|
|
My parents got here about a couple of weeks before Thanksgiving. Then my brother got here about a week before Thanksgiving. All this time we ate at the Chineese buffet,the Golden FUCKING Corral and every restaurant in between,then after they all left,here comes Thanksfuckingiving.
So why am I so goddam....proud to be an American?
Cause I gained 10 pounds.
No more excuses. Back on that treadmill. I love salad with vinagarette dressing....I love salad with vinagarette dressing...I fucking love salad with vinagarette dressing...I fucking goddamm love salad with vinagarette fucking dressing....
Okay. I'm okay now.
FUCK!!! WHY CAN'T I POST A FUCKING POAL HERE? WHY??
|
|
|
|
|
Most of those addressed will not know or at least not remember Betty Brown. I got a Christmas Card from Betty this morning. She is the widow of my Dad's half brother (Willie Elven Brown). She lives now and has for years in a house near Lancaster High School in Lancaster Texas. Frank and I went to visit her there about four years or so ago. I would guess that Betty is about 85 or maybe a bit older and she lives all alone in that same house where she and Willie lived when he was alive. It was something that Willie and Betty did once that I think was a very noble and caring thing . They had an acquaintance who had a family of five children. Four girls and a boy I think. One night the friend couple went out on a date of sorts and left the children at home under the supervision of the eldest (a girl12 years old) and they never came back. They were involved in a deadly automobile accident that killed both of them leaving the five kids all alone. Willie and Betty went over to that house, bundled up the kids and took them home, made the preparations to adopt all five kids ---which they followed through. Willie was a welder at a Dallas tank manufacturing company and was already feeling the effects of the occupational lung disorder which caused his death within the next five years leaving Betty all alone with five kids. The story has a happy ending. They all reached adulthood, married and moved away and are now fine citizens. No Child Protective Services, no court supervision that I know of, no insurance from the dead parents---juist Willie and Betty to take care of them and not even Willie for very long.
Betty was a nurse for a local clinic and finally had to give that up due to her health. She is still the same bright and cheerful person that she was thirty or forty years ago. Her Christmas Card that I got today said that her Parkinson's disease had progressed to the point where she could only navigate around her house with a walker but that everything was all right. Imagine that--everything was all right!
Just thought that you should know.
love
dad, granpa, ami
|
|
|
|
|
There are definitely some things that we used to say or to hear that are no longer in vogue. I had to be reminded of some of them by a book I have called "Dewdroppers, Waldos and Slackers". All of the ones below are expressions or names that I remember from that time.
A lot of the language centered around the itinerant jobless people who called everyday at our BACK door and asked if they could do a bit of work for a bite to eat. These people always approached the house at the backdoor and would make their request with hat in hand. Mother nearly always had something in the pantry or in the stove to feed these men. There were "Hoboes", "Tramps" and "Bums" and nearly everyone used those terms interchangeably but a few insisted that there was a difference:
hobo-----Many insisted that a hobo was not a hobo unless he was away from home.
tramp---tramps were held to travel but lived by begging and did not work
bums---neither travelled nor worked
The request for food was nearly always put as "Ma'am could I do some work for you for a bite to eat?"
I don't put a lot of stock in those definitions. We used the three terms interchangeably for anyone down on his luck and out of a job--of which there were many.
There was a general alphabet soup of government agencies after FDR took over as President:
WPA--Works Progress Administration
CCC--Civil Conservation Corps--organized on miitary lines and used to improve national parks and scenic spots.
NRA--Nationasl Recovery Act
and many many more.
The most colorful language was that of the soda jerks and restraunt waitresses as they took ones order and shouted back to the kitchen , cook or to the soda jerk any one of the following: (these were remarkably the same over the area I lived in)
A barrel of mud--a chocolate milkshake
A barrel of red mud--strawberry shake
a black cow--a root beer float (these are still available in small country towns in West Texas)
a black stick--a chocolate ice cream cone
a blonde stick---a vanilla ice cream cone
shoot one red---a cherry Coca Cola (some times it is "Hang one red")
shoot one yellow--- a lemon coke
shoot one green---a lime coke
shoot a sissy---a vanilla Coca Cola
punk and gut---a sausage and biscuit sandwich
98---a warning from the soda jerk that a parent of someone in the store had just entered
Bossy in a bowl---beef stew
flop 'em---two eggs over easy
cat beer---milk
a freak--Orange coke
Adam's ale---water
nervous puddin'---Jello
hold the hail---no ice
87 and one half---Wow--Just look at that doll!
95---a customer is walking the check
98--the boss just drove up
pull two on the city--two glasses of water
Hoover flags--pockets turned wrong side out to show that they are empty
First lady--spareribs
Of course there were many many more but this will give you some idea of why you would not have instantly understood everything in the thirties. Sort of silly I guess but I miss 'em sometimes.
|
|
|
|
|
I have always thought that an extensive and well stocked vocabulary was the indicator of a well educated , experienced and interesting person. To that end I keep a spiral notebook at hand when reading and copy down words that I do not know or feel uncomfortable with and search diligently for a place to use them so that I can truly add them to my vocabulary. A word not used is after all hardly lodged in one's vocabulary. Today on the last day of 2007 I am forced to admit that I have failed to add a few words to my vocabulary by using some that I have copied down in my reading and must further admit that they have been there dormant in my Commonplace Book for most all of this year. The problem is that they are words that have just not come up in my conversation this year. The words and their meaning are below:
catapan: The officer who governed Calabria and Apulia under the Byzantine emperors.
bolluschickie: Young males of the Pribolof fur seals
spetch: A piece or strip of undressed leather trimmed from a hide used in making glue
turdiform: Having the form or appearance of a thrush
denariate: A portion or piece of land worth only a penny a year in rent
I guess that I am travelling in the wrong crowd because I just haven't found a place to fit these words into any conversations that I have had this year. Maybe my life will be more exciting in 2008.
love
dad, granpa, ami
|
|
|
|
|
Jackin, whackin, spankin that puppy
Behind the restaurant, in the dumpster
Pagin thru the dirty mags
Wipin off the guacamole
Drippin from the slidin door
Hopin wetbacks don't discover
My aromatic lovin place
Sleeve my cock in chimichanga
Thrown away with cigs stuck to it
In a moment, I'm in heaven
Makin tons a sour cream
Lick my fingers, so delicious
I just love me some Mezkin food.
|
|
|
|
|
I used to be a circus performer, I was the guy who juggled the chainsaws. I lost my job because of a little accident that cost me my arm. I was walking around checking out the various attractions while on break and decided to check in on my buddy Earl who to this day runs a little ride called "The Zipper." We were joking around about how sometimes somebody will ride on it after having just eaten and throw up all over which inevitably means vomit sprinkling down onto the people below them. He let me in on a little secret which is that when this happens he will let the machine run like that for a few seconds and then switch it to reverse its direction of travel which causes all of the spew to not only churn onto the person that vomited but their friends in the cage with them. There's also the added bonus of some of it working it's way onto the people who were previously in the cage above. All of this talk got me wondering and so I asked him "Well, what do you do when the machine gets stuck?" His reply was slightly disconcerting "I'm just the operator, not a mechanic." Of course now that I had said this the machine made a loud grinding noise and then there was the kind of screech only created by metal scraping against metal. The whole machine seized up and all of the passengers started screaming in sheer terror even though it was obvious they weren't going anywhere. I looked at Earl and he just shrugged. Now, being the kind gentleman that I profess to be I spoke up and told him I had some mechanical experience as well as some knowledge of hydraulics and asked if it wouldn't be too insulting to his manhood if I checked it out. He told me to go right ahead but to make sure I did have anything on that could get caught in the moving parts of the machine. I don't wear jewelry and never have need of a watch so I dove right in. I started looking around at the base where all of the gearing was and noticed a rag caught in a sprocket and chain system that seemed to be jamming everything up. I grabbed the rag and began to pull as hard as I could. Slowly the fabric began to tear and with enough yanking back and forth it came free. The machine quickly began to move again and I started screaming "Earl! Earl! It's got my arm!!!!!!!!!" Earl came running at me like a maniac and with a look of pain on my face I jerked my arm from the darkness and showed him that everything was fine by wiggling all of my fingers. "Got you good, fucker!" I said triumphantly. Earl shoved me against a rail and told me I was an asshole and that I'd better leave before he kicked my ass. I was still laughing which I'm sure he didn't appreciate but conceded to his recommendation.
I had to use the bathroom anyway and I do mean #2. I was headed to the Port-a-Johns when my cell phone began ringing, it was Carla the new girl that had just began work at the concession stand where they specialized in corn dogs. We had been flirting shamelessly for the past few days ever since I caught her and one of the other girls seeing who could get one of the wieners for the corn dogs the furthest down their throat. "Hi, Darlin', how are you?" She spoke sweetly into the phone. "Um, I'm fine, I just need to take care of something real quick, can I call you back?" I replied. By this time I had stepped into the stall and was working on getting my pants off, using both hands to remove my belt and unbutton while holding the phone between my ear and shoulder. "Just what is so important that you can't talk to me right now?" She inquired with a hint of contempt in her voice. "It's, uh.. it's personal." I didn't really want her to know what I was about to do, #2 isn't exactly something most chicks find attractive in the least. "Oh yeah? Personal like that bitch Charlene from The Cyclone? Just what the hell are you doing?!" This was not going well. "Nothing like that, I would never do that to you, it's just I.. Shit! Shit, shit shit!" In mid sentence my phone had fallen from between my neck and shoulder and fell into the toilet. "Why me, God? Why me?" My pants were around my ankles and I was staring at my phone in the bottom of the toilet bowl thinking about how I was going to fix this situation, both with my phone and with Carla. First things first I had to retrieve my phone. I bent over placing my right hand against the back of the stall while reaching in to grab my phone with my left hand. I guess my right hand must have been just above the flush button because the next thing I knew I had slipped and began to fall forward when my right hand hit the flush button and I watched my left arm get sucked into the hole of the toilet. I was totally disgusted and tried to pull my arm out but quickly discovered it was stuck. My arm must have created a really strong suction and I couldn't get it to budge.
I was beside myself and didn't know what to do. Should I yell for help? Would anybody even notice let alone come to the aid of somebody in a Port-A-John yelling like a maniac? Did I really want to bring the embarrassment upon myself? Surely I could figure a way out of this. I put both of my legs against the wall and pushed back with all of my might to no avail. I should have really taken that Spin class I was thinking to myself. "This can't be real, I have to be dreaming this." I repeated to myself and even slapped myself with my free hand but didn't wake up. This was real and I needed fix it. I tried everything I could think of including pushing my arm further into the toilet in an attempt to break the suction but it just got tighter as the trapped blood caused my arm to swell. At one point I was jerking so hard I almost pulled the whole thing over on myself. A while later after I hadn't been able to feel the lower half of my arm for what seemed like ages I gave in and forced the door open hoping somebody would pass by and see my predicament. It was nearly twenty minutes before a man walked by and did a double take. We ended up trying to pull my arm out with our combined might but it was enough and ended up hurting like hell. I felt as though would pull my arm off if we continued and he told me to stay where I was and he'd come back with help, I told him I wouldn't move an inch. Normally this exchange would have been funny but the situation at hand (Ha Ha) drained all of the humor out of it.
I sat ruminating lover my misfortune and finally he arrived with help. The people tried to calm me even though I was far past the point of panic. This was horrible. I could see people pointing and turning away to laugh. "What did I ever do to deserve this?" was all that ran through my mind. Finally after discussing it my "rescuers" decided the best way to break the suction and get me out was to tip the whole thing over. "Once it breaks free from the tank below air will be able to get through and the pressure will be equalized which should release your arm." "Great." Said my inner voice "Now I get to be covered in the shit of God knows how many other people, how can this possibly get worse?" The worst was yet to come. The men pushed and pushed and finally the whole thing began to lean backwards until it flipped over slamming me against the back of the Port-A-John and audibly snapping my arm. I didn't get much time to consider the pain as I was quickly coated in disease heavy feces. Somebody had been eating cashews.. A couple of guys threw a large blanket over me and pulled me free from the toilet. They began to spray me with a hose and I turned so they could spray my arm so I could see the damage. I couldn't move my arm or even really feel it except where the break was but from just above my elbow to the tips of my fingers was completely white. I sat down wrapped in the blanket, still covered in shit and freezing cold staring at my arm. The paramedics finally arrived and walked me over to their van where they gave me a look over. One of the medics looked at my arm and then looked at me and said "I know you really don't want to hear this but you're probably going to lose that arm.." I looked down at my lap, avoiding eye contact as well as conversation and didn't say anything the entire ride to the hospital.
Once I had been cleaned up the one of the doctors came up to me and told me I had broken my humerus bone in several places and that due to the loss of blood flow for such an extended period of time the flesh below my elbow was effectively dead. Amputation would be necessary to prevent infection. I would no longer be able to continue juggling chainsaws or really anything I had previously done. My life was more or less over. Even worse, because my insurance company refused to cover the costs I would owe a rather large amount of money in medical bills. After months of physical therapy I was able to obtain a job bagging groceries. When life is as funny as you think it can possibly get somebody sends in even more clowns. The only advantage to my job is that my hook causes the customers to pity me and so they tip me very well. I'm still paying off my medical bills. Sometimes I'm afraid to use the bathroom because I don't want to start crying, but I guess if a grown man is going to cry he may as well do it in the privacy of a bathroom.
I edited this to make it slightly more readable as well as corrected a few errors but for the most part it was something I just typed out real quick. Deal with it.
|
|
|
|
|
So those lighted boxes that hang from poles or wires, you know the ones that are supposed to direct the operators of motor vehicles to proceed or to stop, they don't have much meaning here in murfreesboro. I used to wait at the intersection and count the drivers that ran the red lights. It was fun for a while then it just got sickening. Well today I was at that intersection waiting for the light to turn green and wow it does, so I would take that to mean the the traffic on the cross street would have a red light. the truck in front of me pauses for a good 3-4 seconds before he decides that the light is green enough for him and BAM... car barrels through the red light travelling at least 50 right into the side of his truck sending him a good 15 feet sideways. After hitting the truck she somehow make a 90 degree turn and hits my jeep...HOW the fuck did that happen... ?
I got out ready to hit someone when I noticed that the driver was a fifty something year old woman with a handicapped placard, so I returned to my jeep pulled off so traffic could continue. I spoke to the driver of the truck to see if he was ok. He was fine. Surprising as he was just broadsided at 50 MPH.
He gets back into his truck through the passenger side and just drives away, his excuse being " I need to let my old lady know what just happend." vrrrrmm...gone
no one was injured but the bitch who ran the light...she nailed her head to the steering wheel and had to be taken to the hospital via ambulance... serves her fucking right
So...
DON'T RUN RED LIGHTS...
|
|
|
|
|
Dear Bill,
Hey, buddy, I got up before 3am this morning and figured I’d write you a quick note to catch you up and let you know I haven’t forgotten about you. There’s not a great deal to report here, but I can be fairly windy in reporting very little sometimes.
I still haven’t signed the papers on the new truck yet. I haven’t heard from the truck dealership, and I haven’t called them. The initial problem was that they had no way of documenting my income. I had tossed all my old paystubs, and we changed payroll companies back around October or so. So my year-to-date figure on the check I took them in December didn’t show very much. I had very little credit history, oddly enough, other than the lien the IRS has against me, which I’m paying off steadily. So anyway, it’s been well over a month, and I’m still driving that new truck for free and not complaining. I have my old truck back, and I’d be happy to sell it, but I’m in no hurry for that either.
I’ll make some time this morning and go to the post office and get you a money order while I have a little jingle in my pocket. I haven’t sent you any money in a while, and it costs me so little to make a big difference in your quality of life in a given week that I hate it when I put off doing that. It’s Friday morning here, so I reckon that won’t get to you until next week, but still.
I got myself into dreams of romance over the last month or so and gradually lost sight of any proportion I had to my perceptions. It’s funny how that can happen with me, but the results can be pretty pathetic, and even tragic, if I don’t have a little humility about it.
I met this guy online and chatted with him on the phone a few weeks back. I told him that I wasn’t interested in long-distance relationships or internet romance, and that I’d have to meet him soon. So he flew down from Virginia about three days after we first talked. That was pretty sudden, but I told myself and him that it was the only way I could keep talking to him with any sincerity. That was my rationalization for getting me into the very situation I told myself before that I would not get into the notion of developing.
We had a great visit over the weekend and enjoyed each other’s company and visited with my friends and family and saw some of the local sights. I was smitten, really taken with him, and I hated to see him get on the plane and head back east that Tuesday morning. Immediately I began working on him to move down here. I was relentless about it, actually pretty obsessed with the idea. I reasoned that his circumstances were perfect for such a move. He was unhappy where he is, he’s between jobs, he’s single and ready for some kind of relationship and we seem to get along perfectly and enjoy spending time together. There’s also a good deal of mutual attraction physically. He doesn’t know very many people where he’s at; it’s not his hometown, and he’s essentially couch-surfing there as it is. He is in the midst of a settlement process for a neck injury he developed while working, and he has a doctor’s appointment in February, but I assured him that we could fly him back up there for that at minimal cost so as not to disrupt that process.
The downside, of course, is that this is a very sudden and dramatic change for both of us. I live about a thousand miles away. We’ve only met in the last month, and he knows nobody in Dallas except for me. All my protestations to the contrary aside, there’s no telling how things would actually develop between us. There’s no opportunity for that process of shared experience over time to take place in which a normal relationship would grow between two people. We would be microwaving what otherwise would be a slow-cooked meal and hoping for the best. He has a history of uprooting his life and moving cross-country with the vague hopes of things being better elsewhere, and he’s understandably hesitant to do that again.
All the same, I had convinced myself and told my family and friends that he was probably moving here soon. It suited me to believe that, and it more or less fell in line with the way I approach these things. It also seems to be the way he operates, whether he’s comfortable with that or not. I figured that, in light of that, we were both, at the very least, a marked improvement for one another over partners and circumstances we have each chosen in the past. He is thirty-seven and fairly centered and self-aware, and I am sober going on two years and moving forward with my life in a substantially methodical and stepwise fashion. I can really build an edifice of rationalization that is rock-solid and unassailable when I’m in the mood, Bill.
Things began to come to a head over the last few days. He’s been under the weather, and I’ve grown impatient; not so much for him to make a move, but just to tell me that he is, in fact, coming and when he’d like to do it. I pushed, he equivocated. I sulked and pouted, he reassured. I missed the talks we’d had that hooked me in the first place, the long conversations about the things that interest each of us, and the fascination that comes with getting to know someone else’s insides. I really like that stuff when the curiosity is mutual and bound by some measure of affection, but my demands were creating some distance and building a reticence in him, I think. I was objectifying him at that point, and it had become an obstacle to the very thing I desired.
I lost sight, most importantly, of what is really important in my own life. I am living now by a set of principles that require that I be willing to let go of my old ideas about what works and brings me happiness, that I let go of my unreasonable demands for security, prestige and romance. I became fearful that I would not get something I wanted. My self-centeredness in that regard was the chief obstacle to my own happiness – a happiness that is not contingent upon the satisfaction of my disproportionate demands when those demands are subordinate to that Process which I have been attempting to put into practice in my life over the last year and ten months.
I awoke this morning just before 3am with a brainstorm. My mind would not shake it loose. I felt like I knew a few things:
1. He is unhappy where he is
2. he is going to move somewhere, and it is likely not going to be in the town where he lives right now
3. he’s probably not going to come here, or in other words, I didn’t make the cut
4. I have a resentment against him, God and myself for screwing myself out of something I thought I really wanted
5. the only thing I have any real control over in that situation is my own resentment, and that resentment can potentially wreck my life in a very real and substantial way regardless of the possible outcomes of this situation
So I got up and started my coffee, got on my knees in the living room and prayed the way I do every morning, went to the bathroom and sat down with a cup of coffee to read and write and clear my head and find some relief and another way to approach this so that I could let it go. It wasn’t important whether any or all of those first three propositions were true or untrue. The last two were where my responsibility lay.
It was exactly those unreasonable demands that were instrumental in bringing down the longest relationship I ever had. It was similar demands that ended the last relationship I was in, though I think it was more my resistance to my partner’s desires that was my part in that one. I suppose it is more or less that situation that drives most people apart and creates conflict in people’s lives everywhere on the planet. What I had to do was let go of the idea that the solution was in finding a way to meet those demands, and instead, to find a way to let go of that attachment to their satisfaction, such that, whatever happens, I can be happy and usefully whole again. This is how that Process works. This is how moral inventory and self-examination and dependence upon the intercession of God work in my life to dispel the ill effects of self-deception and self-centered fears. Resentment and hurt feelings and the attachment to unreasonable demands upon others and God are all things that work to form a tyranny in my life. I labored under that for forty years or more, and it nearly killed me. It does, in fact, have the power to kill. The slavery to my impulses and emotional states is the end result of following my disproportionate demands and desires and attachments to their logical end. Following that road leads back to a drink. And for me to drink is to capitulate to a living death.
That all sounds very dramatic and verbose, but it is simply a logical process and the nuts and bolts of how I continue to move forward and work toward objectives that are not of my choosing, but which, in the long run, bring me real happiness. The downside is that I have to swallow a good deal of pride and live with the embarrassment of doing all of this in public – it’s just my nature, I suppose, to let everyone see my guts in all their distended and convoluted glory. The upside is that I grow a bit, and that pride I am chewing was simply false pride in any case.
It matters not, really, whether he moves here. He will do whatever he does, and I can’t control that. He may show up next week, or I may never see him again. It likely will be some other permutation of the possible outcomes, as it almost always is in my life. The nice thing about all of this is that the emotional disturbance on my part has come and gone in the space of a very few days, and at no time during that period did I consider going off the reservation. It didn’t even occur to me. I got myself wired up on a bit of an emotional bender and showed my ass in public, but the end result was some raw feelings and a clearer picture of me.
I really like this guy. I really do. Hell, he could move here, and we could have a wonderful life together. Everything so far has led me to believe that he’s a good fit, and I see no reason why that should change, if circumstances conspired to allow that. The important thing for me, however, is that I not take my eyes off of what is truly necessary for me to keep moving forward on the path I chose back in April of 2006. Without that focus, I’m no good to myself or anyone else. If I can maintain that (and that is an act of will that is really the proper use of will power in my life) then I can have anything I want that God wills and be satisfied with it.
I work with a couple of guys who, oddly enough, deal with very similar issues, and I have lately been at a loss as to exactly what to say to them about their situation. As a sponsor all I really have to share is my experience, and my experience over recent days has really only been negative. I think I see now what the answer was, and why that answer was slow in coming. My experience points toward one thing, really: a dependence upon a God of my understanding to give me peace of mind and true happiness, regardless of circumstance.
Yer faithful correspondent,
|
|
|
|
|
I feel like such an ass. I mean I should be happy with my life. I'm free to do anything now. My host home is very easy. He goes to day program in the morning and while everyone else is going to the rat race with traffic and all that I get to take Moop on a morning ride,discovering new trails. I mean Moop has almost a thousand miles now and it's not even a year old.
But here I am with a feeling of loss. I mean I'm too young yet to be considered retired. I miss my guys. Every day I worry about them,that they're not hurting the staff or themselves or their families for they had a rough day. 15 years is a long time to be working with people that depend on you. Then I think about why I got fired. It's definetly not my job performance. I've been incident free for years. Maybe it's the other staff? I've always been nice to them. But it's not my fault that my boys behaved around me and not with them. Is that why they had to let me go? So my boys can start getting used to other people? Maybe it was because they didn't want to pay my hospital bill. But after some fighting,Aetna is paying up now.
This shit shouldn't even affect me anymore. It's been 6 months now. And yet shit goes on in my head like I suffered a loss.
It's selfish. I mean we have people everywhere that suffer real loss. Loss of a son,a wife...divorce..that's what REAL loss is.
I really need to get over this. I guess it will just take time.
I think it's just lately even though my family says otherwise for I'm doing a lot with my free time to benefit others and taking good care of my host home person,I feel so...worthless.
|
|
|
|
|
I have been asking myself some serious questions today and since there is no one here but my dog Sara and I there have not been very many answers forthcoming. So I have decided to share these self-asked questions with you and the answers that I have dug out to save you the tedium of searching through literature and the internet for answers.
1. How many of the seven dwarfs can you name?
Ans. Well, Disney's seven dwarfs were Dopey, Happy, Bashful, Grumpy, Sneezy And Doc. The Brother's Grimm who created the seven dwarfs even before Disney never did give them any Christian names . But now I'll get down to the real question—all of the dwarfs had beards save only one—which one? (The answer is Dopey)
2. So you know poetry? Then I am sure that you have read or heard the poem that begins:
"Half a League, Half a league, Half a league onward,
Into the valley of death rode the...
Rode the who? Of course you knew, "The six hundred". Actually there were 673 of them but we have to allow Tennyson a little poetic license when he wrote "The Charge of the Light Brigade".
But in the spirit of the true trivia nut that is not good enough
. The real question Are you ready? How far is half a league? (The answer is that a league is not so easy to define. It originally was intended to be I/20th of a degree of latitude but by the time Tennyson wrote "The Charge of the Light Brigade" different systems were in use and a league could vary from 2 ½ miles to 4 ½ miles. So to determine what Tennyson meant we sought a measurement of the length of the valley down which the Light Brigade rode and found that the valley was only 1 1/4 miles long so Tennyson was thinking of a League as 2 ½ miles when he wrote the poem. Actually there is a curve in that valley such that the Light Brigade only had to face the Russian cannon for only a third of a league—but accuracy doesn't always make good poetry so lets just let Tennyson have his "Half a League". Oddly when Texas joined the Union it retained its mineral rights for "seven leagues from low tide" which would be 21 miles by the then recognized length of a marine league to be three miles so we got 21 miles of oil land whereas the other states mostly only got three miles. I am a trivia nut. Now I am off thinking about the fact that Mexican Law allowed early emigrants to Texas to settle on a "league and a labor" of land which was 9 square miles plus all the ground a man could plow in one day (which incidentally was reckoned to be 146 acres.) That was with an ox-drawn plow and a long summer day. See what all you can get into reading poetry?
3. I used to have a couple of horses out here at the farm. Actually they belonged to Frank and to a friend of his who was a farrier. For the life of me I can't remember their names. We actually got rid of them because they spent most of their time on the front porch of the house. But to get to the question—would you be surprised if I told you one of those horses was 22 hands high?
Answer; Yep horse height is measured in :"Hands" and a hand is 4 inches and is measured from the ground up to the point between the shoulder blades called the "withers" at the base of the neck. And if I told you I had a 22 hand high horse you could laugh because the world record high horse was an English Shire Horse foaled in 1850 that measured 21.5 hands high or 86 inches. Sixteen hands high is considered quite tall for a modern horse.
But now for the trivia lover's question: what was the name of Festus' mule in Gunsmoke?
(The answer is "Ruth") and the name of U.S. Grant's horse in the Civil War? (The answer is "Cincinnatus").
4. Most of us Texans and poker players the world over know that Wild Bill Hickock was shot in the back of the head by Jack McCall while playing five card draw in a poker game in Deadwood Gulch South Dakota and I'll even bet that most of you know what hand he was holding when he was killed. What was it?
Answer–He was holding two aces and two eights which is almost universally called "a deadman's hand" in poker. But the real trivia nuts will want to know what was the fifth card in his hand? ( it was the jack of diamonds)
5. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse as explained in Revelations 6th Chapter appear on four horses of different color . The rider of the black horse carries a set of scales, the rider of the white carries a bow and a crown, the rider of the red horse carries a sword. But what does the rider of the pale horse carry?
Answer: Nothing. The significance of the four horsemen of the Apocalypse has been explained to me several times by as many different people and I am not sure that I have ever really understood what any one of the people was trying to say so in about fifteen minutes before I go to bed I am going to read the sixth chapter of Revelations once again and see if it all becomes clear in my mind. Don't wait up for me to call and explain it all to you.
Now just so you won't think that I am cheating I did not make all this up. I got it from a book called "Did The Corinthians Ever Write Back?"by Ken Weber which is a most interesting book .
And just so you will know we don't really know whether the Corinthians ever wrote back or not
or where they sent their answer if they did. It is a fun book.
Love
Dad, Granpa, ami
|
|
|
|
