Hot…good night a livin, it has been really hot and humid down here. Tryin to do a little work around here is like working in a sauna. All you have to do is basically just walk around the yard and the sweat is just pourin off of you.

By the time I get up to the shower in the evenin I smell bout like an ole boar hog, and my clothes are just drenched. It’s bad when Cheyenne walks over to you to get petted and loved on, stops, catches a good whiff, then decides she really doesn’t need any attention right at the moment.

I come up to the porch in the afternoon now and she waits on me with one paw on a bar of soap, and a dern towel in her mouth! Once I get almost on the porch she drops the towel over the soap and takes off to the other side. Man’s best friend…HA!

No, actually Cheyenne has kinda stepped up to the plate in regards to helping me out since it’s just the two of us now. She’s a ton of company to me and tries to get me involved in things to keep me busy, and I guess you’d say… “help me adjust.”

Just the other night she went to the door and sat beside it, the “okay, buster, let’s go outside a while” look on her face. Well, I thought she had to pee, so, I open the door, let her out, and watch her a few minutes. She doesn’t even attempt to “find her a good spot,” to squat, but instead sits down and starts gazing up at the moon, which was full by the way, and absolutely beautiful.

Next thing I knew, she’s sittin there on her haunches, starin back at me, and taking her left front paw and starts pattin it on the ground with a “c’mon out and let’s sit a while look” on her mug.

So, feeling kinda stupid, I go out and sit down beside her. Well, this seems to be just what she wanted me to do, so she looks up at the moon, and gives a low howl, then looks back over at me. I start pettin her a little and ask, “What ya doin, Shiny?”

She looks back up at the moon, howls again, only this time a little louder, and then it dawned on me…she’s tryin to get me involved in something, occupy my time sort of thing. So, long story short, she and I sat there howlin at the moon for a good 30 minutes or so. In reality, just between us…it was kinda fun!

Our other dog, Susie, didn’t know what to make of us???

I came down stairs a couple days back, after getting my shower, flipped over to Marshall Dillon on the TV, and here comes Cheyenne with a bowl of her food. She stops and sits it down beside my recliner, takes off again, and here she comes, this time with…Susie’s bowl!

It then became obvious to me that ole Shiny had…made us dinner. I was like, dern that doesn’t look half bad, and shoot, I really didn’t feel like cookin anyway. So, we blessed our food, and went to workin on it.

We’d had chicken wings the night before and I’d put Alpo over the wing bones for them and I have to say, that Alpo ain’t half bad, although personally I prefer the beef much more so than the chicken flavored! That’s just me though, those other two seem to like either one.

One other good point to eatin this way…I never washed their pans out for at least a week or so, so…dishes once a week, how good is that?

Yesterday I started runnin squirrels with her and Susie. Now that’s a ball! I know, I know, I’m the last one to the tree EVERY time, but that’s just how it is. I mean you take something with two legs, and compete, race wise, against something with FOUR legs…what cha gonna do??

It, to me, is not so much about the competition of who gets to the tree first, although this seems to be a BIG issue between her and Susie, but more about just bein included in the pack!

I gotta tell you guys though, since I started hangin out with those two more, it’s getting really hard to walk past a tree…or a tire on the truck! I can’t even imagine tryin to walk by a dern fire hydrant anymore!

I’m beginning to realize now, that if I’m not REAL careful, I may never use the bathroom in the house again?? Gotta watch that. Especially when visitin the neighbors!

I tell you another thing…wait a minute, what’s that??

OH, gotta go for now guys!! Sounds like an ambulance just turned onto the road out in front of the house! Dang I’ve got where I love chasin one of those dern things…see ya!

You guys take care, and God bless. As always, keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!

Dub and Deb

As you guys know, we’ve been getting rain, rain, and more rain coming off the storm in the northwest gulf.

I dumped 5 inches out of the rain gauge last night, so I really don’t know how much we’d had. Then this morning I dumped another inch and a half. I haven’t checked it this afternoon but I’d be shocked if we haven’t had another inch and a half as well.

This could keep up for another few days, but hopefully it’ll start moving out soon. We’ve not had any strong winds here, possibly gusts of up to 25 mph, but nothing bad at all. Like many others along the eastern seaboard or the gulf coast areas, once one of these storms starts heading in our general direction…we keep our eyes peeled!

The name of this particular storm?

Debby. Yep, that’s what they’ve gone and named the dern thing! The weather center spelled it wrong but, Debby is still Debbie no matter how ya cut it!

You believe that? I was like…dern woman, I’d been begging for rain all spring and son-of-a-gun, you’re seeing I get it all at one time! We’re drownin here how bout it!!

No, actually even with the rain we’ve had, as fast as we’ve gotten it, you look out it’s standing, you look again in 30 minutes or so…and its gone! We have been terribly dry this year but seem to be makin up ground quick.

Our pond is up at least a foot or better, and this will continue to rise even after the rain stops. We dug it fairly close a dry creek-bed, it’s a creek when its wet, and dry when it ain’t, so the pond will leech water from the creek until it dries back out again.

This could be a while now though…we’re into our rainy season now, and water shouldn’t be a worry to us anymore this year. Unless we have a season with several storms, then it’ll be another type of problem…too much water!

Sounds as if I’m a guy that’s pretty hard to please, huh?

I’ve been around enough years now that I understand that many times in life its feast…or famine. Lookin at my picture still though, you’d have to come to the conclusion that I’d been experiencing in my life way to much of feastin, and maybe not quite enough of famine! LOL!

Although I have to tell you that in all reality that’s not the case, but once Deb and I had gotten to the point we COULD feast ever once in a while, I swear I just didn’t know when to quit.

We’d get past the feastin and start back on the faminin (is this a word fam-a-nin) again, and I’d still be feastin away on what I’d put up while we WAS feasting! Thank you Food-Saver!

I believe I was the only one in the Country that when the economy took such a downturn…I was PUTTIN ON weight! LOL!

Then ole Deb, bless her heart, showed me a new road to travel. A road of good healthy eating, choosing the right foods to nourish our bodies with, and, oh my God…exercise??? I thought she’d lost her cotton pickin mind!

You can’t imagine the things that were coming into my mind! I began having nightmares!

Me and my big mouth had told her, “Honey, whatever you do…I’ll do too!” You see, that’s been my biggest problem all through my life. Opening my big mouth instead of listening, grasping, and thoroughly understanding what was just said.

Then, knowing Deb like I did, I KNEW once she started all this healthy this, and healthy that, she’d never go back to the way it was…the GOOD life.

Fried pork chops, mashed taters and gravy, cat-head biscuits, corn bread, fried okra, peach cobbler, fried chicken, cube steaks smothered in…grease, fried green tomatoes, well, ya’ll get the picture. She dropped all this just like she’d been snake struck. I was in denial for weeks.

All of this in itself could lead to many other things that I had always found…belittling, even un-masculine!!

Things like putting conditioner in my hair, bathing regularly, trimming my toenails, takin off my cap and partin my hair (what’s up with that), using a napkin, washin the dog (believe that), even liftin the lid on the toilet, these things all became…routine. I was a wreck!

Many times after a hard day in the garden, I’d come in and sit down at the table, oh yeah, she got me to washin my hands prior to that too, and here she’d come, sash-shaying from the kitchen.

She’d have a big plate of…bean sprouts, cottage cheese (YUK!), ice water and one dern THIN tomato slice laid up on a big ole thick bed of lettuce. Makes my mouth water just thinkin about it right now!
I’d ask, “No dressing honey,” and she’d hand me a slice of lemon. She’d say, “Just squeeze some of this over it Dub, it’ll help it, AND, it’ll be SO healthy for you!” “God Bless you honey,” I’d say…

I’ve waken up before in a cold sweat, raisin straight up in the bed dreamin about tryin to get into the front door of Wal-Mart, yet I can’t. I’d lost so much weight the door just wouldn’t open??

I’d climb up on the handrail beside the door and jumped off…right onto the mat, but still the door wouldn’t open…I’d lost TOO much weight. In my dream I’d keep climbin back up on that handrail and I’d jump again and again, hopin that just one time, the dern door would open where I could get inside.

I mean after all, all I wanted was one of them Nathan hotdogs with ALL the trimmings, just so maybe the next time I come I’d be able just to walk through the door like everyone else!

THEN the kids from down the road got into the act, although I’m not so sure Deb didn’t have a hand in this deal. She had to or they couldn’t have gotten in through the gate…I’d locked it.

BUT, here those two young’uns would come, everyday bout 6 in the evenin, peddalin them bikes around the circle in front of our house, hollerin, “Mr. Dub…Mr. Dub…look what we got!”

I’d raise up in the swing, look out in the drive and they’d go whizzing by, each with a liver cheese sandwich (my favorite) strapped to their backs! Off the porch I’d go, chasin them little suckers right out the gate (which was mysteriously open again…go figure) and down the hard road they’d go.

I’d walk back to the house and by now Deb would be sittin in the swing. “Dub,” she’d holler, “that was a nice little run you just took…very good! I’m proud of you!”

So as you guys can see, healthy eatin, good nutritious food, and livin right may indeed be good for you, but there sure is a whole lot of work and sacrifice to be put into it.

I’m thinking this weekend of possibly making some of that good ole Georgia link sausage, made into a casserole with about half a dozen onions, a #1 washtub full of taters, plenty of cheese, whole milk, plenty of salt and pepper, a pitcher full of sweet iced tea, and maybe a slice of hot apple pie with a big scoop or two of vanilla ice cream to wash it all down good.

Naw…I’m tryin to watch my figure.

I hope you guys enjoyed this little bit of nonsense cause I sure did. I had a chuckle or two putting this down this evenin, and boy it felt good to laugh. I can honestly say that while doing this I indeed had a smile on my face and one in my heart…I hope you did as well!

I hate to run but I gotta get a shower, wash and condition my hair, put a nice part in it after I dry it off some, trim my toenails, brush my teeth…

God Bless!

Dub