My 14 year old companion of 12 years: Buddee The BBQ Dawg, has been diagnosed with Degenerative Myelopathy.  Its not too bad yet, but has spurred me to do some research with my Vet and online for support devices.  DM is a “painless” disease affecting the nerve sheaths, usually starting in the rear legs with gradually debilitating neurological damage.  Eventually, he may not be able to use his back legs.  As time goes on this disease will involve his front legs and his internal organs.  It moves, usually fairly slowly, so it will/may be some time before it becomes fatal.  He is currently experiencing some minor coordination problems, loss of balance in his hindquarters, dragging of toes on his left hind leg, (intermittently), and some arthritic side-affects when lying down and getting up.  Good friends in Hawaii recommended a company that appears to be the best of the choices in a “walker” for dogs, called Eddie’s Wheels:  http://www.eddieswheels.com/index.html.  I have contacted them via email and telephone.  I thought the process would be fairly straightforward, but they know more about this disease and its affects than I do.  The initial recommendation is for an adjustable cart that will serve Buddee even if weakness in his forequarter develops.  Price is going to be in the area of $600 incl. Freight.I find myself in a poor position to be able to do the right thing for Buddee.  I don’t want to have to euthanize him if/while the rest of his body is healthy and strong.  But I don’t have cash reserves at the moment to get him what he will need within the next few months. If you would like to help, and can in this poor economy, I will appreciate it and so will Buddee Dawg.  You can’t imagine how embarrassed I am to have to admit to this inability to meet a responsibility to my best companion.  He is totally confused when he suddenly loses his balance and sits down unexpectedly.If you would like to help, please leave a comment or write me at my email address, and I will send particulars.

Aside from the fact that I’m grumpy because Wally World puts up Christmas Decorations and Christmas gift products prior to Hallowe’en, and kinda getting tired of hearing the same Christmas songs over and over for the past 2 months +, I hope each and every one of you are safe, warm and surrounded by family and friends this Holiday Season.My Very Best Wishes for the coming New Year!!

I have been skeptical and suspicious of the whole “Cloud’ computing hype from the very beginning.

If it’s YOUR data, and your PRIVATE “stuff”, why would you hand it over to some mega corporation and PAY them for the privilege of having access to or committed responsibility for the safety of your “stuff”????

If they LOSE your stuff, do they guarantee that you will be reimbursed for the VALUE of your stuff?  How many hours did you put into gathering your data and how much is your time worth?  What if its research?  What is that worth if you lose it?  What if its a history of your family in Photos going back several generations?  Do these companies reimburse you the Monetary value for that?  You PAY them to take care of this material.  What do you get in return?

This is just dumb.

Just because new technology allows that you CAN do something, doesn’t mean you SHOULD do it.

Holy Shamolley!

http://tinyurl.com/ykmpzeo At least with Apple, you have the ability to back up your own stuff on your own computer, Mac OR PC and put/keep it somewhere safe.Whew!!Unbelievable.

Does anyone besides me automatically say: “We GOT it!” whenever that woman holds up the store dummy arm and leg and then says: “arm and a leg”?

I have been lax with blogging here this past year, while getting settled into a new culture in Texas.  But the disaster at Ft. Hood is in the news and while families await news of their loved ones and others have perished or are badly wounded, there are some that take advantage of ANY opportunity to shove their own agenda down our throats.  In this case, in Texas, the ONLY politicians to elbow their way to the cameras and microphones are those that are standing for Election or Re-Election here.  Rick Perry the incumbent Guv, Kay Bailey Hutchison the pretender to the throne, and Senator John Cornyn, desperately trying to keep his face and voice in front of the public.  All three of these have managed to make a “gripping” statement of deathless prose that if they are elected they definitely will “do something”, while making saccharine comments of condolences.  Other than those politicians, we haven’t heard much from those whose jobs in Politics are not up for grabs.  Pretty sad, but very typical of the Political mindset.

First BLOG entry since I moved to Texas.  This coming weekend,  Memorial Day weekend, is the annual Fredericksburg, Texas Crawfish Festival at Marktplatz in the center of town.  Ten bucks gets you into the grounds, where you can eat samples of different gumbo’s, shrimp, crawfish, etouffée and andouille.  Local vineyards will be on site with their current offerings.  When I left San Antonio a little over 5 years ago to return to Hawaii, there were only about 4-5 vineyards in this Hill Country area….  now there are about eleven.  All good!!!  I’m goin’ for it!!

While you can blame Bush for many things, losing the election for McCain-Palin isn’t one of them.Blame Palin, and blame McCain for picking a ditzy person who can’t build a focussed thought and verbalize it.“I’m like, OK, God, if there is an open door for me somewhere, this is what I always pray, I’m like, don’t let me miss the open door,” She speaks like a 16 yr old teenage girl with boys on the brain.  I’m like…. OK, ….I’m like, don’t let me miss….She speaks in run-on sentences that jump from subject to subject without any substance, answers or insight.   And she answers nearly any question put to her with: “you betcha”, without detail or expansion of her thought process.  Such as it is.  How did this person get as far as she has?  Can anyone please point out any substantive quote that she has made in the last 9-10 weeks? I’m baffled why McCain virtually handed the election to Obama by a) choosing her, and b) keeping her when it became apparent she was like this. If anyone lost the election for McCain it was Palin herself. IMHO.

Buddee and I’ll be moving, permanently, back to Texas on November 15th.  Initially I’ll be staying with my Sis in Fredericksburg just until I find a place of my own.  Currently, I have mailed, via USPS, nearly all my belongings, at great savings of $$$ over several estimates from moving companies, and they have, thus far, all arrived safely and intact.  I still have 2-3 smaller boxes to mail over the next 6 weeks, and then my computer gear as the last gasp just before I fly out.  Friends of the family will take over as caretakers of this place, and inherit my furniture, and lots of excess cookware(!) that I have found I use only sporadically, if at all.   This has been an interesting experience, but its just too isolated from human interaction and interplay that a gregarious person like myself requires to stay sane.  I’ve been provisionally offered a job by my first Boss in San Antonio, who is planning on opening a second Apple Dealership and Authorized Apple Repair Center in the Hill Country North of San Antonio.  We’ll see how that turns out.  Alternatively, I will plan to place some ads in the local fish wrapper and do Macintosh software support.  I’m looking forward to getting back together with my family, spending some time with my Mom and Sis, and re-acquainting myself with close friends in San Antonio.

From CBS Today:A conservative columnist who welcomed Sarah Palin’s entry in national politics says she’s proven to be a dud and should step aside as John McCain’s running mate.  <http://tinyurl.com/3gyqde>  Copy and Paste this URL, without the brackets, if you cannot click on it.

I watched the interview this morning.  Two things disturb me.  One is minor, the other extremely troubling.The first is that Sarah Palin has even worse verbal/cognitive skills than Geo. Bush.The second thing that jumped out at me, and that I find dangerous, is that Sarah thinks that “education, reading books” gives her a perspective on the world and international affairs; when in fact it only gives her a look at the perspective of the author(s) of the books.  Which gives too much latitude for her personal literary bias to influence her decisions.  There is nothing like face-time with world-leaders, and with the citizens of a country, to base your perspectives on. I’m an Independent when it comes to our government leaders, and I believe that John McCain has now committed political suicide with his choice of running mate.  Every time she appears and reads the campaign-prepared comments from a teleprompter convinces me more and more that a McCain ticket is not the ticket I will vote into office.   With John McCain’s health issues and past history, I cannot bring myself to even imagine a Sarah Palin Presidency.Â