08:36 – It was 25F (-4C) when I took Colin out this morning, but a stiff breeze made it feel a lot colder. Barbara is due back from Winston sometime this afternoon. Colin and I never did manage to find any wild women, so we mostly read, played ball, and watched videos. Colin did get a chance to do some small-rodent pouncing in Bonnie’s back field when I took him out this morning.
Here’s the view from our back deck.
Well, actually, it’s the title card from the BBC series Cranford, but it’s the same view except that our cows are Black Angus and there are a lot more of them. Same rolling hills with cattle grazing, same trees, same mountains disappearing into the mist in the background. Have I mentioned that I really like where we live?
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Email from Cassie, who has another canning session scheduled for this weekend. This time, she and her friend are doing it at Cassie’s house, using Cassie’s new Presto 23-quart canner and a second canner that her friend is bringing along. Cassie is supplying the canning jars for this round.
They’re not doing ground beef this time, because it wasn’t on sale yet. But the pork roast and sausage was on sale, so Cassie’s buying a bunch of it. She’s going to use her slow cooker overnight to make pulled pork using this recipe and then can it in her favorite homemade barbecue sauce (for which she didn’t cough up the recipe).
She really, really wants to do bacon, but like me she’s very concerned that the USDA recommends against it because they haven’t done the necessary testing to develop an authoritative, guaranteed-safe procedure for doing so. But, as Cassie says, they do have such a procedure for sausage, and she and her husband both like it, too.
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I’m still waiting for Trump and his Republican congress to do something about our ridiculous gun control laws. I signed an on-line White House petition the other day that calls for the repeal of the National Firearms Act, which would be a good start. Next, they can repeal GCA68, and we’d all be able to order guns on-line. But the really major thing they need to do is start issuing federal permits that allow concealed and open carry anywhere in the US for any adult citizen. As a first approximation, they should declare that any citizen who has a valid state-issued driver’s license is now authorized to carry open or concealed using only that license as proof of authorization. Those citizens who do not have driver’s licenses should be able to visit any US Post Office, present proof of identity and citizenship, and be issued a carry permit on the spot.