Driving to work, I saw the new Twins stadium lights on. They also had the big TV screen showing some football program. From the little bit I could see from the highway, it looks like it will be really nice. I think it will be worth getting some tickets for a game, just to check out the stadium. That will probably a common occurrence once the baseball season starts. Sorry, no pictures. I didn’t have the camera with me.
Speaking of baseball and thinking about warm weather just around the corner – well, maybe in another 4 months – I was thinking about grilling this year. Have you ever seen the Big Green Egg grill/smoker? It looks like a great grill, but out of my budget at $700+ for the large size. I watched a video online of a guy smoking a ‘Boston Butt’ – a pork roast-type thing, not from the butt, but from the shoulder of a pig. We call it a picnic ham or picnic shoulder around here.
Being a DIY kind of guy, I was wondering how I could get the equivalent of the Big Green Egg, but at a decent DIY price. Obviously, there are others who have wondered the same thing and a search on the Interwebs finds THIS and THIS and THIS. Building the actual clay pot smoker/grill will be the easy part. I’d like to go a step further and make it a programmable, computer controlled cooking machine. That video I watched about the Big Green Egg had a device that would control the heat in the smoker by monitoring the meat temperature via a probe, it would monitor the temperature inside the smoker via a probe and the controller would adjust the smoker temp by turning on a fan that blows air into the firebox of the smoker/grill. The guy said with just a single load of fuel, it would burn for 24 hours. The long, slow cooking is what made the meat turn out perfect. Why is it that usually guys do the grilling? Is it the fire? The mess?
What about that State of the Union tirade that PeeBo (President Barak Obama) gave. Boy, does he think he’s something. I listened to some of it on the way to work, but I don’t think he heard me yelling at him and what he was saying through the radio.
At the risk of giving you armchair psychologists out there a reason to give a negative analysis of me, I’m going to write about Jessica and Erika today. It is, after all, the one year anniversary of them being stolen from our family. Don’t worry, I won’t go on and on about it for days to come.
One year ago today was one of the top 5 worst days in my life. If you read my blog entries on December 20th of last year, you’ll remember it was one of the top 5 best days in my life. How could those two days happen so close together? Why did they have to be the one of the top 5 for the same reason? I’ll say right now that there is no legitimate reason that Jessica and Erika were taken away. It did not have to happen.
Well, they were taken from me, but given up by others would be more accurate. I would never have wanted my God-given daughters to be taken away – for ANY reason. During the events of last year everything was a blur. It wasn’t just a little blur, it was a complete white-out. As time passes, things become much more clear. I can focus on what really happened and I hear things from other people that were familiar with or were in the events that led up to Jessica and Erika being taken. It all helps sort out what really happened. If only we could turn back the clock and change things….but, what’s done is done.
At the risk of sounding vindictive or blaming, I have to stop writing about it now. All I will say is that I would still to this day and will always, give anything to get Jessica and Erika back where God put them, into our family. That doesn’t mean that they are more important than Brenda, Holly or Mitch. It just means what it means…our family should be complete with all 6 of us together.
Here are my favorite pictures of Jessica and Erika. Below is a picture of all of us together.
I’ve been watching some TV shows online (for free) that Milton Friedman created in 1980. The title of the series is “Free to Choose.” You have probably at least heard the name Milton Friedman. He was a Nobel Prize winning economist that favored capitalism and market forces dictating economic policy. I agree with almost all of his viewpoints regarding the economy, politics and the like. If you watch the videos, you’ll see that Friedman’s theories are just as applicable today as they were in 1980, 1880 and 1780. You can view the shows from THIS website.
The shows are very entertaining. The first half each hour long show is a documentary-like presentation by Friedman. The last half of the show is a debate/discussion with Friedman joined by 4 or 5 other ‘experts’ with different viewpoints. They sometimes get into a little heated banter that is fun to watch. That is if you like economics like I do.
The videos would be great for young people, especially high schoolers to watch for economics class. I wish I would have been more interested in this type of thing when in high school…but that’s a different story. Friedman also wrote a BOOK with the same title, to go along with the video. Or you can check out some of his OTHER BOOKS.
Another great economist is Henry Hazlitt. He wrote some great books, including Economics in One Lesson, which you can read free online HERE. Hazlitt also wrote The Failure of the “New Economics where he debunks Keynesian economics, which has hurt economies in the US and other countries, and has also led to socialist policies.
All this may sound boring if you don’t think you have an interest in economics or politics. But if you give it a chance, you may find an economist or politician deep down inside you. It may at least make you aware of the direction our country is headed and get you to write some letters or call your elected officials to let them know your viewpoints.
