Goose Me!

Working a crossword puzzle and got down to just 6 blanks.  Clue for the shorter of the 2 words, "flock of geese."  Blank blank blank I N -- my only idea "gaggle" would not do.

Looked it up on Wikipedia.  I did not know that a gaggle of geese is only a flock on the ground.

Skein - that's the word of my day!  It's a group of geese flying.  Which could also be called a team or a wedge of geese.   But not flying too close together because then those geese would be a plump.

Who gnu?

So now I was left with only one more set of 3 blanks, which were followed by the letters:

          BIDAVIDSMALL...the clue was Harry Kemelman sleuth.

I had no idea, but I sure thought the answer had to be BAMBI DAVID SMALL.  No other name I could think of ended with BI.

Of course I was dead wrong, the sleuth's name, er, title is RABBI.  So I learned something else today.
I learned that someone needs to write some mystery novels with someone named Bambi as the protagonist!

Baseball Players work on Labor Day

Also working this Monday:  the folks who work at the Chicago Transit Authority.  People who sell tickets at Wrigley Field.  The beer vendors and the ushers who throw out the 3 guys in the right field bleachers who drink too much and shout obscenities.  The guys who sell the $4.25 bottles of water.  The gals who sell $6.25 hot dogs.  The EMTs on stand-by in the stands.  The umpires and radio and TV announcers, police-people blocking traffic.  Fast food workers at Dairy Queen and McDonalds in Dwight and Channahon.

All these people working, and more, who made it possible for us to relax and enjoy this:

 

and this

 

 

while we were here

 

 

 

How did this happen?

I find myself happily at home on Friday night ... surprisingly all by myself for a couple hours!  This never happens.  Well, until now.

J-dude and The Player are out playing Frisbee golf.  This will take some time, as J-dude has coerced er, convinced The Player to play 18 holes.  Sisi is at a friend's house at a Friday night event called "dinner and a movie."  I think there is frozen pizza and a DVD, and 2 of her good school friends who just found out today that they are in the same class this year.  And they have J-dude's former 5th grade teacher.  Sisi has never had the same teacher as her brother until this year.  I think it will be just fine for her. 

This teacher is the one who had an unfortunate mispronunciation of 'Homo Sapiens' in J-dude's class...homo say penis.  According to J-dude after she read it aloud that way and the class started snickering, she simply put her head down on her desk and said nothing for quite some time.

O boy.

And how did THIS happen:

Alfonso Soriano played somewhat above average but not spectacular baseball for many years as a Cub.  A few weeks ago he got traded to The Yankees.  And now he has set a near record for RBIs in 2 games...he had 13 RBIs in 2 games, second most in major league baseball history. 

Why not with the Cubs?  Oh...people have to be on base ahead of you to get RBIs...yeah, that's right.

It's hard to watch a player go elsewhere and shine like that.  But that's part of being a Cubs fan.

Farmer Brown, Dorothy, and Terra Cotta Pots

Farmer Brown: 

I was all set to blog about how I met some friendly strangers today.  And I will definitely get to that topic later, but just as I sat down to blog I decided to turn on the telly and I happened upon the BBC World News Program where there was a short bit about Farmer Brown.

Farmer Brown lives in the US, in Virginia to be specific.  He has been a tobacco farmer.  But for a lot of good reasons, he sees that might not be the greatest future use of his land.  So he has turned to farming...(drumroll please!)  ...Chick Peas!!  He has been travelling around Virgina trying to get other farmers interested in growing them and giving out samples of hummus.  One farmer seen to stick his finger in the container, swirl it around, then taste it said, "Not really my kind of thing.  But I'll grow anything!"

So how 'bout them apples garbanzoes?

Dorothy:

I went shopping for bras today.  Some of my blogging buddies will remember our trip to Vicki's Secrets years ago...yeah, I'm still wearing some of those.  It's been too long since I got some new underwire.  So today I stopped off at Kohl's after work.  I found a couple bras I liked and headed to the check out line with Dorothy behind the register.  Dorothy has been working at Kohl's since about the turn of the century.  Yeah, THAT century.  She is a happy person who could probably have retired about the time I graduated high school.  But she seems to like working at Kohls.  She asked me, of course, if I would be paying with my Kohls Card.

No, I will be paying with my debit card, thank you.  I answered.

You can all imagine the next part of the conversation.  Do you have a Kohl's Card?  Do you want a Kohl's Card?  Do  you know you can save a lot of money  with a Kohl's Card? 

My answers got sillier and sillier and her questions got sillier and sillier. 

At one point I said, "Dorothy, I think we need to take this show on the road."

We decided that we would head to Las Vegas and perform our comedy routine.  The audience, those that stay for the entire show, will have the "opportunity" to sign up for a Kohl's card at the end of the show!

Terra Cotta Pots

If you want to meet some friendly people and you don't live near Dorothy, you should go to your local thrift store and look for terra cotta pots.

If you buy them, you will be accosted by other friendly shoppers who wish they had seen them first.  "Where did you find those?"  "What are you going to do with them?"  "Are there any more?"

Warning:  Long conversations about mosaics and birdbaths and plants may ensue!

Farmer Brown Redux

The news item AFTER Farmer Brown was about the new Prince George Alexander Louis of Cambridge...that's how important them chick peas are.  O yea!

Summertime and the Lasering is Easy

My new "Native American" name is Takes Many Naps.  I worked hard to earn that name this week, on vacation in Holland, Michigan.  Napping on the beach, napping on the sunporch, anywhere except behind the wheel of the car, of course.

But my Laser Tag name yesterday at Lost City Laser Tag Arena was "Renegade."  At first I thought it was "Renegade Idiot" but J-dude pointed out that it was Renegade with ID and some numbers below the name.  So I felt better.

And it was the first time I ever played Laser Tag and I won, beating both my kids!  Who (unbeknownst to me until later) had formed an alliance and thought they were beating me by a lot of points.  Which they were, except for the fact that when we were in the briefing room (where we were briefed on the rules of laser tag by a young woman wearing camoflauge pants) I actually listened.  And I learned you could get a heckuva lotta points if you could destroy one of the two bases.  Or twice a heckuva lot if you got both of them.  So while the kids were hitting my jacket front back and shoulders over and over I destroyed the red base.  And got the kids a couple times, too. 

When the game was over the young woman wearing camoflauge pants told us the winner was Renegade.  Me, that's me!  I said.  The kids were, for the first time ever, stunned into silence.  Ha!

I did break one of the rules of laser tag, however.  Rule number 6 was "no bad language" and I distinctly remember hearing myself mutter Damn! once.  But Madamoiselle Camoflauge did not kick me out of the arena. 

The kids Laser names were Vortex and Quazar.

In college one of the men's dorm floors chose "Quasars" as their floor nickname.  They chose that because a million years ago before flat screen TVs, Motorola had a TV with an ad campaign that said "Quasars.  Our works are in our drawers."

Next time I hope my Laser Tag name will be Raquel Welch!

Pure Michigan 2013-style

This year we have rented a bigger house in Holland, walking distance to Lake Michigan.  The beach here is very nice, shallow for a long distance out.  We've swum, kayaked, played badminton, and gone for a bike ride.  We have watched movies at the house and also took advantage of one rainy afternoon to see Despicable Me 2.

We have read and read and read.  J-dude has watched lots of cable sports channels that I don't get at home. 

Something for everyone.

Today's highlight was a trip to pick blueberries.  We went to the Gold Barn Blueberry Farm, about a 5 minute drive away.  In about 20 minutes the kids and I had picked about 20 pints.  We froze some, ate some, saved a few to snack on today, and a pie is in the oven as I type this blog!!!  I have to say it was easier than shooting fish in a barrel.  Not that I would do that.  But I will definitely be going back to Gold Barn this week!!!

Tomorrow we will hit the Farmer's Market.  The rest depends on Mother Nature...

Chargers of the Light Brigade

My life has been overtaken.  It seems that I have more devices that need to be charged than my aging brain has memory slots for remembering the location of these items.

I have a charger for my cell phone.
I have a charger for my home laptop computer.
And for my work laptop computer of course.
Now I have a new item called a jetpack which I can fire up anywhere and get internet access for my work computer.  And it has a charger, too.

My Kindle has a charger.

My continuous glucose monitor has a charger.

Some of the chargers probably have chargers too but I can't recall.

On to the valley of confusion rode the six hundred.  Wikipedia tells us that the Charge of the Light Brigade refers to a battle called The Battle of the Balaclava....I like baklava!!!

I especially like baklava because it does not need a charger!

Cheers!