WOW! Now I am hungry and thirsty!! Those look very good. Put me down for the team gardener. Each year I put out a large garden mostly for the fun of it. Like most amateur gardens, it produces about a 100 times more than I can eat. Some things can be canned or frozen but I just can’t eat 100 cantaloupes or 50 watermelons in three weeks!!! Fortunately, we have a local Hospice Center a few miles away. They have a year-round thrift shop but in the summer they also run a farmers market. The local amateur gardeners bring their excess produce for them to sell. It works out well for all.

Each year I try to do something different. I have grown lufa sponges (actually a type of gourd), yard long beans, giant pumpkins, etc. Last summer I ordered some Tabasco pepper seeds (Capsicum Frutescens var. Tabasco) from a seed bank and made my own Tabasco sauce. True, McIlhenny ferments theirs for three years and mine was for only three months but it came out remarkably well. It is not as deep red as the original but the taste is quite similar.

If nothing else, the MOT team will eat and drink well.

Dave: The bot ran a cycle last evening and is in the process of running one now. It cleans remarkably well ... I am surprised. Will post more on it later.

Cheers

IRobot vs. Dogs

Dave:

No name ... I’ll just call it Bot for now. I once had a goat I called “Goat” for 7 years. My Dad always said; “Never name anything you might have to eat.” Not that that applies to the bot.

Well, the bot is a trip!! It works much better than I imagined. The first cycle through the house, I had to clean it 3 times as it gets under things the big vac will not. Hey! I’m a guy ... if you can’t see it ... why clean it, right? The next cycle it completed the whole house without any intervention on my part. It even made it back to the base station and docked to recharge. It works great on pet hair (the bane of my existence). I have two large dogs and a cat. I’ve set it to run every night.

But I have to say that even if it did not work well, it would be worth the price for entertainment value. I have a Great Dane (137 lbs) who is very “mellow” and not much ever bothers him. He is content to be the #2 male ... behind me. When I started the bot last night he immediately went to investigate. As soon as he determined he could not eat it, could not breed with it and, of course, he knows he cannot urinate on anything in the house, he quickly lost interest and lay down in my office. Eventually the bot got to the office and bumped his leg. He raised his head and gave it his very best “evil eye” look and put his head back down. Only when it got close to his head did he get up and move to the front room. It appears he is not going to be intimidated by something the size of his food bowl even if it does move.

The other dog is a mix-bred mutt (a mere 88 lbs). I took him in as an abused puppy rescued by the SPCA from an abusive home. It took me two years to get him the point where he was not terrified of anything new to him. When the bot started he yelped and I swear he almost came out of his skin. He ran to his “safe spot” ... under the coffee table. He really does not fit well under the table but somehow it makes him feel safe. His eyes never left the bot as it was obviously a monster on a seek-and-destroy mission to do him terrible harm. But the bot finally got to the coffee table and for the rest of the cycle he was stuck to my left hip as I am his ultimate “protector”.

The cat is a “barn cat”. Her job is to kill mice and rats in the barn and adjacent properties. She only comes inside in the morning to demand to be groomed and sometimes eat. She rarely eats much as her belly is usually full of warm, red mouse meat. I can’t wait to see what she does with the bot the next time she shows up.

Cheers!

That was cool! My Dane would never expend that much enery over something that trivial to him.

I think I will go out and look for the cat.

That’s about it, Dave. She was curious and stalked it a bit but soon lost interest.

So I put the cat out, turned it back on and settled down to let it finish its job. When it got to the office again, apparently my Great Dane had enough. He got up, walked over to it, and put his big paw on it. When it started to move again, he stuck his nose under it and flipped it over onto its back (which shuts it off). Apparently he is not going to take any $#!+ from an automated dinner plate.

Score dog = 1, Bot = 0

The “little” dog is still terrified.

Cheers!

MyOnlineTeam Daily Statistics for 11/10 - All Members:

Team rank movement report
=========================

                              Prior                New         Current
Member name                   Rank      Change     Rank        Points
=========================     =====     ======     =====     ===========
txjallen                         35         -1        36       1,149,925
John Parker                      36         +1        35       1,150,506
Vialls                           59         -1        60         628,062
Dataman                          60         +1        59         633,219
Old Rocker                      138         -1       139         137,980
mapplebeck                      139         +1       138         138,367
madambaster                     165         -1       166          80,581
TLD                             166         -1       167          80,349
Orakk                           167         -1       168          79,944
Natalino                        168         -1       169          79,772
gillpinch                       169         -1       170          78,455
Jonathan Figdor                 170         +5       165          83,450

Points milestones report
========================
No points milestones found.

Runtime milestones report
=========================
No runtime milestones found.

Results returned milestones report
==================================
No results returned milestones found.

New members report
==================
No new members found.

Retired members report
======================
No new retired members found.

For the week as a team:

Statistics  Total Run Time  Points   Results
Date         (y:d:h:m:s)    Earned   Returned
11/10/2007  0:141:23:42:58  159,709  593 
11/09/2007  0:139:16:13:21  155,751  601 
11/08/2007  0:145:22:45:15  158,766  627 
11/07/2007  0:150:11:37:03  171,137  637 
11/06/2007  0:146:10:58:04  147,674  560 
11/05/2007  0:144:05:09:12  160,058  619 
11/04/2007  0:139:19:04:08  150,908  532

Team Records:
Results Returned: 08/24/2005 1,609
Points: 06/26/2007 334,880
Runtime: 01/25/2006 1:123:00:53:34

Good crunching folks!!!!