had WWII Sub photos! One guy purchased a print and told me he was stationed on a Boomer in the 60s (I thought that was WAY WAY awesome. . . a BOOMER. Boomers were the nuke subs that could take out a nation . . as opposed to Hunter Killers that could only take out Boomers). Another old guy was the radio man in older subs. A tattoo artist loved the forward torpedo photo and purchased one saying it would make an outstanding tattoo.

--------------------------------

I don't think DJ will win money this week on her awesome $20 football pool put on by a church (there were legal problems with "pool" and the name is now a "sweepstakes"! Each week she gets 3 random NFL teams. Add all the points scored and she COULD winn $500 a week. This week she had Houston (34) which seemed promising but then she had San Diego and Carolina( 24 & 21). Not going to make the cut. MAYBE 5th place but the Dallas/NYJ game hurt her. There has to be a TON of people in this pool, 17 weeks, 3 random teams $1000 a week given away. All for $20.

---------------------------------

Have a great week and get those fire places ready - high Thursday will be in the middle 50s BRRRRR!

Rod

WOW

2011-09-09T10:58:00.002-05:00

What can you say about last nights game - amazing. Not just the final minute but how the Packers REALLY were tough in the red zone!! And Cobb, pretty sure he is the 1st player to get fined for tying an NFL kick-off record! He said God told him to take it out. What would happen if you did not listen to God. What if God said take a knee. "God told me to take a knee". Well, God WOULD be the best offensive coordinator the Packers have right? And . . . .LORD KNOWS the Pack need help on Special Teams.

Brewers? Yea - why is it all the clips I have seen I see the back of Gomez's jersey! Seriously - you rarely want to see the back of a center fielders jersey.

Today is get the final things ready for the Sun Prairie Art Fair tomorrow - problem is I have to pick up 12 large canvas images and put the hardware on AND pack the UHaul and make sure everything is ready. Man I wish I had those canvas YESTERDAY!!!

The interesting thing about the Art Fair is that this will be the 1st time I've done a fair twice. I have the same spot, the weather is exactly the same, the Badgers are playing at home against a bad team (just like last year). It'll be nice to compare.

Then after being on my feet for 12 hours and setting up and down a pretty sturdy canopy I have to wake up Sunday early for 18 holes of golf for the leagues banquet, FORGETTING that I'll miss IRONMAN AGAIN. No league banquet for me next year - I have to get shots of the IRONMAN competition - ching ching!

Sunday is 911 and one thing that I have been hearing about that time was how sports were so so important to Americans. After 911 Americans needed some sort of normalcy and it was sports that help a lot of people.

I do not have a lot to say but felt I needed to say SOMETHING - now I'll get back to moving stuff into the garage.

Have a great weekend!

OH - this is so funny! I had tears in my eyes!

Louis CK Punches Dog In The Face To Save Her Life

Rod

Hydro Street Brewing Company - Update

2011-09-06T15:45:00.001-05:00

I met with Aaron and Sandye today at what will be Columbus's new Brewery - Hydro Street Brewing Company.

Aaron is shoveling through yards and yards of paperwork and (side note - 90 calories of Coke is like two gulps! - I need another one). . . . . . and Sandye was waiting for some sort of contractor who it seems keep showing up late or never.

There is no firm opening date but things are moving along at Island Speed. However I believe they receive their Liqueur License tonight, one of only a couple available (I did not know the Holding Cell went belly up, what a shame).

However I did get to look at the plans and talk about the process and frankly - I am totally pumped.

Here is what the place looks like RIGHT NOW!!

As you can see Mr. Frey is trying to sell some carriages and I'm thinking he is trying to talk Aaron into the idea that all seating will be in carriages (I think there is an ordnance stating all bar stools must now be in a carriages) . . . (you would not know that because the city website only gets updated once per decade).

BUT if Aaron holds his ground there will be seating for 49 customers, not 50 (there is an ordnance saying only 49, at 50 you get 25 penalty points (that is a new ordnance and if you would ever go the to City Counsel Meetings you would know that).

Speaking of City Council Meetings there is one Tuesday night and I'm thinking about going there and suggesting we get a Town Crier. I have a photo of what the Mayor would look like if he became the town crier.   At least we would know since THE CITY WEBSITE NEVER UPDATES!!

In fact on the website it says: Have you got a question for someone "at City Hall"?
   Got a suggestion?
      Or a complaint?
Well.... here's your chance....   Just click on Request Tracker
      to get in touch with someone in city government who can (and will) respond.

Well - I registered over a week ago and am STILL waiting for my secret password so I can ask a question. The website says they pick up brush every other Tuesday - STILL WAITING!!!

Anyway - the small Brewery will be a 1 barrel a day system. Hoping to have 10 taps with one of those taps being an R&D tap with experimental beer.

A barrel is 43 gallons and a gallon is 8 pints so each day 344 pints will be brewed up (about). All sorts of styles(Miller, Miller Lite, Bud Bud Light, Schlitz Light, Steel Reserve, Pabst Blue Ribbon, Natty Light, Gluek, Beer 30).

mmmm Doesn't the above look good? LOL

OK OK - I JOKE!!

The actual brewing will be enclosed behind wrought iron gates (as per law). A brewing area can not be open to the public. There will be a bar and some food options but I forgot to ask about that part.

Anyway - something to look forward too in the cold months ahead.

Cheers
Rod

Giving the Cheif of Police A Way Out.

2011-09-02T09:14:00.004-05:00

First let me say that the Chief of Police and I are good friends and I totally respect him and his authority (which actually means I've never met the dude and I'm hoping I don't get pulled over because my tail light is not bright enough).

This whole mess was caused by the fine officers in blue when they posted on Facebook "There will be some changes made to the parking restrictions near the elementary / middle schools this week. Watch for signs."

After a few comments/complaints there was a smack down from the Facebook police stating "The changes on Dickason Blvd. were presented to the council for approval last month - during a public meeting. Additionally, these restrictions were always in ordinance under Sec. 98-78(b). This is nothing new except that I have ordered signs."

The problem is for the past 20 years residents on the EAST side of Dickason Blvd have been parking on the street and all of a sudden and without warning it is now NO PARKING.

Response was " Every ordinance has the potential to affect every resident." Notice the word "Potential" There is no "Potential" here - it has a very LARGE affect.

"People need to be more proactive and ask questions and attend meetings, etc.Take more of an interest and ownership and responsibility in what happens."

"We have a city website and we post notices in public buildings (which we all regularly walk into?) and have a city cable access channel and advertise in the local paper. Additionally, I use social media to communicate as well."

I then proposed that the City Council hire a Town Crier so the citizens would be better informed and I believe at the next meeting I'll bring this up!

I mean very few people have Charter, very few people read the Cbus Journal (I did and never saw the notice) and really - who goes to the website regularly. I signed up on the site to voice a comment but can not as of yet because I have not gotten the magic return email that allows me.

SO - here is the deal - the actual ordnance 98-78 b. (1) states " On the west side of the west lane of South Dickason Boulevard from West School to Fuller and on the north side of the 200 block of Fuller Street except for school buses waiting for or engaged in loading or unloading schoolchildren.

I believe the parking in question is on the EAST side of the EAST lane South Dickason. So any tickets that have been given out (if any, I don't know) are in violation and should be ripped up.

I do not see any changes to the ordinances the website.

Since all of a sudden everyone is looking at ordinances (thanks to the Chief) I did see that ordinance 106-35 states: A beautification committee as defined in ordinance 78.33, shall consist of three citizens appointed by the mayor, subject to confirmation by the council in January of each year, for three year terms, one each three years.

Who are these citizens? I know Main Street Org had a committee but they were not "appointed by the mayor".

Just saying.

ANYWAY - I gotta get to work. It's been a very busy week for me (seriously it has).

OH - saw Who'sIn on TV last night talking about the F&M Bank AND I have heard rumors of a big going away get together at The Kurth Wednesday night for Who'sIn who has one foot in Florida and one in Columbus (meaning I would not want to be in Nashville looking straight up!).

More on that when I hear plans.

Have a Laural and Hardy Weekend!

If you see me pulled over honk and wave

geez - is the new Hurricane hitting Columbus? It's raining at .85 inch per hour at the moment.

Rod

Mystery Solved

2011-09-01T08:00:00.000-05:00

I tell ya! "A Game of Thrones: A Song of Ice and Fire: Book One" is an awesome book. Few times in my book reading life have words had a physical effect on me. There have been a few times when I reach the end of a chapter and while the events were not exciting the words and how things transpired made something in me move. . . . .or it could have been that pizza I ate.
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The Columbus Fire Department and the Columbus Police Department have let the citizens of Columbus down this week. First the Fire Department tells a developer it's OK to burn brush for 4 days south of Cbus. Who cares if there is smoke drifting into peoples houses 24/7 for 4+ days straight. After all the Chief does not live there. Who cares that when you wake up a 4:00 in the morning you see flames from an unattended fires.

Then the Police Department decides on a whim there will be no parking near the elementary/middle schools. Of course they don't care about the city residents who park on the street and now must find new places to park.
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On the brighter things. I have watched way to many Brewer games this year and I have noticed behind the batters in the front row was a woman who was keeping pitch by pitch scores. She always had the same exact seat. Now I'll admit that the woman in question was rather good looking. The thing that got me was that she seemed to always be alone and at every game. Different people were always next to her. Who was she? A players wife? Someone working for the Brewers? She was always very "into" the game.

Mystery solved.

Adubya did some research and it seemed other people had been wondering the same question. She is referred to as "Front-Row Amy" on WisSports.net. According to WisSports.net "Apparently, she has had season tickets for three years, and comes to the games by herself. She was in the third row the past few years, but was able to move up to the first row this year. She also commutes from Oshkosh for the games...and the clincher as far as convincing me that this is "our girl," she said that likes to be there alone, so she "can focus on the game and keep score."

Her actual name is Amy Williams(42). She is on Twitter, where she describes herself as "the most passionate Brewers fan you will ever meet."

She also says there that she loves to dance and work out.

Here is a Twitter post - guess she is not a Cub fan

Amy Williams@BrewerGirl823Amy Williams@ Miller Park pkg lot. Sum cubs fans r blasting that stupid song..cubs r gonna win 2day..Really?? Think u just got swept be the 28 Aug via txt

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Last night of golf was last night (odd sentence there). Hit the ball well, didn't score but I was making contact with authority (for the most part).
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Big day in sports Brewers Badgers and Packers. I put $10 on the trifecta. Brewers to win, Packers to cover 4 and Badgers to cover 35. If all of those come in I with $56.

It's a very very silly bet but how often can a person play all three games!

Don't worry about the Brewers. They are playing like a NORMAL good team now, can't expect them to win 75% of all their games. If they win today (they are huge favorites) the Cards have only gained 1 game. Heck, if the Brewers lose all 6 games tot eh Cards they are still up by what 4.5?

Stay cool tonight!

Rod

USS Cobia

2011-08-30T09:13:00.002-05:00

Mary mentioned the U505 in the comments yesterday. That was the sub that had the Enigma codes for WWII. Actually the whole Enigma Code thing is interesting as we had cracked Enigma way back in the late 1930s. But the Germans kept changing the way they used the codes.It was an excellent machine used stupidly.

ANYWAY - the U505 was mentioned a lot in the book "Shadow Divers: The True Adventure of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II by Robert Kurson . . one of the longest titles I had ever seen. Excellent book (I skipped past the personal "how we got to this point" section).

ANYWAY, the USS Cobia was pretty interesting but was NOT built in Wisconsin but is "like" the 28 subs which were built in Manitowoc during World War II

The USS Cobia was a Gato-class submarine which formed the core of the submarine service that was largely responsible for the destruction of the Japanese merchant marine and a large portion of the Imperial Japanese Navy in World War II.


USS Cobia

Her first war patrol was bound for the Bonin Islands where she sank 3 ships one of them the Nisshu Maru, a troop transport carrying a Japanese tank regiment to Iwo Jima. Only two tank crewmen of the 26th Tank Regiment died but all of the regiment's 28 tanks went to the bottom of the sea.

Main gangway leading to the bow. Opening about 2x3 feet.

Second and third patrols were pretty non-eventful . .well OK I suppose it was pretty eventful for THEM at the time, attacked by Japanese aircraft and she rescued two Japanese sailors who had been adrift for 40 days.

The Cobia carried 80 personal and patrols were normally about 2 months. Of those 80 only 15 EVER got to go topside for fresh air - the other 65 never saw the outdoors for 2 months and stayed below in 80-90 degrees and 80-90 % humidity. Showers were few and you COULD smoke on board! Awesome!

Christmas Tree panel showing what hatches were open or closed

Her fourth patrol she sank two sea trucks. One of the targets resisted with machine gun fire which damaged Cobia's radar equipment and killed Ralph Clark Huston Jr., a 20 mm gun loader and the submarine's only casualty of the war.

The radar on the Cobia at the Museum is still operational and is the oldest working radar in the world. She also rescued seven surviving crewmembers of a downed Army bomber. One of the crewmembers, Jean Vandruff. You can read his account of the story here. Here is a photo of him being rescued by the Cobia.

After Engine Room (DJ in the middle).

Fifth and sixth patrols had some bad luck. She attacked a cargo ship, but was driven deep by depth charges hurled by minelayer Hatsutaka. I did not realize that depth charges were not meant not SINK a sub but to push it to the surface for capture. Sinking was just a plan "B". She could go to a depth of 300 feet.

Bow torpedo tubes

What got me about being inside was there was that like the above photo - not one part of the sub would have been nice to bounce off of in an attack. STUFF everywhere and the above photo looks much more roomy then it really was.

There are parts of the ship I could not get into as they were too small for a tour. The conning tower the actual engine room and many rooms were smaller then a bathroom stall. The actual toilets, of which there were 5(?) had a process of 9 actions to flush. Miss one of those things and the next guy got "freckled". Showers were used to store food so no showers.

So that is my story - I'm hoping to get up close and personal at some point on the USS Cobia.

Have a great rest of the week, turning HOT and then turning COLD. Your typical late summer heat up, violent weather, and then cool down.

Thursday the Packers play, the Badgers play and the Brewers play, lets make it a trifecta!

Cheers!

Rod

So So Close - uber long blog

2011-08-29T07:36:00.000-05:00

Spent a couple days in Door County - sort of a business trip to get a few more photos for the Pumpkin Patch Festival in Egg Harbor. While my canopy is looking good for around the Madison area if you take out the big threee pieces of canvas that have the State Capitol I have some wall space to fill.

But first - I need to tell a story of Milo. As you all know Milo hates coffee, can not stand the smell and will go out of his way to rid the world of coffee.

Last Sunday I had made coffee and Milo was outside catching more mice (there is a shit load of mice it seems in the area as we get a present every morning.) With him being outside it was safe to have coffee so I set the cup on the little area above the couch so DJ could grab it.

I sat down and was reading the paper and DJ was reading and we here MEOW!! I go let Milo in and go back to the paper. All of a sudden a Netflix envelope drops on my head and we look up and there is DJ's full cup of coffee, literally, wobbling on the edge of the ledge a few feet above our heads with Milo, I swear smiling over it like a cheshire cat. MILO!!!!

Since I'm on a Milo thought wave. We left Milo and Sierra along to protect the house and left a huge bowl of food and water for them to munch on. We get home and open up the door and there is the garbage on the floor (oops), empty bowls and the entire canister of cat food, upside down on the floor.

Not only does Milo know how to open the sliding doors to the house (unless we lock them) but he has also learned that knocking food in containers off the counters, SOMETIMES, opens them spilling the contents (like a dozen cupcakes) onto the floor for any animal to eat. Blake did not feel good the night of the cupcakes!
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Door County was pretty nice except for the complete lack of cloud cover. Clear blue sky which I loath for photography. But, I made do. One thing that was brought to my attention was that "Vince" might not be a big seller. Seems over half of the cars up there were from Illinois. I need to make it down to Chicago.

We were only up for one and a half days so basically we just drove around looking for targets of opportunity. Had a vague plan but many times it's the surprise's that make the best shots. We traveled up to Deaths Door where the ferry takes people to Washington Island and took some shots but not really anything to get excited about. However at Gills Rock I saw a scene flash by and DJ commented there might be a shot so we stopped and talked to some fishermen.

Here is the results.

Gills Rock

This looks MUCH better large - I tried several things and everything just looked like a photograph that anybody could take. So I tried it out a little with the same technique I used on the wooden boat panoramic.

After stopping there for a while we went to Peninsula State Park so Blake could walk his favorite trail - the Hemlock Trail. He LOVES this little hike as it's soft on his feet and he is just in heaven. We let him go and with a huge grin on his face he leads the way. If you know Blake he is like walking a sack of potatoes but get him on this trail and just takes off wagging his tail. Well, it's a long trail (for him) and is downhill the first half mile. We started the 2nd half and found a bench and were "resting" as he was huffing and puffing and we had him sit for a few moments.

He would have none of the sitting. He looked at us with a huge grin and happy sparkling eyes and BARK!! WOW - he never barks. He wanted to GO GO GO. Remember, he's 14 years old and according to the UK Kennel Club the average life span for a Cardigan Welsh Corgi is 11.7 years.

Well - we started again and he was a little trooper huffing and puffing and we made it.

Have you ever seen what the Iron Men looks like the day after the race? I've always wanted to push them over and run because I knew they could not catch me. Blake was sore on all for legs. He had problems getting out of his bed, the sides were too high! He spent the next day in the car sleeping and as of Monday morning he is still very sore and can not move a lot - I think I'll have to call the vet for pain pills.

We went to Cave Point as I had an idea for a shot but once we got there - it was CRAZY busy. Two bus loads of Japanese (not that I have a problem with Japanese), a biker gang, a group of knuckleheads swimming, and 4 or 5 large families, yea, not a great time for a serine scenic photo.

However - as luck would have it - the very first thing I did was stop at the entrance and snap off some photos. It was nothing I had not seen before . . . but maybe I just did not SEE it before. Maybe it was the lighting (we went from clear blue to total blah cloud cover in like 10 minutes).

I had walked through that opening every year for the last 40 years but on that particular day something drew me to the scene.

Opening to Cave Point

And as I was taking that shot (actually I ran back to the car to get a remote sensor of the camera) the cycle gang roared in, the buses can in, the knuckled head were looking to a place to swim in Lake Michigan and so forth.

OH - I forgot - another shot from Gills Rock.

I'm still trying to figure out how to crop this. In a 12x36 pano? I don't know - it's vexing me - maybe a perfect square? Here is the pano.

Maybe a vertical pano - I don't know. I swear I took more shots but seems I didn't - the round bobber things are the stars!

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Seagulls - wanted to get a seagull perched on something - never happened!

So I took some shots of seagulls in flight - they looked like snapshots of seagulls in flight that anybody could take (like me). Hey - I'm tossing things out there to hear any comments (good comments) - sometimes I stumble on something (Rainy Day in Madison was one of those).


Jonathon

On the way back to Columbus we stopped in Algoma for a lighthouse shot - BTW - the temperature in Algoma Friday at 2:30 was 68 degrees!!

Also on the way down from Door we stopped at the Wisconsin Maritime Museum to tour the USS Cobia. I have a bunch of shots on the website of the inside and will be making some posters but here is one of the outside of the ship.

I'll have more tomorrow - this is getting rather long!

Warm end of the week coming up!

Have a good one.
Rod

doughnut shake down

2011-08-24T09:05:00.001-05:00

The biggest news I can think of is that finally, FINALLY police have cracked the doughnut shake down that was happening in Greece. Seems two Bulgarian men and a Greek wrestling champion were using violence to bully their way into the doughnut bigness. Police had to pose as undercover doughnut vendors - WHEW!!!
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Anybody see the celebrations in Libya? Why can't we in America go nuts and shoot guns in the air with wild excitement - that would ROCK!!! Think about how a Green Bay Packer game would be so much more fun if after a touchdown we were allowed to fire indiscriminately into the air.

There was one scene in Libya last night where a group, looking a lot like Mad Max characters, were kneeling for a camera cheering and a group was standing behind them. All of a sudden the kneeling group started hooping and screaming and shooting their guns, INCHES from the heads of the guys standing in the back (who looked VERY surprised).

Celebrations are so fun!
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Game of Thrones - AWESOME book! Seriously!!!
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Brewers are on the cover of Sports Illustrated and I have now heard a few national sports people at ESPN wondering if the Phillies are actually the favorites anymore. You know this little winning streak is looking less and less like a streak but more like . . normal. The second half plus a few extra has the Brewers 33-11. NOT too shabby. Can you call 44 games an anomaly? I've been putting money on the Brewers every game - not even carrying who is pitching. Just plunk it down like a monkey! Doing fairly well :-)

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Packers are 9 point favs over Indianapolis Friday night.
Packers are even money to win more then 11.5 games, the only other team to have an over/under of 11.5 is New England.

Green Bay is 2nd in winning the Super Bowl behind the Patriots. +650 (bet 100 win $650)

Wisconsin is -180 to win MORE then 9 games this season (meaning bet $180 to WIN $100, plus your $180 back).
The Badgers have a 25 to 1 chance of winning the BCS Championship.
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I just saw they opened a new Zip Line in the Catskills - it's 4.6 miles long and 600 feet above the ground at some points. THAT WOULD BE AWESOME. DJ and I almost went on a zip line in Squaw Valley - we were pumped but . . . . Closed on Mondays!! RATS!!!

Columbus should have a zip line - maybe from the water tower to . .UDEY Damn!!!
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Walker Walker Walker - not a great week for the Cheesehead Pharaoh. First . . did you hear his announcement about how many jobs he created last month? hmmmmm I didn't either. Two moths ago he had a big presser and was touting 9,000 new jobs. This month all was quite. Move on.

OH - Wisconsin LOST 12,500 jobs! (damn liberal Democrat's are to blame).

Then with the recalls going badly for him (they went very badly, not catastrophic but very very bad) he is feeling some pressure. So he decided that it's time to talk to his socialist friends "and mend fences, let's all work together".

Well, his little butt buddy Fitz had to vacuum his dog and could not make it to the big meetings. In fact all of the Gov's buddy's had some other very important things to do . . . . geez, it was almost like they were distancing themselves from him.

I'm sure State employees will get a HUGE jolt today or tomorrow when they see the paychecks - NOT AS ADVERTISED!!! A TON comes out this check. Hundreds of dollars extra. Instead of $80 for Health insurance, $250!! SWEET, that will make people happy.

OH - interesting graph of the GOP hopefulls.

Lastly - you have all heard that Obama's approval ratings are declining. No worries - they are well within the norms of a President. The thing that is out of normal is that his likeability ratings are still very strong.

Have a great couple days!

Rod