This morning, my wife had this weird feeling. So she called her niece to see how Linda (wife’s sister-in-law, sister of her first husband) was doing.

Linda passed away this morning in her sleep.

It was good for my wife that we did go and visit with her Wednesday morning. They talked and laughed about everything. Told my wife, keep those memories of her and know that she has gone to be with her mother and her brother.

It never is a happy or good occasion when a loved one passes on.

We did go to Winterset this morning and picked up the camera. Again, it was a wonder that the camera was still on the table at the park. And the very nice Korean woman is tickled that her camera with all the pictures she took on her travels of the USA and Canada are again in safe hands.

Having off and on little drizzles of rain today. And watched the news about flooding in various parts of Iowa. Tell you, if you have never been in a flood, you really can’t imagine what these poor people are going through.We are lucky here in that we are not that near any river or stream that could overflow and flood us.

Wife is baking and cooking stuff for the baby shower tomorrow. And found out today that the doctor may birth the baby in 2-3 weeks. Not let the baby girl go to full term. This is because the mother is diabetic and they do not want the baby to be diabetic also. As soon as they verify that the lungs of the baby are fully formed, they will deliver her. Again, another worry for the family.

Now, before you forget to do so, call or better yet visit if you can those relatives of yours that are elderly or may have health problems. And let them know you love them.

Today found out that our sister-in-law I wrote about yesterday is dropping a bit faster. They now are giving her morphine every 2 hours instead of 4 hours. Doctors are a bit vague about how much time she has left, but everyone has been told to visit her in the mornings only as soon as possible. Saturday morning my wife and her oldest daughter will be dropping by to visit and my wife said, probably be the last time she will see her until the funeral. Very sad really, to see this great woman slide so fast and look so sick (can’t think of another word to describe how she looks without getting gross on you all).

Then last night, our daughter told wife that her husband’s older brother has been diagnosed with cancer of the kidney. They will be taking out one of the kidneys soon, plus check him carefully to see if the cancer has spread. Everyone is hoping that the cancer is only in the kidney and removing the kidney removes the cancer for good. He has been a bit weak for some time, and skinny.

Today one of my wife’s sisters came this way from Coralville (east end of Iowa) with 3 Korean ladies (one who had her 2 kids with her). Some connection between university in Seoul and the University of Iowa in Iowa City, plus the sister’s church. They all wanted to come to Madison County and visit all the covered bridges. So Becky (my wife if you have forgot already) met them in Winterset and they went to lunch after visiting John Wayne’s birthplace and seeing his new statue. After they went to the park in there to see the Cutler bridge. Then walk (the road was blocked off) up to see the stone tower. Well, Becky left then as no way she was going to walk uphill about a mile or so to see the tower (she did that once before and swore no more walking up there again for her). Anyways, to make a long story short, her sister called from Coralville a little over an hour ago. Seems the Korean lady left her camera on the table at the park! Yes, all the pictures she had taken on her journey around the USA and Canada (she said she has drove about the same distance that it is by air from Korea to here,  about 6,000 miles). So Becky called Marcia (cousin, Aunt Louise’s daughter) and Marcia called a friend of hers in Winterset. Guess what? He went to the park and the camera was still on the table! How about that for good news to offset a little bit the sad news we been getting? In the morning, Becky will go to Winterset and pick the camera up. Return it this saturday when everyone gets together for the baby shower in Des Moines (Marcia’s first granddaughter!) I bet there were some good Korean words used when the lady found out her camera was found and it was safe.

No rain today, but the ground is so saturated that so far the top layer has yet to dry out. Took the hoe to wipe out some weeds that dared to pop up and it was hoeing mud. Hopefully the rain they forecast for tonight and tomorrow does not come here or if it does, it is just a light sprinkling like yesterday.

Hey, got 21 jalapenos picked! Told wife, tomorrow or Sunday got to slice all of them up and pickle them suckers for use later. Finally, a use for the dill plants growing wild at the other end of the building.

With our president and his liberal democrat cohorts in charge, are we due to see bread lines like this one?

Bread line during Great Depression
(Picture from the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration.)

And how many of you remember these two? Harpo and Groucho Marx? (no relation to Karl Marx)

Okay, Sunday and Monday we got a few thunderstorms. And they dropped some serious rain here! Our rain gauge recorded for the Sunday thunderstorm a total of 3 inches. Well, the great governmental agency that runs the weather service as usual blew it and gave us just 1.59 inches. Not too far off the mark really compared to Monday. Monday morning early a thunderstorm came by that dropped 5 inches of rain! But more during the morning hours brought us another 2 inches. For a total rainfall of 7 inches for monday. But the government as usual, really blew it and said we only got .55 inches of rain! See, not only do they take our money in huge amounts and dole it back to us in small amounts, but they do the same to rain. Oh well, such is life.

Now all that rain has not helped our gardens at all. They were and still are so water soaked that just about all the plants are varying shades of yellow. Hopefully soon we will get several days of good sun and warm weather to dry out the gardens and perk those plants back up. But the forecast so far is more rain tonight, tomorrow, tomorrow night, the next day and night. In other words, we are going to get even more rain to make sure the plants don’t dry out, but continue gasping for air for all the water in the ground. Sure that Saturday is start of a trend of sunny days and warm weather.

Jalapeno plants are doing good! Had one the other day and it was delicious on the nachos (yes, and hot). Today some dropped on the ground because of the rain so wife brought them inside (just 4 decent sized peppers). And tomorrow or next day, I will pick about 12-15 good sized peppers that are ready. Think we will have a nice huge crop of jalapenos this year. We intend to slice them and pickle them as freezing them we discovered is not the best way to preserve them.

Tomato plants are coming along. Except for 2 plants, all have blooms and little to golf sized fruit on them. In a couple weeks at most we should be harvesting a few tomatoes each day. We will get enough of a crop for my wife to make quite a few quarts of salsa. Half her mild way and the other half my hot way (lots of fresh jalapenos in my half).

Yesterday we went up to Des Moines. Visited Aunt Louise. Yes, brought her some food so she won’t starve. That is what she says, if not for us and her daughter she would starve there as the food is not to her liking. Plus the weekly thing where my wife styled her hair and got her looking gorgeous for being 98. Aunt Louise again was in a talkative mood. Talking (this is where I just sit there as I do not know half the people she talks about) about the early days, the families (hers and my wife’s, as Aunt Louise is the sister of my wife’s mother) and who died, married, had a baby, and so forth. Eventually she let us leave so she could proceed to her meal. We stopped by Aldi and loaded up on food items my wife said we need if we want to survive. Then back to home.

Where wife had a phone call almost as we walked in the door from a niece of hers on her first husband’s side. Her mother, sister of wife’s first husband (he is dead) was put under hospice care and they are giving her some morphine mixture every 4 hours to keep her pain down. And they do not give her much more time. She has gone over the 6 months the doctors gave her to live last year. Her birthday is this Sunday and she wants to celebrate it so she can say she lived longer than her mother. So she is going downhill fast! And this morning we drove up to Adel to visit with her. Tell you, she barely looks like the woman I know! Her face is all puffy, just a few straggly strands of hair on her head, her legs are way swollen and look terrible. So I just said hello to her and hugged her. Then let my wife take over as it is her sister-in-law. They both talked and laughed for a couple of hours about everything and everybody. We left about 1230pm and came on home. Got a bit of rain then, from just south of Des Moines to our exit. Thus a little bit more rain for the gardens!

This Saturday wife and her daughter will go back to Adel and visit with Linda (yes, that is her name, forgot to mention in previous paragraph) for a bit before they go to a baby shower. Baby shower is for the proud mother of Aunt Louise’s first and guess only great-granddaughter. From what I have gathered over the many years, baby showers are not for men so of course I will stay home.

Okay, have to add this one, as I read it all earlier this afternoon.

Let Them Eat Dog
A modest proposal for tossing Fido in the oven.

Despite the fact that it’s perfectly legal in 44 states, eating “man’s best friend” is as taboo as a man eating his best friend. Even the most enthusiastic carnivores won’t eat dogs. TV guy and sometimes cooker Gordon Ramsay can get pretty macho with lambs and piglets when doing publicity for something he’s selling, but you’ll never see a puppy peeking out of one of his pots. And though he once said he’d electrocute his children if they became vegetarian, one can’t help but wonder what his response would be if they poached the family pooch.

Now go read the entire article here: Modest Proposal

And just a bit of conservative news to offset MSM and all their liberal drivel that few I would hope actually believe. I mean, surely you do not believe what CBS, NBC, MSNBC, etc puts out for news?

Note to White House: Stop Obsessing With Fox News

Now this really is a weird one!

Yesterday at Humeston, took scads of pictures with our digital camera. Worked excellent and all the pictures came out great.

Late afternoon yesterday, I took the card out of the camera and uploaded all the pics on the card to our computer.

Wife was happy and she did whatever she does with the pictures, then upload a bunch of them to her facebook.

So everything is okay, right?

Wrong!

Later in the evening, for some unknown reason, I picked the camera up and clicked the on button.

And it did NOT go on!

Thus I changed the batteries in the camera with new batteries.

And it did NOT go on!

So I took the batteries and the card out of the camera, and shot in a burst or two of air into the chamber. Then put the batteries and card back in.

And it did NOT go on!

Earlier this morning, checked and recheced. Even took the batteries out (new remember) and put in two more new batteries (and yes, I surely did place the batteries the correct way in the camera, aint lost my mind that much yet).

And it did NOT go on!

So at some point we will have to buy a new camera. Which reminds me. The camera case has now outlasted 3 (three) digital cameras in the past 8 or 9 years. And will be the home probably of a new digital camera.

Rest in peace, you piece of Kodak crap! hahahahahhahahahha