Break Out The Long Johns!

Brrr! The rain stopped sometime early Saturday morning but the sky remained cloudy all day, making it look like it could start over again at any time. And the temperatures had really dropped! It was 62 degrees when we woke up yesterday morning and the high only got up to about 65, with a steady breeze blowing all day long that made it seem even cooler.

The overnight low Saturday night was somewhere around 51 degrees and the high today is only supposed to be 65, if we get that much, and that same steady breeze will continue to make it feel lower than it is. Yeah, baby. Time to break out those long johns!

By the way, do you know why long-handled underwear are called long johns? I didn’t until I did some research. Back in the19th century, boxer  John L. Sullivan wore them in the ring when he was fighting. People used to call them ‘Lohn Ls’ and that eventually became ‘long johns’ and the name stuck. Don’t you learn amazing things when you come to this blog every day? You’re welcome.

We also had the high tides the weatherman predicted, and pictures on the news were showing the beaches with just a thin ribbon of sand showing, the rest covered with water. It’s a good time to stay home and get some writing done.

Or for snoozing in the recliner, which is something I seem to have gotten very good at lately. I sleep well at night, but every afternoon I find myself getting a little droopy and taking a nap. I don’t know about you, but I hated taking naps when I was a kid. I’m so glad I’m older and wiser now. 😊

I mentioned the other day that I was still having trouble with a lot of errors during dictation. Several people suggested I buy different brands of microphones or headset microphones, and while I appreciate your input, I have purchased and tried a dozen different microphones in various configurations over the years, from moderately priced to very expensive units, and nothing really helps. I ordered an external sound card from Amazon and it’s supposed to be here Monday. I am looking forward to seeing what happens with that.

I’m beginning to believe that the problem is more on my end and the way I talk than anything else. I’ve been experimenting with some of the different voice settings on Dragon, seeing if there’s an accent that works better with the way I talk. I think I have a rather flat voice with no accent, but who knows?

Two very nice readers have suggested I just send the files to them after I dictate them, and they will make the corrections, which would save me a lot of time. But trust me, that would not work because sometimes things are so garbled that I can’t even read them and I have to go back and think about what I was saying at the time. I’ll keep plugging away at it and hopefully figure out something one of these days.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us. This one is courtesy of Jim Harper.

Today is your last chance to enter our Free Drawing for an audiobook of Birdsongs, the first book in my friend Jason Deas’ excellent Benny James mystery series. To enter, all you have to do is click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn this evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

Thought For The Day – Am I the only one bothered by the fact that the guy in the Operation game was wide awake?