Gunny Walker

  Went to eat at Chef Wang's last night. A whole group of us. Turns out that the parents of the Baby-matics are moving to North Carolina. I've known him for about nine years now. We worked together and claims his original thought was, "This guy's kind of weird but okay." No one could ask for a better compliment than that.
  The Baby-matics and their mother fly out today. Father-matic is leaving work on July 21st. So he's leaving pretty soon as well. The thing is there are three baby-matics. I can't understand how parents gain weight. I get my best exercise hanging out with those kids. (That's why they are the baby-matics.) The general consensus is that the baby-matic 2003 is going to upgrade with some new hardware, Tooth 2.0. Baby-matic 2000 is still a bundle of energy. She's starting to turn into a little ham. It's a good thing they are moving this year. She should be going to school next year. I'm just glad that she didn't call me "Mr. Gunny" this time. I'll be Mr. Walker or just plain Gunny, but the mixture of those annoy me.
  The big news of the day was that the Baby-matic 2002 has learned the joy of Knock-Knock jokes. The first one goes like this...
2002: Knock Knock
GW: Who's there?
2002: Orange
GW: Orange who?
Baby-matic pauses and then laughs hard.
Then I usually laugh as well over the silliness of it all.
  You gotta love kids.
  In other news, Lil D at work is having a kid. The truth is that this was being kept on the DL so I couldn't report it here. The reason it's been kept quiet is because he isn't married, but he plans to be soon. Lil D is a young guy who's really straightened out his life. He's a real success story and great guy to know. I'm sure he'll make a good dad.

Also since this is the last post of the month, I'd like to add the following words...

• MACD (Moving Average Convergence Divergence)
  
• SMA, EMA, and any other Moving Averages
  
• RSI
  
• OBV
  
• stochastic (I still have no idea what this one means)
  
• And Clint Howard, just because I feel like it.

It seems that the adwords in Google's banner are based on what I list here. I wanted to load it up for the month of June.

  Greetings folks. Happy Monday! I bought some Marvel stock today. I'm jumping the gun on technical analysis. The stock hadn't qualified by close of Friday, but I think that today it qualify. Anyway, I'm taking a chance. We'll see if it pays off. It wouldn't hurt for you to go Wednesday to see Spiderman.
  I know I will be. Wednesday at five.
  I don't understand why this Iraqi handover is such a big deal. Surely, no one thinks that we are leaving anytime soon. After all, things seem to be teetering on the brink of anarchy over there. You know what would really take your mind off the problems in Iraq? Going to see Spiderman.
  Why do people invest in Gold? Really? If anyone can answer this I'd like to know. We use it to make batteries somehow. That's it as far as I know. It's conductive, so I guess it's used to make circuits actually. What else is it besides baubles and such. People buy gold in case the economy collapses, but just how much are you going to barter with something that you can't eat, use for shelter, or even use to kill something/someone?
  You know what would help you out? Pop tarts. And I believe they are distributing some cool Spiderman software as well.
  No, not all news today is related to Spiderman, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't go see it Wednesday. Twice. Please?

  Some times, "funny" just falls into your lap.
  the Discovery Channel is running a special about the Parthenon. There was a fellow, Lord Elgin, that removed parts of the frieze of the Parthenon between 1804 and 1815. The Turks had damaged the Parthenon in war in 1687. Christians had hacked of many of the terrible graven images that it contained much earlier. Elgin with the permission of the Ottoman ruler of Greece removed parts of the frieze to the British Museum in London.
  It seems though that the naked, male, marble statues were a bit unusual for England's high society. (And this is the funny part.) "Many of high society's well respected women were shocked upon seeing Elgin's Marbles."
  Hey, it ain't Comedy Central, but it's pretty good for the Discovery Channel.
  Also, they mention the Nashville Parthenon, so I guess we get some props there. If you're ever in NashVegas. Go see it. During the day you can see the inside, but also go see it at night. It's pretty nice the way they light it up.

  Just in case you were curious, there's a Davidson County tax auction coming up. Now that's two weeks away. (July 14th at noon) Some of these properties are going to drop off the list. As a person whose been to some of these, let me tell you, if you're holding out for that really sweet property in Bell Meade (Or some other ritzy place), you're not getting it. Pretty much everybody else there will have more money than you. If they don't, please tell ME how you made your money. That's why I buy properties in the 'hood.
  If you see a bald guy with a goatee, that's me. I'd love to hear if you read this here. Do remember however that this is an auction. Don't be if I bid against you. (I know I was when people bid against me.)
  Here are some helpful links. You can see photos and floor plans, if available, at the website for the Property Assessor of Davidson County. Also, you should see the maps on Davidson County Metro Planning Department. Make sure that you check the flodway/flodplain box and then refresh the map. You don't want to buy a property and find out that it's a drainage ditch.
  On the second site, you can also find out several other pieces of information such as...

• Zoning for Businesses, Commercial, High Residential, Adult Business...
  
• Airport impact zones
  
• Whether or not it has road frontage
  
• How close it is to train tracks
  
• And much more. Just go look to find out.

  Anyway, just thought that I would pass this stuff along. And if you want to know about how this stuff works in other states, check out the 16% solution.

Guess what arrived in the mail today!

  "I've been bad. Repeatedly. But why brag? The details of my exploits are only a pretext for a far more expansive consideration of general truths. What is this? It's a philosophy of poetics. Of politics if you will. A literature of protest. A novel of ideas. A pornographic magazine of truly comic book proportions. It is in the end what ever the hell I want it to be and when I'm through with it, it's going to blow a whole this wide straight through the worlds own idea of itself." --- Henry Fool

  That's a man that believes in his writings. Too bad it turns out to be crap.
  Henry Fool is the story of a garbage man and a writer. They become close and their lives become intertwined. The garbage man becomes famous by dealing in garbage and the writer becomes obscure pretty much by the same means. It's a strange little story that should not be viewed by those weak to offences. There are scenes with vomiting, sex, defecation, and many with curse words, but it's statements like the one I listed and the strange intertwining of characters throughout the story. It's a strange little story that I enjoyed.

  Okay folks, so when you look at charts there are three basic types. There is the line chart that everyone seems to know. It's a basic chart that's pretty straight forward. The problem is that there are other charts that tell you much more information.
  Another popular version is the bar chart. Now this is a very popular form of chart. (No really!) The problem is that I never heard of this kind of chart until a few months ago when I first started reading about technical analysis. There is quite a bit more information located in this type of chart.   Now if you look to your right you will see an oversimplified version of a bar chart. There are four different parts to a bar chart. The part labeled "A" is the opening price. (Basically how much the price was at the first sale of the day or period stated.) The part labeled "B" is the high for the time period stated. "C" is the closing or final sale price. "D" is the lowest price at which the particular security sold. It tells you how the stock moved and how much it moved around. Now, below there are four bars.
  The four bars are the four basic movements that a stock can make. First there is bar A. It obviously shows that the stock opened at one price and closed higher for the day. It sold a little higher than the close and little lower than the open, but it was basically and "up day." B shows that the price opened near the close of the previous bar, but dropped in price. It never rose above the open. It was a "down day." The bar does not tell you whether it slid quickly downward. Now C shows that the stock closed and opened on the same price. It rattled around a lot during the day, but at the end of the day, it went nowhere. D is the simplest chart there is. It probably had one trade all day, or by some freak accident, all the trades were at the same price. If the stock hasn't traded at all that day there won't even be a chart. Sometimes there is one trade that is far off kilter can mess up the whole chart. It is possible to see a chart of the day that can give minute by minute details. (example)
  Technical analysis is a way of studying the past to predict the future. It's not perfect, but its a method that a lot of traders use.
  Now the third type of chart is known as a candle stick chart. It is blocks with lines, but essentially it is the same thing as the bar chart. The dark boxes are down days. The light boxes are up days. The information is the same, but with a lot more complex drawing. (I've heard that this type of charting began in Japan. Leave it to the Japanese to make things much more complex.) I find it distracting and unnecessary. All right, so now you've got the three basic charts. Now I've got stocks to watch. See you later.
  Read more about technical analysis.

  Okay, so I assume you know about the butter incident. Then Gooseneck said that no one can drink a gallon of milk in thirty minutes. Well, I had to respond to this challenge.
  Well, I tried it. I managed half a gallon in the first five minutes, but then I was done. I couldn't do it. I had to put the milk down.
  I then went to sleep for the day, but I woke up four hours later. I'm lactose intolerant. My gut felt like five miles of bad road. No wait, make that six miles of bad logging trail. The game of "What can Gunny eat?" is now over. Since I was up for the day, I decided to go see the The Stepford Wives. It's a pretty good movie with a good twist at the end. Although you should know it's not like the original. I think that the new version should be darker than what it is. It honestly reminded me of Shock Treatment (sorry no DVD). Anyway, that's all I've got. Good night folks.

  Boy, sometimes I feel like such an idiot. I've tweaked the main page. (And the sidebar here as well.) The pic of my old dog Buck takes far too long to load. I'll need to lower the resolution. It's one of my first digital pictures, so I hadn't learned how to reduce the resolution. It takes far too long to load for such a small photo. Anyway, the dumb part was after I had done all of this, I went to update the page and then it couldn't find the server. I spent thirty minutes pusing this button and that menu, and couldn't figure it out. Had the server gone down. I'm getting my hosting for dirt cheap. I keep waiting for them to crash, but I guess they are doing okay. There's no reason why these internet services shouldn't be cheap, they just aren't. Anyway, I went to launch Internet Explorer and then it hit me.
  I wasn't online.
  Boy that's an ego buster.

  Anyway, before I start talking about stocks and stuff, let me say this...

Nothing on this website is a recommendation for any of the stocks listed on this website or any associated website. Nor is it a recommendation for any of the trading or investing patterns listed on this or any associated website. Any advice is given to the reader with the sole intent that he or she will analyze their own portfolio of investments and risk tolerance. I, "Gunny" Walker am not professional investment advisor. "Gunny" isn't even my real name or a derivation of any of my real names. Any information that is given on this website should be analyzed by the reader and/or their personal investment advisor. The purpose of this website is to entertain and inform, but you must make your own decisions.

  I've probably needed a disclaimer for a while. I don't want any heat off of the SEC. Especially, now that I am about to start talking about technical investing.

  (Sorry this post is so long folks, but I would appreciate it if you would read it all. I haven't been posting much because this monstrosity has been floating around. I've really been dreading it. That and the changes that I want to make on the blog.)
  Things are changing at BTCA. We aren't getting paid as much. Well, actually I am. They won't be lowering our pay, just the way that we get paid. We used to get four or five percent raises based on how good of a worker that we are. Now we just get 40 and 55 cent raises. Now this breaks down like this. If you get paid less than 11 dollars then you get bigger raises. If you get less than eleven dollars you get smaller raises.(Assuming your getting the greater raise.)

Rate of pay	5%	New Pay	Old Pay
8.00	.40	8.55	8.40
11.00	.55	8.55	8.55
13.00	.65	13.55	13.65
15.00	.75	15.55	15.75

  Can't say that I blame them. After all, there is no power as great as compound interest. The truth is that a couple of years ago I realized. "Heck even if I get a standard raise then, I'm still doing pretty well." I guess that attitude is why they are altering the pay scale. You have to kill somebody to get fired at BTCA, and there are some people that have been there twice as long as I have been. They could easily be getting raises of a dollar a year.
  The thing is that forty cents is a lot to bust your hump for. I mean you work forty hours a week 52 weeks a year. (Okay, there's a vacation in there somewhere but the math's the same) 52*40*.40=832 Dollars a year. Is it worth it?
  Well had you bought Stock in Marvel Comics at 16 dollars a share and sold it last Friday, they you would have made 2.67 a share. If you had bought 100 shares (price $1,600) You would have made 267 dollars. Had you bought 200 shares ($3,200) you would have 534 dollars. With 300 shares ($4800) you'd have made 801 dollars a year. That's pretty close to what you made with that forty cent raise. Now had you sold when it broke 22 dollars a share (It's high was been 23.82) Then you would have done well. That's 6 dollars a share. The numbers are much nicer. (600/1200/1800)
  Of course, figuring out which stock to buy is the trick. Had you held Southwest Airlines in that time you would have lost a dollar for each share.
  I picked these stocks because I have made money on these stocks. I bought Marvel when it was four dollars and sold somewhere around eight. Then I bought it again when it dropped back to five and sold again when it hit eight. A total profit of about 700 dollars. (Pull up the five year chart, you can see it was this low.) Of course this was over two years ago. Had I held my 200 shares until today it would be worth over $3,000. I would have tripled my money.
  The trick is to figure out when to buy and when to sell. I got cocky and pissed away all my profits on wonder stocks like K-Mart, WorldCom, and such. Seems like somebody else declared bankruptcy while I held them but I can't remember whom.
  Anyway, now some of you thought a few paragraphs back, "well Gunny, it must be nice to have a few hundred dollars to gamble away in the stock market." The truth is why don't you?
  I work with a guy at BTCA. We'll call him Jim. Jim is recently married and recently became a father. He's a decent guy, but he works two full time jobs. Now he is 25, but the truth is that life isn't going to get any cheaper, and neither are kids. Kids expenses can grow much faster than that 832 dollars a year. Heck a pair of my glasses cost half that much. (That's because they are extra tough. If I bought cheap ones at half that price, I'd break them in six months.) The question is how much would you have to work to support yourself and your rising expenses?
  Jim is 25 now, but what happens when the kid hits 16 and Jim is 41. Is that eight hundred a year going to buy that kid a car? (With inflation, that won't buy tires.) Will that eight hundred a year pay for college in a couple of years. Will Jim still be working two jobs like he is now? Probably. He's got a thirty year mortgage on that new house. Or only able to work one job because he's worn himself out. That would cut his pay in half. Of course none of us want to get paid less, do we?
  The truth is that Jim will be dead if he works two jobs for 16 years. Or crazy from only getting 3 hours of sleep a day.
  Of course, you work to support yourself. Your wife works to support herself. What of you get an extra mouth to feed? Or two? With double family wouldn't you need double the income? (So says the childless bachelor.) I want to grab Jim, shake him, and yell, "I sure hope you are saving a great deal of your income, because you're rocketing to the poorhouse."
  That's why you must invest. Because life ain't getting any cheaper.

  I love Comedy Central. First they have Reno 911 followed by The Daily Show followed by Tough Crowd. If I had a Tivo...
  But then I'm too cheap for that. (Well actually, I watch too much TV. I don't need anything that makes it any easier for me to goof off.)
  The stories that they run on the daily show are great. Stories like how Philadelphia is courting to the gay tourist. Why not they have no kids to spend money on. That means more money for travel, and of course, gay people love to shop.
  I've been reading Song of Susannah (The Dark Tower, Book 6). I bought it on vacation because I needed something to read on the plane. It's been a little hard to read. I also don't like the way that Stephen King is writing himself into the book. I'll have see what happens.

  By the way, just so you know MeMa's bag was 59 pounds coming back from Oregon. She was charged 25 dollars because it weighed more than 50 pounds. Since she didn't have to pay this on the way out, it can be assumed that her suitcase gained nine pounds. Where did it gain nine pounds? Well, one can only assume it was from souvenirs. How many souvenirs?
  22 postcards, a spoon, a magnet, a pair of pot holders, a leaf, 7 sticks, a shopping bag that says, "made in Oregon", a name tag from the Shilo Inn that says Paul that she found on the light rail platform in Portland, and 39 rocks. (Where ever MeMa goes there is an erosion problem.) Some of these are for her. Some of these are for others. Don't ask which are which. Those are just the souvenirs that I know about.
  When Canada decided to become a country they needed a name. They eventually decided that they wanted a name like no other. To accomplish this they decided to draw letters out of a hat. When the big day arrived one pulled the letters out of the hat while another wrote them down.
  The first letter was drawn. The man called, "C, eh!"
  The second letter was drawn. The man called, "N, eh!"
  The third letter was drawn. The man called, "D, eh!"
  And thus Canada was named.
  That's all I got today folks. Wash it out and try again tomorrow.

  Comedienne. Some words bother me. Comedienne is one of them. Can't female comics be comedians? Why do they need a different word? There should be words for guys that are doing what are regardarded as typically female jobs. (Here's where I show that I am a sexist pig.)
  From now on male nurses shall be referred to as "nursettes." Male secretaries should be known as "secretariats." Male aerobic instructors shall hereby be called "gay."
  And that's why on the plane back to Tennessee, I invented the word "stewardessessess."
  MeMa didn't find it very funny. (No silly, I didn't tell her the gay joke.)

  All right, I made it home. I was very tired and have slept quite a bit since arriving. We left Coos Bay yesterday morning and drove to Portland. We stopped at the end of the Oregon Trail and arrived at the airport at about seven o'clock. Then we waited for our 11:55 flight. Then the turns out that the plane was leaving late. There was some weather in Dallas that was holding the crew up. Not the plane, just the crew. Our plane was there. Just not the crew. They had to leave another plane and then get on ours. I'm thinking. Gee whiz, just let us get one plane. Then I can buckle up and sleep.
  So the plane doesn't leave until after one. So we get on, they go through the safety dance, and then we take off. Turns out that we arrive in Dallas with our plane boarding for Nashville in ten minutes. MeMa and I head for the gate as fast as we can. (Which for MeMa is not actually that fast.) I think that if this ever happens again I'll get her a wheelchair. Surely I can push her faster than she walks.
  We got on the plane to Nashville and a quarter of the plane was bound for Bonnaroo. We arrived on time.
  The funniest part of the trip was MeMa waking me up to ask if I wanted anything to drink. I was a little too busy sleeping to care. I guess she had a hard time understanding that.
  Anyway, the trip home was uneventful except for the aches that I got from getting my three hours of sleep in an airplane seat. Some of which I still have. So I think it's time for some more sleep.
  Good night folks.

  Parogac.
  That's the way that MeMa spelled it. Of course, she went a one room school house some 60 plus years ago, but you'd think that she could spell it better than that. I knew she had it wrong. She was pronouncing it with an R between the last two letters. There's nothing like the internet. After two hours of searching I find this drug she took as a little girl. She says that she can remember when they started restricting the sale of it. The druggists did this completely on their own. They sold the stuff in little bottles and made people sign a log when they bought it. Then they compared notes to see who was hitting various stores in town. (And you thought that Reagan started the drug war.)
  The actual spelling is Paregoric. A camphorated tincture of opium, taken internally for the relief of diarrhea and intestinal pain.
  Wowee! Booze and opium! No wonder why it settled the kids right down.
  I think I've got the right drug, but I'll have to speak to her today to find out, but for now, I'm going back to sleep.
  I woke up dreaming about falling off cliffs. We went to the ocean again today and I looked down a lot of cliffs into it. (I also saw some sea lions.) I think I can go back to sleep. I'll need my rest. We have to drive back to Portland and then we fly out at almost midnight.
  Good night folks.

  Hey folks. Just got back from the beach today. That's right the Pacific Ocean. There was a big rock out there and I climbed it. Then I went to rinse my hands of the water. Then a big wave came along and I was almost in it up to my knees. So technically I dipped a toe in for several hours.
  Then we went and got some lunch at a local restaurant.
  Then I went back up the big rock with MeMa's camera. Then we drove down the coast to the State line and back again.
  Yesterday on the way back from visiting some relatives, I'll probably never remember whom they are, we saw The Oregon Vortex.
  That's right. It's a non stop thrill ride when you hang with me.
  Tomorrow we're going to look at some flowers.

  The most annoying thing about vacationing with and/or visiting family is this.
  "Are you hungry?"
  This starts more feuds than any other niceties in my family. Actually all the niceties start a war.
  There are great argument starters such as...

• "You paid the ticket last time. I'm paying this time."
  
• "What do you want to do?"
  
• "I heard you like museums. We have one just down the road." I visited two museums in Portland and have now been classified as a museum frequenter. Truth is what ever I do on the first day is what people suggest for the rest of the trip.
  
• "Well, if you're paying for the ticket, then I'm paying for the tip"
  
• "Are you thirsty? We've got beer, Pepsi, Verner's, apple juice..." And at least eight other drinks.
  
• "You just want water?"
  
• "Did you not see the salad dressing?" (I like them dry.)

  The biggest one has to be the whole meal thing. MeMa needs to eat small meals frequently. If she doesn't, the demons act up. She can't handle lettuce, too much bread and the doctor said cut out the "fatty foods." So then she escalates it to "Are you getting hungry." That means I don't want to inconvenience you.
  "Look I know you need to eat often. Do you need to eat?"
  "My stomach is getting empty."
  "Good we're eating then. What do you want?"
  "What do you want?"
  "Mexican food, with lots of jalapenos and red sauce."
  "I don't know if I can eat that."
  "Then pick something."
  "I'll eat whatever you want."
  "Okay, Mexican it is then. Unless you want Subway." Which has lots of bread.
  "Do they have something other than sandwiches?"
  argument continues.
  This explains a lot about me. We're too darn polite. We wind up dancing around the issue and then kill an hour talking about eating before we actually do it. Several times during this vacation (as with many others) at MeMa saying, "Look if you are tired/hungry/bored let me know. Otherwise you are going to suffer. I'm getting tired of these niceties."
  That's why a lot of people think I'm rude. It's because I am honest. Brutally so. And it shocks family when I am completely honest instead of biting my tongue. My uncle (MeMa's son) came to the Christmas party one year and said, "Hey what happened to all you hair?"
  I almost snapped back with "Hey, I haven't seen you here in three years. Heck, I just assumed you died, old man."
  See I have manners. Sometimes I bite my tongue. And I'll only attack if you attack first.
  Another thing I hate: Professionalism.

  Hey folks. Nothing much going on today. It's day two of meeting family members that I have no idea who they are. Step cousins. Ex great aunts. Half cousins. Et cetera. I wish there were something exciting to report, but there isn't. There wasn't anything very exciting yesterday either.
  Sorry folks. This is MeMa's vacation. By doing what an eighty year old woman wants to do, it turns out to be not very exciting.
  I do have to admit that I am proud of my uncle. MeMa wanted to visit his ex wife. That's why I am currently in Rogue River. Clifford went in and actually talked to her. Of course, all he could say afterwards was how bad she looked.
  I'll be sleeping here in Rogue River for the night. I've got to figure out how to give Clifford the money for this hotel room. His daughter reserved it. Unfortuantely, it's the only one in town and it costs 80 dollars a night. Had we stayed eight miles from here at the Motel 6, it would have been 45.
  Clifford keeps giving me a hard time about spending so much time on the internet, but if he had consulted with me first, I would have saved him eighty five dollars.
  But he'd never listen. He's pretty well stuck in his ways. I keep getting directions to places off of the net, but it's pretty obvious that he doesn't trust them.
  By the way, MeMa's souvenirs are up to 10 postcards, a spoon, a key chain, 11 rocks, a stick, a leaf, and a shopping bag. Oh and a name tag from the Shilo Inn that says Paul. She found that on the ground at the light rail platform in Portland. Some of these souvenirs are for her. Some are for others. Don't ask which is which.

  There's a new blog up, it's called Everything's Jake. (Make sure you put in the hyphen.) It's updated infrequently. It's fun to read. He lives in Kentucky and a few of his posts are about work. He's the one in charge. I remember when I was a boss at Big Time Corporate Anti-Christ. It sucks to have to be the adult. Luckily now, I'm just a peon.
  I've even got a motto. "If you aren't a peon, you just get peed on more."
  Like it? I made it up myself.
  Anyway, he's got a couple of posts about work. Here and here. I can relate. If I didn't know better I'd thnk he was working for BTCA. I guess the man breathes down your neck hot and heavy where ever you are.
  Some day, I think that I will add him to the side bar. Of course, being the lazy guy that I am, it'll probably be right after he quits blogging.

  I saw the ocean yesterday! Twice!
  We drove from Portland to Coos Bay. It took about five hours. MeMa and I stopped at a lighthouse and whale watching station. No luck. We also stopped in Reedsport for some McDonalds
  I was freaked out by one thing. You can't pump your own gas in Oregon. I'm told you can't pump it in Washington either. Heck the main reason that I stopped at the Exxon was to use the bathroom. If they aren't going to have that then I'll just find out which one is the cheapest. It seems none of them have bathrooms or markets. Just so you know, I've heard you can't pump it in New Jersey either.
  I saw some seals, sort of. My room wasn't ready at the Motel Six, so we decided to find Clifford. We went to the Chamber of Commerce and bought a map. We found Clifford from a letter that MeMa had received. I think that we shocked him. He owns 14 acres and lives a way off the road. He figured out who I was by the fact that I have a shaved head and a goatee.
  We drove around for a while, not really looking at anything, and then went and ate some Thai food. It was a pretty boring day. I think that I'll have to ditch them a couple of days to go out on my own. That's the only way I'll get my toes in the ocean. MeMa yesterday didn't even want to go to the beach.
  MeMa also has demons in her stomach. I have yet to see her eat anything that they don't fight over. I shall watch it with great interest. Clifford frequently spoke of wife without being torn up too much. I guess he took the transition into widower pretty well. That's all for now. I'm charging up the digital camera. Maybe I'll have some pics tomorrow.
  Later folks.

I'm sure that if you are reading this, then you read about my butter incident a few days ago. Read This.

Dear Mr. Gooseneck,

  I will gladly accept your challenge in couple weeks. I am lactose intolerant. Is that okay? I think that I can easily drink a gallon of two percent choclate milk in one sitting, possibly half an hour. Is that okay? It would have to be one sitting, because I wouldn't be very mobile afterward. Being that I shall not return from Oregon until next week, and would like to make plans to go to the Wilson County Fair which is a real fair unlike the shoddy job we do here in Rutherford County. So it will be a couple of weeks before I can undertake this challenge, but do understand that I will take this challenge if only in the name of science.
  Thank you and have a good day,
  Gunny Walker

  This is not an open invitaion for a game of "What can Gunny eat?" Please visit Gooseneck's site. Especially if you are sports fan. (I am not.)
  Go visit the Wilson County Fair. They have tractor shows, lawnmower races, and demoliton derbys. They actually rival the Tennessee State Fair.
  There, now I am done.

  During WWII, the Japanese launched rubberized silk balloons loaded with explosives. The hope was that they would slip into the jet stream long enough to eventually come down over the mainland US and start forest fires. Then the US would be too busy fighting problems at home to fight the Japanese. At least, that was the plan. Out of 9,000 balloons, less than 350 made their way to the mainland.
  However one did quite notably. Unfortunately, one landed in Oregon. A minister, his wife and five children were on a picnic that day. The minister was busy parking the car. Until this time the government and the press had kept information surpressed. The children dragged the balloon from the woods where it landed. Then the bomb exploded. It killed 5 children and the minister's wife. This was one of the few attacks that the US suffered during World War II.
  I saw this balloon yesterday or at least what was left of it. I would love to have brought you a picture, but it wasn't allowed. It was basically down to a couple of hoops and some simple, rusted mechanics. There wasn't much to it. I asked the lady at the gift shop, but she had no idea what I was talking about. She said that she hadn't even seen it.
  I was shocked, but I guess since she lived through WW II, she had no desire to experience it again.
  MeMa and I went to a museum ran by the Oregon Historical Society. We also rode the street cars and light rail a lot.
  Portland is amazing they have so much public transportation. They have buses, light rail, and trolleys. And they all take the same ticket. Why anybody would need a car in this town is beyond me. We easily traveled around town for lunch, went to museums, and shopped at the Safeway. (How do you fit three elephants into a shopping cart? Hint: take the "S" out of "Safe", and the "F" out of "Way".) We would have gone to the mall, but MeMa was tired. She is almost eighty after all. We got back to the hotel at 6 pm local.
  We go to get a car today. We'll ride the Red Line to the airport, get our car, and drive down to Coos Bay to where her brother lives. The ride will probably wear her out. She will be eighty years old this year after all. Maybe Clifford can keep her better entertained than I can. I have bought a map of Portland and a book on Coos Bay.
  I had thought of going up to see the Columbia River, but MeMa wouldn't make the trip. She can't handle a quarter of the walking that I can. Heck she can't even handle the food. I let her pick a place to eat and she said whatever I wanted. She was ill from it all day. Tomorrow I think that she will pick a place eat or we will not eat at all.
  In other news, Southwest was up yesterday. It had been down four days in a row. I've got to remember though that I am new to this technical analysis stuff and I did make some money. Yahoo Finance says that the market should move lower, but they might as well flip a coin. I'm not sure any market analyzer is right much. If they were, there would be no need to report on it. I'd be sipping daiquiris in the Bahamas. (Okay, in Disney World.)
  That's all for today. As I said, they don't allow photos in Museums so I didn't take any pictures. Well, except for the Columbia Avenue exit sign on the interstate. She's a sucker for anything with the name of a Tennessee Town in it. I hope she doesn't see the exit for Fairview. It's been our first day and she has bought souvenirs. Eight postcards, a spoon, a key chain, and a stuffed bear for her neighbor. She says that she won't be buying any more souvenirs. We'll see. We'll probably hit a Wal-Mart today for maps.
Later, folks.

Greetings Folks. Except for the couple of hours I had on the plane between Dallas and Portland, I haven't had any sleep for 34 hours. So, MeMa and I are safe and secure in Portland. Good night little doggies. Later.