15 Years Together......

My Grandparent's 50th, me in the background. 

This is when I knew what I wanted in life, and that

was to be like my grandparents.

When I was 11 years old, I attended my paternal grandparent’s 50th wedding anniversary and family reunion. At that celebration, I realized what I wanted in life. I wanted a large family and to be married 50 years too.

I got married for the first time when I was 21. I had two daughters with my first wife and that marriage did not last.

I was devastated and heart-broken as I saw my dream of a large family and 50 years go down the drain.

I dated for awhile, and in time, I met KinDee. She had two boys and our children got along great. I treated her boys well and she treated my girls well, and in time, we decided to make a go of it.

I met KinDee through my cousin Sarah, who introduced me to my first wife as well. This was probably August of 2001. It was before September 11th. I was still driving semi and I didn’t get to see KinDee much, but in time, I eventually took her on a few trips with me. One of the first big trips we took was to Braselton, Georgia. It was the first and only time that KinDee has ever been to Georgia.

It sounds so cliché to say that we’ve had our good times and bad, but that is the truth. Our story was not a fairy tale. There were times that KinDee and I got together and split up. In fact, when Jenna was born, I had no clue as KinDee had left me. I was eating barbecue at Cousin Jeremy Durnan’s home. I didn’t get to see Jenna until she was a week or two old.

My mother asked me to reconcile with KinDee and over time, we worked out our differences and got married 15 years ago today. It has been a hard 15 years, which again sounds cliché as I have yet to see many marriages that are easy. Life is hard if you really think about it.

On the morning that we got married, it was frosty and cold. We drove up to the courthouse and got married by Judge Larry Woods who married me the first time. It was quite informal. I got married the first time in striped bib-overalls. With KinDee, I wore solid blue ones.

Present were our mothers who were witnesses, and my sister Joni and KinDee’s sister Vicky. Afterwards, we came home and had some cake and that was that. We were married the same as those who spent thousands getting married (no disrespect towards those who go that route, but we didn’t have the money to).

Here we are, 15 years later, two more kids later, and our kids now range from 20 to 10. KinDee will be a grandmother in a few months. We won’t do much today. Jenna already bought us some treats and wrote us a touching letter. They want us to leave this afternoon so they can do something nice for us. God bless them.

Back in 1987, I remember my grandfather speaking to someone who commented on looking at all his family 50 years on and Grandpa replied, “If you ain’t got family, you ain’t got shit.” That just about summed it up.

I look at my family, especially now as they grow older, and while I will never have that “large” family that I wanted, nor have I reached that 50 year milestone, I feel the same sense of purpose that Grandpa felt all those years ago. This marriage is really about family and what you leave behind. These 15 years haven’t been for my wife and I as much as it has been for our children.

I pray that my wife and I both live to see 50 years together. Even if we don’t, I cherish the 15 years we’ve spent together and pray for more.

Taken at Jeremy's wedding in 2003 or 2004.

Our family - 2015

Quaker Oats Old-Fashioned Grits

I have tried to figure out exactly what grits are. Everyone seems to know what they are when they are cooked, but nobody can agree on the starting product.  

I suspect a majority of grits served in average restaurants t today are the “Quick Grits” variety. But, what did our ancestors eat? What is this “hominy grits”? Is it actually made from hominy corn that has been dried, then ground? 

I have read that Quaker actually makes hominy grits. I wrote to them for a definitive answer.  

It appears they have a process of removing the germ without going through the whole nixtamalization process. Here is their response:

 

Eric:

Thanks for writing to us about Quaker Enriched White Hominy Grits. We appreciate the chance to respond to your inquiries.

Quaker Grits are made from the milling of corn kernels. The important first step is to clean the kernels. The kernel is then split, which removes the hull and germ, leaving only the broken endosperm. Therefore, Quaker grits are not whole grains. The endosperm is passed through heavy steel rollers, which break it up into granules. The various sizes of granules are separated by a screening process and graded. The large size granules are the grits, while smaller sizes become corn meal or corn flour. For Instant grits, we take raw grits and add vitamins, minerals, salt, and water, then cook the grits. The cooking process removes most of the water, instantizing the grits. Following the cooking process, Quaker Instant grits are dried for packaging.

PFBA - The Future & Automation

The employee complains about “the man.” The employer complains about the cost of labor. In the end, the employers are gaining an upper hand. They have been for some time.

First, companies are able to have their goods manufactured in parts of the world where people live on slave wages at best. These companies can then import those goods back into the United States and sell them cheaper than they sell goods made right here to home. How is it that a television set can sail across the ocean and still sell for less than a television set built here? However it happens, that’s what has taken place. Globalization just pushes the pedal to the floor in the process.

For those companies that cannot import their goods from other countries, namely, service industries and agriculture business, the companies have pushed for lax laws that allow cheap labor to flood into America. These are the illegal immigrants. Those Americans who cry foul, including those in the traditionally organized labor camp, are told that complaining is tantamount to racism. Nobody wants to be a racist, do they? Of course not, so it’s an effective way to quiet the resistance.

Here’s the question. When you have so many Americans sitting out of work, and are trying to automate more jobs, just who will have any money to purchase these goods and services?

These companies have found ways to squeeze more and more out of their labor force and the profits that were once spread across an entire workforce are now being pocketed by those at the top of the corporate ladder. This is evidenced by a truth that hardly anyone disagrees with; the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer.

These titans of industry are now turning to the Democratic Party and aligning themselves with socialists. They are calling for people to be given “free” this and “free” that, but none of them are willing to pay higher taxes, or, God forbid, pay higher wages to their employees.

When companies pay a good living wage to their employees, their employees can afford to purchase goods and that is good for the economy. Also, by paying a good wage, employees no longer have to turn to the government for help. Walmart and McDonald’s both pay such low wages that the United States government subsidizes their labor costs. Most McDonald’s and Walmart employees cannot raise a family or live on their wages alone, and therefore turn to heat, health, and food assistance. Walmart’s owners are some of the richest in the world. They have enough money stuffed away that their great grandchildren will be rich. Imagine if that money had been spread amongst their workforce. Think of the savings to the government, aka; You, the taxpayer.

Here are some changes that would make the situation better.

1.      Tax any money not paid out to hourly employees. In other words, if a company makes billions and pays a paltry wage, they will be taxed heavily on that money because odds are, their employees are accepting government assistance. This will encourage companies to pay better wages as opposed to paying taxes. Either way, that money will be spent on the employees. I believe most companies would rather pay the money directly.

2.      Tax automation. If the government taxes automation and uses that money for the poor, many businesses may forgo automation and keep real people employed. The only time machines should be used is for dangerous work, which should be taxed at a low rate. We would rather have robots do dangerous work.

3.      Companies should be taxed for exporting jobs. If a job could be done in America, and it is not, the goods should be taxed to compensate for the under-employed. This could be pegged to the unemployment rate. In other words, if few are unemployed, it may make sense to have items made abroad. If certain items are meant to be made abroad, like Chinese silk, or Pakistani rugs, then that should not be taxed as high. There’s no reason that televisions are made overseas and shipped here cheaper than they can be made here.

We already use our tax system to influence people’s behavior. Corporations are not people. It’s true that they are made up of people who have collectively invested their money, but most corporations are run by a select few people, who in almost every case, are paid astronomical wages compared to most company employees, and they have fantastic benefit and severance packages. This is money that could be used to lift the lifestyles and retirements of their employees, while still allowing those at the top to be filthy rich. The only difference is that they won’t have as many succeeding generations able to inherit the wealth.

I am a capitalist, but a personal capitalist. I am not a corporate capitalist. I am also not a globalist. I believe in being a part of the global system, but I believe in forced diversity. Those who are globalists are trying to homogenize the world, to essentially form a world monopoly of power and influence. A monopoly is not a good thing. While having multiple different governments and systems is a pain in the ass to multi-national corporations, it is good for humanity. Diversity is good.

Do you ever think of me?

I still think of you. I remember those nights out under the stars. I bared my soul to you. Those nights with you were magical, just laying there, looking up to heaven with you.

I told you that I would have married you and I meant it. Still, all these years later, you are one of three women that I have loved not counting family. I have loved two other women, but none the same as I loved you.

I have thought hard about why things happened the way they did. For me, you loved me one moment, and hated me the next. It made no sense and for years it ate away at me. It wasn’t until I got older that it started to make sense.

I remember our last night together before you left for awhile. I also recall a phone call before that where you felt you might be in “trouble”. I remember a while after that when you told someone’s father that you had the same sort of trouble, which wasn’t true, but I wondered why you had said that.

Yes, years later I have wondered if you were. I wonder if you went and had done what I think you had done. I never knew. I suppose you wanted to protect your reputation. However, I wish you would have gone through instead of ending it. I wish it didn’t have to be the way it turned out. But I don’t blame you.

Long ago, I moved on in life, but it took awhile. I married, had children, and divorced. I remarried again and have had more children. But I have always wondered, “what if?”, but I have accepted my lot in life. It doesn’t matter. I have been blessed with a wonderful family; wonderful children.

If it is as I suspect, I don’t blame you. I did love you. I would have continued loving you.  I will always remember you and the time we spent together, and what may have been. I will take that to my grave. 

Truth on the Jones Act 09/28/2017

After much investigation today, I learned;
 

The Jones Act does not prevent ships from foreign countries to enter Puerto Rico. It prevents foreign ships from taking supplies from American Ports to Puerto Rico. If Mexico sent a ship to Puerto Rico, it could do so.
 

Where people are saying the Jones Act is "strangling" Puerto Rico is that there are ships delivering goods in American ports right now that want to haul supplies to Puerto Rico and they cannot because they are a foreign ship and cannot ship from one American port to another. An American ship has to do that.
 

They say there are a ton of supplies sitting in San Juan right now, but that there is a large shortage of truck drivers to distribute the goods. The Jones Act doesn't affect truck drivers in Puerto Rico.
 

As soon as the governor of Puerto Rico asked for the Jones Act to be suspended, Trump did it. Before that, many people told Trump that Puerto Rico was getting plenty of supplies but where the problem lay was in distribution.
 

Regarding the Jones Act for Florida and Texas, hell if I know other than a couple of news articles that I read said that the push for that suspension came from politicians in those states, but that Puerto Rico has little representation in our government.
 

Blame politics. All parties are guilty of it.

 

Socialism or Capitalism? The NFL Decides......

Imagine if you had someone mow your lawn and they left one wide strip in protest of what police were doing to black people.

Imagine that you ordered breakfast somewhere and they gave you eggs sunny-side-up instead of scrambled because they are protesting what they perceive police are doing to black people amounts to brutality.

Imagine if you went to the Emergency Room and the nurse decided to take a knee for one minute before doing their job. There you are, needing help, and your nurse is taking a knee, looking you in the eye, and telling you it’s in protest of one cause or another.

Imagine you had an employee of any sort, and they start doing things against the rules because they are protesting something totally unrelated to what it is that you are doing. Would you not have the right to fire them? Do they have a right to protest on your time, when you are paying them to do a job? Are they entitled to have you pay for their protest?

What if your employee, known for working for you and representing you, goes out and acts in a way that reflects badly upon you or your business. Do you not have a right to sever ties with that employee?

This is what is happening in the NFL and other sports right now. EMPLOYEES are protesting on company time, and are making statements while on their boss’s dime that may or may not hurt their employer’s position. Unless their employer specifically asks them to do these things, the employees have no right to protest on company time.

Socialism teaches that people have a right to work regardless of the position of their employer. Capitalism says that the boss is always right.

Which side are you on? Are you a socialist or a capitalist? What if you were the boss in this situation?

 

 

 

Canning Tomatoes - Eric E. Durnan method

Do you have questions about canning tomatoes? I did too, but got tired of all the bad information on the internet. I have been canning for over 6 years now and I have learned a lot in those 6 years, especially in the area of canning tomatoes. The one problem that I had early on was “tomato float.” This is where you can tomatoes only to find later that the tomatoes are floating to the top while you have a quarter of the jar full of water on the bottom. Some people have written that the water on the bottom is actually juice, but it isn’t. It’s water. I’ll tell you how I know.

For many years, I drove semi and hauled fluid milk and other dairy products. While a lot of the milk that I hauled went into bottling, a bunch of it went into making cheese as well. One by-product of cheese making is whey. Whey in its raw form is a nasty greenish looking water with some foam and bits of cheese. This is milk with most of the solids removed, but there are still solids in this whey. I don’t think I ever hauled a load of raw whey, but I saw what it looked like plenty of times. I went to dairies where farmers showed up to collect the raw whey to feed to hogs or spread out on their fields. This was mainly done at the smaller cheese plants that I saw in Wisconsin.

Most of the time, either the cheese plant, or a dedicated whey plant, would condense the whey down by using reverse osmosis or ultra-filtration. Rarely did I see heat used for this purpose. The water that was taken out was called “cow water” and they would pipe it down into the trucking bays for us to wash our trucks with it. I never tasted it. It was labeled non-potable, and it had a slight sheen to it when you sprayed it. In the end, it was water that was once in the cow’s udder, mixed with the milk solids.

Once condensed, the whey was transported or dried on site. Nobody wanted to ship raw whey as that was seen as shipping water. There were different levels of condensed whey. Some looked like a slightly thicker than milk consistency which I was told was equivalent to 8 semi-loads of raw whey. Then there was stuff that was nearly as thick as Elmer’s Glue which was so heavy that the tank could only be partially filled and it was a really rough trip to the processor as that whey moved around with a ton of room, and the same weight as a full load. One processor that we took this highly condensed whey to was in Colfax, Wisconsin and he told me that he liked the really thick stuff because it meant less work for him making it into powder. Since it was so thick, the sugars in the whey would separate out and stick to the bottom of the tank, necessitating a steam clean out.

Not only was whey condensed by removing water, but milk in it’s raw form is often condensed, and even canned. Often times, milk is dried all the way down to powder.

Does this mean that you can get your original product back by adding water back in? The answer in every case that I’m aware of is no. Processing changes food in irreversible ways. Whether it be dairy products, or tomatoes, once you process them, you’ll never be able to get the goodness of the original back.

When I noticed tomatoes floating in my jar, my years of hauling dairy products told me that the problem was too much water. Others make arguments about pectin, air bubbles, and a host of other reasons. Regardless of pectin or air bubbles, it’s obvious that separation has taken place and what you see on the bottom of the jar is water.

It’s for this reason that I decided to remove excess water from my tomatoes before canning. My canned tomatoes are exclusively used for cooking anyhow, so cooking my tomatoes down can either happen before or after canning, and it makes more sense to cook them down before and use less jars.

Here is my process. I prepare my tomatoes by cutting out the stem area and any other bad spots it may have. I have a pan of hot water that was boiled, then the fire shut off so that the temperature of the water is just under boiling. I dip my prepared tomatoes into the hot water for a short while and then transfer them to a strainer in my sink where the skins are removed. At this point, the tomato is transferred to another pan. Once finished, I put a lid on this pan of skinned tomatoes and cock the lid to let steam escape. I turn on the heat and bring my tomatoes up to a slow simmer and let them cook down. I mash them with a potato masher and essentially make tomato sauce, but chunky. After simmering the better part of a day, I transfer them into jars and water bath as usual. If they are low acid tomatoes, then I add a little lemon juice or pressure can 10 pounds for 10 minutes. Don’t take my word on the weight and time. I’m not the USDA. It’s just what works for my family.

We always check our jars for a good seal before opening and we always cook our canned products before consuming. If they smell or look bad, we dump them. I haven’t had that problem yet in six years with anything I’ve canned. I have had a few things others have canned and been given to me that hasn’t passed the test.

Going this route has saved me space in my pantry and the cost of many lids for many jars. I don’t get “tomato float” anymore. Cooking the tomatoes down almost sweetens the flavor as well as make it bolder and more prominent. It’s certainly not watery. Doing tomatoes this way goes well in making any kind of sauce or chili. It’s also good for goulash.

I have thought of adding other things to my tomatoes before canning, like onion and basil, but have found that the flavor changes because of the processing. I only add some salt now to my jars before canning and add everything else after I open the jar back up.