I discovered a cool thing on my Samsung Android phone. I use the voice command "Hey Google" all the time for finding places and web sites. Today I wondered if it could send a Text to somebody in my Contacts list by just asking it to.

Maybe everybody knows this already, but it was a pleasant surprise to have it work! I asked Google to send a message to Daniel. She said "Got it, what's the message?" I said "and the potatoes were amazing". She generates it, reads it back to me and then asks if I'm ready to send it.

There's a Cancel and a Send button that you then have to Press, but it's a great trick to know. My hands were all greasy from opening shrimp and crayfish shells.

Daniel and his wife Jennifer were partying down in Huntsville, AL this weekend with her company, and they ate a lot of seafood. Today they were trying to finish off a big foil pan of leftovers, they couldn't, so they gave it to me.

Seafood lunch!

I was listening to a song called We Can Learn To Love Again which pretty much sums up the concept, but at seventy seven, I don't buy it. Hell I can barely make male friends, much less find a lady to hang out with.

Nobody is going to hook up with my sorry old ass in this small house in this small town.

The only woman I had any feelings left for, skipped town without telling me, and blocked my phone. We've since talked via email and it sounds like she's landed OK. She still won't tell me what happened or where she is, but she appeared happy and content.

There is not another man involved, she is not in Washington State, and she is still connected to her grandkids, somehow.

So, I'm giving up on the Steph thing! I totally accept that I will never see her or her family again. It's time to move on, down the rabbit hole of life...

The five year mark for this blog was met last month. Every memorable event and most of my daily ramblings (some trashed) are here. My previous blog back in Idaho covered more years than this one.

The truth is, the blogs exist for my benefit really. No one probably cares what I did on a particular summer day three years ago. They might have at the moment, but now it's archived.

I don't know why I feel compelled to write about my life, take pictures of it and then plaster it out to the Internet. It's what social media addicts do using Facebook etc...

Maybe I'm looking for recognition, where I need to keep people interested in what I have to say, otherwise I become irrelevant.

Or is it because I want to transform memories into words and images before they fade and die within the confines of my abused mind.

It's probably both.

btw: I have my Post notification issues under control, thank you. Only my boy Riley and grand-daughter Shelby receive Texts with a link to each new Post. On occasion, if a Post relates to one my very few friends, I'll send it to them.

A bright green stripe has appeared on my phone screen, from top to bottom. Or bottom to top, depending on which way you swipe.

This phone is five years old and I'm expecting possible battery issues, but not a display problem. I wonder if Samsung added a snippet of code to start a screen falling apart after five years. They want to sell me a new phone!

Is there an agency that monitors Android code for these big players? I'll bet not. Companies like Samsung and Apple have proprietory code bases that could contain anything.

Code can operate the electronics down to a binary level. What if code was included to go online after five years, and start extracting random phone issues from a company database.

And them implement these issues in a random manner. Self destruction of a solidly built computer, to get you to buy a new one, in a way that is untraceable. They don't want your phone to last!

I was walking down a trendy Miami street called Ocean Drive this morning. It was wide and on the beach. There was a sidewalk opposite the beach with outside seating restaurants and a steady crowd of people flowing in all directions.

It was mesmerizing as it streamed in 4K from the big TV screen while I stood directly in front of it. My surround sound system was rocking and it felt like I was right there.

The footage was smooth, probably shot from a gimbal based camera, held in front of them while they walked. As people approached I found my body shifting to avoid a collision.

So I have a new exercise! Swaying left and right to avoid pixels pretending to be people.

I just realized that I write, like I like to read. I skip over a ton of content on the net because I don't like the style.

I love a writing that states a fact or position right away, dives down into it creativly, then carrys it to a smashing conclusion.

Talk real, inform me, be provocative and make me want to read more!

I met Beryl at one of my IBM Sys-3 accounts in Monterey, CA, in the seventies. We had dinner in town, then hung out in my large enclosed hotel hot tub, drinking and smoking until they kicked us out. We consumed the obligatory sex thing that night and there was no chemistry.

We never tried that again and became lifelong friends. She would rent big beautiful homes up in Carmel Valley, a very hip and cool place, with the Carmel by the Sea beach lifestyle twenty miles down the road.

She would get roommates to split the rent. When I was down there for business, I would stay with them in the current place. She also had a teenage daughter named Judy.

Carmel Valley was an experimental pot growing community. Many farms were scattered all over the back woods, learning how to grow bud without seeds, by killing the males.

One night Beryl threw a growers party at our house. Best party I've ever been to in my life. About forty growers showed up with their partners, all packing their crop, rolled up into giant joints. Show off and check out the competition, Willie would have been in heaven, probably would have played...

One grower left a bag of leaf from his crop at the house. Thanksgiving was upon us and as we prepared the turkey for her family and friends, I suggested putting the leaf in the stuffing.

The leaf still had a lot of THC in it, and the guy just gave it to us if we needed something to puff on. Beryl, for some strange reason, said sure, and we mixed it up into the stuffing.

I could very easily pull a TikToc here and say Wait for part two, but that ain't my style.

Judy got a new video game that she was playing on the TV after dinner, surrounded by the guests. There came a magical (possibly criminal) moment when I looked around the room and realized everyone was really stoned.

We never copped to it, nobody knew why turkey dinner at our house put them in the zone. Everyone made it home safely.

I recently talked to Beryl back in Idaho, she was a happy grand-mother living in Hawaii!

I think this is a grand-daughter:

I told a friend today that I wished I had a coin older than me, as he scrounged thru my laundry Quarters. All of a sudden he stood up, pulled out his stuffed wallet, and presented me with a Buffalo Indian Nickel with a 1929 date, and it's way older than me.

It was the oldest coin he owned, he carried it in his wallet, and now it belongs to me. As soon as I grab a photo, it's going into my wallet.

Hopefully my son Riley will carry the coin when I'm gone.

It's been an interesting day in Southern Tennessee. I fed my ducks at 0815 and we're perfecting the two handed technique, where I feed two ducks at a time from each of my hands. The two shy ducks hang behind, and I throw seed back to them during the frenzy.

Then I came home and watched NetFlix. A friend of mine texted me, saying he was trying to bail his woman out of jail for being unable to pay child support, and he wanted to borrow some money.

I called my bail bondsman and he said he doesn't take child support cases. You are basically just paying the support amount. He remembered me, he and his Philippine wife came by my house one evening.

I wasn't comfortable with the amount of money, and I turned my friend down. No matter the friendship, I can't be a bank. Then he found a way to gather most of the money, and was $250 short. I can handle that, and his woman should be free by this evening.

Then I went to the Park and hung out at shelter seven. There were a couple of friends there and we swapped stories about helping people out around here.

I stopped by the tobacco store for ice, plopped a five in front of Annie, and she smiled and gave me three back. Ice is $2.14 but I always pay $2.25, so over the last five years I've built up credit.

It's not even 1400 and I expect to get a hug from our little jailbird, when they drop by later...

My neighbor Daniel is finally back to work after foot surgery. I miss his morning visits but now it's late afternoon before he ends his job with the School District as the head Maintenance Guy.

He has to be cautious approaching my door, down the path. Not knowing what he's facing, he's a bit on edge. It's tough having an old cantankerous friend next door!

I love my friend Daniel. It's been five years now that I have been fortunate to have him as a friend. He is also the weapons guy on the block, squared.

Speaking of relationships, Daniel asked me last night if my current State had to do with Steph and I said maybe...