With nine you get eggroll

Last night we had the family over and Dorothy made egg rolls. Lots of good food and laughter.

Gracen and Santa

Hunter's turn

It was Hunter's turn for a birthday dinner.

Here is Hunter's first appearance on the blog along with Tara, Marley and Sam.

Marley's Party

Last night we were at Marley's 12th birthday party.  Her mom did a great job organizing and putting this thing together.  It had a cake decorating theme and the girls enjoyed it.

Here's the cake Dorothy made.

Marley begins to design.

They all get busy with their cakes

Even Hunter tries his hand.

Jenna gets some assistance.

I took this picture before the girls posed.

Here's the first picture of Marley to ever appear on this blog. She was four years old.

quote of the day

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had  not lived.

--Henry David Thoreau

Recipes

Since my retirement I've been doing most of the cooking. I'm always searching for new recipes and every once in awhile I find an exceptional one.  I've decided to feature the good ones on the blog.
This recipe is very simple to make and is very tasty.

Boudin Stuffed Peppers

Simple ingredients make this an easy project. I used red bell peppers but any color will do. Pickled banana peppers, Boudin sausage, a tomato and two slices of cheese round out the main fixings.

Cut the tops off two bell peppers, remove the seeds  and boil in water for at least three minutes. Warm two links of Boudin sausage in the microwave for two minutes, then remove the casings and crumble into a bowl. Remove the peppers from the boiling water, shake black pepper into the interior of the peppers (you'll be glad you did).  Spoon the Boudin into the peppers pressing down with the spoon to compact. Fill only half way. Add a layer of the sliced banana peppers then continue to add the Boudin pressing it down to fill the peppers. Top off with another layer of banana pepper some of that tomato you see in the photo (chopped) and bake in preheated 350 degree oven for 30 minutes. Remove from oven, place a slice of cheese on the top of each pepper and return to oven for another five minutes. I served mine with leftover pinto beans and dinner rolls:

Marley's Birthday

It's hard to believe but our Marley Kate is going to be 12 years old. We had her dinner at our house yesterday.

The rest of the kids are singing "Happy Birthday" to her.

                          

I'm just a little horse

 A pony with a cold was giving a speech to all the animals in the barnyard. Before he began he explained, "Excuse me, but I'm just a little hoarse."

Saturday evening, when all the kids were over for Sami's birthday, my eight year old grandson asked me this question:
     "Grandpa, are you in puberty?" 
     "No", I replied.  "I left puberty behind more than fifty years ago."
     "But, when your voice changes, isn't that when you're in puberty?" he asked.
     I explained to him that I had a cold and was just a little hoarse and that my voice would be back to normal in a couple of days.

Tara and Sam, growing up

                                 It takes all the cousins to blow out the 23 candles on Samantha's
                                 cake.

                                           It's hard to believe that Sami is 23

                                             Gracen likes to pose for pictures too.

                                           We had a cake for Tara on Thanksgiving day.

                                              Tara 24 years old.

the telephone company

Yesterday I called the phone company and had my land line disconnected.  When we bought our first cell phones we continued the land line because that was our only source for the internet. Two years ago we had satelite internet installed so I called the phone company to have the land line disconnected. The customer service representative talked me into keeping it for a low monthly fee of around five dollars. After the taxes and fees were added the bill came to twelve dollars. In June of this year the bill jumped to 22.00 then this month it jumped to 27.00  That's increasing faster than the rate of inflation.  I called.  They explained that the price of local service went up, but had no explanation as to why it increased. I had them to disconnect the line.  The government tells us that inflation is quite low.  The truth is that inflation is quite high. We're being lied to.

gracen pics



Gracen and her dad at the keyboard

                                            Gracen helps herself to great grandma's dessert

I went for a walk today. The sun was low in the sky and the shadows of the trees lay long across the highway. There was a brisk cold wind blowing. I  wore just a long sleeved flannel shirt but I was warm from the walking. These Fall afternoons signal the approaching end of another year. It may be the influence of my yearly bout with SAD but I’m always reminded that life ends in the same manner. A slow dimming of the light. The ebbing of potential.

miscellaneous paraphernalia



Last week at breakfast we had this view. The sun was not shining on the trees in the foreground but the ones in the background were bright in the morning light

                            The next morning was foggy and as the sun began to burn off the mist, the foreground trees burst into light leaving the distant trees enshrouded in fog.

Friday night Dorothy, Kelly, Marley and her friend Madison went to a Zac Brown Band concert in Tulsa.  I stayed home with Hunter and Jenna and we ate hot dogs and french fries then watched old Laurel and Hardy movies all evening.

I picked up Jenna and Hunter from school and we stopped at the ice cream parlor for a cone.

Occupy Tahlequah

This morning I drove over to Tahlequah to check out the occupy movement there.  I met with Richard and Ashley Oates and Kate Starr who were occupying the space in front of the local Bank of America. They were distributing fliers urging people to transfer their money from the big banks to local smaller banks and credit unions.  Smaller regional banks are actually sounder than the commercial giants who ran the economy into the ditch and then came to the taxpayers for a bail out.  Credit Unions are owned by the share holders themselves and traditionally loan at lower interest rates and pay higher interest for deposits. Transferring your money is a practical move. If you are in the Tahlequah area stop by and give these people your support.

Richard, Ashley, and Kate

What I'm reading now

Inspired by Kay's list of banned books on Kay's Thinking Cap I decided to read a banned book. Although not on Kay's list Stranger in a Strange Land is a book that I have been intending to read for some time. It's a story of a young man who was born on Mars and is brought back to earth. Having been raised and educated by Martians he is in fact a stranger in a strange land. He has super powers. He finds the earthbound human culture and mindset confusing and eventually creates a new religion. Heinlein received the Hugo award in 1962 for this story that explores human sexuality and religion. Books do not necessarily end up on banned lists because of being sexually explicit or politically incorrect. They are banned because they provoke the reader to think. A thinking citizen is a danger to the status quo enjoyed by political, religious, and economic leaders.

Newspaper coverage of Occupy Tulsa police action

Here is what the Tulsa World had to say about last night's action against Occupy Tulsa.  (includes photos)

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=298&articleid=20111102_298_0_Tulsap195784

Autumn

On my way to Tulsa I took these photos.

Occupy Tulsa

Last night the Tulsa Police Dept. closed in on the Occupy Tulsa site and arrested nine people. They also confiscated several tents. Here is a link to video taken with a cell phone. The video portion is shaky but the audio is very interesting. Those arrested were pepper sprayed before being carried to the police vehicles.

http://www.justin.tv/tulsaslick/b/298959450

Occupy Tulsa

I drove to Tulsa to donate some supplies to the Occupy Tulsa movement. While I was there I took these photos and visited with some of the demonstrators who were holding  a vigil outside the Bank America building.

They pitched their tents in the shadow of Bank America

In some of the media stories Occupy Wall St. demonstrators have been portrayed as homeless or unemployed people.  The people I talked with  were students or people with jobs who gave their time to the cause after work or on their days off.

www.occupytulsa.com