Tuesday, May 29, 2012

MAN THAT’S HEAVEN


I hope your Memorial Weekend was enjoyable.
Mine most certainly was. Friday after my 4:00 PM checkup with the surgeon who rebuilt my shoulder, we high tailed it to our little redneck getaway in Nashville IN.
We had several family members coming in from all parts to gather for what has become a traditional get together of camping and celebrating moms birthday.
This year was special with mom hitting her 80th very spry birthday.
Before we left the house I told Jojo A. K. A. Nurse Ratched that my incisions should be sufficiently healed as to allow me to swim (float around in a raft like a wounded manatee) in the lake. Jojo insisted that it was not an option and it was too soon to do that 2 weeks out of surgery. I confidently told her I would allow the good doctor to be the final arbiter.
After the doctor had gone through the preliminaries of what he found and what he did to fix me up I hit him with the lake question. He had a sheepish grin and said I was the forth patient to ask him with that question today. His answer was not what I had hoped for.
I asked him to factor in the holiday weekend and the very high expected temps, to no avail.
I did make it to the water however in a raft that would allow me to keep my shoulder above the lake water. That is until the seat of the raft broke and I was left with one arm slinged trying to make it to the dock before I became fish food.
Most of the family stayed at the Brown County Seasons hotel that is only 5 minutes from the lake. We had some takers of our offer to camp with us.
The hotel is really nice but we saved the 500 bucks and communed with nature running back and forth to the hotel as needed. We had a wonderful birthday dinner for mom at the hotel Saturday night and everybody came to the lake Sunday for swimming, paddle boating, fishing, burgers, dogs and the race and a great time was had by all.


The weekend was made more special with the addition of my cousin and his family from Huntsville Alabama joining in. Jim AKA Shaver, Sharon, Jordan, Ethan stayed at the hotel one night and camped with us the 2nd night.
You can't help but have a great time when the Bama crew is in town.
If you were going to start this planet over again, these are the people you would want as prototypes.
Monday as the weekend is winding down I think of what Memorial Day is supposed to be about. We all get caught up in the rat race of ushering in the good times of the impending summer. If we didn't have brave service men and women we could not enjoy weekends like these.
We would all be slaves of the state in some dystopian shit hole world dictated by the likes of a Hitler, Castro or God forbid a disgusting Islamic Sharia type theocracy.

I realize if you are not a family member or weren't there this weekend, this post is about as exciting as being invited over by the neighbors to watch an 8mm film or Kodak slide show of their vacation. Sorry bout that.
Laying here in the hammock reminds me of the nap my grandson Trenton and me took Saturday afternoon.
My bro-in-law Bob who is married to Rita of An Ordinary Life,
when we talk about our respective grandkids, he just says times like these, rides on lawn tractors, fishing, naps on hammocks, anything done with grandkids, anytime spent with them he says "man that's Heaven isn't it?"
Right you are Bob, right you are.



Monday, May 21, 2012

WHERE I WAS BORN. WHERE WAS I BORN?

I was born in Washington Indiana.  That's what I told people decades ago.  Yesterday if someone would have asked me where I was born, I would have told them Washington Indiana.  Today if anyone asks, I will tell them Washington Indiana.  Twenty years from now if I'm lucky enough to still be on this Earth and the retirement home asks me where I was born I will tell them Washington Indiana.  How the hell do you not know where you were born.  I can even produce the original ancient document that proves where I was born.  This document has not been suspiciously photoshopped in layers.  I can't imagine why I would ever have any reason to lie about the spot on this planet where I first popped into the universe.  That's because at the present time I have no plans to run for president of Kenya

Friday, May 18, 2012

IT'S A 33 WAY TIE


Going to the track today put a thought in my head. How unfair it is for only one driver to cross that yard of bricks at the conclusion of "The Greatest Spectacle In Racing"? They all want to win, they all should win.  In this era of "fairness" fostered by Dear Leader, Barrack Hussain Obama mmmm mmm mmm. We need to make some changes here at I M S.  We need to widen that famed yard of bricks at the start/finish line and at the conclusion of the Indy 500, the car leading the race should be required by Obama to slow down and let their competitors catch up and cross the finish line together.  Of course many cars don't make it to the last lap, so I M S needs to have wreckers pull what's left of the wrecked cars across the finish line as well.  Also if there is, God forbid, a terrible accident during the race and a driver gets killed, they need to execute the remaining 32 drivers.  After all, it's the fair thing to do. 

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

IT VEXES ME SO



I have been staring at this dead limb for months.



Every time I sit out on my patio in the morning drinking my coffee, or in the evening when I'm drinking a cold beer, I look up at the big dead limb on my huge oak tree and it mocks my tattered body.
"Come get my dead limb with your saw!"
"You were just up here a few years ago and cut some dead limbs even higher then this one is.
"Go to hell Pin Oak", I say, "you got a lot of nerve trying to goad me just 3 days since my shoulder surgery and my arm in a sling".
"So? Just last week you would have been able to do it with just one good arm and one bad one", the smart ass oak tree said, " I could read your mind, you sat there glaring at me plotting and planning it all out. Your 24-foot extension ladder hanging in the garage was pictured in your mind along with that nice lightweight electric chainsaw and best of all your wife was out of town on business. Everything was in place, with Jojo nowhere around to interfere with your plan to cut this dead limb into little pieces bound for your lakeside campfire. Now look at you, all hopped up on pain meds with your arm trussed up like a Christmas goose.
It's funny, you used to think you were oh so brave and tough so many years ago when you used to work construction, walking top plates of 2 story walls and working off 40-foot high trusses hanging on with only one arm and leg while you ran conduit like you were one of the Flying Wallendas.

That was how many years ago? 30, 35?
Now look at you old man, just sitting way down there looking way up here at my dead limb. Your pathetic, you make me want to ooze sap! Your boss, err I mean your wife wants you to bring in hired guns to trim my dead branch and cut down that dead cedar tree in the front yard.
Goes against your nature to have someone else do your dirty work doesn't it Mister D I Y?"

This mockery is what I have had to put with since I have entered the fragile stage of my life. I wanted to take out that limb and the dead cedar tree so bad I couldn't stand it.
So today I was sitting on the patio and my stepson and his buddy came over and asked which limbs I wanted cut.
Uhhhh, I didn't know you guys were coming over.
Yeah mom said for us to come over and "help" you cut some limbs off.
Well...... I guess you (pride swallowed), can get the ladder down and see if you can get up there and cut that damned thing down.
Oh, sure no problem.


It took the boys all of 10 minutes to cut the bastard limb off and into little pieces of campfire wood.
Then I had them trim several more branches in the front yard and we even cut down that 100 foot dead cedar tree.
I kept trying to "help" the boys pull branches and direct the angle of the chainsaw when we cut the cedar tree down and I finally figured that I could be of more use getting the hell away from them and let them finish up in front while I sit out back on the patio.

Staring at the big oak tree that is now minus one huge dead limb.
The mighty oak still mocks me, he rolls his eyes with mouth agape in a huge smile and says.




 "Well, well, well, you finally got that limb down didn't you? Or should I say THEY got that limb down while you scampered about, trying to look useful, you coward!"

"Yeah, maybe your right oak tree, maybe I did need help to do this little task. Maybe I am on the backside of 50 and maybe I am just held together with little screws and wires and pins and brackets and string. Maybe I am not the man I used to be physically, but with age maybe I am just a bit wiser these days.
I'm no Shakespeare scholar, but I do remember this quote, and it didn't have much meaning to me way back in the days when I would climb to the top of big tall oak trees like you just for the view.
Today I understand the wisdom of Shakespeare when he wrote”,
"Discretion is the better part of valor."

Thursday, May 10, 2012

THIS TIME TOMORROW

I will be in a deep slumber with no dreams to gauge the length of unconsciousness by.  The surgery begins at 11:30 AM and may last 3 hours or better.  I am making last minute preparations whilst I still have 2 arms functioning. A couple of days ago I started wondering how I was going to mow my grass for the next couple of months.  The tractor I have now is an older John Deere that I got last year in a trade with a friend for appliance repairs.  It's old but runs like a Deere and has a hydrostatic transmission.

My old old Wheel Horse has a manual trans and the John Deere runs circles around it.  The only problem is the lever for the hydrostatic trans is on the lower right side which is going to be way out of reach of my left hand.  My old Wheel Horse has a shifter for the manual trans right in the middle easily within reach of either hand.  Aha ! I kept my old Wheel Horse and mothballed it around the far side of the house with a tarp protecting it from the elements.  I grabbed the battery charger and headed out to where I parked it over a year ago. Damn! Where's my old tractor at? I know I parked it right hereeeeee........ Uhhhh wait a minute, it's all coming back to me now, I seem to remember it had something to do win my neighbor.........(fade into memory sequence)... Oh yeah, he wanted to buy it from me last year, he has access to a huge barn and wanted to keep it out there to mow from time to time.  What did I tell him????? Think damnit think! Ok it's all coming back to me now, again, I told him I wanted to hang on to it for awhile in case the old John Deere took a shit on me.

  I did tell him to take it over there and use it as much as he wanted as long as he stored it in the barn for me.  It was a win win (I hate that expression) for us both.  I called Barry and we headed over with my trailer to pick it up.  It hadn't been started since last fall so I figured we would have to push it on the trailer.  When we got there I thought just for shits and giggles I would try the starter.  Boom! she fired right up! The only thing it needed was some air in one tire and she mows like there's no tomorrow.  I know this is a very dull post to you, what else have you come to expect here? But it makes me feel a little better knowing that even though I will be down an arm for the next couple of months, at least my  lawn will look nice.

 See you all on the other side of general anesthesia.

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

I SEE DEAD VOTERS


Went to vote this morning and I got 3 days left till the surgery so I figured I better get a bike ride in too.
Awhile back we got our voter registration cards in the mail with the new location of  where we vote now. It's about 4 times as far as the old location but that's a plus when your riding instead of driving.
I grabbed my list of Republican endorsed judges and my voting registration and I also took Betty Thomas's registration with me. She is the old lady that owned our house before we did.
My buddy who lives across the street grew up here and him and all the other kids in the neighborhood referred to her as the old witch. Seems like every neighborhood has one of those.
The old witch's house (now ours) was a black hole for baseballs, basketballs, footballs and even mitts.
Any ball that was thrown, hit, kicked or bounced in her yard was immediately snagged by the old witch and was sucked into the vortex never to be seen again. That is till one day when the old witch was gone and her browbeaten husband called Barry over to the house. He led Barry to a closet and asked if any of the sports equipment was his or his friends.
I guess it was like walking into a Finish Line sporting goods store, there were years worth of stolen balls and even mitts. It seemed that if the old witch was having an off season and her numbers were down, she would sneak over to the other next door neighbor's yard and help herself to any balls or mitts that had been forgotten to be picked up by the kids.
Barry walked out of there with a bag full of stolen booty.
Anyway I digress, Betty has been dead for 10 years or better, but we still get mail for her and an occasional recent medical bill. Seems that even though the old witch has been shagging balls in Hades for the last decade she is still seeking medical care.
Now she's trying to vote!  When I got to the poll I gave the witch's card to the poll worker and said "This woman has been dead for 10 years and unless she's a Democrat she shouldn't be eligible to vote anymore".
I guess the poll workers and most of the people standing in line were not Democrats because they laughed their asses off.

They marked her as deceased on the voter roll and I took my ballot to the booth.
I held my nose and marked the ballot for Mitt Romney.
Then I let go of my nose, skipped over the little circle next to Richard Lugar and filled the circle next to his opponent’s name. Richard Mourdock.
As I fired up the motor on the bike and headed home I started thinking about the voter ID law debate. I'm glad my state has this law. I know that the liberal Democrats that oppose this law, oppose it for one reason and one and one reason only.
It makes it harder for them to rig elections, not impossible just harder.
I guess some people just feel that's it's unfair that dead ball stealing witch's from hell shouldn't be allowed to vote for Obama.

Sunday, May 6, 2012

IT DOESN'T GET ANY BETTER


Saturday
Jojo and me are spending our first night of the season here at the fishin cabin sans Hank FM. Jojo has already caught a few fish and I have caught a few cold ones.
We had our two little buddies spend  Friday night with us, Trenton and Gavin were a riot to have around for the night. My grandson Trent is taking his first steps and he took a few for mamaw Jojo and me.



The fountain of youth



Me, daughter Nicole and the boys


We dropped them off to their respective mommies Saturday morning and headed south.
The weather is beautiful here in Nashville Indiana and we have some burgers and dogs that will meet their doom on our fire pit grill tonight.
The moon will make its closest approach tonight and it will be full. Hopefully the sky will be clear and Jojo wanted to do some shots of Crown later.
With all those things going for me I will undoubtedly be irresistible to her later.
I am trying to make the most of this weekend as I have 6 days left before I will lose function of my right are for a few months.
I am still training my left arm to assume the duties that my right arm naturally took care of lo these many years.
One clarification I want to make in reference to an earlier post "LIVIN AS A LEFTY".
In that post I was making a futile attempt to be humorous when I wrote that my left hand needs to be trained to perform the morning ritual of cleaning up after responding to a call from Mother Nature.
My mom and my sister Rita thought I was talking about another kind of ritual.
Let me assure everyone that giving myself a "stranger" was not what I was referring too.
First of all I'm almost 57 years old and sad to say the needs of a 17 year old and the needs of a 57 year old are quite different. Also every guy learns at a young age that a stranger ain't that strange.

SUNDAY
Very peaceful night with the neighbors from hell gone.
It was warm enough to sleep with the solid doors open and the double screen doors shut. This option gives us security from bugs but not big varmints, 4 legged or 2 legged. For defense against those I have my 9mm locked and loaded 1 foot below my damaged right arm.
This affords a fine view of the trees, stars, lake and last night an incredible moon that I kept waking up to and tracking across our weekend getaways big screen.
My shoulder was killing me, but every time I woke up from the pain I looked up at that view through the screens and Jojo fast asleep beside me and I couldn't help but feel like a very lucky man.

Jojo sunning and fishing

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

NOBODY SINGS LIKE HANK, NOBODY !

Went to the lake today to fill the water tank and get the fishing cabin opened up for the season. My shoulder surgery is scheduled for a week from Friday so my bro in law helped me do that and take a load of campfire wood as well.
When we got there I looked over at the house next to our lot expecting to see Hank FM's truck parked in front and Hank should be pretty well trashed by this time singing a drunken karaoke version of Hank Williams JR out on his deck.
I blogged about this asshole last year DAMN THE NEIGHBOR.
They were renting this place last year and many peaceful nights were spoiled by Hank FM and his drunken women.

As we drove by the house it seemed unusually quiet and serene, no trucks in the drive and no drunken tunes emanating from the premises.
I thought no, could it be? No I'm not that fortunate to get rid of 2 asshole neighbors in one year.
At our homestead for the last 7 years we have been living next to some real winners, the only time the grass got cut was when the city came out and did it. They were foreigners from Zimbabwe or some other shithole county on that continent and were trying to recreate a Savanna like environment and I don't mean Savanna Georgia.
They kept junk in their yard and the city finally had to come out and haul that away.
I planted some bushes to try and block the view of their place so I wouldn't have to look at it when I sat out on my patio.



Then one day a couple of months ago, poof they were gone!
The house is empty now and me and some neighbors have been mowing the grass and cleaning up their trash.

So meanwhile back at the lake, Bob and me finished our projects, did a little fishing and as I was about to leave I walked over to the house and looked in.
I was very pleased to see a completely empty house.
The only drawback about losing Hank and his old lady?
We don't have TV there and these tools were often our only source of entertainment down there at the lake
I guess we will have to settle for watching the moon and the stars and listening to the evening breeze moving across the lake and into the trees that surround our little fishing cabin. Either that or I could treat 3x to some drunken Jimmy Buffet karaoke.
I’m just too good to her sometimes.



Tuesday, May 1, 2012

HAPPY DEATHDAY BIN-LADEN

One year ago today, the most evil piece of shit since Adolf Hitler met the business end of a US Navy Seals weapon and suddenly figured out he that he was backing the wrong horse.  Giving the go ahead for this operation was the only thing Obama has gotten right in his pathetic career.  I see Obama is now using the Bin Laden killing as his latest campaign ad. To hear him talk you would think Obama single-handedly wacked him The Gaff-o-matic AKA Joe Biden is making the claim that Mitt Romney would not have approved that mission. Romney had a great come back stating that even Jimmy Carter would have made that call.  If the dirtbag Bill Clinton had been less concerned with getting B J's from skanks in the Oral Office we could have taken out Bin Laden years ago and 9/11 would still be just a telephone number you dialed when the shit hit the fan.  Well anyway, it's a great day to sit outside and have a beer to celebrate that Bin Laden is finally serving a useful purpose in the world.  Good to know he has been turned into shark shit.  Great job US Military! You are the true hero's of this operation, not Obama!  You don't get hero points for making a call that even a dolt like Jimmy Carter could have figured out.