Now a lot of you will think I am a dinosaur, having graduated from high school in May of 1953! Yes, and you are probably correct. Sometimes I feel like the only thing that my 4 years of high school did was make me 4 years older.

But wait, there is one thing I learned that has stuck with me all these years have passed, some 67, and that is typing. I have retained the skill of being able to type using both hands without looking all these years and do appreciate the ability to do so on a QWERTY keyboard. I suppose you know why the keys on a typewriter keyboard are arranged as they were.

When they were first invented the typewriter, they discovered that typists could type faster than the keyboard could handle, so they began to experiment with key placement so the keys would not jam on a mechanical machine. So, frequently used letters were placed further apart to solve this problem. I suppose once you have learned to type on a QWERTY your fingers never forget their place on a keyboard.

By a strange twist of fate, I was in an IBM training class when they introduced the IBM Selectric Typewriter. It was revolutionary in that it eliminated the old system of individual key and in their place was a small ball with all the letters and numbers distributed around on the surface. It was much faster, easier to correct and would also be suitable to be connected to a computer for the output of data.

Oh, you don’t know what QWERTY is referring to? It is the first 6 letter keys reading from left to right on the upper left side of the keyboard under the number keys. Unfortunately, typewriters are no longer manufactured in the U.S. and I am not sure anywhere else in the world, thanks to the computer. Just Sayin…RJS

We get a dozen or more every year, we don't want them here but don't want to kill them either, so I catch them and take them to a place down from us where there is water and lots of rodents. Our biggest dog (85lbs) got bit in the cheek by a small one, he was swelled up and sick for three days but was fine after that. We gave him antihistamines for swelling and pain pills for the pain.

He's a lot smarter about rattlesnakes now, won't get closer than six feet, he also has an excited bark that we call his rattlesnake bark. The Airedale seems to be smarter than him about them.

When I was young we fished for catfish using either of two types of bait. We'd stop by the chicken processing plant and get a plastic gallon jug of chicken guts. That worked well. If we couldn't get the chicken innards we'd stop by the grocery store for a box of Wheaties breakfast cereal. Then stop by the tackle shop for a cup of blood bait.

The blood bait process is pretty tough and I'd wear a pair of latex gloves today. You get a double handful of Wheaties cupped in your hands. Dip your hands into the water and back out once. Then start kneading the cereal in you hands and it'll turn into a doughy ball. Now the rough part. Take a chunk of blood bait about half the size of your doughball and start kneading it in while trying to hold your breath. If you just got to have a breath of air turn your head into the wind before inhaling.

The blood bait provides the smell and the wheaties dough helped hold it on the hook. We also used baitholder hooks, 3/0 hooks with what looked like a spring around them. Haven't seen any in the stores for years though. I see a hook similar listed at Bass Pro by Rod N Bobb's Spring Dough Baitholding hooks.