Unusual sighting 12.10.18

            I understand that what seems to be unusual to me, is probably not unusual for those of you who have extensive experience with celestial events. I have shown the reading public, signs in the sky such as an “X” that is located over the Ford Homestead. We here at the Homestead often wonder if, and why, we are being watched, or possibly even being protected, by a heavenly presents. Yes we are believers, but does that provide us with an extra layer of Devine Shelter?

            This morning as the Tres and I ventured out the front door to retrieve the so-called newspaper, I happened to look up into the early morning sky and I observed a single bright star. Why would there be a single bright start in the sky at the Ford Homestead? Why only one star and no other stars to be seen? Are there wise men heading toward our house. Am I supposed to join the other wise men and venture forth to find a new born King? It is Christmas time!

            All those questions, and no answers in sight. For that one person who is doubting that I did see the single bright star, I have a photo. I took the photo with my cell phone camera, and if my cheap cell phone camera can take a photo of this single bright star, that means it was bright and it was there for a reason. You may click to enhance, and please suggest answers.

            That star is in the eastern sky. The house in the photo is the home of a Priest, I am not sure which church he is affiliated with. Could the star be there for him? If I am the one to see it, how could it be for him?

Look up and learn, share what you learn! 

Senior Wise Man at the Ford Homestead; Don Ford

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The birthday party 12.09.18

            Few words, several photos. 

 Above, birthday cookie not a cake.    Next Gabi trying to blow out the candles, Alex watching.

Gabi and her best friend Anna Kate.              Other grandparents Ann and David. 

Opening of the presents.                                Birthday girl Gabi!

             Have things to do so I better get at them. What? None of your business what I have to do! No I am not going to take a nap! I have already taken my after lunch nap! Even though it is none of your business, I will enlighten you as to part of what I plan to do.

            First, I plan to get my two new solar powered rope lights and take them to my tallest radio tower. I have a pulley at the top of the tower with a rope. I have one solar powered rope light already attached to the rope, and it is located near the top of the tower. I plan to install the other two rope lights. At night they flash on and off and several people have ask me why the lights are there. My response is, “Cause I like them”! One person thought I was transmitting on the HF radio causing the lights to light up.

            Second, I plan to get a cup of real coffee and enjoy it.

            Third, I can’t plan that far ahead.

15 days till Christmas, are you ready?

Solar Lighting expert; Don Ford

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Birthday party 12.08.18

            No it isn’t my birthday, and if it was I would not tell you. My favorite granddaughter is having a birthday party, today Saturday. She will be 12 years old on the 13^th. Yes she is my favorite granddaughter and she is my only granddaughter.

            The present I ordered for her is supposed to be delivered here to our house by the US mail people. I know the package is at the Hewitt post office this morning at least that is what the tracking shows, so we hope it arrives prior to lunch, as Gabi’s party starts at lunch and if I have to wait here for a delivery I might miss out on the Pizza.

            I have just had a revelation! I know at least one of you have no idea what that word means, so I will reveal the meaning. I also know at least one off you did not get that play on words, revelation and reveal.  Why do I even try to educate, or at least inform the reading public?

            My favorite granddaughter’s birthday is December 13^th. Next year she will be 13 years old, that makes her a teenager, but the best part of this is…       Did you already guess it?

         December 13^th, 2019 will be on Friday the 13^th. WOW!

            I have a photo that was taken yesterday by David (our youngest son). The photo is of the grandparents and the grandkids in front of a Christmas tree. We had a neighbor who is a real photographer take some photos that she will doctor up a bit, and then email them to us. Sorry you can’t see much of the tree in this photo.

In the photo below you can see more of the tree, click to enjoy.

These photos are taken by a non-paid professional member of the Ford Family.

            The weather prognosticators were saying we would have rain for a couple days ending about noonish Saturday. They had predicted from 2 to 5 inches rain, we only received 3 inches here at the Ford Homestead. Today is Saturday and it hasn’t stopped raining yet.

            Let us jump back into the past for a moment. If you can’t jump just, sit there and imagine that you have jumped. In a past well written article of mine, I had noted that I had problems installing a Wi-Fi range extender. Actually I did not install it and put it back into the box.

            Yesterday, I was having problems with my printer, again, so I decided to uninstall it and reinstall it. This time I followed the destructions. I am not good at reading, understanding and following written destructions, but I did take the time to do so yesterday. My printer now works as it is supposed to, I can even print from my cell phone. That made me so happy so I decided to attempt to install said Wi-Fi extender.

            I now have the range extender installed, and it seems to be working. You are correct, I could probably do anything if only I could understand the destructions. 

            Oh, just in case you are wondering, our gift for the Gabi has arrived at the Homestead. While I was sitting here I decided to check and see if it were out for delivery and the tracking showed that it was delivered. I checked the front porch but nothing to see. I then decided to check the mail box and the small carton was pushed all the way to the back.

We are now ready to go to the party and I should not miss out on the pizza!

Don’t drool over the photo of the pizza!

Pizza connoisseur extraordinaire; Don Ford   

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Double check and saved 12.07.18

               This is a story that some of you may not believe, but it is all true. The story begins with an elderly person who was wanting to get a birthday gift for their granddaughter, let’s make up a name for this granddaughter, we will call her Gabi.

            Now let’s say her birthday was in the month of December, kind of in the middle of the month. We can state that the granddaughter was having a birthday party a couple days before her actual birthday. The party was scheduled to be held at one of those pizza places where the kids can play games while the adults sit around and talk.

            Now this elderly person had decided on an MP3 player which the granddaughter had said she wanted. The company selling the player offered a carrying case for the MP3 and ear buds, along with a micro SD card for the unit at what seemed to be a reasonable price. We don’t want to state the name of the company as we do not advertise for companies if they don’t pay us. The name of the company sounds like the largest river in South America.

            When this elderly person ordered the item, it had free shipping that could take up to two weeks. Having ordered items from this company in the past the elderly person thought the items always arrive much earlier than two weeks. Order placed, the older person was expecting to get an acknowledgement of shipment from the company, but none came. He would check daily for the shipping info.

            After a couple days, the older person decided to change the order and pay for delivery assuming it would get there much quicker. You can do this if they haven’t shipped it yet.

            A total of seven days passed and they had not filled the order. This senior person was getting very upset, and thought he would not have the gift ready for his granddaughter’s birthday party. He decided to go back on line to see if there was anything he could do.

            Surprised, the items were about $20.00 less now than when he originally ordered them. He decided to order the items again and use their offer for a month free service. The old person placed the order with a delivery date of Saturday, free shipping and he saved about twenty bucks. This old person then sent a message to cancel the first order, and since they had not filled the order, they were able to cancel it.

            Now let’s see if it gets here tomorrow or not.

Crap happens, don’t step in it, do something about it!

 

Elderly person; Don Ford

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Happy with, Unhappy with 12.06.18

            Did you even read the title? What could we be happy with, and a moment later be unhappy with. If you said, “That is Donna’s thoughts of The Donald”, you could be right, but that is not the reason for the title. The title line has to do with the Tres. One minute we are happy with him, and the next minute he gets on our last nerve. Sometimes he listens, other times he can’t hear what we are saying, or possibly he is just ignoring us. He is like a normal Ford kid, hard headed! He was being nice in the following photo.

            As I sat outside yesterday afternoon enjoying a cup of real coffee (real is not instant coffee), all the doves flew from the neighbors trees, so I looked up to see if there was a hawk. Seeing no hawk, my focus went to the Christmas Star on my flag pole. That is when I noticed that there was an “X” in the sky. Was this “X” marking the spot of my Christmas Star? Possibly it was marking where the Ford Homestead is located, so the three wise men can find us. Possibly, the “X” marks the spot where a wise man already lives, “Me”! Either way, it was identifying the Ford Homestead as a nice place, and the people who live here are blessed with abundant kindness, and plentiful humility. If you are wise, you will click to enhance.

            Well I changed the name of my Wi-Fi router, as we should all know, anyone in the area can see the name of your router if you haven’t blocked it, and most of us don’t block the name. People (bad people) have a tendency to use the neighbor’s unsecured router. Heck I have tried to connect using the neighbors Wi-Fi, but they are mostly secured. Occasionally I find a guess router that is not secured.

            Why did I change the name of my router and what is the name I have given it.

            I changed it, “Cause I wanted to!”

            The new name is, “FBI / CIA unit”! It is my thought that the neighbors might see this and assume that the real FBI or CIA are in the area checking on things.   

            Now we are back to grandpa being silly, and I enjoy being silly. Heck, if you can’t have fun (aka being silly) then don’t do it!

            It happened last evening. We were able to get the Ford’s Dodge into the garage again. Most of the items have left the garage, or they were able to be moved to an area so the van can be parked there again. It has been about 6 weeks since the vehicle has been in the garage. My first wife and I are both happy.

            My spouse of almost 5 decades has given me a four foot tall metal shelf. It had four shelves and I am going to try to place it in the shed today. That means I need to get rid of some junk, I mean items, to make room in the shed for the shelf. As you can see, a retired senior person’s work is never done!

            Well I guess that is it for now, I can either go to the shed and work, or I could take a short nap. Maybe I will flip a coin to decide, wait a minute, being on a fixed income I don’t have a coin to flip, now what can I do? It is very difficult being a retired person on a fixed income. Actually, the only part that is fixed is what little one gets, the outgoing is never fixed and is usually expanding.

May your income be ever expanding!

Senior retired person; Don Ford  

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Conversation with Gabi 12.05.18

            On the way to school yesterday morning, Gabi turned the radio off. She usually turns the radio off, I guess she don’t like what I listen to. Being silly grandpa, I begin trying to sing the song that was on the radio. I got the look from Gabi, so I asked what she was thinking. Were you thinking the grandpas are silly, or maybe handsome, or possibly very smart? She said I was thinking about a character that I have made up. She told me this character’s name, that it was a skeleton, and there was a friend who was also a skeleton and its name. She then told me a little about the story she has made up.

            I suggested that she write these stories down or put them into her computer. Gabi has always had a vivid imagination and I think she needs to put these ideas on paper. She told me that they are all in her head. I said I understand, but if you put them into the computer now, some day in the future you might turn your ideas into a book. Some writers make lots of money.

            We arrived at school and she exited the vehicle heading into the building.

            Took the Tres to the vet yesterday, it cost a fortune for some pills. The main problem is getting Tres to take the pills. He is smart enough to not eat them even when put in food. The vet suggested, putting the pill in something that he likes, then placing it some place as if you don’t want him to get it, but allowing him to get it. The vet said he did that with one of his dogs and it worked for him. I have not tried it yet.

            Our cat Charlie has hurt his right front leg. Not sure what happened but he is limping. He has been eating Tres’ dog food, and my present spouse formed a hypothesis. She believe Charlie could not jump up on the washing machine, where we keep his food bowl. That seemed like a good supposition, but it proved to be at least partially incorrect. With Charlie’s food bowl beside Tres’ food bowl, Charlie went to Tres’ food and ate. Charlie likes dog food!

            Now some info that you don’t want to know. I have been printing all these postings for this year (2018). I have them in an oversized three ring note book. The printed stack of blog postings are more than 2 inches thick, and the year is not over. Don’t click if you don’t care.

Maybe Gabi will become a “blog novelist”!

Senior blog novelist and teller of tells; Don Ford

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Seat belts 12.04.18

            As some of you might know, I pick Alex up from school most afternoons. We are usually toward the head of the line of vehicles, all of which are wanting the vehicle ahead of them to move out of the way so they can get their kids. When Alex gets in the vehicle I am trying to hurry him so we can get out of the other vehicles way. He gets situated as I am moving on the drive and I usually ask if he has his seat belt on.

            Yesterday after he was situated he stated, “When you ride a bus you don’t have the use seat belts, the bus drives slow”. I acknowledged that he was correct, although some new buses have seat belts.  

            The seat belt conversation caused me to begin to think about seat belts and when I first started seriously using the belts. Back many years ago, I was a volunteer fireman here in the city of Hewitt. We not only fought fires but we ran on other calls like medical emergencies and wrecks.

            One night we received a call of, “a head on collision”. When we arrived at the scene we found a car, had hit a van, head on. These vehicles were coming over the top of a hill at night, when they collided. There were two young men killed in the car, and the female driver of the van was killed outright. There was a female in the passenger seat and several children possibly as many as 6 kids in the back of the van.

            The van had only two seats, one for the driver and one for the passenger. The kids were tossed around inside the van and they had broken bones and all types of injuries, at least one of the kids died.

            It took several days for me to get those visions of death and injuries out of my mind. That incident was what caused me to begin using seat belts. 

Different subject: I used the walk behind mower for the third time yesterday to clean the leaves from the front yard. It was a fairly cool day so I had to dress warmly, photo to follow.

            An observant person would see in the back ground, areas that have been vacuumed, and areas that are still covered with leaves. I worked so hard and long I was an hour late eating lunch.

I again want to present a photo of the yard after it was cleared and then a photo of the neighbor’s yard across the street. The leaves along their curb and in their yard are mostly from our trees. 

                 Alex was somewhat upset with me, saying he wanted to rake those leaves. I agreed to let him rake the leaves next time, as I know there will be one more covering of leaves before the trees are empty. He likes to make a pile of leaves and then jump in them. 

            I have scheduled Tres an appointment at the vet today. Vets in general, charge way too much.

May your trees stop shedding, and your vet give a 50% discount!

Senior silly grandpa; Don Ford

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Got it dun 12.03.18

            For that one person who actually looked at, or maybe even read the title line, dun is pronounced the same as done. I saved one key stroke (one less letter to type) and I also like dun instead of done.

            What did I get done? I was able to get the leaves picked up from the back yard. Now, I still need to attack the front yard, for the third time. If I am able to clear the front yard again today, I will not be finished, as there are still leaves on the oak trees. I assume the neighbors wish the oak trees were clear of leaves, as they will need to share in the cleanup effort.

            Ms. Ford is getting closer to having all her Christmas decorations in place, and it is getting close to time for her to start baking and making candy. There was one decoration that was purchased at the store where everything is a dollar. Being on a fixed income, retired seniors must frequent such stores in order to survive. It would be nice to be able to go to one of those upscale stores like the rest of you all do. If we could shop at Wally World like the rest of you who are not on a fixed income do, it would be such a pleasure. We can’t shop in the upscale stores, so I sit here with a tear in my eye wishing…

            I have a photo of the cheap decorations. Would you believe I was force to pose for this photo? Click if you must.

            There was a comment on the so called TV news this morning about the right age to start kids in school. Basically they said the younger kids were more likely to have A.D.D. and be more unruly in school, and learn slower. They commented on those kids that were born in August and starting school at age five. Five year old kids now days go to kindergarten. I was born in August, I started first grade at the age of five. I had and have A.D.D. Now we know why I can’t read or write. If only they would have started me in the first grade at the age of six, I probably would be able to both, read and write. (Attention Deficit Disorder)

May your shopping be at the upscale stores, like Wally World!

Senior Christmas decoration exhibit; Don Ford

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