Scrappy's new movie: "The Deer"

Hi, everyone!  This is Scrappy B. De Mille and I have a new film I starred in to show you.  But first, I want to tell you about my big day today!  Hmm?  Oh, Daddy wants me to show you a couple of pictues from earlier this week.

First, we finally had a bird at the bird feeder Friday!  Daddy called him "Woody", but I don't know how he knew that.

Sunday night, KC (my boy) and Daddy saw Mr. Skunk again.  I wish they'd let me chase him!

Daddy said he came so close, KC said, "I don't know if I want him any closer!"  KC's a scaredy-cat.

So, now I get to tell you about my big day.  It didn't start out too great- Daddy didn't feel too good this morning, so we had to just make a short walk.  I don't know why Daddy can't just pick it up in a bag like he does mine, but he insists on the bathroom.  Go figure.

Then Mommy got up and had a really good idea.  We went to Dairy Queen, and I got ice cream and a bunch of french fries while M & D had cheeseburgers.  Then we took a walk around this park and a big swimming pool (note from Daddy: Jury pool at New Haven) and a shopping center.  I wanted to go in, but Daddy said I wouldn't be interested.

Then we took a ride and I got to meet a buncha people and a dog! (note from Daddy:  We went to my sisters' house.  My niece was there with her three daughters- one of which I hadn't seen since she was a baby, and two others I'd never met.  The dog belongs to a neighbor who doesn't seem to give a crap and the dog ends up coming over to my sister's all the time.)  His name was Spanky, and he was a light tan/white pug.  Daddy said his name fit him perfectly, but I'm not sure why.  We had a great time, except everytime I tried to explain to Spanky that I was the boss, I got yelled at.

We were there for a long time, and then we came home and took  a nap.  When we got up, it was almost an HOUR past my dinnertime, can you imagine.  I think Daddy felt bad, because right after that we went to the woods.  And boy, did we see deers!  Hmm?  Oh.  Deer, not deers.

This is that one (Daddy calls her a doe) that likes to pose.

She had a buddy over by that bush.  Daddy calls him a buck.

He had a friend.  We had run into him before, but he ran away.  Once he saw his friend didn't care, he came back.

Daddy thanked the deer, and then we went back into the woods.  But we no more got into the woods...




...and we were face to face with Mama deer and her two fawns!



They were a little shy-er than Mama.

Awww....

Like a good boy, I just laid there hoping they'd come up and play with me!

Finally, I told Daddy, as long as they're just gonna stand there, why not get a video?  So here's me with the deer- oh, and I'm sorry but I got Daddy tangled up and made him spin around right before the 2-minute mark...





When we went to leave, I thought I'd try one more time to get Mama deer to play with me.  Igot up about ten feet away, but then she lowered her head at me for a second, and went off to talk to the babies.  I hope you like my first movie!

Laurie's 4th of July bash...

...went very well, even with 18 people (2 of them little kids) and a Booogle all in basically one room with temps at 104 (peak around 3 PM) outside.  No grilling allowed onsite, so hot dogs were boiled, just like the sweet corn.  But still good, plus plenty of desserts, potato salad, friendship dip (Remind me to have Laurie do a guest-recipe) crackers out the yin-yang, a large bowl of M&Ms (the culinary star of the show), and some nice cold PBRs to keep me from getting claustrophobic.

The attendees:  sis-in-law Mary and brother Chuck, sister Mary, our lovely hostess, my firstborn, niece Danielle (DJ), sis in law Linda, bro-in-law Jack.

Jack, photogenic even upside down.

The four-footed brigade...

Action Jackson, his mom Katie by the door

Brother Paul's nose, brother Art, Mary, Jack, soon-to-be-Mrs.-Art Tracy, and Chuck

Tracy's young'uns

After a good feast and several rounds of Draw Something (in which Chuck astounded), it was off to the fireworks.

The gang heading toward the spot we staked out (Insert whistle from The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly here...)

Just to annoy her- my favorite task

And now, for your viewing pleasure, the grand finale...

Tricks sans treats

Anyone who follows simple dude's blog (check the button on the right hand side) got to hear him get pranked by his Lady Friend, who decided to keep him out of her ice cream cones "in a most delightful waaaay" (with apologies to Mary Poppins).  Which got me to thinking about the two best pranks I've pulled.  One was the April fool I pulled on my son KC that you can read about here.  The other was years before, and involved a veteran creature of habit- my dad.

To set this up, envision the home of my youth.  Coming in the back door, you turned right, went up two steps to the inside door, and opened it to face the west wall.  Along this wall was the cabinets, the oven, and of course the kitchen sink.  Above the sink was a 2X5 window running its length, giving one a view of the driveway, the neighbors, and the road.  My dad, as I said a creature of habit, would come in, lean over the sink and look out for a few seconds, and get a drink of water.

So I devised the idea of rubber banding the trigger to the spray-gun.  I simulated his stance and adjusted the gun to center of chest, and waited for him to come home and do the inevitable.

The most amusing part of a trick like this is the many split-second actions you do while your brain tries to kick into gear.  This was no exception.  The plan worked flawlessly.  He was a little off center, so I stood beside him to subtly nudge him into position.  Then he went for the glass and I backed up.  He turned the knob, and the jet of water struck him square in the chest.  In the less than a second afterwards, he turned the inactive faucet away to no avail, grabbed at the gun (which merely spread the attack), and once he was good and soaked, his brain caught on and turned off the knob.  I laughed.  I cried.  I screamed.  This was true father -son bonding such as we rarely did, and when he got over the shock and the pieces fell into place, he turned and said, "You dooflink!"  (That was his child-appropriate cuss word.)

Running a distant third in the evil trick department was a spur of the moment deal a couple years later, after dad had passed on.  It was a cold winter night, and as was our habit back then, a group of friends had gathered to play euchre and get drunk.  Everyone had left except my nephew- yes the same nephew who keeps getting mentioned in my cap collection blog (again look right, just higher).  It was late (like maybe 1- 1:30 am) and he asked if he could get a piece of toast to help him sober up.  I started the toast and asked what he wanted on it.  Margarine was the reply.  Now in those days, I used to get the bargain brand, nu-maid, in the hard plastic bowls that made such great food storers and cereal bowls.  And at that moment, as I opened the refrigerator and my mind went back in time two months- to a can of pork and beans, emptied into one such bowl, which I had all but finished off, put a lid on it,and then spent the intervening time going from "there's not enough in there to bother with" to "hey, I forgot about that", to "that probably isn't any good anymore" to "Someday I'll have to throw that out."

I'm sure you can guess what happened next.

If you can imagine the face of someone who looks down to find his foot in the biggest, freshest, smelliest pile of crap he or anyone else has ever stepped in, that would be the look on his face as he opened the bowl, got a look (and apparently a whiff) and sealed the bowl back shut.  As I laughed and tossed the offending bowl into the trash, he called upon the Good Lord in many and various fashions to testify he had just had the most disgusting experience of his life, as well as debating a kneel-down session in the nearby bathroom.

Ah, memories.

more march manglings

Just a quick run through of thoughts I haven't gotten to with all that's going on around here.

1. Per Bob's wishes, there will be no funeral service. The plan right now is everybody's going to meet at the house Friday and see if there's a) anything anyone wants to keep; b) anything worth selling on e-bay and splitting the proceeds; c) anything that Bob hid well enough that it hasn't been found yet ( a real concern, as Bob was a gun aficionado on a Bob G. scale); and d)anything that really should be destroyed before the house gets bulldozed (apparently one back room has some truly spectacular mold formations). Beyond that, I don't know. Chuck is the executor, and thus will win the right to keep the urn and all the fun crap that goes with it.

2. Wisconsin's Governor Walker did what he should have done all along- pulled all

the stuff that required a quorum out of the union scaleback bill and let the loyal state reps pass it while the traitorous (i.e. Democrat) reps sat in their Illinois playpen and cried. Now come the howls of "a corruption of democracy" from the liberals. Which is hilarious because of how ingenuous it is- it's not a "corruption

of democracy" to hide out in another state on the taxpayer's dime, but it is to legally conduct the business of state without them. Nor was it crying foul to bus thousands of union out of staters into Madison to protest, or to have Obama's minions immediately organize a recall movement for the GOP legislators who stayed and DID WHAT THEY WERE ELECTED TO DO!!! Union members, democrat voters, do you want to know why the conservative mainstream can't stand you? Look at this situation. In Wisconsin, we see liberals/unions being:

-cowardly, running from the fight they knew they couldn't win fairly;
-two-faced, demanding "honor" from the GOP they have no intention of living by;
-disrespectful, breaking into and trashing the state house because they didn't get their way.
And the media, screaming about the "Ash Wednesday Ambush". And the cheating doctors, the union sheeple who WILL NOT EXCEPT THAT THEY HAVE TO SACRIFICE TOO!

3. In a sidelight to this, I had heard yesterday that Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels is one of 5 "serious candidates" for the GOP nomination in 2012. Today, it was Walker, whose courage and ingenuity won him some speculative love. If Mitch wants some of that love, he ought to get on to doing the same thing; and woe to him that he didn't think of it first. And Winfield, Phil? How's that house search in the Land o' Lincoln coming?

4.Jim Tressel, OSU football boss, gets a 2-game suspension and a fine from the university for lying about what he knew in Tattoogate. I was just reading that the charges against him involve NCAA rule 10.1 (involving unethical conduct), a rule from which only one coach has ever escaped with his job. Of course the OSU president Gordon Gee (you remember, the guy that thought Minnesota and IU were "murderer's


row" and TCU and Boise St. were "the little sisters of the poor") tried to blow off the situation by implying that Tressel had the power to fire HIM. Fine, I'll go with that. Tressel, you can keep your job- if you fire Gordon Gee. I guess it's true that once a bureaucracy gets so big, even a half-wit can run it. As if Obama didn't prove that.

5. And I apologize for the Obama ending on the Happy Days video. I didn't proof it first as I was trying to save the answer to her dad's birthday song for a surprise. However, Laurie makes up for it with the follwing suggestions:
-Use a paint program to draw moustaches, horns, unibrows, etc. on Obama.
-Photoshop even bigger ears or yellow, rotting teeth on him.
-Paste a hat on him. Her choice was a pointy white one, for some reason.
Keep in mind these are not politically correct choices, and any one of which might lead you to being accused of being Evangelical, homophobic, or racist. Or worse yet, acting like a -OMG- liberal! So be careful.

Quick update

Laurie's dad is now in a hospice- waiting for the clock to wind down. We thought we were going to lose him several times Sunday night. At one point, at the end of a bad bout of struggling and twitching, he opened his eyes to see all 5 kids, one step-grandkid, 5 significant others, and somebody's pastor, and said, "Boy, there sure are a lot of people here..." Most of the time, though, he was out of it, asking for a "charlie" which we eventually deduced was some military lingo for a landing or docking clearance. Laurie's on her way right now to go visit. They were given an estimate of 5 days, and I'm not sure when but I believe we're on day 2 or three.

A little faith, a little sadness

One of my favorite radio preachers is Ed Bousman, who broadcasts on the God Is Just A Prayer Away radio network and I get it on WLW Cincinnati 700 AM (right now at 6:30 Sunday am). This is a tough, no nonsense, "get-wet-or-not-yet" preacher who has an artistic way of putting the broadcast together. First, the theme hymn begins; then he introduces himself and the ministry, followed by "It is written: all the Churches of Christ salute you; " followed by a series of "it is written"s that feature the key verse for the sermon. Then the music stops and he reads the key verse, followed by a recitation of an appropriate hymn, during which the theme hymn restarts and comes to a conclusion. At which point he says, "And now..." followed by the sermon title and sermon. I've listened to this man since the 1980s (he started in 1962) and in trying to see if the old boy was still kicking or just getting replayed (At least as of 2007, still kicking) and learned that he took up the radio gig when he asked his congregation to "pray for something impossible" and this was his answer. Though this is all interesting, I have digressed.

This morning he was preaching on John 14: “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. 2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. 4 You know the way to the place where I am going.” To put this in context, he said you have to go back to the last verse of the last chapter to see what they weren't to be troubled about. That verse is the one where Peter is told before the cock crows he will deny Jesus 3 times.

He goes on to the denouement of that scene, when the cock crows the second time, and Peter looks up and sees Jesus looking at him. (Luke 22:60-62). I have always found this, to me, the most chilling verse of the Bible. But Ed goes on to say, "But I do not have time to spend on sympathy for the great Apostle..." And my mind says, wait a sec. How can you not have sympathy for Peter here? Then I let him finish.

"...for that rooster has crowed for me, many times." OUCH. Don't you just hate proper perspective?

Then he goes on to talk about the reasons why not to lets our heart be troubled, and he breaks it down this way. "In My Father's house there are many mansions." Mansions=really nice rooms in Our Father's House. When did you feel safest? In most lives, a room in your father's house means a) you are a child; b)you are being taken care of; c) you have no real worries about the outside world- no bills, no maintenance, no 9-to-5. d) even in the worst of times, it is an oasis of safety. Sometimes, perspective is a blessing.

Which brings us to the second part of this post. Yesterday, we visited Laurie's dad at the hospital. Trying to describe this man without hurting feelings is nigh onto impossible, so let me just say this: He is a man who has had ample opportunities to truly bond with each of his five children, even after his military style treatment of them as kids; invariably, he has purposefully said something hurtful to each one when they got the closest to them in order to (or at least succeeding in) driving them away. Laurie had been the latest recipient of this: she had been making a point to call him once a week until a very hurtful- and untrue- thing he said ended all contact several months ago.

Flash forward to Friday. The man has a plethora of health problems and, sick to death of doctors, takes very little care of them. Brother Chuck ( a bigger man than I would be, BTW) assumed the mantle of checking up on him every day as he has regressed. He was found unconscious on the floor Friday and we got the call he was in bad shape. It took Laurie a real effort, but realizing that she had to do now what she could live with later, we went up to see him.

This morning, about halfway through the sermon, Chuck called again and said his respiration is down to 5. He won't eat, and hasn't in 2 weeks apparently, has pneumonia in both lungs, and his gall bladder is "basically a ball of muck." All his organs are failing (the kidney specialist came in as we were leaving) and he has had congestive heart failure for years.

I wonder how troubled his heart is. He has at least 4 Christian children (Paul and Chuck both have Minister's licences), but when you spend your life alienating everyone who should care about you, what good has it done? I told Laurie, "It's a shame to live your life so you get to this point and your kids don't even want to see you."

I wasn't unwilling to see my dad when he died; I WAS unwilling to watch it happen. It had been just him and me for the last 8 years, for better or worse. He was a dutiful Catholic insofar as going to Church every week and putting his money in the envelope; like most old-time Catholics (myself included for years), the "born again" concept was just part and parcel and not talked about. I don't pretend to know what the relationship is between Jesus and someone like that; I do know that Matt. 7:21 (21 Not everyone who says to Me, "Lord, Lord," shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.) scared the HELL out of me until I was saved. That was when MY heart ceased being troubled (on that end, at least).

Where was my dad? I don't know, and he wouldn't discuss it. At the end, long after it should have been discussed, he was only lucid about 2 minutes out of every hour. Where is Laurie's dad? Now that he might be at that same spot? Only God knows for sure.

All I can say for sure is, the opportunities were there.

Prelude to time machine

I woke up at 4 this a.m.- about 30 minutes ago- and couldn't get to sleep. Whether a symptom of or a defense against, I began thinking about the year of our time machine 1976 and all the things that were happening or about to happen in my life. And the more I remembered, I began to wonder how I would have gotten through without the music.

This was the year I began to transition from the safe haven of Ron Gregory and WOWO to the exotic and dangerous territory of WMEE. Hence my first real tastes of the Rolling Stones and Led Zep, and songs like the Isley's Fight The Power. We were just coming off the trauma of the mid-year replacement in 8th grade of Mr. Walker with Mr. Stork- a replacement we had caused and felt horrible about. A trauma that was mitigated somewhat by the fact that ol' Stork was a decent enough chap for a mildly-repentant hippie. This was the season in which I learned to cuss- unfortunately- and got my first inklings about the nature of sex, and of love beyond the grade school crush of the month.

The safe haven of life in a tiny Catholic school was soon to end forever, an ending I've never truly gotten over in my heart. Soon I would be facing not only the new experience of high school and having to find basically a whole new field of friends (and vastly different relationships with those who remained), but doing in it in an environment where the population of one classroom was close to the size of four GRADES at my old school. I would not only be facing malicious bullying for the first time, but also religious prejudice, which absolutely took me off guard.

I would be facing this in a new framework personally. A lifelong two-handsful of warts would evaporate almost overnight because ( I swear to God this worked) I cut a potato in two, rubbed it on the damned things, and threw it backwards over my shoulder, never seeing where it landed. That was the good side.

The bad side was that I was just months away from my mom's tearful announcement that she had Leukemia and her swift and painful rush to death just weeks before I started high school. Not only was I facing figuring out how one lived without a mother, but I was doing it while taking up her position as the victim of my dad's emotional bullying when drunk. At least this was a transition in the fact that I had been getting more of it anyway as I got older. But now I was getting it all, not to mention the guilt and grief dad felt over mom's passing plus his own very sober and very real trauma of having to be a dad learning to raise a son alone, a son who was learning how to be a father's child alone. It was not a fun time between us.

Mom's death changed the whole structure of our family. The days of Thanksgivings and Christmases with the whole family together vanished in a eyeblink. Rumblings started over doc's treatment of mom and over who got what. And the house got a lot quieter. My faith had begun to change as well, the result of getting a New Testament from the Gideons and actually getting to read a Bible for myself for the first time instead of the pre-digested pieces that Church and school had taught me all my life. Things like Mary, the rosary, confession, purgatory, and most important, salvation came into question. If God gave us the Bible, why wasn't the Bible the last word?

I met my oldest friend this year, the one I mentioned on last night's post, along with her brother. This family became a HUGE part of the transitions going on. We would go on to become the core of our high-school "clique"- the clique that encompassed all those who could never fit into any other clique. This group, and my appointment as the "official" joke-teller to the seniors, were all that bought me survival through my freshmen year.

Did I mention I became a freshman that year? That encompasses all the teenage angst at its genesis, all that "life or death" crap we went through back then, never knowing better until we were too old to do anything about it. Jobs, careers, college, all became part of the worry-set this year. And to top it all off, the two true loves of my life, the Oakland Athletics and the Miami Dolphins, were beginning their own transitions. The A's were about to go from three time world series champs and 5 time division winners to a club that needed good luck and a stiff breeze at their backs to avoid 100 losses every year. The Dolphins would soon have their first losing season in the NFL- something that had been unthinkable for 6 years now.

If anything caused my hatred of change, this year was it. And the only sane and good thing I could wrap around me was the music. And as we shall see, even it was changing. A year like the summer of '75 would never come again. As Don Henley would later sing, this was the end of the innocence. I sometime get crap over on bestalbumsever.com for my top 50 list. Why do you not have any new stuff? How do you explain to a 20-something that it's because these are the years you LIVED through?

First thing I remember was askin' papa, "Why?",

For there were many things I didn't know.

And Daddy always smiled; took me by the hand,

Sayin', "Someday you'll understand."

Well, I'm here to tell you now each and ev'ry mother's son

You better learn it fast; you better learn it young,

'Cause, "Someday" Never Comes.

what I did on vacation day 2

Other than the aforementioned green hole expedition, we watched Kansas beat GA Tech, and then went to a birthday party for Laurie's brother-in-law Jack.

Here's the basic group: picture one (l to r) : the legs of TJ, who is Laurie's niece Katie's fiancee; the back of Laurie's nephew Andy's stepdaughter Abbey with Andy over her left shoulder; Laurie's niece Rachel; sitting, Jack's sister in law Penny and brother "Beanie", and Mark Burns; standing at the edge of the table is the birthday boy hisself; and running towards me on the floor is my good buddy Baxter. Picture two features Laurie's sis-in-law Mary holding new kitten Manny (seated in the rocker).

Here is Manny. He was found abandoned by a co-worker of Laurie's brother Chuck. Mary guesses him at no more than two weeks old due to the fact that she is having to bottle-feed him and rub him to go to the bathroom. At first they didn't think he was going to make it, but he's a real fighter. Everyone fell in love with him, especially Mark's wife Jackie. The picture is him and Laurie.

Next we have the new generation: the little little guy is TJ and Katie's son Jackson. The slightly bigger little guy is Andy and wife Kristen's son Blaine. He gave us a good floor show, shaking his booty to the Allman Brothers. Jackson got his moment in the sun by sticking his hand in mom's broccoli casserole. And for good measure, while she cleaned one hand, he put the other one in. And while she removed that one, he grabbed a foot with the first one. Easy, mommy, I'm just experimenting with more efficient eating methods.

Once the crowd dwindled somewhat, we started a rousing game of pictionary. Some of us are better artists than others. Among the words we refused to do were: parasol, cornflake, tango, and cowardly lion. But the topper was Jack's rendition of lab rat. He never did get to the "lab" part, because we couldn't figure out his "rat":

I ended the game with a wonderful green and red marker rendition of an olive, which gave the boys (me, Jack, Mark, and Rachel's friend Christian) the win over the girls (sister Mary, Jackie, Rachel, and Laurie). Rachel's man Alex did the timekeeping, dice-rolling, and guessed for the girls when Laurie finally succumbed to whatever bug she got from Tina this week. I've a feeling that whatever day three brings, it'll be me'n'Scrappy against the world.

what I did on vacation day 1

Yep, on two weeks vacation, and today was day one. Uncharacteristically, Scrappy actually left me sleep in, so no walk today. Don't bet on that repeating tomorrow. Got a message from son KC saying he calls Baltimore over Atlanta in the Super Bowl (the real one, that is.) I'll look into that in a bit. Laurie and I ended up going to Grabill days, which we missed last year because of my idiot leg. Grabill Days is always just a hair better than most of the area festivals because of the Amish influences, like the Souder store. Laurie picked up a bottle of raspberry jam there, and I got the obligatory fudge. We ran into my brother Tom (the oldest of my family), who I haven't seen in ages, and his whole family: wife Kathy, daughters Robin and Raine, and Raine's daughter Tori. Most of that music I like so much on time machine I learned to love with Rob and Raine. Rob was born 5 months after me, Raine a year and a half. (Yes, I've been an uncle my whole life, just about.) Amazingly enough, it was Tori- who hasn't seen me since she was 6, about 20 years ago- who picked me out of the crowd. Rob didn't even recognize me till I took my hat off- a slow building OMG moment.

After a couple of steakburgers (mine w/mushroom and swiss), we met up with Laurie's sister Mary and our friend Jackie and re-toured the stuff we looked at but didn't pay attention to the first time. The highlights were the metal detector/coin collector's booth (which is by the Fudergong, and scroll to the end of the post to find out what a Fudergong is) and the couple that melted glass bottles in a clay kiln to make artwork. There was also this guy who was a mushroom hunter and guide, who had a t-shirt I loved- "all mushrooms are edible- some only once". And the stone monument place that had the stone sign for your front porch-"ring bell/ if no answer, pull weeds".

We ended the tour with a stop at a garage sale at American Legion post 47 on St. Joe rd. You don't want to go by the Journal Gazzette's sale map here. It says Halter rd leads across a bridge to St Joe, but what it DOESN'T tell you is that for a quarter mile it is Clay st., then becomes Halter road for another quarter mile before t-ing into St. Joe. Gotta love our road-naming system in Allen county. If you can't find the road you're looking for, just stay on the one you're on till the name changes.

At any rate, we did find the sale, and I got a new pair of sunglasses (I've worn a pair with one arm for about 2 1/2 months), a pair of binoculars, and a military canteen for those aforementioned walks with Mr. Beagle. Then, as one might expect, came a well-deserved nap.

_______________________________________

Okay, let me look at the NFL. AFC east goes to New England, central will be Ravens with the Bengals making a wild card. South, uhmmmm... I'll go Colts, much as I hate to (I am not a Colt fan) and I'll call Tennesee for the other wild card. The west is a real mess. I'll say the Chargers sneak past the Raiders. Not sure if it matters who comes out of this, they'll get killed by the NFC in the Super Bowl. Uhmmmm.... I guess I'll follow my son and take Baltimore.

NFC: east goes easily to Dallas; central, I'll take Green Bay, with the Vikings edging upstart Detroit for a wild card. South will go to New Orleans with Atlanta grabbing the other wild card.

The west is a real mess. Where have I heard that before? I'll say that the 49ers will go 9-7 and win the division. I'm going to say that the winner of a Vikes-Saints rematch will beat Dallas in the conference championship, and go on to win the super bowl. Based on last night's game, right now I'll take New Orleans to repeat. Now, last year I had the Titans taking on the Cowboys, and Jeff Fischer managed to 0-8 me out of the running before half the season was gone. So, sorry, Drew.

____________________________________

Fair fun found at the fudergong
By Steve Penhollow The Journal Gazette

Searching for an answer to just what exactly a “fudergong” is? Visit the Grabill Country Fair this year, and you’ll see for yourself.
Spend more than an hour at the Grabill Country Fair and you will become enamored of, perhaps obsessed with and possibly haunted by a single word.
Fudergong.
A confident voice comes over the PA system seemingly every five minutes or so entreating everyone to go to the fudergong.
Whether you previously wanted to go to a fudergong or not, you soon find yourself almost desperate to get there. But also apprehensive.
What in the name of all that’s Amish is a fudergong anyway?
Google the term and all you get is references to the Grabill Country Fair.
Try to translate it at various German- and Dutch-friendly language translation sites and you get bupkes.
It is, however, fairly easy to get a translation of bupkes.
I called the Grabill branch of the Allen County Public Library and spoke with a librarian by the name of Angela Fox. She consulted a couple of her fellow librarians.
“We’re not betting our lives on it, but we think it means ‘gathering place,’ ” she says. “Both of them said, ‘gathering place’ so either they’re sharing the same brain or it actually means that.”Later, Fox called Lynn Witt of Grabill Town Council fame. Witt had a more definitive answer.
“It’s from the German,” he said. “The person who named it said it was an eating place. Now you take your Amish, they translate it as the place where you walk in front of cows and horses, an area you walk down through and feed them.”
Witt’s not sure a more exacting translation is even necessary.
“Whenever you say, ‘Everybody meet here tonight at the fudergong, someone always says, “What the heck’s a fudergong?” ’ We know what it is out here, but strange people don’t.”
Don’t be a strange person.
Embrace the fudergong.

a little news, a little fun, a little hockey, a little love.

First the news:

There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage from the Eyjafjallajokull ( Iceland)volcano, but a state of emergency was declared and scientists feared the eruption could trigger a larger and potentially more dangerous eruption at the Katla volcano.
Saturday's eruption, which occurred just before midnight (2000 EDT, 8 p.m. EDT), came weeks after a series of small earthquakes. Television footage showed lava flows along the fissure.
"This was a rather small and peaceful eruption but we are concerned that it could trigger an eruption at the nearby Katla volcano, a vicious volcano that could cause both local and global damage," said Pall Einarsson, a geophysicist at the University of Iceland's Institute of Earth Science.

Could this be the harbinger of our March disaster? Stay tuned.

Next, the fun.

Former President Bill Clinton poked fun at his ex-veep Saturday, telling the Gridiron Club's annual dinner that he was speaking on the night before the start of spring, "otherwise known to Al Gore as proof of global warming."
Clinton also made fun of Republicans, his White House successors, his own health and his audience of reporters, saying he was there because "I really didn't have anything much better to do tonight."
Clinton, who stood in for President Obama, said Democrats are going to pass health care.
"It may not happen in my lifetime, or Dick Cheney's, but hopefully by Easter," he said referring to his and the former vice president's heart ailments.
Obama, who's preparing for Sunday's probable House vote on health care reform, spoke to the dinner via videotape, saying that when he called Clinton to stand in for him, the former president said, "Let me clear my schedule for the next three years."
Clinton said Obama told him he was busy in the White House "polishing up his Nobel Peace Prize." Obama, he joked, asked: "You've got one of these, don't you?" -- a joke rooted in reports Clinton is unhappy that the current president got a Nobel Prize after only months in office while Clinton failed to be awarded one after long efforts to bring peace to the former Yugoslavia and the Middle East.
The dinner marked the 125th annual gathering of the Gridiron Club, whose members include Washington-based reporters.
In another reference to his health, Clinton said his favorite cocktail now was "Lipitor on the rocks," referring to the widely prescribed cholesterol-lowering medicine.
He said that when Obama appeared recently on Fox News the president was "keeping his word about meeting with hostile leaders without preconditions."
In a poke at Obama's combative chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, the former president said, "I found Rahm. I created him. I made him what he is today. I am so sorry."
In the 1990s, Emanuel worked in Clinton's White House.

I always knew Bill was a comedian. I just never found him funny before. Thanks to FoxNews for those stories.

And , the hockey. Maxim Yakutsenya got his 4th goal of the playoffs at 0:19 of the second OT to give Neftekhimik a series-tying 2-1 win over Salavat Yulaev in a game that saw the goalies make a combined 83 saves. And Ak Bars sneaks out a 3-2 win to take a 2-0 lead on Metallurg. Stanislav Chistov had tied the back-and-forth game for Magnitogorsk with 6 minutes left; But along came Alexi Morozov, unsatisfied with his hat trick yesterday, scoring with 1:48 left to win it for the Snow Leopards.

Finally, a shout out to my (current) favorite nephew, Andy Schible, who sent me this:

Thx Uncle Chris! love you blog btw

See? One out of 5 nephews love this blog! We'll work on doctors and pharmacists next.