Okay, technically it isn’t a plain, but rather a prairie. Snakes on the prairie just doesn’t have the plagiaristic ring I was going for, though. It’s sad, but I haven’t actually seen any snakes in the year I’ve lived here. Nor lizards. Plenty of mice, gophers, shrews, grasshoppers, praying mantises, ants, wasps, hornets, bees, flies and birds (yeah, I’m getting tired of breaking out into individuals and am just going to lump ’em for now), but no snakes or lizards. Oh yeah, also turtles (seen, not not seen, make sense? Probably not, but I don’t care right now). And fish. And people. And cows and horses and more people. But still no snakes. I’d like a few snakes on these plains (or prairie). Preferably big mouse-munching snakes. Then I wouldn’t have to deal with so many mouse-bits scattered about by the cats. Oooh! Is it time to break out my mouse-bits photo again? Sure, why not?

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While I may disagree with their choices, I respect the decisions of the soldiers who chose to go to war in Iraq. Hopefully they will come home alive, and relatively uninjured. I applaud, however, 1st Lt. Ehren Watada, who is willing to risk prison and a dishonorable discharge rather than support an illegal war that disgraces our country and undermines our security. Here’s to you, Watada: May you go free and the criminals who brought us this war rot in prison. I think Bush, Cheney & co. would look absolutely smashing in stripes, don’t you?

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Good news: A fuse blew and the pump is back online. If I so choose, I can be stink-free today. But why change what works? I say stay the course and refuse to bathe!

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I’m feeling European today. A feeling heavily influenced by the dead well pump, which means no water or bathing today. We had thunderstorms roll through the area last night, which made for a spectacular evening. Sometime around midnight, lightning struck pretty close and we heard something pop and sizzle. I am now thinking (38 years and he starts NOW?!) that may have been the power line to the pump. Grumblegrumblegrumble. Hey, at least I now have a reason to go to the gym!- showers.

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Okay stalkers, start your engines!- my friend Christine has been profiled in Capital Community News | DC North. Someone needs to teach the web gurus over there about the magic back/home button.

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Yesterday was a burn day out here on the prairie. The grass farmers are torching several thousand acres, so the wife and boy-child may want to hold their breath for a few days to reduce the risk of asthma attacks.

This is the smoke rising from behind the houses across the street from me. Can’t you just feel the tasty lung-chunkies rising?

As a knapweed farmer, I cannot burn; too much risk of losing my precious crop. Not wanting to put all my eggs in one basket, I have diversified and now raise Western Tent Caterpillars, several wasp species, hornets, yellowjackets and field mice. The wife is focusing most of her energies on gophers and moles, with a small crop of cabbage moths on the side. It is so much easier to be organic when you raise weeds and rodents.

A taste at this week’s crop of grasshoppers (tasty dipped in chocolate, no?). I couldn’t decide if defecation was his way of scaring me away, or scaring away the small bug crawling towards him.

The quail love our sunflowers

And a closer look at said sunflower

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Convert to Linux, or the terrorists will have won!

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Don’t forget to wear clean underwear. A racing stripe down the seat of your tighty-whities is NOT an acceptable expression of individuality or of your opinion of the new security measures. If not for the rest of us, do it for your mother’s sake.

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Never invite a tiger to tea
for it will want some meat
but if you do not give it some
you are what it will eat.

(more from the boy . . .)
The lion’s more vicious
and finds you delicious
regardless of whether
you serve meat with your tea.

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It is the end of another week, and the tweaked neck still lingers. The boy-child is wandering through the house singing “Everybodywants to be a cat” and reciting his latest dinner-party advice: Don’t invite a tiger to dinner, because after he finishes his dinner, the tiger will finish you. Good advice, although I don’t know that I will need it anytime soon. I don’t know all that many tigers.

Anyway, the neck is why I haven’t written anything lately: It hurts too damned much to just sit in a chair. It also hurts to lie down, but only if I try to roll over or sit up. If I lie perfectly still and ignore the bits of me that start falling asleep and screaming for a rollover, I am perfectly happy. Please, pity me.

I’m thinking of writing some new greeting-card slogans.
Dating/Dieting:
So I’ve heard you recently gained some weight/Is that why you swallowed your dinner date?

Darn, I think that’s it. I should have written them down.

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