Trouble With The Law

It seems that my nephew has already attracted some attention from state law enforcement authorities. 

It's always a shame when good kids go bad, especially at such a young age.  I'll do what I can to be a positive role model as an uncle, but it may be too late and Jacob may already have a permanent record.

Welcome To New Readers

I have a longstanding tradition of personally welcoming all new readers here at Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes.  This wasn't much of a challenge when I had four readers and they were all family and friends.  But after last months Urban Homesteading and What it Means to Me post was mentioned on a Facebook group, my readership exploded.  I went from 9 followers to 15, almost overnight.  Wowzers.

I vowed that I wouldn't let my meteoric rise in the blogosphere go to my head and endeavored to stay focused on my humble origins, and true to my original blogging promises.  As such here is a hearty Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes welcome to the following new followers:  

Stone Cottage Mama - Has some fantastic stories of urban homesteading in the Pacific Northwest.  I may never keep chickens and ducks like she does, but I do enjoy all the terrific pictures of their feathered residents and the detailed information about their care.

Nitty Gritty In The City - A fellow Midwest resident, she has a very entertaining blog and I look forward to every posting.

Liberalucy -writes a terrific politically oriented blog that I spend way to much time reading.

And to Sheryl and Brande, who near as I can tell (please correct me if I'm wrong), don't have a blog of their own but are gracious enough to visit mine.  Thanks!

Much love to my new readers and many thanks to all my readers.  You validate my time spent on here and every visit and comment is greatly appreciated.  Thanks!!!

Baby Pictures - My New Nephew

Here's another cure baby picture for you all.  My nephew Jacob. 

Look at that big ole' Buddha belly.  He's gonna be a swarthy young gentleman when he grows up.

I Won!!!

There are a ton of great blogs out there that are more popular than this one (I know I know, calm down, it's OK, this came as shocking news to you) and they often get cool books or new garden tools to try out, write a review of, or giveaway on their blog.  In the course of all the incredible blogs I visit I end up entering quite a few of these giveaways.  Well, I finally won.

Special thanks to the awesome folks at Dog Island Farm (a great name and a fantastic website so chock full of information I get lost there) for randomly selecting me as the winner.  See Winner Winner Chicken Dinner.  Thanks!!

Spring Projects on the Urban Homestead

The urban homesteading blogosphere is atwitter with everyone's plans for Spring and various upcoming projects on their dockets.  What are we going to be working on here at the Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes Homestead in the next few weeks?

1. Shoveling snow.  Yeah, this sucks.  Even though it's near 50 degrees today, we're under a Winter Storm Warning here in Eastern North Dakota for Saturday night through Monday morning.  We're supposed to get 6-9 inches of snow, but I'm really hoping that this storm will skirt us like the last one did a few weeks ago (see Major Winter Storm on the Way), or maybe just dump rain instead of snow.
2. Finish the compost bin I started in the fall.  It's a 3-bin system (like the one here) and has a ton of space for yard waste.  I quickly realized last summer that my new yard was WAY too big for one small compost bin and needed additional space to make compost.  I'll continue to use the one large plastic compost bin for kitchen waste, fruit and vegetable waste from the garden, and anything else that attracts pests since it's more secure than the open 3-bin system.  
3. Build a fence around the blueberry and strawberry patch in the backyard.  These are all within the backyard, inside the fence, and have taken a beating from the puppy tornado this winter.  Between her eating the blueberry bushes, crashing into them and breaking them, and peeing on the strawberries, I think it's for the best that this area is cordoned off from Little Miss Puppy Carnival of Destruction. It won't be a serious fence, probably just made of scrap wood or lilac shoots, it just needs to be a visual deterrent to keep her out of the area.

Flood Walls Are Up

The city crews came by Monday and erected the flood walls at the entrance to Riverside Park, just a couple of blocks from our house.  The flood wall is a pretty impressive engineering feat, especially when you consider that they put it up in one day. 

The wall is a series of metal panels that are slid in place in a large vertical groove on either side of the yellow flood wall.  The panels are supported with vertical beams then braced with diagonal arms and sandbagged along the ground to hold them in place. 

They also park a huge dump truck in front of the flood wall to prevent accidental bad drivers?  Evil-doers?  Just in case?  It's hard to tell, but since the dump truck probably isn't needed for anything else, it's probably a good place to leave it here. 

The National Weather Service issued its first Flood Warning of the year yesterday for Grand Forks and East Grand Forks.  The current river level is right at minor flood stage of 28 feet and is forecast for 29 feet plus by next Wednesday (the cataclysmic flood of 1997 was 54 feet, and the current dike system protects to like 60 feet).  With the first flood warning we officially enter flood season which should last for the next three to four weeks.  On the one hand flooding = bad, but on the other hand flooding = spring. 

TenderHeart Bear

Ready for an uncomfortable bit of knowledge about me?  I sweat a lot.  Many of my friends and family already know this.  But for whatever supernatural or otherworldly reasons that no one yet understands, I sweat in the shape of a perfect heart when I play volleyball.  Seriously.  Don't believe me? 

This was taken after our most recent volleyball game.  There's no chicanery here, no hi-jinks, no tomfoolery I assure you.  Alycia can attest to the authenticity of this photo and scores of former volleyball companions past and present (Chris, Heidi, Brenda, Dave, Angela please leave a comment) can attest to this paranormal phenomenon.

The truly strange thing is that this only happens when I play volleyball.  Basketball, running, mowing the lawn, canning applesauce in a hot kitchen, digging a hole in the garden, they all make me sweat, but never in a heart shape.  It's truly strange and awesome.

Don't be scared, you're in the presence of greatness. 

One of my former volleyball friends (and Care Bear aficionado) started calling me TenderHeart Bear which wasn't the intimidating nickname that I typically encourage others to call me, but was certainly much better than some of the other names I've been called.

TenderHeart Bear - The Most Intimidating of all Care Bears

Do you see the resemblance?  I certainly do.  And I care, lots. And you should consider yourself blessed to be affiliated with a blogger bold and innovative enough to share stories of his own sweat.

Seven Reasons Deaf Dogs Are Better Than Hearing Dogs

All dogs are awesome, even "regular" hearing dogs.  But if you've never thought about it before, here are seven ways that deaf dogs are better than their hearing counterparts.  

1) - I can sneak around on them.  Let's say it's a quiet Sunday morning and I'm lounging on the couch reading the paper.  The missus and pooches are all having a lazy Sunday nap, all is perfect. Except that EGADS!!, my coffee cup is empty.  No problem.  I can sneak to the kitchen and refill my mug with hot caffeinated liquid happiness.  I can't do this with hearing dogs, they'd wake up, see me going to the kitchen and think I'm getting some bacon, and start thumping around and wake everyone else up.

2) - Thunderstorms don't bother them.  We get a lot of thunderstorms here in North Dakota, especially in late Spring and summer, but it doesn't bother the dogs one bit.  I know a few dogs who are extremely frightened of thunderstorms and will freak out, hide under the bed, run away, or have accidents in the house.  It's not their fault, they're just terrified.  My deaf dogs?  They sleep right through the thunderstorms.  Every once in a while a big clap of thunder right on top of us will rattle the windows and they may perk their heads up and look confused, but that's the extent of their reaction.

3) - Sirens don't bother them either.  Ambulance, fire, or police sirens have never started my dogs to barking or howling, which is nice.  My old house in San Diego was in the territory where my sister was stationed as a firefighter.  She was an engineer and drove the fire truck, and when they came back from a call and her route took her by my house she would always blow the air horn (which is very, very loud) and it may have scared the crap out of me (I'm pretty sure this was her goal) more than once, but never startled or woke my deaf pups.