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 Being Retired now, I thought that it was time for a new name to this Blog |
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Talk about perks, my career had one of the best I can think of! I traveled in the course of business, delivering classes for my employer. I was a Senior Training Specialist for Motorola Solutions, and taught classes on a wide variety of subjects centered around 2-way radio communications. I knew that when the time arrived that I would retire, and I have. I've always said that if you can't stand the heat in the kitchen, get out! I can't handle the heat anymore. I was qualified to deliver approximately 32 different classes, but about half of those were 'Legacy' classes, and were not in demand anymore. My students were technicians, those who maintained, programmed, calibrated, and repaired large 2-way radio systems. Some of these systems are statewide, and use TCP-IP networking to allow sites to communicate with others. Some are small, traditional type radio sites. The size doesn't matter, in each case the systems must be kept operational at all times, since many of them are Public Safety Systems. So I traveled, sometimes frequently, 3-4 weeks in a row.... where have I been? Some of the places I've been (I can't list them all here, the list would be toio long) are pretty interesting. 1. Hawaii - Four times, Oahu, Maui (twice), and the Big Island 2. BangkokThailand, twice 3. Frankfurt Germany, twice 4. Algiers, Algeria 5. Melbourne Australia 6. Bismarck North Dakota, Summer & Winter 7. Los Angeles, Too many times to count 8. Washington DC, Too many times to count 9. Seattle three or four times 10. Texas, all over the state 11. Florida, all over the state 12. New Mexico, HOME! Several times  Best Cultural And Regional Honorable Mention |
Our Dog's Diet In thinking about our dog's diet, some of you will probably say, "Your dog is on a diet?" Or maybe you'll ask, "Your dog has a diet?" So let me explain what they eat, and why. When I first met my wife, she was feeding her dogs whole Turkey wings, bone and all. Like most of you, I said, "You can't feed a dog bones! They'll choke on them!" (I didn't realize she had raised dogs since she was a child, had shown dogs around the country, etc). She looked at me and said something like, "C'mon Jim. Do you really think that wild dogs (Dingos, Jackyls, Hyenas and the like) don't eat bones? Do you think they eat only the meat and leave the bones for something else? I thought about that, and realized how stupid my statement was. Our dogs are on a 'natural diet'. The eat Kibble only when we travel, and only after our frozen meat is gone. Kibble = Dry Dog Food, such as Purina Dog Chow. Except Kathy wouldn't be caught dead feeding her dogs Purina. We feed them Orijen Dry Dog Food, the contents of it are too numerous to list here. Here is a partial list: Chicken, turkey, salmon, whole herring, chicken liver, dehydrated chicken, dehydrated turkey, dehydrated chicken liver, dehydrated egg, dehydrated sardine, chicken fat. They eat healthier than we do! Being curious, I once asked her how she started her dogs on this 'Bones And Raw Food' (BARF) diet. Before I met her, one of her Akita's didn't have a very good coat and was constantly scratching herself. After many visits to the local Vet, she chanced upon a Holistic one. Eventually, it was discovered that her dog was allergic to Corn! She looked that the ingredients on the bag of dog food and saw something like this (I looked at the ingredients of a bag of Purina One): Chicken, Rice Flour, Corn Protein Meal, Whole Grain Corn, Chicken By-Product Meal , Whole Grain Wheat, Soybean Meal, Beef Fat Preserved With Mixed-Tocopherols. Only the chicken is something a dog should eat. After all, they're carnivores. Compare Purina One contents to the Orijen contents! A 40 lb bag of Purina One is $39. A 5 lb bag of Orijen is $35! Yeah, those contents in Orijen are not cheap. Neither is feeding them that natural diet we have them on. I wanted to tell you a bit about their morning meal. BTW, we do not leave food out for them to munch on, They are fed morning, and night. Their morning meal (at least this morning), is Chicken Neck, Pheasant Neck, Liver & or Kidney Chunks, Heart Chunks, Lamb Tongue, Duck Wings, and Baby Scad Chunks. (Scad is a species of marine fish belonging to the family Carangidae, which also includes jacks, amberjacks, and pompanos). What amazes me still, is watching Buddy, our Akita, bite through a Duck Wing or other bones. We don't feed them weight bearing bones, those are too dense. We do use them in making Bone Broth. He seems to bite through that bone relatively easily, though I'm sure it's not that easy. It amazes me at the strength of his bite. Then I consider the bite of a Crocodile or Alligator to put things in perspective. I often think that humans once had a much stronger bite than we do now. Maybe not. Feeding your dog a diet like this is not cheap, I can testify to that. I won't say how much we spend, she buys the dog food, I buy our groceries. I think I have the better end of the (unspoken) deal!  I only wish we ate half as healthy as our dogs do. Wow, we'd be in so much better shape! |
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