Maybe the ones that are hurting will take away a little lesson from all this (I doubt it), get ready for it, have food and water (At least three months) – a generator and light handy. It does not cost much and when the snow hits the fan again or some other natural disaster or whatever else there is – lost jobs, giant rabid infected mutant rabbits, zombies, what have you, they can take care of themselves.

Yep, we live in a small city, last snowfall we had, just last week, we got 15 inches, measured in my lot with a yardstick, between me and the snowblower and the kids and their shovels, we had it all moved in an hour. The roads where never closed and people made it to work and went on with their everyday life. Nice, but again Minnesota is set up for winter, the east isn’t. I feel sorry for them. Here it ain’t cold till it hits freezing, then if the sun is out we call it brisk.

My god, I’ve seen people go swimming in the lake and sunbath at the beach in December around here. Nuff said, here are some pics of the snow around our place, just for fun.

Here are two views of the front, this is the west face.

This is a view out the back, east, at my Blacksmith Shop.

Now to the dog part of my post.

When we moved here, we had to leave our dog behind, this broke our hearts and we had to pay a deposit for Joyces  cat. Our landlord was very adamant about no dogs, so we went on with life without  the the joy of having a mutt around. It has been almost two years and the landlord has seen we take good care of the place and we are good tenants,  so he finely relented and let us have a dog. Yeehaw!

Now I really respect the No Kill Humane Societies other rescue groups and encourage every one who wants a dog to get mans best friend from them. No sense in getting a new untrained puppy when you can get a really nice older trained dog for way less then a puppy from a mill. So thats what we did, I took the wife and our youngest son over and we played with the dogs till we found one we agreed on, turned out to be a nice boxer /lab mix by the name of brandy. She is a really good looking dog, a year and a half old, in great health and nice. But it turns out she is an attention whore, she just has to have attention all the time, which is okay, We have 13 people in this circus and there is always some one to play with her. I think we made a good choice, have had her for about two weeks now, she is quiet and lets us know when she has go out, shes big and gentle and loves to play, she is not afraid of people or other dogs and gets along with the cat and most important of all she gets along with my three year old and all the other kids here. So have a look and remember if you want a dog, try the humane society before you go out and put down huge money on a puppy.

Later, Zenlogic.

Lost track of some people, heard form others, that is life,  I wish you all a happy new year and a good life.

As I look back, I give thanks to god for the peace and ease of the last year, and I give thanks for the unknown future, for surly he will watch over us and guide and protect us. I know that I don’t always get what I want, But I always get what I need, if I just have faith. Time and time again this has proved true. Lord help me to remember this and please look after all of mine and I and all the ones here and gone. Thank you.

Should old acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind ?
Should old acquaintance be forgot,
and old lang syne ?

CHORUS:

For auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we’ll take a cup of kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

And surely you’ll buy your pint cup !
and surely I’ll buy mine !
And we’ll take a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

CHORUS

We two have run about the slopes,
and picked the daisies fine ;
But we’ve wandered many a weary foot,
since auld lang syne.

CHORUS

We two have paddled in the stream,
from morning sun till dine^† ;
But seas between us broad have roared
since auld lang syne.

CHORUS

And there’s a hand my trusty friend !
And give us a hand o’ thine !
And we’ll take a right good-will draught,
for auld lang syne.

CHORUS

Here’s a pics or two to tide ya’over.

Sheila’s mom, Sheila and Brother Mike.

I have more Pics but I have to go through them and crop and resize, you know the drill. I also have a video and will figure some how to get it here.

Later, Zenlogic.

This is a laminated blade. I arranged  the blanks like this:

Hard layer

soft layer

hard layer

Then I forged welded it and folded it it. Now it was like this:

hard layer

soft layer

hard layer

hard layer

soft layer

hard layer.

This  way it ended up with a double hard layer for the edge, with a total of six layers, Any how here are some pics.

I forged it to pretty close to  the shape I wanted, then went and did the stock removal thing, tried to do a scandy edge on it, was somewhat successful, as you can see.  Then I  tempered it and put the final edge on. She is Sharp. The handle is a piece of old hickory hammer handle. I save all my old hammer handles for just this reason. It has a poured but cap, to hide the nut that holds it all together. Works out nice, light and quick to go where you point it. All the weight is in the back and with the blade set down like it is, it is a real nice slicer. Blade is four  inches and the handle is four and half, it weighs only four point one ounces. most of which is in the tail. Now to make a sheath for it and then on to the next one.

There it is, Each one better then the last. Later zenlogic.

Well to the point of this post, on Friday we went and picked up her gown and invitation’s and graduation stuff,  We got home and every body wanted to see her  in it. We had a fun half hour with it, all of us telling her how good she looks and such, you know how that goes. But as soon as I saw her in it, I about fell over, She has that smart and sexy thing going. Drives me crazy. Of course she forbid me to put this up, so what could I do.

Love you She. Later zenlogic.

Nice day……. here’s the thing, dad has finely broken in to the high tech world, he bought himself a HP 25 in touch screen computer about 3 months ago, really nice computer and he is catching on fast. He also bought a Kodak 3-in-1 printer/scanner and he has been scanning every picture he ever took. Man it’s great. i was seeing pictures that i have never seen before, well the upshot of this was I got to burn them for him and keep a copy. So i thought i would show off a couple of them.

Back in 92 i got Sean(my son, he was about 5 then), an HO scale train set, but i found that i loved to play with just as much as he did, then, as with everything, i let it get out of hand. At the time we lived in a 2 bedroom apartment, hardly enough room for for the five of us, let alone the six fish tanks and the 2000 books and now a 4 by 8 train layout, Man when I do things, I don’t do them by half.

Sean and the kids and I had lots of fun building it, at least I think they did, I know I did.

Here are some pics of the lay out. Notice it sits right in the middle of the living room and yes that was Sean’s bed underneath the train layout. He loved it down there.
Explanations under the pic.

1. This is the layout, that’s me back when I was young and handsome, the train layout Is HO, 4×8, the mountains are pink foam and paper mache, hand painted. The buildings, except for 2 or 3, are all stick built. All the landscaping was done by me and the kids.

The layout had two separate lines, the outside one, a big oval and the inside line was the mining line. Separate lines and separate controllers. All the lights worked and all the switches switched. It was great.

2.This is the long shot, showing all of it and under it. Yep that is where Sean slept, if you look closely you can see a venation blind rolled up above his bed, at night he would just pull the rope and let it down. You can also see the controllers for the separate lines and the switch buttons.

3. This is a close up of the yards.

Well that’s all the pics I have of the train layout, later when we moved we had to tear it down, but we still have the rolling stock to this day, and one of these days mason and I, women willing, can go hog wild like Sean and I did.

Just to add some fun, I thought I would throw some pics of me in. One from when I was a baby, one from when I was 5 or 6, and one of my bother and i, I was about 15 then.

well, yea I was a ugly little critter, then the big gene kicked in and I got big and ugly, and now at 50, I am just an ogre.

Well this has been fun, I will put the pics in the gallery too, so you can see full sized ones.

Thanks, later zenlogic.

Now it doesn’t, but if you type in “ogre” I am on the 14th page!  I want to be 1st again. I want to be top Ogre again -  Oh well, Such is Fame.

Ogre

sorry for the mess, later – Zenlogic.