Well, I’ve upgraded to the latest and greatest version of Word Press. It was relatively painless thanks to my web host Blue Host. All I had to do was click on the upgrade button and in less than 5 seconds it was done. I don’t really know what improvements I will see, or for that matter, what changes have occured. I will just have to work with the program and find out first hand.

CPS is Child Protective Service. There is an 800 number that you can dial to report child abuse. Actually, you can use it to report any abuse but it is designated mainly for children. This number can be called 24 hours a day, seven days a week. But the busiest day for this number is Super Bowl Sunday.

It appears that the spell checker has started working again though I don’t know why. Also, in the past, all comment had to be approved by me before they were posted. A few days ago, the comments started posting by themselves. Today, the comments once again need to be approved before they are posted. There must be something going on with the program. I suspect that the Word Press folks are testing changes in the program.

I just upgraded to the latest version of Word Press about 2 weeks ago.  Last week, they came out with another upgrade in an effort to fix the problems in the first upgrade.  I was about to upgrade to the newest version, as it had a lot of security fixes.  But just yesterday, they came out with another even newer version.  So as it stands right now, I have the new version of Word Press but not the newer or the newest.

“Location, location, location”. That is what I think whenever a new business comes to town. The same thing goes for housing. A classic case is the condo developer who wants to turn an 19th century 3 story building into condos. But not just any condos, expensive condos!

These condos are selling for a minimum of $200,000.00. Definitely a premium price for the Lowell area. But what is more interesting is the location. These condos are locate on main street in the historic district along the side of two rivers. Unfortunately, you can’t see much of the rivers if any from the condos. You see, the building is right next to a flour mill with very high silos.

If you look out the back of the building, all you can see is the flour mill. If you look out the front of the building from the top floor, you may see some of the river but not much as there are other buildings which block the view. In fact, I can see more of the river from my house than can be seen from the condos.

Oh did I mention that there is no parking? Well, I shouldn’t say that there isn’t any parking. Rather, I should say that you park behind the building in the alley. Of course, if you buy a big enough condo, you might get a car port. If not, then you will have to scrape your car on those cold, wintry mornings.

So, why does the developer figure that this is premium living space? Perhaps he figures that he will have a niche market since everyone else in the area is turning similar space into low rent apartments. Or perhaps he figures that the mill workers are going to retire soon and may want to stay close to the world that they have known for the past 40 years.

Personally, I think that the developer has confused Lowell, MI with Lowell MA. Certainty similar condos in Lowell, MA could easily sell for the asking price of the Lowell, MI condos but this isn’t Lowell, MA, this is Lowell, MI. The condos have been on the market for about 4 years now and not one has sold. Where’s that business plan when you need it?

The walkway outside of my building has a surface of bricks and concrete and little garden plots of grass. The bricks are not cemented into anything. Rather, they rest on their own little bed of concrete which is low enough to provide a level walking surface.

When the first snow of winter arrives, the walkway is not yet cold and so the snow melts immediately. The water from this melting snow runs between the cracks in the bricks and settles into the lowest spots of the concrete brick bed. Later, when the weather gets really cold, this water freezes and forces the bricks above it to rise slightly.

Now, the state has three methods for snow removal; chemical, snow blower and snow plow. These methods are used by themselves or in various combinations, depending on the snow depth.

If it is a light snow, they will probably just use snow melting pellets scattered across the walk way. Of course, the snow melting pellets coat the bottoms of shoes and boots and gets tracked into the building which makes a mess.

If it is a heavy snow, the snow plows will come through and plow the main walkways. The snow blowers will then come through and do clean up in the places that the plow can’t reach. Finally, they will cover everything with snow melting pellets.

Now, this is where it gets interesting. The snow plow is expecting the plowing surface to be level, but it’s not. Those little bricks with the frozen water under them have risen slightly. And when the plow hits them, they pop up out of their concrete beds. This, in turn, creates a walking hazard. Not only do you have to worry about stepping in the holes where the bricks used to reside, you also have to worry about stepping on the bricks.

When spring rolls around, the maintenance crew works on replacing and leveling the bricks, while the lawn crew replaces all of the grass that got burned up from the snow melting pellets. And come winter, the process starts all over again.

A few years ago, annoyed at high gas prices and sensing the need for some practical exercise, I decided to buy a trail bike. My goal was to use the bike for running errands around town.

I had shopped around a little for a bike but really wanted just an inexpensive mode of travel. Meijer’s (regional grocery chain) had a 15 speed trail bike that seemed to fix my need and price range. So, when the day of purchase came, my wife and I traded vehicles. She drove my car to work and I drove her van to Meijers.

Beside buying the bike, I also had a list of accessories to go along with it. These included a combination rear fender/cargo carrier, a lock and chain, a rear view mirror and a tire gauge. I threw the accessories into a shopping cart and then pulled a bike off of the rack.

It was a bit of a challenge to maneuver both a shopping cart and a bike at the same time but I managed, at least for a few feet. When a story clerk saw me struggling along, he came over to help me to the checkout counter.

With my new purchases now bagged and the cart left behind, I practically rode the bike out of the store. When I got to the van, I carefully load all of my equipment in the back and headed for home.

After unloading everything into my garage, I began the process of installing my accessories. First, I installed the rear fender/cargo rack and then the mirror. I knew that I would be on the road in only a few minutes. Next, I needed to check the air in the tires. But as I peered into the bag, it was empty!

What happened to my tire gauge? I know I put it in the cart. Is it in the back of the van? No. I checked my receipt. Not listed. It must have fallen out of my cart on the way to the checkouts.

Drat. I needed to check the tire pressure. While none of the tires were really soft, I was sure that they were not up to the maximum pressure. I gave each tire a squeeze and concluded that they would probably be ok for the time being.

A few days later, I needed to get a few grocery items. Since the purpose of the bike was for errands such as this, I decided to take her out for a run.

Transporting books would be fine for the cargo carrier but groceries might be a bit of a challenge for it. I decided that a backpack would be just the ticket for the trip. So, I grabbed my backpack and headed off to Meijers.

After I purchased my groceries, I loaded them into my backpack and jumped on my bike. It was then that I remembered the tire gauge. Not wishing to go back into the store and noting that there was an auto parts store on the way home, I opted for that solution.

It was about 10 AM when I pulled my bike on to the walk just outside the store. I put my standard down and with back pack bulging, I proceeded in.

Approaching the counter I realized two thing: One, I was the only customer in the store and two, all five of the clerks were starring at me. I thought “must be they don’t have many customers on bikes.”

One of the clerks approached me and asked if he could help me. I told him that I was looking for a tire gauge. He reached behind the counter and pulled out a gauge. He told me it was the cheapest one that he had and that he could let me have it for $2.12.

The price on the package said $4.98. I thought that it must be on sale or something, so, I told the man that I would take it. I reached for my wallet and pulled out two one dollars bills. Certain that I must have twelve cents in my pocket, I pulled out my change. Noting that I only had four pennies, I said “Shoot, I thought I had twelve cents.”

Putting the pennies back in my pocket, I started to reach for my wallet again. That is when the man said “That’s ok mister. Two dollars is close enough”.

I thanked the man and proceeded to leave. As I was walking out the door I heard him say to the others, “Poor devil. Can’t even afford a car.”

We used to have a big furry black cat. He came to us as a stray kitten and judging by how paranoid he was, his previous home was probably not a happy one. Beside being scared of just about every thing, he had this obsession with tinsel from the Christmas tree.

That cat loved that tinsel. Every chance he got he would be under that tree chewing on tinsel. Since we didn’t think that chewing on that tinsel was healthy, we finally had to remove all of the tinsel from the lower branches of the tree.

Then one Christmas day, we noticed that the cat had an eight inch silver streamer hanging down just below his tail. As soon as we saw it, we had a good idea of what it was; tinsel from the tree. Apparently, all of the excitement from opening the gifts had dislodged some of the tinsel from the tree and the cat had, well, eaten it. Not knowing just how much tinsel was still in there, we decided that we needed to manually remove it.

As soon as he saw us moving towards him, his paranoia kicked in and he took off running. In the proud tradition of a bicycle in a Fourth of July parade, his streamer was waving in the breeze. Under the table, behind the sofa, across the living room, up the stairs and finally under my daughter’s bed.

Under the bed was his favorite den. My daughter stored a lot of stuff under the bed plus the bedspread hung down to the floor, so the cat could easily hide before our very eyes in the darkness. Shutting the bedroom door so there would not be any escapes, we started digging for the cat.

It took us about 10 minutes before we finally managed to grab the cat. It seems that the very items that hid the cat also blocked his escape route.

It took two of us to perform the task; one to hold the cat and the other to remove the tinsel. I held the cat as he was rather strong and could break away in a second. Kathy performed the deed. She grabbed the tinsel and slowly started pulling. After about a second or so, the cats eyes got big as saucers and after ten seconds, the tinsel was removed.

We released the cat and opened the door. But instead of running off on a mad dash, the cat, wishing to maintain his dignity, just wandered off slowly as if nothing had happened.

Lowell has a new store, but I don’t know what it is. You see, they don’t have a sign on the outside of the building. They do have a 3×3 white board in the window and have written something on it with dry markers. I guess that is their sign. If so, the name of the store is Quality …… The rest of the words are not legible.

They have put a lot of time and money into getting their business ready and I can understand that their building sign might not be ready yet but still, they should have something stating who they are or what they do. They are right on main street so they should take advantage of their high visibility. They should at least advertise in the local paper or have a grand opening or something.
It looks like they are selling some kind of building products. When I drive by the windows of the store I can see samples of cupboard handles and some kind of floor tile and their 3×3 sign advertising “Quality…” The showroom area is not very large but there is a large garage area in the back so if they are selling anything bulky such as carpet or lumber, the building would be ideal.

The former tenants built hearses. But, they were only there for a few months. Apparently there wasn’t enough market for them or else they relocated to a different facility or maybe even a different state. I do have to wonder how many hearses are needed in the US? I know that most funeral parlors no longer own their own hearses but rent them on an “as needed” basis. I wonder if their business plan included projected death rates in the US.

Prior to that, the hearse people did body work and built hearses as a side project. To me, that seemed like a more viable business approach. But, they were determined to get into the business of building hearses full time. I suspect that they did not have a good business plan

Well, I guess I don’t have a spell checker any more, though I don’t know why. It disappeared as mysteriously as it appeared. Not that I really relied on it as I use the spell checker in my word processing programs instead. I am just curious as to whether I am doing something unintentionally to activate/deactivate the program or if there are some other outside factors that come into play. Maybe this is one of the glitches in my Word Press program. I don’t think that the Word Press people would have access to my site, but maybe they do and they are the ones experimenting with the spell checker. Who know?

When my daughter came to live with us for a year, while her husband is finishing his tour of duty in South Korea, she brought along her pigeons. The pigeons and fly cage reside in the backyard under some trees.

One day, when my daughter was in the fly pen, a hawk came down and attacked the cage. This surprised my daughter as the hawk did not seem to be concerned with her presence. On another occasion, as we were looking out the window, we saw the hawk once again trying to get into the cage.

This prompted my daughter to come up with an idea to try. She got a plastic pop bottle, tied some fish line on it and covered it with faux fur. Then, she threw the bottle out into the back yard and slowly pulled it across the grass, hoping to attract a hawk.

The hawk was not interested. We concluded that apparently the hawk didn’t like faux.
Perhaps faux is too dry and tasteless or maybe there isn’t enough meat for the birds liking. What ever the reason, the hawk didn’t go for the faux.