USMB Coffee Shop IV

[007]

I'm still alive and well! Dropping in to catch everybody up on all the news. For starters, hope everybody had a wonderful Christmas and best wishes for a Happy New Year to everybody. Yes, 007, that Canon EOS 7D you purchased is a great camera. I'm sure you'll enjoy it. I have mostly Nikon cameras but I do happen to have a Canon 6D and I like it a lot. That 7D will get you some great photos so enjoy! Now, to catch everybody up on all the news. Hunting season here was really good this year. I got a nice 8 pointer and a medium sized 6 pointer. My buddy, the vet, now that's a different story! With his bow he got one of the biggest deer I have ever seen on the farm. He got a very large rack 10 pointer (and I mean very large) that weighed between 275 and 300 pounds. It was truly a nice deer. I will not post a picture because of the big shit storm last year when I posted a picture of a deer I had bagged so just take my word for it. This was a massive deer! Now, being around him is a challenge because he won't shut up about getting this deer! Don't blame him. It's truly one to brag about. Corn crop was good and the harvest went off with no problems. Christmas was nice. I suppose the only problem was that Mrs. BBD over-cooked the prime rib. Santa was good to me and even nicer to Mrs. BBD. Now we're both just sitting around waiting for 2016 to begin. My oldest grandson is in his first year of college at VMI and looks very handsome in his uniform. His goal is to finish up there and go into the Air Force as a pilot. I didn't know that outside of the Air Force Academy, VMI produces the second largest number of Air Force pilots. Taco is still being his old self. Likes me if Mrs. BBD isn't around but if she is he won't give me the time of day. He doesn't know that if it wasn't for me, Santa Paws would not have made a stop at our house last night. Mrs. BBD has been getting by with only cortisone shots in her knee but they are not lasting very long any more so she will have that knee replacement in the early spring up at the Mayo Clinic (Methodist Hospital) in Rochester, MN. Aside from the knee troubles, she is doing just fine. I'll be heading up to Monroe Truck Equipment in Monroe, WI pretty soon to have them put a tonneau cover on the back of my new truck. I've been waiting until after Christmas to get it done. I know we aren't supposed to talk politics here, but in a general sort of way I will say that I'm getting tired of the political crap on tv. Some of the politicians need to be put in jail and some of them need to simply shut up. Will be glad when it's all over with. I know that officially, winter has only been here for a few days but I'm already looking forward to spring. Myself, I am doing just fine. Just had all of my routine check-ups with the doctors last week and they said if I didn't get hit by a truck I should do pretty well for a long time to come yet. With that said, I will say "Good night" and wish good things for everybody and if you're in the area, stop by and help me eat up all of these left over Christmas cookies. Mrs. BBD over did it again this year. She always does. I'll be eating cookies until the middle of next month!

That was a big debate for me, to either get a full frame or the crop sensor. After a couple months of research and going back and forth, I had come down to either the the 7D MkII with the crop sensor, or the 6D with the full sensor. I settled on the 7D because of a few different things, one it has a much better AF system with it's 65 cross point sensing. It's supposed to be one of the best auto focusing cameras in the world. Second was the blazing fast 10 fps, and rated to have a life of 200,000 shutter actuations, the 6D is half that. Third was the 7D has dual DIGIC 6 processors and the 6D only has one DIGIC 5. There's other reasons but those were the big ones. I think I watched every possible video comparison and read every review on both that I could find on the internet. I found that many feel that the Canon 7D MkII is the best camera for outdoor, action, sports, wildlife and general use that money can buy. The full frame cameras tend to be used more for shooting portraits or landscape or stills. But now I have to go about learning how to use it. I have read the book, understand much of it, watched quite a few how to tutorials, but the auto focus is very complex. It has so many different modes and ways you can set it up or customize it that it's going to take some use to learn. It sure is fun. This is the funnest toy I've bought myself in years. I always did enjoy the photography, and envied those with a nice DSLR, or two, or three,

Good to hear you're doing well, BBD, and I hope you and the misses have a great new year!

 

[007]

78.2 in Foley under cloudy skies with rain tomorrow and Wednesday.

My Air Force buddy in Georgia just texted me that it's 80 there, and they're a little concerned about flooding.

 

[Ringel05]

I'm still alive and well! Dropping in to catch everybody up on all the news. For starters, hope everybody had a wonderful Christmas and best wishes for a Happy New Year to everybody. Yes, 007, that Canon EOS 7D you purchased is a great camera. I'm sure you'll enjoy it. I have mostly Nikon cameras but I do happen to have a Canon 6D and I like it a lot. That 7D will get you some great photos so enjoy! Now, to catch everybody up on all the news. Hunting season here was really good this year. I got a nice 8 pointer and a medium sized 6 pointer. My buddy, the vet, now that's a different story! With his bow he got one of the biggest deer I have ever seen on the farm. He got a very large rack 10 pointer (and I mean very large) that weighed between 275 and 300 pounds. It was truly a nice deer. I will not post a picture because of the big shit storm last year when I posted a picture of a deer I had bagged so just take my word for it. This was a massive deer! Now, being around him is a challenge because he won't shut up about getting this deer! Don't blame him. It's truly one to brag about. Corn crop was good and the harvest went off with no problems. Christmas was nice. I suppose the only problem was that Mrs. BBD over-cooked the prime rib. Santa was good to me and even nicer to Mrs. BBD. Now we're both just sitting around waiting for 2016 to begin. My oldest grandson is in his first year of college at VMI and looks very handsome in his uniform. His goal is to finish up there and go into the Air Force as a pilot. I didn't know that outside of the Air Force Academy, VMI produces the second largest number of Air Force pilots. Taco is still being his old self. Likes me if Mrs. BBD isn't around but if she is he won't give me the time of day. He doesn't know that if it wasn't for me, Santa Paws would not have made a stop at our house last night. Mrs. BBD has been getting by with only cortisone shots in her knee but they are not lasting very long any more so she will have that knee replacement in the early spring up at the Mayo Clinic (Methodist Hospital) in Rochester, MN. Aside from the knee troubles, she is doing just fine. I'll be heading up to Monroe Truck Equipment in Monroe, WI pretty soon to have them put a tonneau cover on the back of my new truck. I've been waiting until after Christmas to get it done. I know we aren't supposed to talk politics here, but in a general sort of way I will say that I'm getting tired of the political crap on tv. Some of the politicians need to be put in jail and some of them need to simply shut up. Will be glad when it's all over with. I know that officially, winter has only been here for a few days but I'm already looking forward to spring. Myself, I am doing just fine. Just had all of my routine check-ups with the doctors last week and they said if I didn't get hit by a truck I should do pretty well for a long time to come yet. With that said, I will say "Good night" and wish good things for everybody and if you're in the area, stop by and help me eat up all of these left over Christmas cookies. Mrs. BBD over did it again this year. She always does. I'll be eating cookies until the middle of next month!

That was a big debate for me, to either get a full frame or the crop sensor. After a couple months of research and going back and forth, I had come down to either the the 7D MkII with the crop sensor, or the 6D with the full sensor. I settled on the 7D because of a few different things, one it has a much better AF system with it's 65 cross point sensing. It's supposed to be one of the best auto focusing cameras in the world. Second was the blazing fast 10 fps, and rated to have a life of 200,000 shutter actuations, the 6D is half that. Third was the 7D has dual DIGIC 6 processors and the 6D only has one DIGIC 5. There's other reasons but those were the big ones. I think I watched every possible video comparison and read every review on both that I could find on the internet. I found that many feel that the Canon 7D MkII is the best camera for outdoor, action, sports, wildlife and general use that money can buy. The full frame cameras tend to be used more for shooting portraits or landscape or stills. But now I have to go about learning how to use it. I have read the book, understand much of it, watched quite a few how to tutorials, but the auto focus is very complex. It has so many different modes and ways you can set it up or customize it that it's going to take some use to learn. It sure is fun. This is the funnest toy I've bought myself in years. I always did enjoy the photography, and envied those with a nice DSLR, or two, or three,

Good to hear you're doing well, BBD, and I hope you and the misses have a great new year!

I still use my old reliable camera.......

Okay, hold that pose for five minutes..........

 

[Ernie S.]

I feel so lucky that I don't have any allergies, environmental or otherwise. A weird story though. Whenever I go to Market Basket, there is a certain section of the store (in the first aisles 1-3) where I get the strangest sensation behind my eyes. As soon as move out of aisle 3 into aisle 4, it goes away. This has happened several times now when I've gone there, so the last time I paid more attention to where it was happening. Aisles 1-3. How weird? Right? It's almost like an intense pressure sensation behind my eyes, as if the odor of something is bothering my sinuses or something, yet I can't smell anything!

What's in those aisles?

It's actually the frozen foods aisles, but there are other things scattered about too. I'll have to pay attention to that next time I go.

It's possible there's mold under the freezers, that could be what's affecting you.

It's a fairly new store. I suppose that is a possibility though.

Around here there are sprigs of dried cinnamon in a lot of stores. They get my nose running.

 

[ChrisL]

I feel so lucky that I don't have any allergies, environmental or otherwise. A weird story though. Whenever I go to Market Basket, there is a certain section of the store (in the first aisles 1-3) where I get the strangest sensation behind my eyes. As soon as move out of aisle 3 into aisle 4, it goes away. This has happened several times now when I've gone there, so the last time I paid more attention to where it was happening. Aisles 1-3. How weird? Right? It's almost like an intense pressure sensation behind my eyes, as if the odor of something is bothering my sinuses or something, yet I can't smell anything!

What's in those aisles?

It's actually the frozen foods aisles, but there are other things scattered about too. I'll have to pay attention to that next time I go.

It's possible there's mold under the freezers, that could be what's affecting you.

It's a fairly new store. I suppose that is a possibility though.

Around here there are sprigs of dried cinnamon in a lot of stores. They get my nose running.

I can't really describe the sensation I get well. The best I can say is that it is a pressure type of sensation. No running nose or sneezing or anything like that. It's really very strange though, since it goes away completely after I leave aisle 3. I am going to do some more investigation when I go back. I will report back with my findings.

 

[gallantwarrior]

I just finished baking and packing up the dinner rolls for Christmas - yay! My first project in our new oven - and they turned out poifeckly!

(This is why I miss our dear Syrenn - she always appreciated a good baking project.)

Well congratulations. I think I posted here. . .or maybe it was just on Facebook. . .that I found an old hot roll mix in the pantry and decided to make some hot rolls for dinner that night. But they came out much more biscuit like. Hombre liked them though and I fessed up that they weren't really good biscuits but rather were really crappy rolls. Well tonight I found a tube of refrigerated crescent rolls in the back of the fridge and, thought hey were 45 days out of date-thought I would risk it. And yep. They tasted just like biscuits. But they tasted pretty good.

I enjoy making quick breads, too (biscuits, cornbread) - and mr. boe loves to eat them!

But slow food yeast bread is my favorite. The gluten develops more structure and the flavor is better, imo. Now that we're organized again, I'm going to revive my sourdough starter again. I need to test the oven with Real Bread.

I love to bake bread from scratch too and I hand knead it though that has been difficult to do with my ailing shoulder. But as that gets better I'll return to making bread from scratch. By no additives in the flour, does that mean barley free flour? Does that affect the texture? I've been told it does though I haven't done any experiments to test it.

I mean preservatives and boosters. My preferred flour maker is Bob's Red Mill. The unbleached Artisan Bread flour is quite good. I use that and their whole wheat flour for my basic flours.

I've been using their spelt flour

 

[Ringel05]

I just finished baking and packing up the dinner rolls for Christmas - yay! My first project in our new oven - and they turned out poifeckly!

(This is why I miss our dear Syrenn - she always appreciated a good baking project.)

Well congratulations. I think I posted here. . .or maybe it was just on Facebook. . .that I found an old hot roll mix in the pantry and decided to make some hot rolls for dinner that night. But they came out much more biscuit like. Hombre liked them though and I fessed up that they weren't really good biscuits but rather were really crappy rolls. Well tonight I found a tube of refrigerated crescent rolls in the back of the fridge and, thought hey were 45 days out of date-thought I would risk it. And yep. They tasted just like biscuits. But they tasted pretty good.

I enjoy making quick breads, too (biscuits, cornbread) - and mr. boe loves to eat them!

But slow food yeast bread is my favorite. The gluten develops more structure and the flavor is better, imo. Now that we're organized again, I'm going to revive my sourdough starter again. I need to test the oven with Real Bread.

I love to bake bread from scratch too and I hand knead it though that has been difficult to do with my ailing shoulder. But as that gets better I'll return to making bread from scratch. By no additives in the flour, does that mean barley free flour? Does that affect the texture? I've been told it does though I haven't done any experiments to test it.

I mean preservatives and boosters. My preferred flour maker is Bob's Red Mill. The unbleached Artisan Bread flour is quite good. I use that and their whole wheat flour for my basic flours.

I've been using their spelt flour

Well, it looks like you're spelting flour correctly.

 

[peach174]

Morning All !

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and weekend.
Today I am making ham and bean soup in the crockpot.
I give some to my single neighbor guys and they love it. Then I freeze the rest and use it through the rest of the winter.
It has been really cold here at night, in the teens, so ham and bean soup will be really good on a cold winter's day.

 

[saveliberty]

No, How you doin'?

 

[Ringel05]

I tossed the popcorn out this morning...... The Grackles usually take the popcorn and drop it in the makeshift birdbath to get it wet..... one of the Grackle s is trying to do that now....... The water in the birdbath is frozen solid.........

 

[Ernie S.]

Morning All !

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and weekend.
Today I am making ham and bean soup in the crockpot.
I give some to my single neighbor guys and they love it. Then I freeze the rest and use it through the rest of the winter.
It has been really cold here at night, in the teens, so ham and bean soup will be really good on a cold winter's day.

I might appreciate a cool spell here. We hit 82 on Christmas Day. It's currently 76 and about to see another band of thunder storms come through here. The man says rain through Thursday.

 

[saveliberty]

Ice pellets turning to ice and ice rain later. .25 to .35" expected.

 

[Foxfyre]

Cold but sunny here today. Not likely to melt much of the ice under the snow. We so seldom get ice here but we sure got it in this last storm.

 

[Montrovant]

In the low 70s here and still wet, although not currently raining. I think the weather misheard the song.....it's not wet Christmas, it's white Christmas!

 

[Ernie S.]

That last band came through and the temp dropped 12 degrees in an hour.

 

[Ringel05]

That last band came through and the temp dropped 12 degrees in an hour.

Must be a really cool band....... Country? Rock? Jazz? R&B?

 

[peach174]

That last band came through and the temp dropped 12 degrees in an hour.

Must be a really cool band....... Country? Rock? Jazz? R&B?

RADAR band !!!!!!!!

 

[boedicca]

I just finished baking and packing up the dinner rolls for Christmas - yay! My first project in our new oven - and they turned out poifeckly!

(This is why I miss our dear Syrenn - she always appreciated a good baking project.)

Well congratulations. I think I posted here. . .or maybe it was just on Facebook. . .that I found an old hot roll mix in the pantry and decided to make some hot rolls for dinner that night. But they came out much more biscuit like. Hombre liked them though and I fessed up that they weren't really good biscuits but rather were really crappy rolls. Well tonight I found a tube of refrigerated crescent rolls in the back of the fridge and, thought hey were 45 days out of date-thought I would risk it. And yep. They tasted just like biscuits. But they tasted pretty good.

I enjoy making quick breads, too (biscuits, cornbread) - and mr. boe loves to eat them!

But slow food yeast bread is my favorite. The gluten develops more structure and the flavor is better, imo. Now that we're organized again, I'm going to revive my sourdough starter again. I need to test the oven with Real Bread.

I love to bake bread from scratch too and I hand knead it though that has been difficult to do with my ailing shoulder. But as that gets better I'll return to making bread from scratch. By no additives in the flour, does that mean barley free flour? Does that affect the texture? I've been told it does though I haven't done any experiments to test it.

I mean preservatives and boosters. My preferred flour maker is Bob's Red Mill. The unbleached Artisan Bread flour is quite good. I use that and their whole wheat flour for my basic flours.

I've been using their spelt flour

I like that, too!

 

[boedicca]

That last band came through and the temp dropped 12 degrees in an hour.

Must be a really cool band....... Country? Rock? Jazz? R&B?

I'm guessing a Brian Eno Ambiant cover band.

 

[Ringel05]

We're driving back from the wife's Dr's appointment, a pickup truck comes to a stop at the stop sign coming off a side street and all the snow on the cab top slides forward completely covering the windshield........