FD Service Call Today

I am on duty with the FD today. FYI... we do not rescue cats stuck in trees. That is a big city FD type call because they usually have a ladder truck that can reach the heights and retrieve the cat safely. We only have ground ladders that make that type of rescue extremely hazardous for us and require quite a bit of manpower. When they call the station for that circumstance I recommend people put food at the base of the tree and wait until they are so hungry they come down themselves. 

Mid-morning there was a knock at the front door. It was a elderly female resident that lives a couple of miles up the road and she told me she was a damsel in distress. She was on her way back from a veterinarian office in Hartford and had her cat in a pet carrier in her car. Because she is unable to manipulate the latch mechanism, she had the door tied shut. When the vet brought that cat out in the carrier, the string was gone and the door was latched but she didn't notice until she got home. She thought the latch was broken and stuck, but it just has a really stiff spring and she couldn't open it. I went outside to her car to look at the situation and check out the cat carrier for myself. I then called dispatch to log a service call incident and responded with our service truck. When I arrived at her house she was already inside with the cat. I showed her how to hook her fingers as leverage on the door and pull the latch with her thumb, but she still couldn't do it. I opened the door and stepped back and the cat scooted out. She sat on the rug several feet away looking at me, eyes as wide as dinner plates... and then she beat it up the stairs. I conversed with the resident for a few minutes before clearing the call and returning to quarters. So this is as close as I ever got to the cat rescue scenario.

 

Here is the official narrative from our NFIRS (National Fire Incident Reporting System)

"Resident stopped by Station XX looking for assistance with a cat stuck in a cat carrier. She had been to the vet and they locked the carrier. The resident could not open it due to the heavy spring on the latch. If the door was left loose in the vehicle the cat would escape. She requested assistance at her home to release the cat inside the house. Service-XXX responded to the resident's home and the cat was released safely." 

Getting Pretty Sick of This Shit

My Stihl BR800C-EZ is going back to the shop for the third time for warranty work because it runs like garbage at full throttle after 10-15 minutes or so. I got it back from the second trip to the shop on Friday 9-5-25 and used it the next day to clear my entire driveway with no issues. When I was done it went down in the barn where it sat until today. Where I live the leaves are starting to fall pretty heavily, so I had to blow the lower yard clear before I could mow it. 10 to 15 minutes into cleanup the RPM's started dropping off on full throttle and it would almost stall when I let off to idle. I got the yard cleared and did the mowing, but the dealer/service department are getting a curt phone call bright and early tomorrow morning. I will DEMAND they call Stihl for support and inform them this is THE LAST TIME it goes in for service, or I will be making a claim for either a whole new machine or a 100% refund and I'll go buy a Husqvarna machine.

Now before you think I have anything to do with the problems it is having, take a look at my gas powered equipment list. Both 2-stroke and 4-stroke machines and none of them have ever been in for service. I replaced the normal wear parts myself and they all start on 1 or 2 pulls. I always use fresh gas or gas/oil mix. My fuel is mixed with Sta-Bil 360 which has an ethanol treatment along with the gas stabilizer.

 

1995 - Honda Harmony 215 lawnmower.

2001 - Poulan 16" chainsaw (Purchased by my *Dad but I took it away in 2009 at the urging of my Mom before he hurt himself with it) 

2002 - Tanaka hand held leaf blower (replaced spark plug in like 2015)

2005 - Honda powered Craftsman 2500 PSI power washer (I replaced the worn out pump)

2005 - Generac 7550 EXL Briggs & Stratton powered generator (I replaced the shorted out stator)

2006 - Cub Cadet 930 Tecumseh powered snow blower (replaced belts and friction drive wheel)

2006? - Ryobi Weed Wacker to replace the electric Craftsman one I used at my old house on a tiny city lot. Home Depot special. Poorly made piece of junk. The cylinder kept coming apart and I would have to screw it back together. Last time it quit, it quit for good and it went to the dump!

2015 - Honda HRR216VYA replacement mower. At 20 years old I did not want to get stuck with a dead mower mid-season. Last I knew the guy I gave the original one to is still using it. Replaced wheels, belts, and blades.

2016 - Echo weed wacker. Has the brush blade kit too and works great.

11-8-22: I purchased the Stihl BR800C-EZ and used it without issue to cleanup the leaves in that fall, 2023 and 2024. It started acting up at the end of this past June. I did a post about it here. 

 

My only oops was that stupid Ryobi. So in my current stable of power equipment, the one and only Stihl I own is what's giving me grief. I am shocked to say the least given Stihl's reputation.

 

 

 

*About Dad.... He passed away in 2018. He was THE WORST when it came to anything gas powered. He never understood choking or priming and always seemed to flood everything.... to the point gas would pour out of the carb. He always used whatever old skunky gas he had kicking around, nothing fresh or treated. Never mixed the oil right for 2-stroke making the exhaust extra smoky. Because if a little is good more must be better, right? The list of failures is endless. He had a 4000W Coleman camping generator for his house backup to use with extension cords but never tested it regularly. It was a pull start and at this age he couldn't pull it requiring help from the neighbors. Then it ran like crap the whole time and would end up quitting. He decided to get an automatic standby generator. I told him to be sure to involve me in the purchase process to be sure he got EXACTLY what he needed, but instead he succumbed to high pressure sales and the next thing I knew he said he had one coming. Because he dicked around so long getting one, they delivered his generator.... the day Superstorm Sandy was arriving in 2012. Needless to say they weren't doing any installs they were doing emergency service only, so he moved in with us for the week.😒We were happy to be able to keep an eye on him, and don't even get me started about his dog that was with him.

Range Day Tomorrow

My brother and sister-in-law, my niece and her husband will all be my guests at my club range tomorrow morning. They will all have to fill out waivers first and I need to put them on file. I will then review The Four Rules of Gun Safety (I literally beat these into people's heads) and the club range rules and procedures. I facilitated the gun purchase for my brother of a brand new S & W "Victory" in .22LR that another friend was looking to unload so I know he'll be shooting that. I'm not sure what else they will bring. For me, I think I will just bring my PCC-9 and G-17. That way I can also act as R.S.O. while everyone else is shooting.

Hmmmm....

Recently, my blog has become very popular according to the stats. Because I have the "Sensitive Content" warning turned on requiring Goolag login and interaction to say they wish to continue, these are not simple bot hits or crawler activity. In fact Goolag, Duck-Duck-Go, Bing, Yahoo!, etc. none of the search engines find my blog directly by entering "75 Million Pissed Off Patriots", only the references to it from other bloggers. I have everything turned on for search allowances in the blog settings. Even when I search "75mpop" it comes up with my X profile, but not this blog. Yet the majority of referrals come from Goolag? The Goolag analytics show ZERO activity for the past 3 months. Weirdness I don't understand.

So if you are visiting my blog, please drop a comment. My brain is starved for the dopamine hit that comes from interaction on my ramblings. I am coming up on 3K followers on X so I do get quite a bit of activity there. Of course my hate speech (there is no such thing) earns me regular stints in X Jail, just like Otis the drunk on the old Andy Griffith Show.

GoPro Video

From my Patriot Guard mission to Cape Cod on Tuesday September 9th. I recorded every minute of the ride out and back. I only saved a couple of videos. The first one is the ride to and over the Bourne Bridge ending at Cape Cod Harley Davidson. The second one is the PGR ride from Cape Cod Harley Davidson to the National Cemetery in Bourne, MA. 

Both videos have been cropped at either the beginning or end to only show the best parts.

 

 

The cemetery is actually part of the National Cemetery system like Arlington and is very beautiful. It is located on the unsecured portion of Joint Base Cape Cod (formerly known as Otis AFB and Camp Edwards). That place is kinda special to me for a couple of reasons. I was at Camp Edwards a couple of times on maneuvers with my Army Reserve unit in the early 1980's. My dearly departed neighbor and "Pepere'" Andy Darico that served in WWII was stationed there in 1941 at age 26 when he was already in the Army. He was home for the weekend enjoying Sunday dinner with his family on December 7th when the phone rang. It was his buddy that drove home with him, telling him they had to return to Camp Edwards immediately because there was an attack on Pearl Harbor. Andy did not see his family again for 5 years. While his obituary lists his service battling Rommel in North Africa, he then landed in his family homeland of Italy to chase the Nazi's out of there and then in Germany until the end of the war. Below is a photo of him from 4/21/2002 with the last new car he bought, his 1951 Ford Victoria. He is still missed and spoken about by those who knew him.