What a week

It's been crazy around here, about the time it couldn't get any more crazy something else happens. That headstone I made for that little couple It was for the wife's brother that had died of a overdose in which they say he was poisoned instead of a drug overdose I don't know what the hell happened to the guy but he is dead.
 I had them over to draw up how she wanted the headstone to look like and everything was spelled right so if its wrong its their fault.
 I had that happen on another headstone I did for someone, luckily I had them call and leave a message on my answering machine on how they wanted it spelled and the times on it. I blasted that damn rock and they came to pick it up and right off the bat they say I put the wrong date on it. I bring them in the house and play the message he left, after listening to the message he asks me to blast anther stone for them that he had messed up on the date. I cover my butt on the rocks, I don't like spending all day on a job for nothing.
 Back to my story,after I finished that headstone for the little couple I called and let them know that it was ready they came over and picked it up on June 24th., he was all yes sir and no sir and seemed like a real nice kid and they loved the rock. Well I get a call Thursday the 27th and am told that he was shot and killed real early Thursday morning. So I might be making another headstone. I feel sorry for that young girl to lose a brother and her husband in 8 days and the crazy thing about all this is they both died within a block of each other and on the same street. 


When I started taking pictures with digital camera's some turned out half way decent and I wanted to put them in picture frames, well the prints my printer spit out was the wrong size for the store bought frames so I get the wild hair to make me my own picture frames. These wild hairs I get they get expensive at times and this was one of those times. Luckily I had the saws for making the frames from another wild hair I got some years back so all I needed was glass and a matte cutter. I found the matte cutter on Craigslist for around $100.00 so all I needed was a glass cutter so off I go to Lowe's and buy me a hand held glass cutter I bought the higher end one they had since I had tried cutting glass before with a cheap one and it just made me cuss a lot it didn't work. Guess what the higher end one don't cut any better so I get mad I ought to know by now I shouldn't go shopping mad. I get online and search for glass cutters I see all kinds of hand held cutters and just can't get it out of my mind that big ass glass cutter they had at Lowe's, that sucker was about 6 foot wide and 4 or 5 ft tall and cut glass like butter now that is one hell of a glass cutter, guess what I have on my wall that takes up the whole damn wall, yep one of them big ass glass cutters and it works great. It came with some attachments that I can cut matte board with and plexie glass also. Its a glass cutting sumbitch.

When I went out to the ranch this last time I had met Amado Pena the artist so I figure I'll buy a couple of prints. That's all I can afford after buying that big ass glass cutter. I made me some frames for them out of old fence pickets I have them framed but have no place to put them right now.

BEN WOODS

Today is 1 year since my ole buddy Ben Woods passed away. I still have his blog "An Older Texan Remembers" on my blogs that I follow list. I go to it at times just to remember Ole Ben. I knew Ben from the 80's when I lived in Alpine Tx. we had some good times together with him and his wife Ann. It doesn't seem like its been a year since his passing, he is missed.

                                                    R.I.P. Ole Friend



 I haven't felt like writing much for about a month now I have some things going on in my life right now that I'm dealing with and and I just don't feel like writing hopefully things will start getting better in a month or so. I will probably be moving out to my place in Terlingua pretty soon and starting a new life out there. I don't have anything left here in Austin to keep me here and I'm ready to get the hell out of this hell hole.

Ballooning has been all but dead around here because of the wind so I've blasted a few stones for some people. I try to help people out that don't have a lot of money and can't afford to buy a headstone. I've been lucky so for from people giving me the stones to make the headstones out of and save some people a lot of money.  When I bought this setup headstones was the last thing I thought I'd be doing with it.This one is solid marble 3 inches thick, 3 feet long, and 2 feet tall and it weighs a ton. It took 4 of us to get it in my blast cabinet.

I took down all my hydro ponic stuff ,it is getting way to hot for the shallow water tubs I had and I'm starting to down size for the move so they had to come down. I will say one thing I did learn is once the tomato's started getting big they start using a hell of a lot of water. I was putting 6 - 8 gallons of water in that one 18 gallon tote every other day just before I took it down.

ROT RALLY

Well the ole Rot Rally is back in town this weekend so I won't say much just post some pictures.

Back Again

Made another trip out to Terlingua for a birthday party and some other things that I'll talk about in the future.
One thing I've learned about going out there is you never know who you are going to meet. I went to that birthday party and right off the bat I meet Amado Peña, if you don't know who he is you can check him out here "Amado Peña". He is one heck of an artist. Turns out he went through school with the lady who was having the birthday party and he came for her party.

Diana is one nice lady,Ive been going to her party's for a few years now and they are always great. She rents the whole dang place and has food and a live band each year for her birthday. This year it was at the Bad Rabbit cafe down at Terlingua Ranch.

I worked some more on Yucca Flats and it looks like the wild donkeys like pretty well it looks like they hung around for awhile and had a lot of fun rolling around in the dirt. Every time I think I'm done with that place I see something else that would look better if I cleared it out some more.

                         I thought that it would look better if I cleared out around this yucca.

So I ran over the brush with my 4-wheeler to knock it down and make sure there aren't any critters that might want to bite me and then I grabbed my pick and rake and went to town on that damn brush.

Now that looks better doesn't it.

                I have some more that I knocked down and will clean up on my next trip out there.

I plan on cleaning out all around that tree and have a little more shade for someone camping out there.

I need to blast a sign that will advertise my Yucca Flats Camping Area and put a couple of picnic tables out there and I should be done. Who knows I might make a dollar once a year from someone or group wanting to have their own private camp site in the middle of nowhere with mountains all around them..