I came across the saying “Dead as a Door Nail” today and that got me thinking…What is a Door nail?  Of course the obvious then hit my pea brain, how is it to be as dead as whatever a door nail is?

Boy did I ever go on a search.  There are tons of sites that talk about Dead As A Door Nail and they have an assortment of things that are pretty much dead and related to that door nail they talk about.

So, here is what I have deducted from all the sites I read about.

WAY back when Sir Butt was stomping around in Common Ground it seems that someone invented nails.  Each nail had to be made by hand, forged from a very hot fire and pounded into shape via an anvil and hammer.  Every nail, as it came to be known as, was unique, but it was a whole lot easier to put together pieces of wood with a “nail” as it was using wooden dowels or wood pegs, as what was the custom of the time.  And so, to have something tacked together using nails was very unique and something that only the wealthy could afford, it became “the” thing to have.  Even if it was a smallish thing.

And so the story goes, and the kings and the rulers of the lands built these big old places for themselves and their understudies to live and have their parties and on each one they had big old doors made of wood.  We all know that wood can only come in so wide a piece, because of the thickness of the base of the tree.  So, in order to make a door, say 5 feet wide, it would take several slabs of wood to cover that distance and then would have to be held together using a couple of other pieces laid across and fastened some how.  This is where the nails came into play.

So, now we have a door to fit the space.  The first hinges were made of leather.  Another story.  So the nails were pounded through the cross braces that spanned the vertical slats and then through another cross board on the other side. These braces sandwiched the upright boards in such a fashion as they could not move.   Cross boards were generally used at the top and bottom of the doors length, but for a stronger door a third brace was used in the center as well and an even stronger door had the middle brace going diagonally down and across the door.  Fancy doors even had an “X” shaped out of diagonal braces.  Very strong doors for sure.

Over time, with the door opening and closing and sometimes slamming shut or banging on the outside of the building when fully opened, the ever so strong nails would loosen and cause the door to fit rather poorly in the opening it was to keep closed up.  So the wise people who built doors back in the day were rather cleaver to note that if they bent over the protruding pointed end of the nail and smashed it down against the wood the nail would never be able to work itself loose again.  And so they did that across the entire door and they called the nail “dead” because it was of no use other than to hold the door together.  On a side note it also made the door a safer place to play around with all those pointed ends now laid flat.

Other sites I visited said that the metal door knocker on the outside of the door; (you know the one that hinges at the top and then drops and strikes a metal plate and makes a loud metal to metal noise to alert the occupants of your visit) would strike a very large headed nail to make the knocking sound and it was that large headed nail that was actually called the “dead” nail, mostly because its sole job was to create the metal to metal sound.  Once pounded through the wooden door and bent over on the other side it was of no other use and so it became “dead”.  I personally would not have said it was dead as it was, after all, providing a very good metal to metal sound.  By definition a “dead” something is of no value, and so I don’t understand their thoughts on dead nails in a door.  Oh well.

Now here is another take on “dead nails”.  You open the door and suddenly a large gust of wind comes up and slams the door on your hand….OUCH!  Now you’ve done it, probably broken your fingers but at the very least your finger nail is blackened by the blow.  It’s going to hurt for many days and then the finger nail will fall off and hopefully grow a new one in its place.  Dang that makes my fingers hurt just to think of it and this typing is effected by the pain in all eight fingers and occasionally the thumb on my right hand.

And so the effected nail(s) on your hand were commonly called “door nails”.  And don’t get “door nails” confused with “hammer nails” you should be able to tell the difference.  I’ll give you a hint or two,  “door nails” can happen to any finger or thumb at any time and can even happen to all the nails on one hand or in the worst case all the nails of both hands at the same time…ooooo that is an ugly sight in my minds eye….. as opposed to “hammer nails”, they generally occur on the nails of the weaker hand than the persons dominant hand.  For instance, I am right handed and so I hammer by holding the hammer in my right hand and will hold the nail with my left hand….you get it.

So, the next time you see a friend with a blackened nail, ask them in a nice way if it is a door nail or a hammer nail and see what the response is.  Either way, I hope they don’t cold cock you and you end up “deader than a door nail”.  Be safe.

Bears Butt

Jan. 2, 2013

Happy New Year everyone!

We had a wonderful time with the grandkids last night, even the 4 year old slept well and didn’t miss him momma like we thought he might.  This morning the kids enjoyed a dip in the hot tube and then we had bacon, eggs and ebleskivers  for breakfast.  A great way to start the new year.

The parents picked up the kids around noon time and then it was just Mom and me to try and get something done…right…we had to catch up on the internet things.

So, then Sherry decided she needed a short nap, so here I am.

Last year I went in search of how some fishermen made up automatic hook setting devises for use while ice fishing and I made one up myself.  I have not tried it this year and last year I only tried it a couple of times with no success.  So today I went in search of maybe a more modern design than was on the web last year.  Nope.  They have not improved upon what they had last year.  But I did find a very interesting ice fishing devise that some of you might just fall in love with.

Enjoy!

Bears Butt

Jan. 1, 2013

Today is the last day of the kids school vacation and the last real day to take them ice fishing.  Well, not really the last day to take them ice fishing, but it is the last day before 2013 to take them.

They have been going the rounds with the flu and Kenzie is the last (it appears) to have it.  She is on the wait and see list as to whether she gets to go today or not.  That will be up to her and her parents.

We are heading to Hyrum as we have gotten a hot tip from Shipley as to what and where the fish are biting.  The ice is around 4 inches thick and that should be plenty to be safe.  The weather over night was very cold with a 7 a.m. temp of 5 degrees…it should have made more ice during the night.

I’m really looking forward to the trip.

Brandon and I will be trying to keep up with four kids, so we probably won’t be doing much if any fishing ourselves.

Pictures and more will be posted when we get back.

After coming home, the kids will go to their homes and have supper and then all will come to Grandma and Grandpas for a sleep over!  It will be a fun night.

Bears Butt

Dec. 31, 2012

Had a great time fishing.  The weather was perfect.  A very slight breeze some of the time, but most of the time just right.  The ice could have been thicker as we only found it to be about 3 inches with a little slush on top of that.  A bit scary for me.

But the fishing was excellent.  All of us caught fish with an estimated 25 trout caught, 2 bass and 2 perch.  Most of the trout were very small, like under 8 inches, but we did manage a couple pushing 16 inches.  All of them went back into the lake.

The 2 perch did not have such a lucky time.  We kept both of them.  Addie caught the biggest perch and it measured in at just over 10 inches, but what made it so big was its girth.  It had to be close to 10 inches around!!!

All of  us caught at least one fish and most caught more than one.  It was a great day to be on the ice.

This last picture was just as Conners fish spit the hook!  Right at the ice hole!  Dang it!

What a great day to be outside.  Yes it was cold…like 15 degrees, but still a whole lot better than sitting inside watching a football game of something stupid like that!  I can hardly wait to do it again!

Bears Butt

PM report…only 6 hours left of 2012

We just checked the lottery numbers for last night’s Powerball and unfortunately none of our numbers came up.  What does that mean?  It means that we did not hit the lottery in 2012.  That should not come as any surprise as most people do not win the lottery.  We keep our hopes up for at least a token win on occasion.

Today is our day to renew our “subscription” and begin the next 10 draws with full faith that the balls will fly up the chute and show us our pick of numbers was the right ones…..ya right.  But it also means the beginning of the drawings for 2013!

So, the lottery didn’t come through for us last year, but we are entering another new year and 2013 just has a ring about it that says it will be our year.

In addition to my dream of winning the big pot in the lottery, my dream goals for 2013 include drawing the Limited Entry Bull Elk tag for the San Juan late elk hunt, after all I have 3 points.  Securing a turkey during the turkey hunt.  Catching a lot of fish including trout, catfish, perch and bass.  Bagging a muley buck during the muzz hunt (I missed two last season).  And finally being a real help to the booshway at the Willow Creak Free Trappers Rendezvous this Labor Day!

My other goal, which is totally out of my control, much like the lottery, is to have the spammers who visit this site to quit coming around.  I know they don’t read my postings as some of them are advertising handbags and such and post statement like..”I really love coming to your site and getting such valuable information that will help me with my life..blah blah blah”;  And a posting like that is associated with my post titled  WHAT IS WASSAILING???? or  REDNECK LOGIC.

If they truly get anything out of my postings I would think of the two I mention here they would get the most out of  Redneck Logic.  Remember, “Do you own a lawnmower”?….”No”….”Then you are a queer”!

So, like I have said before, you still have today and tomorrow to get your goal done for 2012.  In reality that is enough time to get quite a bit done.

Bears Butt

Dec. 30, 2012

Today is National Pepper Pot day.  I had no idea what that even meant and so my search began.  Come to find out a Pepper Pot is a spicy woman who would just as soon finish the plumbing job under the sink than to listen to men argue about how to do it.

For a woman to be called a Pepper Pot is actually a very large compliment.

On another note back when Washington was trying to figure out what to do about the British and his troops were freezing their butts off at Valley Forge they didn’t have a whole lot of food available.  They resorted to eating everything they could find and one of those dishes contained tripe as the main meat.

I have never eaten tripe, but I suppose if I was starving it might just be a good thing to eat.

They put the tripe in a large pot, added water to cover it and started it boiling.  Then they called everyone together and said “Hey dudes, if you want to eat something that will taste good, you best go gather up something to put in this pot of tripe”.  Well, they could have said that, but it doesn’t matter because the troops came through with loads of vegetables they gathered from the local area.  Potatoes, carrots, dried peas, parsnips…you name it…and it was cut up and put into the pot and boiled up.  Lots of pepper was added because that was the main spice they had available.

As the pot simmered  the soup became just like a stew and the men ate it with much enthusiasm, sopping up the juice with biscuits.

We all know the rest of the story as that soup was just the ticket to get them kick started and down they swept upon the British and kicked them out of the country.

My take on the soup theory was that it tasted good because that was all they had to eat.  It made them so angry to have to resort to eating the cows stomach that they decided in order to get out of the fix they were in at Valley Forge they would have to go kick the British’s butts in order to find a better food supply.  Which they did.

So, enjoy the Pepper Pot day!

Bears Butt

Dec. 29, 2012

MMMMMM.  For lunch today we had some of a plate of really good crab meat and home made dipping sauce…my friend Stein’s parents (also my friends) made the sauce and put the plate together as a gift for Christmas….Very YUMMY!  That home made cocktail sauce made with home grown horse radish’s really hits the spot.   I doesn’t get any better than that.

As we were eating, my mind got to wondering about artificial crab and how it’s made.  Of course my good friend the internet was going to get involved later on in the day.  Lucky for me the snow kept falling and I didn’t have to get out and shovel or plow snow.  Sorry neighbors…you will have to wait until tomorrow to get shoveled out.

Back at the internet I looked up the key words “artificial crab”…man there is a lot on there about that.  I was very surprised to find just how it is made and what it is made out of.  Someone many years ago told me it was made from real fish and I believed him and sure enough it is…for the most part.

For you Gluten Free people…you better stop eating it right now and find a source with gluten free ingredients because the main manufacturers of it don’t care about your well being.  It’s just fish…you say?  Well that is part of what you are eating.  The rest is not fish.

So what is in the crab like stuff that flakes apart and tastes so very good?

Sugar, sorbitol, wheat or tapioca starch, egg whites, and vegetable or soybean oil . Natural and artificial crab flavorings are added, and some of these flavorings are made from real crab or from boiled shells. Carmine, caramel, paprika, and annatto extract are often used to make the crab’s red, orange, or pink coloring.

BOILED SHELLS????  Ok if you say so.

I went in search of some more information about the making of the artificial crab that I really like to eat.  I found where a guy had put together 9 facts you need to know about this, but before you read too much further the artificial crab meat is made from an ancient process called “Surimi” in Japan:

1. Surimi is a Japanese word that literally means “ground meat”.

2. To make surimi, the lean meat from white fleshed fish such as pollock is pulverized into a thick paste. The gelatinous paste can then be combined with various additives to become fake crab, fake lobster, and whatnot.

3. The assortment of additives may include other fish products, but it is usually egg whites, oils, salt, starches, and spices.

4. Here is the ingredient list for a fake crab product called Trans Ocean Crab Classic:

Alaska Pollock, Water, Egg Whites, Wheat Starch, Sugar, Corn Starch, Sorbitol, Contains 2% or Less of the Following: King Crab Meat, Natural and Artificial Flavor, Extracts of Crab, Oyster, Scallop, Lobster and Fish (Salmon, Anchovy, Bonito, Cutlassfish), Refined Fish Oil (Adds a Trivial Amount of Fat) (Anchovy, Sardine), Rice Wine (Rice, Water, Koji, Yeast, Salt), Sea Salt, Modified Tapioca Starch, Carrageenan, Yam Flour, Hydrolyzed Soy, Corn, and Wheat Proteins, Potassium Chloride, Disodium Inosinate and Guanylate, Sodium Pyrophosphate, Carmine, Paprika.

You can see that it is a highly processed food product, with MSG and an assortment of starches and gums to create the expected texture.

5. Food manufacturers love Surimi because it enables them to take cheap fish and upgrade it to a taste and mouth feel of the most expensive fish meats – crab and lobster.  (I wonder if you could make it from carp?…just askin)

6. Approximately 2% of the world’s fish catch is processed into some sort of surimi paste.

7. Nutritionally, surimi is low in fat, but usually very high in sodium. In the product example above, a serving of 2 fake legs contains 480mg of sodium (20% of the daily max)

8. Surimi does have some protein due to the fish and egg content. But nothing to write home about. The above product has 6 grams of protein for a 3 ounce serving. Tuna has 30 grams.  Lentils have 20. Cheese has 30 grams.

9. Surimi is cheap – you’ll pay 20-30 cents per ounce. Canned salmon or tuna are usually 50-60 cents per ounce. Real crab and lobster are much more expensive.

Well if it didn’t taste so dang good I would probably quit eating it right now, but it is good and a very good thing I didn’t know what I know today or I would probably not have tried it in the first place.

Now, you have to see the video I found on the process.  I really wondered how they got the red involved in the meat and make it look just like a real crab leg meal laying there on my plate.  The originator of it must have really had a smug look on his face as he watched plate full after plate full being devoured by crab eating connoisseurs.

You will like this!

Bears Butt

December 27, 2012

I have lived my entire life thinking that some day…some day I will get in on a ground floor “thing” that would make millions and millions of dollars and I would be able to quit my job and do nothing but anything I wanted for the rest of my life!

No worries, no cares…the bank would be calling me constantly saying my account was over the FDIC limit and that I would have to open another account in another name or move the money to another banking institution.

AHHHHH!

But after 63 years it has not come to fruition! What have I done wrong?  Why was I not in the right place at the right time?  My idea of a knife to gut a deer was stolen, from the very bar, the night I drew it on a napkin and showed it to two strangers sitting there…suddenly before I could show the draft to the legal office at the Air Force Base in Wiesbaden Germany, they informed me the very same draft had been filed on for a knife to be called “The Wyoming Knife”!  Drat…I was close on that one.

But now!  I have stumbled upon another deal…this one is aimed at the video game people and even though I do not personally play these types of games it is being laid at my feet and I am being asked to “help them out”.  This one could go places and quickly I might add.  I am sharing this with you just in case you too have been thinking along the same lines I have all my life.  Good luck with your decision…I know what I’m going to do.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1880614492/huevos-rancheros-video-game-the-sabroso-showdown?ref=live

Bears Butt

Dec. 26, 2012

Watching the snow fall this Christmas Eve and waiting for the time when I need to leave to go pick Sherry up from her work, I started searching the ever knowledgeable internet.  Sometime or another I had heard the word “Wassle”, be it in a song or in a school play or somewhere else.  I had no idea what was meant by “wassle” and so on to the internet.

There are a couple of ways to “wassle” and I’m sure given enough time there will be more ways.

In it’s simplest form I understand that “wassailing” is a form of forcing yourself upon someone for refreshments.  Drinks and food in the day.  It seemed that the servants (peasants) of the richer folks in the areas would break into their masters homes and demand food and drink and if he did not provide it to them they would ramsack his place.  Sounds like Trick or Treating doesn’t it?  These folks seemed to think the master owed them more than he was paying and so this was considered a legal and binding thing to do each year.

They would gather in smallish groups and head down the road singing and dancing and just plain merry making…sort of like our own “going around” that we have traditionally done for the last 40 or so years.  But, unlike the past ancestors of Old time England/Germany/Wales/Switzerland or where ever, we would never think to trash a home that did not provide us with food and good drink.

Here we come a-wassailing
Among the leaves so green,
Here we come a wandering,
So fairly to be seen.
Here we come a-wandering
So fairly to be seen.

Chorus
Love and joy come to you,
And to you our wassail too,
God bless you and send you,
A Happy New Year,
God send you a Happy New Year.

We are not daily beggars,
That beg from door to door,
But we are neighbours children,
That you´ve seen before.
We are neighbors’ children,
That you´ve seen before.

I wonder what a thief breaking into your home would think if you suddenly began giving him sandwiches and beer.  NAH!  Give him what he deserves, a fast flying chunk of lead.

There is always at least another side to every story and so Wassailing has one as well and like I said earlier, there could be more than the two I mention here and surely in the future there will be other spins put upon it.

The wassailing went into the orchards and the farmers fields.  An old time traditional drink was one made of apple cider and it was heated for the occasion and just like our own rendezvous, someone came in with a twist (apple pie comes to mind), and added cinnamon and slices of lemon and lime.  The kick came from fermenting it before the big night and now I have heard that the kick needs a bit more added and they pour in rum/vodka and assorted other mixes to make sure the wassailers don’t stay awake too long.

The songs of the orchards had phrases that lead one to believe they were singing to assist the trees to make lots more apples for next years harvest for without apples you would not be able to have a very large bowl of good old punch.  A prayer to the apple Gods!

Here’s to thee, old apple tree,
That blooms well, bears well.
Hats full, caps full,
Three bushel bags full,
An’ all under one tree. Hurrah! Hurrah!

Extending into the flocks of sheep and cattle, wheat fields and the other crops they grew.  Without all of that wassailing would be to no avail.  Food and strong drink!

And so to each of you, I wish Merry Christmas and may God Bless You!

Enjoy!

Bears Butt

December 25, 2012  Merry Christmas!