Cap'n Bob & the Damsel

CapnBob

Retirement Milestone Nine

nine.pngIt’s hard to believe that another year of retirement has passed, for which we’re very grateful. We had a good year with some travel to visit family and see the sights of the great American Southwest. We have had a good health year, only suffering some of the usual senior aches and pains, but nothing too serious.

We still love living here in the Sonoran High Desert of Arizona. We currently are experiencing some light rainfall with a promise of heavier showers overnight. That should break the drought in this area good and proper.

During the coming year, we are planning a vacation in the springtime to visit the grave of my great grandmother Emma in Montrose, Colorado. She was buried there in 1960 and until just a few weeks ago had no marker on her grave. Damsel and I changed that and ordered a slant from a monument company in nearby Delta. We would like to visit the cemetery again to view the marker in person and decorate it with a wreath. My great great grandmother Adeline is also in that cemetery so we will place wreaths on her marker which she shares with her son, my great uncle Ulysis.

We don’t have a lot of other plans for the coming year and are playing it by ear, so to speak. We have plans to do some home improvement; painting the house exterior and walls plus new furniture for the inside. It should be a good year until the tenth retirement anniversary next fall.

01 Oct 2018 by Ancestors Arizona Notions Retirement Wanderlust

Tropical Cyclone Rosa

Tropical Cyclone Rosa

It looks like we Arizonans may be in for a taste of the remnants of Hurricane Rosa, currently situated in the eastern Pacific Ocean off the coast of Baja California Sur. The storm is expected to head northward and bring rain and flooding to northwestern Mexico and the Southwestern United States. The current forecast track of the storm will bring the center of it directly over us during the next few days.

We can already see signs of the weather that Rosa is going to bring. There are cumulus clouds beginning to form in all directions from here in Wickenburg. There is a layer of thin cirrus covering the southern sky.

The warnings include heavy rainfall and possible flash flooding, which is something we’re used to getting during monsoon season. Damsel and I did our usual thing to go around the property and secure loose objects that the expected winds might blow around. We took down the flags and stored them away until after things calm down.

Rain and embedded thunderstorms are forecast starting tonight and lasting through Thursday. The image above is from the National Weather Service. Click to enlarge.

30 Sep 2018 by Arizona Environment

Viking Rider

Viking Rider

Damsel captured this photo as we pulled into the grocery store parking lot yesterday. The rider’s helmet made me think of what I imagine the Vikings might have worn for headgear. The motorcycle and sidecar are an unusual sight in this part of the world; it is a classic Russian IMZ-Ural.

From Wikipedia:

IMZ-Ural is a Russian maker of heavy sidecar motorcycles.

In 1940, the Soviet Union acquired the design and production techniques for BMW R71 motorcycles and sidecars.The first M-72 model was finished in 1941. Originally, factories were to be located in Moscow, Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg), and Kharkov, but due to the approach of Nazi German troops, the Moscow facilities were moved to Irbit, and the Leningrad and Kharkov facilities to Gorkiy (now called Nizhny Novgorod).

The origins of the IMZ-Ural are linked to developments in the Eastern Front during World War II. The Soviet Union was preparing for possible military action by Nazi Germany. Joseph Stalin ordered the Soviet military to prepare in all possible areas, including the ground forces that would be defending the Soviet Union against invading German tanks and infantry. Mobility was especially stressed after the Soviet Union had witnessed the effect of the blitzkrieg on Poland.

[more]

Other than the headgear on the rider, the man’s vest is also interesting. The patch on his right side is the combat service identification badge of the US Army’s 1st Cavalry Division. On the left side of the vest are more patches and decorations, most of which I can’t make out from the photo. However, there are also military service ribbons. I can’t tell if one of them is a Vietnam service ribbon, again due to resolution issues.

The Viking Rider mounted his unique vehicle and was gone before I could ask about the motorcycle and thank him for his service. Maybe we will see him again. He won’t be hard to notice.

Click on the image to enlarge.

28 Sep 2018 by Arizona Classics Military Notions

Thirteenth Blogaiversary

thirteen.gifWell, here we are at another year milestone for the Cap’n Bob & the Damsel Blog. Thirteen years ago in September, we began posting about our Perspectives on Life and Politics. I’m not sure about the exact date we started, since some early posts were lost, but the first day of fall should be close enough.

We started this back in 2005 prior to retirement. I seemed to have a lot more time to blog back then before becoming ‘busy’ in the after work life.

We might have slowed down in posting, but the world and it’s myriad of fake news, political asshattery, and steady stream Constitutional abuse has not. We may not post often about those things, but we notice and are otherwise politically active behind the scenes.

We will continue posting when we feel the need for it and because The Wandering Minstrel is now permanently offline, all the posts about classics, firearms, notions and otherwise will be posted here, probably resulting in more activity on this site. Stay tuned for the next thirteen years.

22 Sep 2018 by Blogosphere Notions

Alex Turns Four

Alex Turns Four

Our eldest great grandchild, Alex, had his fourth birthday today. We sent him a birthday package via USPS and our granddaughter took these pictures of him opening his gifts. They live in Northern California.

He is at an age where he understands the concepts of birthday and who sent him presents. His mother says he really liked our presents.

The gifts were a Fire Tablet and Headphones. The interactive nature of the tablet should help him learn things as well as him playing games on it.

We have three great grandchildren now. Alex, his little brother, Mikey, and Maci, our great granddaughter whose mother is the second eldest of out three grandchildren. Maci will be two in April and Mikey celebrates his first birthday in November.

Our grandson, Jerry, just turned three in August. Jerry also got a Fire Tablet and Headphones. We were able to give Jerry his gifts in person, since his parents visited us here in Arizona in August.

19 Sep 2018 by California Family Technobabble

Palo Verde Tree Rescue

Small Palo Verde Startup In its new spot

During an afternoon walk, I noticed a small palo verde tree growing on the shoulder of the road out front. I made a mental note to remove the tree from that location due to proximity to road traffic. In a couple of years it would likely have grown out into the roadway.

In discussions with Damsel, we decided to relocate the tiny tree to our rock and cactus garden on the west side away from the RV drive. If the little tree survives the transplant, we will be able to prune it into a nice addition to the garden. It can be made to look like an attractive tree, like so many in Arizona xeriscapes managed by homeowners and landscapers.

I took my spade and carefully loosened the dirt around the little tree, trying to preserve most of the roots. I dug a hole in the west garden and lowered the tree into it. I brushed the soil from the hole over the roots and the lower part of the trunk. We doused it with a gallon of water, hoping that would ease the shock to the transplanted tree.

The two images above are the before and after. Click on either image to enlarge.

18 Sep 2018 by Arizona Environment Home & Garden Notions Retirement

Grumpy Veteran T-Shirt

Grumpy Veteran T-Shirt

I have a new acquisition to my T-Shirt collection. The words and images on the back of it say it all from my perspective. And, it’s true that I was born in July. Click on the image to enlarge.

I found it in an ad on the FecesBook™ website and Damsel said I NEEDED to get it. So I did. It was a little spendy, but it is now mine to be worn on whatever occasions for which it may be suitable. I’m not trying to pick a fight, but won’t back down from one either.

Most of the time I am not actually grumpy, but that mood gets set into motion when really stupid people do stupid stuff. It could be in traffic, in the supermarket aisle, or practically anywhere else. As we have said in the past, “STUPID SHOULD HURT.”

Image courtesy of The Damsel.

12 Sep 2018 by Curmudgeon Rants Humor Military Notions

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