Uncle Gator's Kiawah Adventures

It’s getting to be that time of year again! Happy Hanukkah, Have a blessed Advent, Merry Christmas and Happy new year! That should cover it! The other night I was reading some articles on AI, it was very interesting. There were a bunch of techies from major research organization from around the English speaking world talking about the future of AI. One of the biggest issues they were dealing with was bias. In other words how do the write the algorithms, so that are not biased?  There conclusions were very interesting. I will not get into that because 6 will defiantly show his bias. Because we all know the old saying bad data in equals bad data out (6 cleaned the real statement up, so people of all ages can ready this blog). What all this has to do with Christmas, well 6 will explain. 6 knows that he is old and there is probably no one who reads this story will have any idea about what 6 is talking about. One cold and snow Saturday morning, the week before Christmas, 6 had...

Last evening 6A and 6 ventured out of the house, to leave the comfort of our humble abode and face the harsh realities of the mean cruel world. Only we noticed that old man sun was beginning his nightly slumber a few hours earlier than he did when we saw him on the beach. This could mean only one of two things: first he is getting old and can’t keep the late hours any longer, or second fall is approaching. 6 be thinking that is a little of both, 6 just like old man sun  is getting older and will take any extra minute of slumber, and fall starts on Saturday! Yes that means vacation is done, lawn mower race results are in the books, no more pizza night in short pants, drinking hot Rex. Now school has started, football is all we talk about (hey you Pitt fans, how about that Pitt Penn state game), the county fair, wine fest, cooler nights, rain every weekend, leaves to pick up, shorter days and finally shopping for thanksgiving dinner!  6 realizes that none of you have...

It sure looks like Kiawah may miss the wrath of Florence that is ok, for the last couple have done nothing but raised the price of our rentals.  As we all know, when 6 goes to the beach 6 really likes his personal space, 6 wonders is that is kind of like our family and hugging? . If 6 wanted to have people to the right side and the left side in front and behind him 6 would just go to Ocean City! There is a tremendous amount of preparation involved in minimizing the impact that “squatters” inflict on our good old family vacation. If you all don’t know here is the yearly process that 6 employees to protect your vacation. In early July, he pulls the tidal data from NOAA, and charts the effects that the tides will have on each day of our vacation. Once that is completed, early in August,   6 will then start watching channel 2 news, confirming 6’s analysis with the premier meteorologist Josh Mauthers. Once the trend is verified 6 will then start collecting actual t...

Funny thing happened to me this week, I came home from work and the house was freezing! It is only the middle of October, 6 still has not unpacked his suit case from vacation, what the heck. On went the heater and out the window some more of the inheritance for the girls! Did you know that there is only 9 weeks left until Christmas that means there is only 5 weeks left before we can watch Christmas vacation and eat the fattened hog (turkey). Last weekend when I was at Giant doing my weekly pilgrimage to hunt for food for the week, 6 got in a conversation about turkey’s with the checkout clerk and some random couple who was in front of me in line. It seems that neither one of them purchase their turkeys from Giant, they get them from the Amish people up there on freedom school road! So of course 6 had to ask them a million questions, the first and only important one was can you taste the difference between a fresh (never frozen) turkey and the one you get from the Amish? And all thre...

As we approach the fall, each day brings us closer to that time of year where we change our activities for more of a routine to that of tradition. Why is that? If one really thinks about it, the summer is full of reckless abandon, while the fall brings more stability and routine. Is it because of our education process, having summers off? Is it because we are all animals and they go into hibernation in the winter? Is it because there is more day light? Who knows… All 6 knows it that soon the fall colors will have come and gone, leaving in its wake hours of picking them up, pass out candy to the little beggars that come knocking at your front door, watching PSU kicking the crap out of Pitt and Maryland, laying   in a stock of vittles for the big thanksgiving dinner. BTW one of the most time consuming activities of the fall is picking up leaves, what a waste.   Nature is such a wonderful thing, it actually provides a cost effective perfect way to dispose of the leaves. Tod...