How many of you received dangerous or insensitive, numbbrained “gifts” for Christmas? Surely, it's the tools that're insensitive, inconsiderate or numbbrained, never the owners. Dangerous because of their attacks on their owners or by damaging what little goodwill there is left in the neighborhood.  Such as: Carniverous electric shavers; “sharp” knives; leaf blowers that only blow leaves toward the street or over onto the neighbors’ yards or driveways; dogs that’ll bark constantly or only poop on the neighbors’ place; cats that’ll “claim, with their personal spray perfume” every front porch or set of back steps within three city blocks.

What items can you add to this list? Please describe them.  For instance, Rusty hasn't used an electric shaver for years so the first attempt resulted in an itching, burning face and neck. What animal(s) does/do this give you a mental image of one of these eating on your face? Grizzly bear, Humbolt squid, pit bull, wolverine, Tasmanian devil, pirhannas, other?

Dangerous to many are SHARP tools and knives to those who're not accustomed to using them. Their regular method of forcing tools, say like putting extra effort into slicing something with a kitchen knife, often gets them hurt.

What are your feelings about the people who use/keep the other neighbor alienating items. What chaps YOU besides a hot sweaty summer day with no corn starch?

Who do we know who's lost a loved one, gotten divorced, became ill, are down on their luck, or suffered some other tragedy recently? Are we at odds with a family member that we need to call or make up with? With this season being the loneliest time of the year, and the suicide rate is the highest, depression is the deepest, what can we do to reach out to someone who may be on the brink of doing something fatal? Even the smallest jesture can often mean the world to a hurting individual, completely change their outlook and give them incentive to make a total transformation of their lives.

What can we do? What has someone done for YOU that made a vast difference in your life?  Wishing you and yours the merriest of Christmases and the most prosperous and happy New Year. Thanks for your contributions to the lives of others and to this blog. Thanks for reading and trying to plug the holes in the OLD RUSTY BUCKET.

    Rusty's search for crappie jigs at Tinker's got this reply from Pam or  Debbie, "We don't stock anything like that but one of our guides makes jigs. Let me call 'im." After her call she reported, "Mike, makes 'em. Call 'im at (903)271-2018."
    Arrangements were made for Mike Blakely to make us up some crappie jigs and for him to be our guide. The December 26 current weather forecast for Pottsboro, TX says "Few snow showers, 30%. 38 to 42 degrees". It may force the day to be spent in the boathouse. For 12/27 the "partly cloudy, 39-55" sounds better. Now, for some fairly calm waters, very little wind. Grandpa Rusty's hopin' for 6 y.o. Casey to catch a bunch of fish.

A.  What would YOU do? Just as soon as a guy in Chicago finished shoveling enough snow off the street to provide himself a parking place on the street a woman driver whipped her car into his spot. 

1. What would’ve YOU done?  

2 Guess what he did to be a Darwin Award winner?

B.   A sign beside a crystal clear lake said, “It’s safe to drink the water but it’s not safe to swim in it.”   1. Where was the lake?    2.  Why wasn’t it safe to swim in?

C.  Even though they’re entertaining at times, what do you think of  Rush Limbaugh snd

Sean Hannity? Are they “right on” or are they “way out in deep space”?

D.  Do you think “HILLAROUS CLINTON” appears like the campaign  is taking a toll on her?  Do you think, if elected, she’ll actually BE the president or will Slick Willy be calling the shots?

A HONEY BEE HAS CONTRIBUTED TO THIS ITEM. It crawled all over Rusty’s hand, neck, laptop, and jacket during the typing.

Living in south Louisiana soured Rusty on people throwing trash out of their vehicles. So much so that his own rig is often a gold mine for aluminum can collectors. During a can quest last Saturday his little pocket of credit cards that has been missing since September surfaced. Of course, Mrs. Rusty made her usual "If you'd clean all that crap outta there once in a while, there's no telling what you might find."

Rusty recently tried his hand at rock tumbling. The big boys use three or fours successfully smaller grits of abraisives and and one or two tumbles of polishing medium. Each step of the process takes about a week. Last week while cleaning excess grit off the rocks with a toothbrush, he spied an unfamiliar yellow granular "rock" on the floor under his work, supper, computer, table. A few swipes with the toothbrush caused it to crumble. It turned out to be what son Courtney called a pertified hushpuppy.

One thing about all his traveling for work, Rusty is very fortunate to meet lots of good people. Always bashful, he introduced himself to Paige and Lisa McNeill at church today. That was fortuitous as they’re ranchers outside Hobbs. We have a lot in common as he was raised in Montana and she grew up in South Dakota so we’re familiar with many of the same places. Both Buffalo and Casper, Wyoming, where our  kids were born, are on their travel routes. .

 Their daughters, McKenzie, 11, and McKenna, 7, are following in their parents’ footsteps rodeoing. They both have horses and currently practice roping the family goats. We enjoyed a great meal at Appleby’s. Paige majored in Animal Husbandry at Texas A & M. Lisa majored in Special Education at the (SD State?) university in Vermillion, SD.

        & nbsp;  

Rusty hopes to set up the Bushnell Trailcam at a location on their ranch where there’s a good chance of getting some closeup photos of coyotes. There are possibility of hearing lots of interesting stories of ranching life in the wilds of Montana, New Mexico and west Texas.

The song, “IT’S A SMALL WORLD”  must’ve been playing in the heads of the designers of the fancy portable toilet trailers on our job site. Obviously, no serious thought was given to the needs of the elderly, heavy, or physically challenged. Standard height toilets are a huge disadevantage to some who are challenged to make a graceful landing on  porcelon thronesw. Grab bars would be so helpful during the simple acts of  sitting or standing. For my money, ALL biffies should be handicapped friendly. You can put booster steps by the pot for the kids.

The business openings in the seats are so small an average sized six year old boy couldn’t fall into the pot. While this offers the boys relative security, it hinders fat men because their big butts put their “privates” in conflict with the front portion of the seat. This can cause unfortunate wet spots on the floor, wall, stall door, or one’s clothes. Also, some individuals have no desire to drag their “personalities” around on any germs or social disease carriers left by earlier users. Nor do they want to be infested with sabertoothed crotch crickets.

One old guy’s campaign resulted in his being told he was welcome to use porta cans having open fronted seats. That was fine with the complainer until they hauled off all the porta cans.

Next came the fancy new “potty trailer” obviously the pride & joy of some young designer charged with putting the maximum number of fixtures in too small a space. Try this, the men’s room is 7’3-1/2” x  27’1” inside. There are seven wall mounted (is there any other kind?) urinals wrapped around a corner at one end of the room. Besides the door, there are six wash basins in cabinets along the front wall. When you take out the width of the aisle, the eight throne stalls measure 30” wide x 40” front to back. The side panels between the stalls are 74” high whereas the tops of the toilet seats are 18” off the floor. The rooms are really nice with HVAC, hot & cold running water in the sinks. Just about the right size for boy scouts, it’s not really made for average (or larger) sized American adults. One estimated six foot tall gentlemen reported, “I can’t close the stall doors because they hit my knees.” Several others can’t even get IN the stalls.

One gimpy old guy told his experience, with a little “editing”, about waiting too long to head for the pooter palace. He was just adancin’ when he finally got around a guy exitin’ the fabulous facility on the steep narrow stairway. “The *&%$# zipper on my safety vest was stubborn so I was in a major panic to loosen my overall strap. When it did come loose it fell in the pot. With no handicapped grab bars I had to grab the top of the side panel and try to affect a graceful landing. There I was hanging by one arm from that #$@%&* wall like an orangatang (sic) swingin’ through the jungle. That left the seat about six or eight inches too far below my landin’ gear. When I let go my butt slid off the seat and my feet were stickin’ out under the stall door. The serious bump on my noggin musta released my smaller sphincter. I didn’t go in there for a warm shower. My super extended bladder musta not known that.

“Didja ever try to scoot backwards when there was nothin’ but a slick vitreous china bowl to grab onto? When the other business was finally accomplished it was time to try to stand up but there was nothing to get ahold of. More blessin’ of the @#$#%&* moron who designed the place. Sure wish he/she was disadvantaged in some way and had to use that place

        & nbsp;   Back in the office, all the queries of, “What happened to you? Why’re you all wet?” were met with more colorful blessin’ of the @#$%&*^ designer and the purchasing agent involved.”

An email from Tinker Toney at TINKER'S STRIPER GUIDE SERVICE, Pottsboro, TX, got Rusty all excited today. TINK reported, in part, "We fished 378 fishermen in November and cleaned 3526 stripers. This does not include the stripers that were caught and released. Some of our customers only want to catch and release fish. Several catfish have been caught at the boathouse in November ranging from 12 lbs to 46 lbs."  Go to www.tinker.net to see some of the catches.  Hopefully, Courtney & Casey and Rusty can make a post-Christmas striper trip, stay the night, and see what we can catch the next day. During the rest of December anglers can book January & February fantastic Winter Specials. Contact info is Tinker's Striper Guide Service, 888-846-5377, 228 ILA Drive, Pottsboro, TX 75076. Besides our enjoying the fishing and accomodations of a legendary guide service, my hope is to report a good time. TINKER donated a guided striper trip for four for our LIGHTHOUSE 2911 raffle back in April.