Football

Last weekend I went to my nephew, Jared's football game.  I got invited to the game and this is America, so I get an opinion.My first question to Jared after the game was, "Are you afraid to, don't want to, or just can knock the kick across from you down?"  He said that he knocked him over twice.  I didn't see it.  Jared is a big kid and plays offensive line.  I have him circled below with the kid that he was lined up across from.  Yes, that would be the kid who is half his size and a full helmet shorter than him.  Watching number 77 in action was incredibly frustrating.  

 I have offered number 77, $20 if he get a personal foul penalty.  He needs to get some aggression.  I heard the ref yell at two kids to knock if off after the play, but he didn't yell at Jared.  I know that he hits his sisters harder than he hits the kids on the field who are wearing pads.

I will be at the next game on the 6th and I will bring my video camera.  And I will put together a montage of Jared's "pancakes" and post it here.

Thermostat

Here is a new money saving idea, that I came up with.  I am going to try to make it until Halloween without turning my heat on.  Originally I wanted to make it to Thanksgiving, but that might be hard to do.  But if I do make it to Halloween, then I will push for Thanksgiving.

Free TV

I am throwing out my old big screen TV.  It doesn't really work any more.  But if you want it, you can have it.  It will need some repair work.  When you turn it on, it turns off right away.  Other than that, it is a fine TV that takes up a ton of space.

Elvis

Friday night I went to see the 3 Faces of Elvis show at the Pabst Theater with my friend, Kristin.  It was pretty good.  I scored 3rd row seats dead center.  Pretty much the best seats in the house.  The early Elvis was pretty good.  The middle Elvis was the worst of the 3, probably because he wasn't that good looking of a guy.  He also couldn't pull off the black leather suit.  And it didn't even look like it was leather, more like fake leather.  There was something about his pants that just didn't look right.  But obviously my favorite is the 70's fat Elvis.  I was a bit disappointed by the white jump suit.  I really wanted the Aloha Concert white cape with the eagle on the back.  I mean can't you just badazzle a cape.  Show me some effort.  I am glad I went and it was a lot of fun.  Here is some video from the show.  Young Elvis and Jailhouse Rock

 

Here is "Comeback" Elvis, check out the pants, they just don't look right.

Fat Elvis getting into it.

I wore my Elvis glasses to the concert.  I decided that I was going to throw them up on stage for 70s fat Elvis.  Here he is wearing my glasses.  Although he never did play "You Gave Me A Mountain".

Happy 75th Birthday

Saturday was my dad’s 75^th birthday.  And while he has had some pretty good birthday parties, this surely was one of the most memorable.  I had purchased a fairly large amount of fireworks for the 4^th of July which I had not been able to light off.  What better occasion to light them off, than my father’s birthday.  And both of my parents had given me permission to do so.  Around 8:30 – 9:00 I started lighting them off, and I have to admit it was a pretty impressive display.  Right afterwards I walked to the house and through the garage to see my father in the driveway talking to one of Waukesha County’s finest Sheriffs.  I felt it was duty to intervene.  I explained to the officer that my father was very hard of hearing and that I the one was responsible for the fireworks.  He informed me that he was going to give me a citation and asked me and my father to follow him down the driveway to his squad car at the end.  As we were walking, the officer informed me that it was a pretty impressive display and that he purposely waited until it was over before he started asking questions. I stopped at my truck to grab my ID.  Of course the first ID I gave him was my fake Gene Simmons ID.  

The Gene Simmons ID didn’t go over quite as well as I had hoped.  The officer ran my ID and my father’s and nothing came up.  I got something of a lecture about fireworks.  He asked if I had a permit, and I said that I did to purchase them, even though I didn’t.  Then he asked if I had a permit to light them off.  I told him that I didn’t and that I had done some research, but to get a permit you need a written letter from both the village president and the fire chief, neither of which would happen.   He mentioned that he had not received any complaints but that the village president lived in a nearby subdivision and wasn’t a fan of fireworks.  He decided to let me off with a warning, which between me, you and the lamppost will not deter me from lighting of fireworks in the future in any way.  But the best part of the party was yet to come.  The officer left, and my dad and I started our triumphant walk back up to the party.  I stopped off to put my ID back in my truck while my dad continued up to the house, where everyone in attendance greeted him by singing “Happy Birthday”.

Camping on the Mississippi

It was a pretty action packed weekend for me this past weekend.  And it started early.  It was my annual camping trip to an island in the middle of the Mississippi River.  As always it was a great time, but there are always bumps along the way.  The first bump came as soon as we got to the launch.  I met Eric and Nate there at around 4:00.  Eric’s parents had just given him their boat which had been in storage for 8 years.  I will give Eric some credit, and he did his due diligence with some maintenance prior to the trip.  The first trip to the island consisted for just Nate and Eric with the majority of Nate and Eric’s stuff with the exception of their coolers.  I stayed at the launch to help Eric with the next load.  When Eric returned to the launch, he mentioned that he heard an odd noise and upon investigation to the engine compartment we found more water than should have been normal.  We pulled the boat out and determined that the radiator petcock was broken.  It was at this time that Mike and Tim showed up.  Knowing that Eric’s boat was out of commission, Mike and Tim drove 30 minutes to Mike’s dad’s house to get his boat.  I drove to the nearest town (Galesville) to see if I could find a radiator petcock.  When I got there the store was closed.  Dejected, I went to the nearest dive bar and had a beer.  I think I finally got out onto the island by 8:30 that night, 4.5 hours after I arrived at the launch.  But this also left Nate on the island by himself without any firewood or his cooler which included all of his beverages.  A late start onto the island meant a late start on dinner.  We didn't eat until well after midnight.  

   

This was kind of funny.  Friday night while a group went to the launch to get firewood, Mike and I grabbed a 20 foot long fuse and rigged up packages of blackcats every foot and buried it under everyone's chairs around the fire.  Unfortunately I lit the fuse too early and as it burned the smoke came up from the sand and we were found out.  I should have waited until around midnight to light it.

Friday morning it rained, but that was alright with me, that just meant that I could sleep a bit longer.  The skies cleared by late morning.  There wasn’t much done with the day.  I had purchased some model rocket engines and made some sky worthy rockets out of the remains of the fireworks that were used the night before.   I also came up with the bright idea to also make some rockets out of roman candles that had yet to be launched.  But the rocket of the day was one fashioned out of a roman candle tube that was about 3 inches in diameter and 3 feet long with a “G” engine in it.  

 Here is video of the launch.

I also launched an old model rocket that I had, which went floating back down to earth managed to get blown off course and into a tree on the island. 

Saturday I was scheduled to leave to attend my father’s 75^th birthday party.  More to come on that party.  On Saturday morning, Bob had decided that he was going to go climb the tree to retrieve my rocket.  He was gone for about 15 or 20 minutes when we heard some yelling.  We couldn’t really hear what he was yelling and didn’t pay much attention to it.  Another 10 minutes later Bob came back to the camp all bruised up.  Turns out he fell out of the tree.  His arm was pretty scraped up as well as his back. Bob estimated his fall to be about 20 – 25 feet.  About 30 minutes later, pain was really starting to set in and Bob decided that maybe it was time to go to the hospital.  He needed help getting out of his chair and couldn’t sit down once he got in the boat.  Turns out it was quite the fall, 3 broken vertebrae and 2 broken ribs.  To be honest, this group had been playing with house money for a while now, and we were overdue for a trip to the hospital or morgue.  But Bob was a trooper and he came back to the island Saturday night.  And from this incident came the nickname Brokeback Bob.

Chuck Norris

Labor Day Football

Sunday of Labor Day weekend I went to my sister's house for dinner.  We got some backyard football in.  I had some rather eye popping stats from the afternoon.  21 touchdown, no interceptions.  

Here is Boomer relaxing on the field.

 And what good field General doesn't do so without a beer in his hand?

 Hollywood with a Usain Bolt pose.

 I don't know what Crusher is doing in this one.

 Not the greatest form, but pretty good with a beer in your hand.

 Boomer how big was the fish that you caught?

 This is a Boomer touchdown catch.

 Princess cutting across the middle.

 Hollywood celebrating a 4 and out.

 I must have instructed the kids 5 or 6 times on where the side lines were, marked by cones, but they all seemed to run straight out of bounds whenever they caught the ball.

 Here is a picture demonstrating that I am telling Princess not to run out of bounds.

Fly pattern on two.

And there is Hollywood who seems to think that every game is the Super Bowl.  If he loses, he cries.  I hope for his sake that he grows out that soon.

 After football, Crusher, our Eagle scout in training, was given the task of getting the fire going.  He could only have one match.  Crusher didn't disappoint, he got that fire going without a problem.  Crusher will be in charge of the fire at my parent's house this coming Saturday, but I told him that he had to get it started by rubbing sticks together. By the way, any loyal blog readers that are interested, my father turns 75 on Saturday.  There is a party at my parent's house, leave a comment and I will put you on the guest list.

 I asked Crusher if there was a fire badge in the boy scouts.  He said no, that there was only a fire safety badge.  I was never a boy scout, but I would think the first badge you should get would be the fire badge.