Music City, USA

We arrived at David and Barbara's this afternoon about 3:00. We got settled in and even got to visit with Sara, Emerson and Carly for a bit. Both Sue and I held Carly and did no damage. The four of us drove to downtown Nashville for dinner at the Big River Brewery and then stopped by a local karaoke bar for a bit. Yours truly sang "Pink Cadillac" for the folks and it went over pretty well. Tomorrow, the barbershop convention begins, so there will be more to tell.

We're In The Queen City

We arrived safely in Cincinnati yesterday afternoon. We visited with Kris and Mark and then went out for dinner. The highlight of the evening, after a wonderful tour of greater Cincy (inside joke), we had front row seats for a performance of The Swarthy Band (with Mark on drums). They were the featured band at West Fest and they rocked the house. Today we all slept late. Tomorrow, we will head for Hendersonville to visit with all the Tennessee Moomys, and attend the International Convention of the Barbershop Harmony Society, in Nashville. Wickett did not make this trip. He is spending a week at The Heavenly Hounds Hotel and Spa, where Mitzi, the owner will spoil him and he will probably lose his voice from barking at the other dogs (as he has in the past).

38 years and counting

On June 27, 1970, Sue made the wisest decision of her life, and remarkably, so did I. Not everyone is lucky enough to find the person that will appreciate you when you are doing ok and put up with you when you're not. We are two of the lucky ones.

Wilds of Ohio

We have always considered our neighborhood to be "in town". Lately, we have begun to rethink that notion. Along with the mandatory chipmunks, gray squirrels and black squirrels, we have recently seen, in our fenced-in back yard:

1.) A groundhog
2.) An opossum
3.) rabbits (ok, not so strange, but the number of them is more than usual)
4.) Large hawks, on the fly. (where's Wickett?)

We have also seen deer in the front of the house, strolling around our circle, and yesterday, on our way out for some shopping, we saw a large, red fox. I don't remember seeing one of those, especially this big, since I left the farm.


Unrelated FYI: On this day, in 1963, Paul McCartney and John Lennon wrote the song, "She Loves You", in a hotel room in Newcastle, England. Coincidently, Pete Best was writing, "Ringo?", on the men's room wall at the Cavern Club in Liverpool.

Slightly related FYI: We did not see this guy in our neighborhood.

Wow!!

This gives a whole new meaning to the phrase, "catch like a girl".


I have been duped!. Apparently, this video is fake, done as a Gatorade commercial. I never liked Gatorade anyway, so I am swearing off the stuff for life. Drink tap water. No plastic bottles sitting in a landfill for 300 years. Bah Humbug!! Sorry to any of you who were exposed to this false information. When I taught high school science, I occasionally told kids that rocks were alive, so maybe this is payback time.

Is It Just Me??

Do you think that the 16 year old James Garfield from the last post resembles Ellen DeGeneres? Maybe a little? I can hear Mike and Kris saying, " That man has too much free time!"

Some Portage County History

Back in the late 1840's, a big, blond-haired, blue-eyed teenager, known as Big Jim, walked barefoot on the towpaths of the Pennsylvania-Ohio Canal. He had taken the job as a helmsman, using a whip to drive the horses and mules that pulled the canal boats, to help support his widowed mother and the rest of his family. There are many stories about how, despite his age, he was able to more than hold his own with the tough, older men that worked on the canal.

After an accident that resulted in his being pushed into the canal, his mother convinced him that maybe he wasn't cut out for that kind of work. Some time later, in Franklin Mills, which is now known as Kent, he was nominated for his first public office, a seat in the Ohio Senate. Big Jim is known to most people today as James A. Garfield, the 20th President of the United States. And that's the rest of the story.