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Saturday's Babe BONUS

My story....I got a 90 day Visa for Brazil thru the San Francisco consulate. Very true, they will not even discuss the length. Take it or leave it. At the Miami consulate, I got a 5 year. I now go to Bangkok. Been 3 times this year and have 2 more plane tickets. No visa for 30 days. Airfare cheaper than Brazil. Very safe place to be. Downside, long trip.

Massage man at 117, Who knew a diamond in the rough? Wednesday night “Hat” or was it Hatay” can never get the names right. The massage man at the club 117, dressed in white, and with a smile on his face…. I was a slow night against the wall at the top of the grand staircase of dreams. I was sight seeing, and he came over to talk… well he whipped out his phone and showed me some self pix, turns out he is also an extra in movies, and does stunt work. Then he showed me his personal video hard and happy. Now why would he have that on his phone? He is 50, with wife and kids, and does massage work and film work. he motor bikes to work Needless to say I booked a massage for the next night. So glad I did, not only did he do it all, it was one of the best back cracking flexing massage I have every had. He asked if I was happy, and I said yes sir. So next time at the club check him out, ask to see his personal video, and then go from there…. i have a 2nd appointment this Tuesday night! T

Once again, how can Semitic people have so much in common and hate each other so much. It just ain't natural. 3 million Kiwi's can't be all wrong. They live among 30 million sheep. They have to do something with them. You can only have sex so many times before you get hungry. Chitlins are the only food that actually smells bad even when frozen. As far as I know, humans are the only animal you can eat without killing them. Best regards, RA1

What the hell is AdamSmith up to? He's packin' up his kidneys and goin' to town.

Aw, butchering wasn't that bad. My grandparents kept hogs. Each winter on hog-killing day I loved to go into the smokehouse and handle the job of sliding the kidneys into these little oiled-paper sacks to be taken to some market somewhere. Bet you thought it was going to be a story about chitlins.

Cause Grandma got this just for YOU !

Once I get sick of writing about software I think I will go raise sheep. ‘Exploding demand' for grass-fed meat is saving lamb market and giving dogs jobs Demand for lamb is regaining strength, along with a growing consciousness about the provenance of animals. But to stay in business, sheep farmers need dogs to guard their flocks from predators like coyotes Guardian sheep from predators. Photograph: Jason Wilson for The Guardian Friday 12 June 2015 09.00 EDT Last modified on Friday 12 June 2015 09.05 EDT The relationship between shepherds and their dogs is one of the longest-running stories in human history. But in the US, that story paused for a while and almost looked like it might come to an end. Since the second world war, by and large, Americans have stopped eating sheep. In 1945, there were 55 million head of sheep in the US. By 2013, there was around a tenth of that number. The decline in the demand for wool led to some of the liquidation of the sheep flock, but so did changing food tastes. Americans used to eat upwards of 4lbs of lamb in any given year, but now two out of three don’t eat any at all. The consumers who still eat lamb are a now a small niche market, incorporating immigrants from countries where lamb is a staple and foodies in search of pasture-raised authenticity. Demand is slowly regaining strength, along with a growing consciousness about the provenance of animals and the conditions they’re raised under. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Michelle Canfield, sheep farmer, with Bronte (right) and Moses . Photograph: Jason Wilson for The GuardianFor farmers like Michelle Canfield, who since 2008 has run a small herd of sheep near Snohomish, Washington, it brings both opportunities and constraints. First, she runs “shedding sheep”, which drop their hair, meaning she doesn’t have to pay to shear them. Hers are Katahdin Hair Sheep, first developed in Maine and prized for their prolific lambing and easy-care characteristics. Second, the absence of a USDA-approved slaughterhouse close by means that if you want to eat her sheep, you have to take them away and get them butchered yourself. She doesn’t have a problem selling them – Seattle is close by, she says, where “the Muslim market is huge” (she says it is thanks to the number of migrants who have moved to work in the tech industry). As much as any other foodies, this highly educated clientele “want their grass-fed, natural, local meat, but they want to do their own slaughter, and make sure it’s Halal”. This “exploding demand” for strictly grass-fed animals means that she has to leave the flocks out in the fields full time, including overnight. In turn, the animals are vulnerable to predators, particularly in lambing season. The most dangerous, persistent and clever predator of lambs is the coyote. Canfield tried llamas as guardian animals, and they worked for a while, but the coytoes worked out how to get around them at the same time her border collies did. She started to take losses. Lockjaw traps are illegal, and poison is fraught with risks, so she needed another solution. This is where Moses and Bronte came in. Both dogs are around eight years old, weigh in well over 100 pounds and are off-white in colour (so they can be distinguished from predators). Each is descended from two different ancient lines of livestock guardian dogs. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Moses (left) and Bronte resting in the grass. Photograph: Jason Wilson for The GuardianBronte, the Maremma, was the first dog Canfield adopted . Maremmas are an ancient central Italian breed, created to protect the flocks of Abruzzo, Tuscany and Lazio, a job they still do in a country where wolves are present and protected. Bronte had been raised in the traditional manner of guardian sheepdogs, in a barn with sheep to whom she was bonded. She loved Canfield’s flock, but she had to learn to cool her exuberance. “She tried to play with them, she’d want to wrestle with them, even the lambs.” She was challenging and wilful. “She went feral for a while and I had to retame her with food.” It worked, and now Bronte attends to the flocks dutifully and gently. She looks and acts a little like an oversized Golden Retriever, one who “perceives the sheep as her primary peer group”. To keep her company, and to help at the times when they needed to split up the flocks, they got Moses, a Kuvasz. They are a Hungarian breed whose precise origins are lost in time, but who are said to have arrived with the Magyars in the Carpathian Valley some 4,000 years ago. Kuvasz almost disappeared in the second world war, when many were killed by German or Russian soldiers for protecting their families. There were revived, and now they are another part of the array of working dogs available to livestock ranchers. Moses was a failed show dog; he was too reactive and grumpy for the ring. When Canfield acquired him, she quickly realised what the problem was: “He’s terribly far-sighted. He was growly at dog shows because everything up close was just a jumble of stuff. He’s worked out well here.” The fact that he has learned to be a guardian despite not being raised as one is a tribute to Canfield’s training. While other breeds of guardian dogs might be more assertive and aggressive, these two mostly get the job done with their booming barks. A bark is enough to warn Canfield (“I’ve learned to tell which kind of bark means trouble”) and is also enough to scare off a coyote. They haven’t yet had to physically tangle with a predator. Looking to the future, Canfield worries about wolves. “We’ll see how quickly they make it out here”, she says. Reintroduced in Idaho and the still-protected apex predator, wolves are slowly making their way west of the ranges. They’re already in western Oregon, and one day, perhaps, they will show up in her corner of Washington. Perhaps the same conflicts that have played out in eastern Oregon and Washington between conservationists and ranchers will play out closer to the big cities of the Pacific Northwest, or maybe by then new techniques and new dogs will provide a solution. For now, these two dogs are happy sleeping, living and eating with their flocks. Soon, Canfield will introduce a new puppy who will learn from them – which is how a tradition as old as domestication itself will be renewed. http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/12/demand-grass-fed-meat-saving-lamb-market-giving-dogs-jobs

Exchange student? Peace Corp? Fulbright scholarship to study the mating customs of Chech adolescents? Don't leave us hanging like that!

You must not have grown up in the South.

Yesterday, it was announced that Brazil MIGHT waive its visa requirement for visitors to Brazil who will be attending the Olympic events in 2016. Many from this forum are aware that Brazil charges Americans $160.00 for a visa to visit Brazil. Depending on the mood of the person processing the visas, visitors are assigned Brazil visas that are USUALLY valid for multiple entries and for ten years. However, there are reported cases where visa applicants pay the same $160.00 for a single entry visa and/or less time valid. The Brazilian Consulate web pages discuss this issue and clearly state that there are NO APPEALS to the type of visa issued. To most, $160.00 is not a big deal. However, if a family decided to visit Brazil for the Olympics, say a couple and two children, they are facing $640.00 for visas that give nothing in return for the $640.00 except the right to enter Brazil. The hypothetical $640.00 plus expensive hotels, restaurants and other high priced admission costs (except sauna bois who remain cheap), the visa cost could be a deciding factor in whether a family attends the Olympics or does not attend. If the family does not attend, that is a direct loss of tourist dollars for Brazil. It makes perfect sense for Brazil to waive the visa requirement for those attending the 2016 Olympics. Those who decide to forgo a trip to Brazil because of the expensive visa will put a further dent on the already struggling economy of Brazil. We will have to wait a while longer before we know if the visa waiver will be approved. In the below article, it is stated that Thailand has four times as many tourist visitors than Brazil has. That says a lot and implies a lot. “Brazil, with its cultural diversity, gastronomy and events can no longer just receive six million tourists per year. Thailand with its six million inhabitants received last year 24 million visitors,” said Alves. - Here is an article about the visa waiver discussion: http://riotimesonline.com/brazil-news/rio-sports/brazil-may-waive-visa-requirement-during-olympics/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheRioTimes+%28The+Rio+Times%29 -

I have my permanent visa now so I hope no further worries. But last spring while in Chicago, I did need a new tourist visa. The Chicago consulate was absolutely packed with Americans getting the free World Cup visas. If memory serves, all that was needed was a receipt for ticket requests for WC games and for lodging, receipt request, not even for monies paid, to get the free visa. It would make it much easier if Brasil switched to the Chilean system where a visa is purchased and paid for on arrival in country.

That's funny.

lol...this explains many things. Bacon is one thing, Venison on the other hand...

For nearly all purposes halal is the same as kosher. In the absence of a certified halal butcher, most Muslims have no problem eating kosher meat. And yes some do the job themselves but most take their goat or lamb or whatever to someone in the community better set up to handle the messy part.

That's a neat article, AS. Thanks.