If anyone could do it and make Robert Plant enjoy it, it was Ann and Nancy Wilson.
Today’s Earworm
Posted by daddybear71 on June 25, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/06/25/todays-earworm-383/
Campout Venison Stew
Ingredients:
3 strips of thick cut bacon, cut into one inch pieces.
5 pound bag of potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/4 inch cubes
1 pound bag of carrots, peeled and cut into 1/4 inch coins
3 large onions, coursely chopped.
Whatever seasonings you like. I used Canadian Steak Seasoning (dried garlic, coarse salt, and coarse pepper) and some Essence
1 to 2 pounds of venison roast, cleaned of connective tissue and cut in to 1/4 to 1/2 inch cubes.
1 cup of seasoned flour
2 12 ounce bottles of your favorite beer. I used a nice wheat beer for this batch, but anything that’s not flavored with fruit will work.
Open both beers. Enjoy one while you cook, but set the other one aside for the moment.
Parboil the potatoes. Drain when they are almost fork tender and set them aside.
In a large soup kettle, fry the bacon until it is just about cooked crisp and most of the grease is out of it. Add your onions and fry them until they start to become transparent. Season to taste.
Put the venison in a container that has a lid. Pour in the seasoned flour, put the lid on the container securely, and shake the flour and venison for a minute or so. Dump the flour and meat into the soup kettle with the onions, and scrape as much of the flour that sticks to the sides and bottom of the container into the kettle as you can.
Brown the meat in the bacon grease and onions. A lot of the flour will stick to the bottom of the kettle, but scrape it off as much as you can. Do not let it scorch. Adjust heat as necessary.
Once meat is browned, pour in the beer you aren’t drinking and use it to dissolve the flour that’s sticking to the bottom of the pan. Add the potatoes and carrots, then add cold water until there is about an inch of water above all of the ingredients.
Bring to a boil over medium heat, then reduce heat and simmer for about 20 to 25 minutes, stirring often. Taste the stew and season as needed. The seasoned flour will have quite a bit of salt in it, so go easy on what you add.
Once the stew starts to thicken, shut off heat, cover with lid to the kettle, and let set for five to ten minutes. The stew will thicken a bit more as it sets.
Goes well with biscuits or fresh bread and another cold beer. Feeds a small army.
Posted by daddybear71 on June 24, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/06/24/campout-venison-stew/
Thoughts on the Weekend
- I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – we take entirely too much stuff camping.
- We had a first – We set up for camp, had a good weekend together as a family, and broke down camp without any of us needing psychological counseling afterward.
- To the people who camped around us all weekend, I am sorry from the bottom of my heart.
- Those pop guns I bought for Boo to play with make a sound that really carries, don’t they?
- Quote of the weekend, by Girlie Bear: “I’m not a smartass. I’m just being sarcastic. And I am your daughter, aren’t I?”
- The cost of firewood is too damn high!
- First they tell us to not bring our own firewood because we’ll spread pests and diseases.
- Then they start selling firewood to us at the state park, 5 or 6 pieces of wood to a bundle.
- It cost me $10 for the two bundles of firewood it took to hold a frankfurter roast and a marshmallow toast.
- The choice – Contribute to a gouging government monopoly or risk spreading diseases that could wipe out whole forests.
- Taking the kids blueberry picking on Friday was ingenious, if I do say so myself.
- It gave them something to do other than hang around camp, and they actually seemed to enjoy themselves.
- Boo ate so many blueberries right off the bushes that I gave the cashier an extra $5.
- If the image you have is of five bears of varying sizes foraging, you’re not too far off the mark.
- Irish Woman is preparing 16 pounds of fresh blueberries with almost the same diameter as a quarter as I speak.
- I see a lot of pancakes, jam, and muffins in my future.
- My venison stew turned out rather well.
- It was mentioned that it would have been more appropriate for late fall, but everyone who ate it cleaned out their bowl, so I guess they liked it.
- There is nothing like waking up to the sound of birds chirping, the feeling of dew on the grass under your feet, and the smell of ganja from two campsites over as your neighbor enjoys a little wake and bake.
- We took Boo swimming for a while, but he still doesn’t understand that it’s not a good idea to not drink the lake water.
- Entirely my fault. The boy swims almost exclusively in pool water that’s cleaner than the stuff that comes out of the tap.
- No dysentery so far, but we’re keeping an eye on him.
- When the temperature dropped 10 degrees in an hour and the sky darkened, we battened down the hatches.
- I’m proud to say that neither the new tent nor the screen tent had any problems in the winds and light rain that hit us.
- Saturday night I found myself in a bidding war in a silent auction with a 10 year old girl over a toy microscope.
- I’m not going to say that I corrupted the process by buying off the competition, but it was cheaper than family drama.
- On Thursday, Boo was “The Young Prince” to his mother. By Sunday morning, he was “That Boy”.
- Maybe we had a little too much family togetherness.
- Mental note – Do not use the term “Martha Stewart bullshit” when describing Irish Woman’s efforts to notch the top of the omelets in a bag so that people could tell the difference between ham, sausage, and bacon.
- We had neglected to bring a permanent marker.
- No, I hadn’t had coffee yet. No excuses, though.
- The theme of breakfast on Sunday was “Do not cook what’s right; cook what’s left”.
- I hate bringing food home from a camping trip.
- We continued the age-old family tradition of driving through cloud bursts after packing all of the dry camping gear in the back of the truck again this year.
- Now I just need a day or two of dry weather to set up the tent.
- Moonshine and Bluegrass were very happy to see me when I picked them up from the kennel today.
- If Moonie is a little calmer by this time next year, he’ll start going camping with us.
- It is rather difficult to drive a standard transmission on the truck when you have an 80 pound dog cuddled up in the crook of your arm.
- It is also difficult to drive in traffic when he won’t stop licking your face.
- I won’t even talk about trying to drive after he licks your eyeglasses.
- Answer to the “Dad, I’m bored” comment from Girlie Bear today – “Go clean your room and then do some pushups”.
- Later on, she complained that it was impossible to go for a walk in our little town.
- Guess who packed up his daughter after making sure she had her phone, music device, and water bottle, dropped her off at the far eastern side of the nearest park, and told her that she’d be picked up in two hours at the playground on the far western side of said park?
- If beer counts as a carb in your diet, does hard cider count as a fruit/vegetable?
Posted by daddybear71 on June 24, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/06/24/thoughts-on-the-weekend-31/
Today’s Earworm
For Brigid, who’s laid up getting over a booboo gone bad. Don’t blame me for this little ditty, she’s the one who mentioned it. I’m just the one who’s been humming it for a while. Y’all go on over and wish her well.
Posted by daddybear71 on June 19, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/06/19/todays-earworm-382/
Thoughts on the Day
- The tent dried out nicely and is packed and ready to go camping this weekend.
- There was a bit of water to be bailed and mopped up in a couple of low spots on the floor, but seeing as how we got over 3 inches of rain last night, with strong winds, I’m happy with it.
- Irish Woman decided to damp mop the floor of the tent because I’d tracked a bit of dirt in.
- Apparently I’m the reason we can’t have nice things.
- The people who wrote the reviews for the tent all said that we’d never be able to get it back in the factory bag, and Irish Woman thought we might have to put it in one of my old duffel bags.
- I am happy to report that the tent is not only in its original bag, but has more room in there than it did coming from the factory.
- Don’t tell me I can’t roll up a tent nice and tight, yuppie scum. A decade in the Scouts and a decade in the Army made me a level III tent folding master.
- The new dishwasher is in and running.
- I will be having a chat with our feline contingent. It is unacceptable to have mouse nests behind the dishwasher, even if they are abandoned.
- Preparations are underway for the annual Hoosier Roundup.
- Posting’s going to be slow to non-existent this weekend.
- Our menu this weekend is going to consist of foods I don’t have to work hard to make.
- Yeah, it’s not haute cuisine, but few have been killed by a diet of hot dogs, ketchup, potato chips, and roasted marshmallows.
- I am, however, going to try to make a decent venison stew for dinner one night.
- While getting all of the camping stuff out of the basement, I came to the conclusion that we take altogether too much stuff camping.
- Good thing I didn’t cancel my flight for next weekend. My trip is back on.
- Say what you will about Walt Disney, but the man was a genius when it came to entertaining children.
- Boo has been watching 60 and 70 year old Disney cartoons on Netflix lately, and he’s more interested in them than he has ever been with the dreck that’s on the Disney Channel or Nickelodeon.
Posted by daddybear71 on June 18, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/06/18/thoughts-on-the-day-142/
Blogs Roundup
- What he said.
- Vexarr gets the slow clap of the day. It’s always within your power to make things better; you just have to be willing to do the hard work and take the risks.
- Borepatch has started an excellent series on how to lock down your on-line life a tad. He and I need to sit down with OldNFO and Drang and drink a few beers.
- I want this gentleman to teach our military leaders how to deal with those who won’t act right.
- Couldn’t have said this better myself. Want a good job? Get a good, real education, learn to do something that other people will pay you to do, and work your butt off.
- Spook86 has some good thoughts about the NSA domestic intelligence scandal. He’s another one that goes on the “Bar in a SCIF” list.
- Kathy Jackson makes a good point. Maybe you don’t need the full “rappel down the side of the building, blow out a window, swing in, and clear the room before whipping your helmet off to flip your auburn tresses” training regimen, but there’s nothing at all wrong with getting trained in common shooting scenarios that ordinary people run into.
Posted by daddybear71 on June 18, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/06/18/blogs-roundup-34/
Today’s Earworm
Posted by daddybear71 on June 18, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/06/18/todays-earworm-381/
Asking the Hard Questions
General Alexander, head of the NSA, will be testifying in an open session of the house Intelligence Committee this week. The following are some suggested questions for the good general:
Question 1 -General, exactly what percentage of your agencies requests for warrants to target American citizens are turned down by the FISA courts?
Question 2 – General, please describe to the committee the programs under which the National Security Agency gathers information about the telephonic communications and Internet activities of American citizens.
Question 2 – General, please describe to us the procedures the NSA has put in place to make it impossible for someone to abuse this data that you’ve put into a conveniently indexed database.
Question 3 – Oh, it’s quite possible that this data could be abused by someone in your organization to target an American citizen for personal or political reasons?
Question 4 – Have you lost your damned mind?
Question 5 – General, do you understand your rights under Article 31 of the UCMJ?
Question 6 – Which one of those yokels sitting next to you is your attorney?
Oh, and “Silently We Defend“, General. Have a nice day.
Posted by daddybear71 on June 17, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/06/17/asking-the-hard-questions/
Thoughts on the Day
- It’s summer. Why does the boy get up as soon as the sun rises? Does he have solar cells or something?
- It never fails. I found out that I probably wasn’t going to be making a business trip 5 minutes after I bought my non-refundable airline tickets.
- To the people driving on the expressway this afternoon:
- We got over two inches of rain in the hour it took to drive home, with driving winds and hail.
- Slow down. No really, if you see a line of us going about half the speed limit with our four way blinkers on, slow the hell down.
- Turn on your bloody lights. If your windshield wipers are on, your lights should also be on.
- If you think you need to drive less than half the posted speed, pull over and read a book until the rain calms down.
- If there is a relatively thin, but long, branch blocking your lane of traffic on a two lane road, do not try to pull around it in a rain storm. Get your butt off the driver’s seat, move the stick, and stop being a hazard to everyone else on the road.
- If you look in your rear view mirror and see Mr. Big Flashy Firetruck coming up fast, pull the heck over. Someone’s life may depend on it.
- The new tent was still up when the storm hit.
- We got a little rain yesterday, and I wanted to let it dry out today and put it away tonight.
- The winds and rain pulled out a few of the stakes, and that let the wind fold it in half and lay most of it on the ground.
- Irish Woman was almost in tears when I got home. She thought our new tent was horribly broken.
- A couple of guy lines pulled tight, a couple of flexible tent poles unbent, and the tent popped right back up. No damage.
- I’m impressed. Half the tent was down in a driving rain with the rain fly pulled halfway off and loose, and there were only a few small leaks in the tent.
- Dear Weather Channel – 20% chance of showers, my ass.
- Our nightmare of taking a few minutes every evening to work together and talk quietly is almost over. The new dishwasher will be installed tomorrow.
Posted by daddybear71 on June 17, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/06/17/thoughts-on-the-day-141/
Thoughts on the Weekend
- Yesterday was not my day to exercise my rather limited people skills.
- I’m married to a saint, have I ever said that?
- We put up the new tent on Saturday so that we could figure out how to do it and to give it time to air out.
- Remember the Weasleys’ tent in Harry Potter? It’s about that size, only orange.
- The queen size inflatable bed that Boo and I used in the central room looked small on that floor.
- I scoffed at the “Sleeps 10” label, but you could probably fit a few more than that in this thing if they liked each other.
- Boo and I slept out in the new tent last night.
- He wanted to stay up late to watch out for ‘mean bears’.
- Little does he know…..
- We apparently did have a visitor last night, because Irish Woman found a half eaten bag of hot dog buns up in the backyard tree. I’m guessing raccoon and a trash can.
- He wanted to stay up late to watch out for ‘mean bears’.
- We took the kids to a ‘couples shower’ yesterday at one of the local fish and beer establishments.
- I was amazed. We can never get Boo to eat fish of any kind, but he ate an entire catfish filet on his own.
- The place was really hopping. Our party didn’t have to wait in line with the rest of the patrons, but by the time we got our food, the restaurant was 90 minutes behind on orders and was suspending new orders.
- Yes, I know all that fried food is going to kill me someday, but I eat it maybe twice a year and it is soooooo goooood.
- I’m glad neither of us drank last night. There were a lot of very inebriated people at the beer garden before we left, and I counted six police cruisers on the road between the restaurant and the highway.
- I showed Girlie Bear how to change the oil on my truck this weekend.
- She was amazed at how dirty used oil is. Said it looked like chocolate syrup.
- That is no reflection on the condition of the truck. The oil wasn’t that thick, and I’m right on schedule to change it at about 6000 miles.
- She new believes that one of her life goals should be to buy an old truck, tear it down to the frame, and do a rebuild on it. It’s so good to work with someone whose soul hasn’t been crushed by reality yet.
- She was amazed at how dirty used oil is. Said it looked like chocolate syrup.
- Going against my wishes to not get anything but a card for Father’s Day, Irish Woman got me a gift card to the new Cabela’s.
- I spent it on toys for Boo. That’ll show her.
- The store was absolutely packed. I’m guessing I wasn’t the only dad who got a gift card today.
- Their new gun section was well stocked with just about anything I could think to look for.
- Prices were a bit steep. A Remington R1 1911, which was retailing new for between $700 and $800 in early 2012, was priced at $1300, and that was pretty representative of the lot.
- They do have a very nicely stocked used gun section.
- Wartime production Mosin-Nagant 91/30’s were priced at $169.
- They had both Yugoslav and Chilean Mausers available.
- They had one Enfield Mark 5. I had never seen one of those in the wild before.
- I saw no 8mm or .303 in the ammunition section.
- If you’re looking for rifle ammunition or shotgun shells, the drought is over.
- Remington 00 buckshot for $139 for a case of 100 shells.
- .270, .308, and .30-06 were plentiful.
- No .22 at all
- An ammo box of 500 cartridges from PPU, marked as “.30-06 for the M1 Garand”, was going for $409.
- Some 5.56 was available. 20 XM193 were priced at $13.00.
- Pistol calibres are still in short supply. The only common caliber I saw that seemed plentiful was .40 S&W.
- There were a lot of rarer calibres available that I don’t see on store shelves too often.
- 10mm
- 7.62 Nagant
- .41 Remington
- Also some odd manufacturers. Anyone have any experience with Herter’s or Geco?
- Reloading supplies seemed to be plentiful, but I saw no primers or powder.
- The douchebag who called the 5.11 and Blackhawk shorts I was checking out “Shoot me first pants” didn’t like it when I asserted that psychos don’t discriminate based on clothing, rather that they choose their victims based on combovers like his.
- They make bunkbed camping cots. I did not know that.
Posted by daddybear71 on June 16, 2013
https://daddybearsden.com/2013/06/16/thoughts-on-the-weekend-30/
DaddyBear
DaddyBear’s Den 
