Category Archives: Rancho Roly Poly

Mr. B. recovering from stomach flu

Posted on January 30, 2016 | 3 comments

At first I thought he was just reacting to his scheduled driving class. His first time behind the wheel. Which he had put off for a week until I forced him to schedule it. But the illness seems valid.

After the puking and pooping seemed to end, I got some Pedilyte down him and some Jello and finally a bowl of chicken-n-rice soup. Yogurt awaits.

And the driving lesson is rescheduled for Monday. We shall see if it comes off, or if it occasions another round of the illness. Surely not.

UPDATE:  After yogurt and enchiladas, he washed his sheets and pillow cases, and put them back on the bed with my help. Seems to be all better now.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly

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My Gephyrophobia is easing

Posted on January 27, 2016 | 3 comments

Finally, I can take arched bridges with relative ease. Only took, well, since about 1980. That’s, uh, 35 years or thereabouts. Have yet to try the one to Corpus, however.

Got to do it most days to get up the Highway 183 overpass, north of the rancho, so I’ve had plenty of practice staring at the white lines instead of looking from side to side. Now I can look over the side. Long as I’m not too close, of course.

I still try to take the stairs instead of the elevator. Some phobias never die.

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Posted in Blogosphere, History, Obsessions, Rancho Roly Poly

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Three feet of global warming and plastic bags

Posted on January 24, 2016 | 5 comments

My friends in the Shenandoah Valley have had about all the global warming they can stand this weekend. Richard T., Mr. B’s godfather and my old Vietnam bud, spent his time driving his vineyard’s tractor equipped with snow plow trying to save his neighbor’s prize bull and cows from burial under three feet of drifting snow. Meanwhile, as our Little Barry Hussein prepares his executive orders supposedly involving climate change:

“I also anticipate lots of dumb laws and regulations that will greatly diminish the convenience of everyday living, even more so than that stupid plastic bag ban my municipality enacted a few years ago. Though a soothsayer I am not, I predict such legislation will have a ripple effect across the world’s economies, resulting in increased unemployment, higher prices, and a less enjoyable standard of living overall.”

Oh, yah. As usual, however, Austin’s plastic bag ban wasn’t about the environment, but graft for the ruling party. The Democrats, of course. I was reminded of that the other day when I asked for a plastic bag at HEB, meaning the 25 cent red job they sell now for folks (like me) who refuse to carry European-style shopping bags like good little drones of D.C.

Instead the young clerk handed one of the old-style free plastic bags which now cost, get this, $1 each. Had to specify the 25 center. Astounding? Only because you don’t understand our crooked politics that masquerades as environmentalism.

Via Skanlyn.

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Posted in Blogosphere, Obamalot, Rancho Roly Poly, Texana, The Culture, Weather/Climate

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The point of no return

Posted on January 23, 2016 | 1 comment

Finally got Mr. B.’s learning driver’s permit yesterday morning before school started. Took two trips as I didn’t have the proper birth certificate. The hospital’s issued one wasn’t good enough. Even if St. David’s is a local hospital. Sheesh.

I’m leaving the scheduling of the driving practice up to him. Until I have to start riding with him. Yowza! Eligible for full license in July if driving hours completed by then. The point of no return, a pilot’s term, has now been reached.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly

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Mr. B.’s new desk

Posted on January 17, 2016 | 3 comments

It only took three hours but we finally found a desk for Mr. B.’s room, in the very place he had scorned not two hours before: Office Depot.

First we had to go to Macy’s in the Domain in North Austin, or what I call North Austin, since it’s north of the rancho and still in Austin. With an argument about how to get there as Mr. B.’s Google skills are somewhat lacking. They didn’t carry furniture. “We’re small,” the nice saleslady said.

On to Louis Shanks, an old line Austin furniture store which had one he liked. Only problem was it cost more than a thousand dollars. Even Mr. Argumentative wasn’t going to argue for that. Finally Office Depot and, lo and behold, the very desk he wanted. And a cheap, high-backed executive swivel chair to boot.

Then the hassle of waiting for the desk to be delivered later this week and him putting the chair together but the latter is another story not really worth relating. I left him to do it because he needs the experience, including the cussing he did when it didn’t go as easily as he imagined. I finally provided minimal assistance, such as… well, nevermind. We have the chair and the desk is coming. On to the next problem in my continuing battle with a teenager.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly, Texana

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Facial tissue best bet, at least in January

Posted on January 16, 2016 | 1 comment

A friend insists there’s a financial future in tattoo removal. For whoever can figure out how to get the ink out of the skin of all those Millennials instead of just blurring the death-before-dishonor or the name of that hot bod who is now sleeping with someone else.

In January, hereabouts, however, facial tissue as the groceries call Kleenex and its derivatives, has got to be where’s it’s at. This is cedar fever season in Central Texas, the time for nose-blowing and sneezing. And my annual promise to move to Alpine soonest. When Mr. B. goes off to college, I may do just that—at least every January.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly, Texana

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Self-clean oven self cleaned

Posted on January 13, 2016 | 2 comments

For reasons I no longer recall, Mrs. C. did not believe in running the self-clean cycle on the rancho’s self-cleaning Frigidaire gas oven.I think she didn’t like the smell it put out on the self-clean setting. Result: the glass door was incredibly soiled on the inside. Most of the interior was okay. I guess she cleaned that part by hand.

The other day I decided to run it on its two-hour cycle. Opened windows and turned on ceiling fans. Fortunately it was warmish outside (well, in the 50s) so we didn’t freeze, Senor Gato and me (Mr. B. was gone to school) and the smell was tolerable.

Best part is, later, when the cycle was over and the oven had cooled down again, I followed the instructions and wiped down the interior with a damp cloth, including the glass on the inside of the door. Whoop-de-do. The glass is clean for the first time I can remember. Several years, anyhow. I’m so far successfully resisting any more major cleaning efforts, however.

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Mrs. Charm, Rancho Roly Poly

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