Writersblock, I am sure I never said I would shoot someone who was simply stealing. I have said from the beginning,from my first post on the subject, that I would be ready to shoot someone who was going to cause me harm. Never once have a said or even implied otherwise. It is my opinion that this thread got so heated because the anti gun people on this thread chose to twist my words and my position, instead of actually reading what I wrote. Instead of considering that not every,not even most people who own guns fit into the ridiculous stereotype of gun owners that they have created in their minds,they have tried to shove me into that mold,and I won't have that. It's not me. "because honestly, some of your previous posts didn't sound like that's how you thought" That is the whole point. How could it sound like I thought like that...when I never said anything to that affect? The anti gun people, very much the majority here, have made a united effort to highlight their own ideas of what they THINK and WANT gun owners to believe in, so that they may be outraged about something and have something to attack. Anti anything people love that. Makes em feel good.

Suzique…. agreed. I enjoy potlucks. Agreed about some of them being overladen on the pasta salads, however. The one I went to a week ago had four pasta salads, three of which were nearly entirely pasta and some sauce/seasoning. The fourth was actually good since it had a lot of veggies (and I ate that one). Unfortunately my new local crew isn't really food-creative or savvy. Most of the desserts were also store bought - and so I passed on those as well. (Something about those preservatives do not sit well in my belly). I brought devilled eggs - three styles, all labeled - since my chickens have been prolific. Noting that the weather was HOT, I made sure my freezer packs surrounded them at all times, and I kept checking on them due to that. They vanished. When I make food for pot lucks - or even to share with anyone beyond myself - I follow extremely stringent guidelines. My hands are washed at the drop of a hat. At a previous meal (sit down in my home, not a pot luck), when I suspected but could not ascertain that soapy water might have splashed into something I was draining - I eliminated that, and started over again. Were it just for me, I probably would have taken my chances. I guess what I really hated back at my old home was when the pot luck was hosted at my house with a very tiny kitchen and dining area -- there would always, ALWAYS be one or two people who'd come in and decide to assemble their pot luck at that table. It isn't like either of them hadn't been at my house before, to know the dysfunctionality of that space, either. It wasn't like I didn't remind them, either...

Kath I too have a brother that has turned mean and dark with his political stance. It is as if he has lost his mind! He is so consumed with all the hate and anger and the irony is that he has a pretty darned good life and lacks for nothing. Right now he wife is having physical and medical problems that she will probably never recover from and she may be on that downward slope of old age. So, I try to call him to show that I care about them and he is always trying to bait me with his hateful views. Even while his wife if probably dying, he in consumed with the darkness. He had told me and my sister that we need to be lined up and shot.! It is as if he is possessed by demons. He lives in southern rural area and is surrounded by others just like him. I feel as if I am looking at the face of pure evil! I am 73 years old and have never seen this in my life like this! I can imagine how the persecuted people of Europe must have felt when that evil took over Europe and we sent our American troops to defend democracy and to die on that hill! Both of my brothers were soldiers and both served in Viet Nam. Both put theri lives on the line for democracy. My oldest brother is buried at Arlington. I never thought that America would become this. I am sick to my soul!!

The weather is beautiful here in Oregon. Sunny, blue skies, we haven’t had rain for weeks. I just realized I need to turn my outside irrigation back on! It is so depressing. The snowpack is the worst since modern records began (1980) and the drought and wildfires this summer . . . Breakfast was the topic? I often don’t eat breakfast. In fact until my late twenties I didn’t eat lunch either, I ate one meal a day. I was skinny too, but I don’t know if fasting for 23 hours every day made a difference. I’ve tried to get into a breakfast routine, but there isn’t time. By the time I get dressed, feed the cats, tidy the mess people left in the kitchen, make SWMBO a latte and set it on her bedside table, who has time to cook breakfast? The markets open at 6:30 am my time. For a while, I was eating an “overnight oats” recipe that a friend sent me. The recipe was in the form of a spreadsheet, because that’s how he thinks, with fifteen ingredients of the dehydrated, probiotic, powdered, expensive, hard-to-order kind. It was kind of like luxury backpacking food. K____ claims his $5 oat breakfast has transformed his health and shrunk his waistline, but I didn’t stick with it long enough to be transformed or shrunk. I have also tried drinking my breakfast, in the form of protein shakes and even cartons of “Soylent”. This was convenient but unsatisfying, and I stopped the liquid brekky thing before sliding down the slippery slope to sports nutrition mixes and sucking packets of carbohydrate gels. Sometimes SWMBO stocks my mini fridge at work with things I can microwave for breakfast - hash browns and egg bites and suchlike. These are food, I guess, but gulping down a half-thawed egg bite at my desk is depressing. So, my occasional breakfasts are bought from the coffee shop by my office. A croissant, breakfast burrito, or bagel with cream cheese, with a paper cup of coffee. Gosh, that is kind of depressing too. In a few months I’m moving offices, and will have a full office kitchen all to myself. I’m excited about the possibility of cooking real breakfasts and pulling real espresso shots. I’ll leave a laptop in the kitchen so that I can watch the screens while making my omelette. Multitasking!