I’ve been wanting to give a little more distinctive look to my Daily Chronicles of the American War blog and yesterday started to work on images to add. I tweaked each of the images to give it an “aged” newsprint color. After I had the images in place, I decided to try giving the whole blog a similar “look.” Right now, I like the way that it turned out, but I’ll give it a few days before I decide if I want to keep it this way.

Comments on “New Look to One of My Other Blogs”

A lost Exit78 post, recovered from Internet Archive WayBackMachine; March 2011

In the mid 90’s, I saved the following little piece from a magazine with the intent of perhaps using it in a class some time. I forgot about it and never used it.

Two-way communication

I once worked for a rather staid corporation. At the time, a popular commercial featured a man opening his bathroom medicine cabinet to find a face grinning back at him and shouting, “Hi, Guy!”

I was new to the company, and frequently saw a man in a dark suit pass me on the floor where I worked. We’d exchange looks but never speak.

One day to break the ice, I grinned and loudly said, “Hi, Guy!” He looked surprised, said nothing, and walked away.

I continued to greet him in the same manner for two weeks – until I saw his picture in the company newsletter. He was the CEO.

The next time we crossed paths I started to apologize for being so informal. But he just looked at me with a twinkle in his eye and said, “Hi, Guy!”

I’m sure some instructor somewhere might be able to use this in a class of some kind or another.

March 7, 1863, A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary
by John Beauchamp Jones

MARCH 7TH. -The President is sick, and has not been in the Executive Office for three days. Gen. Toombs, resigned, has published a farewell address to his brigade. He does not specify of what his grievance consists; but he says he cannot longer hold his commission with honor. The President must be aware of his perilous condition. When in adversity, some of those he has trusted, discuss the bases of reconstruction; and when we are prosperous, others, in similar positions, agitate the question of re-organization – the motive of both being his ruin. But I suppose he has calculated these contingencies, and never anticipated paving a bed of roses to recline upon during the terrible, and sometimes doubtful struggle for independence. (more)

(Posted in Daily Chronicles of the American Civil War)

A lost Exit78 post, recovered from Internet Archive WayBackMachine; March 2011

I’ve done a little house-keeping on this blog. I moved all the site related links over to the right and the ads over to the left. Some folks that are into search engine optimization (SEO) seem to think that works better. I’m not going to worry about it overly much. I’m more interesting in placing worth-while content on line. I’ll try to do it in such a way that the search engines can find it, but that’s not my highest priority.

I also added a couple of notes on the right with links to other material I’m working on. I’m trying to get a bit ahead on that stuff so I’ll have time for other things. For instance, I want to move Karen’s Quilts over to a new domain.

I’ve pre-posted several days worth of material in my civil war blog Daily Chronicles of the American Civil War and have an outdoors tip pre-posted for two months in my outdoors blog, Haw Creek Out ‘n About.

When I get a little more ahead on things, I’ll be updating the RV manufacturers index, which needs to be done more often than I am doing it, probably every couple of months. I also want to add more material in other categories.

We’ve got the walls up on the shop and have started on the ceiling joists. The roof will be a gambrel design (barn), which will allow a second level, which will be used for storage.

A lost Exit78 post, recovered from Internet Archive WayBackMachine; March 2011

That’s a little extreme, I think, especially in a small place like Rosebud, Arkansas.

We were taking a bit of a drive on my first official day of retirement and after Karen’s doctor appointment in Little Rock. We had never been in the Heber Springs, Greers Ferry, Fairfield Bay part of the state and I thought we could drive back home with a little bit of a side trip through some of that area.

We had gotten gas just before we ventured off into new territory and I had wanted to get a cup of coffee. Karen had gone in to use the restroom and get my coffee. She came back out without the coffee and without any good words about the state of the restroom and the thick dregs of what was left in the coffee pot.

I figured there would be a place that had coffee in Rosebud.

A while later, as we were getting into Rosebud, I recalled that it had been pretty well flattened by a tornado back in the 80’s. The only reason I particularly remember that is because one of the shift supervisors at work was from Rosebud.

The convenience store/cafe/gas station that I stopped at for gas had certainly been built since the tornado.

One of the things that I’ve noticed since I’ve been off from work is that change tends to accumulate in my pocket, where before it didn’t. I guess I tend to use bills to pay for things in stores, rather than use the change. Now that I’m not around vending machines any more, the change doesn’t get spent so quickly.

After I had filled my coffee cup, I remembered the change and figured that I’d use it for the coffee.

Now, for a long time, I paid 10¢ or so for coffee at the store I usually stop at. Then it went up to 25¢ and I paid that for a long time. Recently, it’s gone up to 46¢. I’ve paid more that that, but hardly ever over a dollar, so I was sure that I had enough change for a cup of coffee.

I was very surprised when she said the coffee was $1.20! However, I dug a little deeper and – since I’m not around the vending machines much any more – I had more than enough change to cover it.

But, a dollar and twenty cents for a cup of coffee in Rosebud, Arkansas?!

If I lived near there, I would make sure not to stop at that store again.

And the coffee wasn’t even that good!

We’ve had a stray cat or two hanging around our place lately.

I really don’t know why, because we don’t have any cats any more and we certainly aren’t leaving any food out for it.

For the first time in a long while, Karen was awakened the other night by the screeching and yowling of a cat fight.

I slept through it.

Yesterday, when we came home from a long drive, we saw what we thought was an scruffy cat with matted orange hair that had been around off and on for several years go running off our deck. I thought I saw it again later out one of the front windows, but when I opened the door it was a totally different cat – a large young bob-tailed cat with short orange hair of the same shade as the scruffy one – and it started to run off until I said something to it. It stopped and went back to sniffing around the porch and trees – all the while keeping an eye on me.

We’re not going to encourage it. We’re not going to feed it. With our traveling, we don’t need to be trying to take care of any strays – not that it necessarily needs it.

Early this morning, I was awakened by a yowl from a cat.

“Oh, great,” I thought. “A cat fight.”

That was it, though. Not another sound.

Shortly after that, though, I figured out that the cat met it”s match when I started to smell what it had probably been messing with. I think the yowl was a response to getting sprayed, because not long afterward I started smelling the distinctive odor of a skunk.

We saw this lovely little critter outside a couple of weeks ago. Don’t know if it was the same one as made the stink last night.

Fortunately, there’s been a wind all day and the smell has completely dissipated – I think most of the spray must have hit the cat.

Maybe it won’t come back.

I’ve been on vacation for the last five weeks – practicing for retirement and keeping busy.

While I would really like to post something here every day, sometimes it just ain’t going to happen. I’ve got plenty of other things that I’m going to be doing, including other internet sites that I am working on.

For example, yesterday and today, I added all of the entries of a small book titled War Diary of a Union Woman in the South into my Daily Chronicles of the American Civil War. I am currently publishing material for the current day in 1863, so all of the material from this lady’s diary prior to the beginning of March, is available. She and her husband have just recently arrived in Vicksburg after a futile attempt to reach Union controlled New Orleans. The hardest days of the siege of Vicksburg are soon to come and the articles from this diary from that period are already scheduled for posting on the applicable dates.

Other activities before we hit the road sometime in May include the construction of a 14′ x 24′ workshop with a storage space above it, taking photographs and creating on-line galleries to share some of the pictures I’ve taken over the years, working out at the fitness center, and reading – something I’ve not had much time for in recent years.

Another website that I’m working on is my Haw Creek Outdoors site. Most of my photo galleries will be situated there as our main interests are related to going places and doing things outdoors. I also have a blog there called Haw Creek Out n About that will have some of my photos and things that are related to the outdoors, mostly hiking, camping, and travel in the United States. The RV area of the site has links to the websites of most of the RV manufacturers in the U.S. that have their own websites, including, where possible, links to the pages for current models. I hope to be able to expand that part of the web site to include useful links for other aspects of RVing and camping.

Five weeks into this, I’ve just crossed the line into really being retired.

I watch perhaps a little more television, but a little more than almost nothing is still almost nothing. I think I actually spend less time on the computer at home and what time I do spend on it is more productive.

Boredom will seldom be a problem.

I’ve got plenty to do.

American White Pelican (reference)

Photographs at Dardanelle Lock and Dam

Dardanelle Lock and Dam – Pelicans and Gulls Photo Gallery

A lost Exit78 post, recovered from Internet Archive WayBackMachine; March 2011

Mt. Magazine State Park Photo Gallery

A lost Exit78 post, recovered from Internet Archive WayBackMachine; March 2011