White Lightning Axiom: Redux

It finally got cold last night. Damn cold. Well, ok. Not really. It did finally get below freezing. And that was the last straw, I had to turn on the computerized thermostat and program in the High/Low temps and kick over the furnace. Yep, I finally bent to the will of the bothersome family and tossed a lump of coal into poor Bob Cratchit's stove. A bit too late in the opinion of the Tyrants though. At 0300 this morning they assaulted the bed and drove me into a route. I ended up sleeping in the basement while the warmth-loving segment of the clan huddled together in the Temporary Master Suite. Serves me right I suppose. When you need to chip a hole in the ice that forms within the toilet bowl, it's time to loosen the purse-strings and put the stingy predilections of scrooge behind me. One thing I manage to do in the morning is empty the spent fuel from the stove and put a nice bed of the remaining unburnt charcoal at the bottom. Stack up some tinder and fuel wood in the standard boy-scout formation so that the Mrs just needs to throw a match at it and, POOF! Instant warming fire. Now that the Furnace boot-straps the cavernous dark places of the Manor to a ROASTING 58 degrees, the distance between there and the comfort zone will be much easier to cover. Good-bye 125$ utility bills, hello EBay Kidney Sale.

And speaking of extracted meat, here is the impetus of the title:

It’s a fact—ham, sausage, and bacon strips will go right to your hips. Eating pork products, which are loaded with artery-clogging cholesterol and saturated fat, is a good way to increase your waistline and increase your chances of developing deadly diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, osteoporosis, Alzheimer’s, asthma, and impotence. Research has shown that vegetarians are 50 percent less likely to develop heart disease, and they have 40 percent of the cancer rate of meat-eaters.