How to Speak Southern, Volume VI

LESSON 6:

Dadgummit: An expletive. Alternate, southern form of 'damn'. "Dadgummit! Bubba's done chased a skunk clean into a hole and stinks somethin' fierce now!"


No copyright. this didn't come from the book I have been quoting. For some bizarre reason this did not make into the Lexicon I have been quoting from. The authors must be Yanks pretending to be Proud South.

The Intimidator...

The World of Luke.

Luke is a very bright kid. But Luke is also hyperactive and impulsive. He gets his work done in school very easily and quickly and becomes quickly bored. Bored, hyper kid = LOTS of discipline problems. Add to that the fact that:

He never gets intimidated.

Dateline today. He has his very first football practice tonight, so he is very excited. He was high energy about it this morning already before school. Kelly just got a call from his teacher already at 12:30 today:

• not listening
• talking in class
• getting out of his seat
• been placed in the corner
• has to have "silent lunch"
• had to sit out of recess
• already has two "letters" today before lunch on Monday (1 letter=5 points deducted from weekly conduct grade)

His teacher tells Kelly that when she was going over some math concepts in class today, Luke was rifling through his desk and not listening to her...

She says, "Luke, because you are not listening that must mean that you think you already know how to do this."

"Yes ma'am."

She continues. "Now Luke, this is rounding to the thousandths. We've never done that before and you didn't do that in 2nd grade. Are you sure?"

"Yes ma'am."

And his teacher goes on. "OK. So if I went ahead and gave you the test right now then you would pass, right?"

"Yes ma'am."

The teacher keeps digging her hole deeper (thinking she is digging Luke's). "Now this won't be a practice test. This will be your test for the week and whatever your score is will count for your grade."

"OK."

She does not have the test ready.

BAM! He called her bluff. Now, the thing is, Luke was probably being honest in all his answers, truly thinking he already knew it and could pass the test. The thing is (which we can never admit to him), he's probably right. His teacher assumes that he cannot do something unless he has seen it first, rather than taking a concept he is familiar with (rounding) and extend that concept out to the next digit. The problem is this - we'll now never know.

By not having the test ready, we are now in a bad position. He still thinks he was right and justified in acting the way he was. His teacher will still look at him like all the other students, and assume he was just being nasty rather than being honest (and proving to her he probably could have done it). So she is already starting to see him as an attitude problem rather than a bright kid who needs more challenge.

And poor Luke just does not seem to see the inappropriateness of his behavior. We have gone over and over with him about this stuff - no talking in class, listen to your teacher at all times, don't talk in the hall, don't get out of your seat, yadda yadda yadda... Yet when he gets home after a hard day at school he sits in the floor crying not knowing exactly what he did that was so wrong...

I think this is just gonna be one of those issues that we are going to have to struggle with every year in school until one of Luke's teachers "gets him" and makes an effort to see WHY he acts the way he does (bright and bored vs. "attitude problem") and then works with him to challenge him...

In the mean time, he's gonna keep his teacher's hopping... and his conduct grades are going to keep dropping...

How to Speak Southern, Volume V

(Busy. Nothing else to post right now. More later.)

LESSON 5:

Comin' Up a Cloud: An approaching storm. "Stay close to the house. It's comin' up a cloud."


Copyright 1976 by Steve Mitchell and Sam C. Rawls

How to Speak Southern, Volume IV

(Busy. Not much going on. Nothing else to post right now.)

LESSON 4:

Break Bad: To behave in a violent, wanton, or outrageous manner for no discernible reason. "Ol' Bill broke bad last night and wound up in jail."


Copyright 1976 by Steve Mitchell and Sam C. Rawls

Space Giraffe tutorial video...

As you may or may not know, I have been a big Jeff Minter fan for years. Jeff was put on tap to design the NEON visualizer for the Xbox 360 media player, and just finished and released Space Giraffe for Xbox Live Arcade. Unfortunately, the game has been getting fairly ripped by a lot of people because they just don't "get it". It definitely pays homage to Tempest, and it seems that some people are playing it just like Tempest, which makes the game rather boring (plus these people likely are not of the old arcade days where the only goal was to get the high score... so again, they just don't "get it"). Minter's game design is an acquired taste and his games are fairly esoteric. One of the biggest complaints I have heard about the game is that they just didn't know exactly what they were supposed to do and that the tutorial was not explanatory enough (and I must admit I kind of feel the same way). But I just noticed on the Yak Yak message boards (Jeff's official message boards for Llamasoft) a mention of a tutorial done by a user over on You Tube. Here you go:




Now two things I myself noted after watching the video:

1. I was actually doing some of it right when I tried it out...LOL
2. I thought you could only "bull" enemies when you had a jump pod, but evidently you can do it anytime even without a jump as long as the powerbar is extended. It is not actually the jump that allows you to "bull" enemies; rather, it is the fact that jumping extends the powerbar which allows you to "bull" the baddies and boost your score multiplier. Good to know, and not something I thought was made very clear in the tutorial of the game.

Just FYI for those interested.

How to Speak Southern, Volume III

LESSON 3:

Bad Off: Desperately in need of; also, extremely ill. 1. "Is that Valley of the Dolls?! You must be bad off for something to read." 2. "Jim's in the hospital. He's bad off."


Copyright 1976 by Steve Mitchell and Sam C. Rawls

How to Speak Southern, Volume II

LESSON 2:

Attair: Contraction used to indicate the specific item desired. "Pass me attair gravy, please ma'am!"


Copyright 1976 by Steve Mitchell and Sam C. Rawls

Finally Vick gets his own doghouse...

(I was gonna find a pic to go along with this post, but no matter what I looked at, I just felt it would have been in poor taste.)

I was a big Vick fan. Not a Koolaid-drinking, blind-faith spouting, rabid fan, but rather an admirer of the man's obvious athletic talent.

And I hope I never see him in a football uniform ever again.

Not NFL. Not CFL. Not Arena Football League. Not the European Football League. Not even McMahon's old XFL.

Vick used his power and money to build and develop his own dogfighting compound, financed it, and evidently not only appeared at the fights themselves, but also participated in the sacrificing and execution of innocent dogs.

There is no excuse for what he did, and it has infuriated me over the last several months as I have listened to him spout all kinds of spin-control crap. He stated out talking about how he's such an animal lover and could never do anything like this. Then he is quote saying no matter where he goes in the world, "Mike Vick" is always going to get the support of his fans. Now that he has accepted a plea agreement, you don't here him saying anything about retracted all the flat out lies he has been spouting for the last several months.

One thing I am glad of: The Power of Celebrity appears to be tarnishing. Vick's going to prison for at least 12 months and is likely done forever in his gravy train that is the NFL. Other celebrities (Paris Hilton, Lindsey Lohan, etc.) are actually stating to get jail time. Yeah, nothing compared to what Vick will get or deserves, but at least celebrities are actually getting SENTENCED and not just sent to some posh "rehab facility." Is their treatment equal to us "common people" yet? Not even close. But maybe our society is just getting fed up with these elitist celebrity idiots. We can only hope.

Hey Mike. Hope you can run and juke in jail like you can on the football field, 'cos you're gonna be running for your life in there.

Good.

How to Speak Southern, Volume I

So I have often noticed that when I am gaming with a bunch of my friends, nearly all of whom either...

1. live north of the Mason-Dixon Line
2. live in the South but are transplanted Yankees
3. live in Florida (which in many Deep South circles is not even considered "South" due to the constant influx of Northern Snow Birds)

...they always make a comment when I say something like "Dad-gum!" when I die in the game... obviously unfamiliar with the eloquent and colorful vernacular of the denizens of the Kudzu Belt...

So I thought I would start educating my Northern friends about the meaning of some Southern phrases... Now I will not plagiarize these, they are pulled from a book entitled, How to Speak Southern, by Steve Mitchell. The dedication reads: "

This book is dedicated to all Yankees in the hope that it will teach them how to talk right."

LESSON 1:

Ahmoan: An expression of intent. "Ahmoan have a drink. Want one?"

I plan on adding one every day just for kicks... This book is written like a dictionary, so there are TONS to choose from. I will try and pick the highlights for y'all...

That being done... Ahmoan go get me something to drink and play Xbox 360. Later.

Copyright 1976 by Steve Mitchell and Sam C. Rawls

The Proof is in the Poop...

Ahhh, the frantic days of after-school-homework-time. Luke needs to study spelling words, Connor needs to read. Mitchell just wants to decompress his sensory-sensitive body and mind by stripping his clothes off and curling up with Over The Hedge on the widescreen. As I get the boys engaged in their work, I attempt to do my own after-work chores.....clean up breakfast dishes, go through backpacks, sign school papers, switch the laundry from the dryer to the basket, washer to the dryer, and hamper to the washer.

At some point, I hear the dreaded call from upstairs, "MOM, THE TOILET IS OVERFLOWING!!" Of course the call doesn't come until I can actually hear the water falling onto the bathroom floor in the boys' bathroom. I run upstairs and there is murky water and soggy paper flooding the floor and seeping into the carpet in the hall. I frantically turn off the valve at the back and look up to see Connor and Luke standing at the door in the hall just staring. I scream, "Get me some towels!" They run to the linen closet and as I'm bent over picking up the soggy bath mat I can see them out of the corner of my eye just standing there. I realize that I must not have given enough instruction and they do not know what to do with towels in light of a water emergency. Now, remember, they are 11 and 8. So, I give more instructions. "Throw the towels on the wet floor!!" It was then that I realized they had gotten about 6 hand towels. Not much help. At least it stopped the 2 inches of water from continuing to soak the carpet in the hall.

"Go get my mop and bucket from the kitchen!" I knew this would be easy for them to find because the mop and bucket are a standard fixture in our kitchen. Connor was the first to respond. He runs downstairs, but it certainly seems it is taking him longer than expected to return. Now, I realize that time can seem to stand still as one is standing in......well, you know. I peak my head around the corner and see him standing on the stairs watching Over The Hedge. "CONNOR!" I scream. "Oh, sorry Mom. Sorry," as if he completely forgot why he was coming up the stairs with a mop and bucket.

At some point, during and after cleaning up I began the investigation. "Who forgot to flush the toilet? Our toilets are the water-saver kind so they don't suck really well. It is absolutely necessary that each time you 'go', the toilet gets flushed. Who forgot to flush?"

Amazingly, no one admitted to making their "deposit" and then simply walking away. "It wasn't me, Mom. I promise." "I haven't even been in that bathroom in days." "I think it was probably Mitch." Now, at the risk of sharing too much information, a mother knows what her children's "movements" look like. Some are long and thin, some are short and fat, some a certain color.....you know what I mean. I started noticing that there was yellow husk-looking material in what I was cleaning. Hmm. We had corn casserole last night. Connor and Mitch do not like corn. That leaves Sean, Luke and I.........which narrowed down my list of suspects. I gave Sean the benefit of the doubt, counted myself out, which left Luke.

"Luke, I believe you are the culprit. First of all, Mitch did his "job" after school today in the downstairs bathroom as soon as he got home. I know this because I saw it. Second of all, Connor was coming in to do his "job" when he saw someone else had already beaten him to his bathroom and that is when he flushed and the mess here began. Thirdly, and most conclusively, you are the only one of the children who ate corn".....as I pointed to the floor. He dropped his head, face turning red and walked to his room. I think I watch too much CSI.......

Roz Savage...is this woman nuts or amazing!?

So just how absolutely amazingly freaking cool is this woman! First, she rows SOLO across the ATLANTIC OCEAN. Over 3,000 miles and 103 days at sea later, she made it.

Below is a quote straight from her website:

It was the year 2000, I was 33 years old, and I seemed to have the perfect life. I had a job, a husband, a home, a little red sports car.

In theory, I should have been happy.

Fast forward to March 2006. I am 38, divorced, homeless, and alone in a tiny rowing boat in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. My last hot meal was two months ago, before my camping stove broke. My stereo is bust. I’ve had no human contact since my satellite phone stopped working several weeks ago. All four of my oars are broken and I’ve had to patch them up with duct tape and makeshift splints. I have tendonitis in my shoulders and saltwater sores on my backside.

I have battled twenty-foot waves, sleep deprivation, self-doubt and depression. But I have never been happier.

They said I was crazy. They said I wasn’t big enough, not tall enough, not strong enough.

But at last, after three thousand miles and 103 days at sea, I am about to accomplish my goal. I am proving that anybody can achieve the extraordinary, if only they have enough guts and determination and sheer bloody-mindedness to see it through.

I am realizing my dream, one stroke at a time.

Oh, and by the way... yesterday, she started a new venture.... rowing across the Pacific Ocean! Can you believe this? And the cool thing is, she seems to be a techie as well. She blogs daily from her boat, the Brocade, has podcasts, and so on! It is really an interesting read, you shoudl check it out...

http://rozsavage.com

Why do we blog?

[DISCLAIMER: This post is in NO WAY an effort to get sympathy traffic or posts or comments or anything... just some of my own introspections....LOL]

I was asking some friends the other day about blogging, and if any of them still did it. I was trying to get updated on all my friend's blog feeds. Well, one said, and I quote:

"I have been kicking it around again, then I realize that I don't really care enough to...."

At first I thought it was just a funny quip in an effort to be the elitist humorist of the group (sorry, Rammy, had to slam you... you know I love you man! LOL), but then I started to think about it, and sure enough, it started to make me question and wonder this whole blogging thing.

As I sit here and think about it, there are several different categories of bloggers/blogs:

1. Those blogs written to disseminate information to the masses of people who are interested in that particular subject
2. Those blogs written in order to disseminate information in order to advance their agenda, influence opinion, or create doubt and mistrust in other organizations, etc....(i.e., whacked out conspiracy theory type stuff)
   
3. Those blogs written to disseminate news data on a timely, to-the-minute basis, to be more personalized and consistent with our "immediate gratification" culture
4. Those personal blogs written as an easy way for family and friends to stay in touch with one another
5. Those blogs written in order to have a good repository of information and stories to be stored "indefinitely" and having an easy location to recall events (i.e., stories about family, journaling, type stuff)
   
6. Those blogs written by people simply due to the "it's all about me" nature of our culture, written not to provide anyone with any information, but rather to simply say "Hey! Look at me! I exist! And I am worth looking at! Even to the point of doing and saying stupid things to get people to notice me!"
   

Though my goals when I started the blog (or so I thought) were #4 and #5, I am seriously beginning to doubt my motives. As you'll see from the site, very few comments are made by others. This seems to tell me that I am blowing smoke out my butt - kind of like the "tree falling in the woods but no one is around to hear" syndrome. If I am blogging posts and no one is around to comment, am I really communicating with others? I would say no. Which brings my blog, unfortunately and embarrassingly, to #6. Am I so shallow that I keep posting knowing it rarely gets looked at, just so than I can say, "Hey! Look at me! I exist! And am worth looking at!"

Sad, really.

Made even more sad by the fact that, even though this realization is slowly creeping up on me....

I still keep posting.

So in the end, what is worse? Having a friend who doesn't blog because he sees it as unimportant even though you'd like to hear from them on a regular basis, or continuing to blog yourself when it seems no one else cares or is interested?

Disturbia mini review

I gotta say, I thought this movie was great! I have become a big fan of Shia LaBeouf in some of his recent movies (The Greatest Game Ever Played, for example), and he definitely shines in this one! He has this amazing ability to display such range of emotion, humor, and vulnerability with such maturity and flexibility it belies his age. But then, he can show the
type of carefree and jovial personality that you would expect from someone his age. There is one amazingly tense scene where he shows such passionate and vulnerable emotions with only his eyes and the trembling of the muscles of his mouth (I won't spoil the scene for you)... He shows more emotion in that one scene than some actors (*cough*Keanu Reeves*cough*) show in
their entire careers...LOL


Anyway, I thought the movie was very well done and tense. It has been described as an updated teen-focused Alfred Hitchcock movie, and I would have to agree with that assessment. It has none of the slasher crap that most movies of this type have these days, where the only thing they try to do is constantly one-up each other with increasingly graphic and gory and bizarre killings. This movie shows no nudity (though close to it once), has very little language, and only typical teen hormone rages. Imagine if John Hughes did a horror movie... yep, high school angst combined with love story combined with tension, fear, and a serial killer. It was a really interesting blend of a lot of stuff and it all came off pretty well (though Shia's sidekick in the movie, Ronnie [played by Aaron Yoo], came off as out of his class when placed in with the rest of the cast). Props go to David Morse too. He has that uncanny ability as an actor to come off as polite, humble, unassuming, sinister, and simmeringly evil all at the same time. Some of his one on one interactions with Shia's (Kane) and Sarah Roemer's (Ashley) characters were WAYYY tense.

The movie had me on the edge of my seat for several scenes, and the acting (particularly by Shia and David) was top notch. All of this without the usual needless nudity and language typical of today's movies. All in all I HIGHLY recommend Disturbia.

Guy Rules....

My secretary forwarded this email to me a while back and thought I'd add it here... Guys are always getting the shaft and getting blamed for stuff. We are always being told that WE are being insensitive to the plight of the women around us and our spouses... Well has anyone thought about how woman are insensitive and inconsiderate of US?!

Guy's Rules

We always hear the "rules" from the female perspective. Now here are the rules from the male side of life.

These are our rules!

Please note... they are all numbered "1" on purpose!

1. Men are NOT mind readers.

1. Learn to work the toilet seat. You're a big girl. If it's up, put it down. We need it up, you need it down. You don't hear us complaining about you leaving it down, do you?

1. Sunday sports. It's like the full moon or the changing of the tides. Let it be.

1. Shopping is NOT a sport. And no, we are never going to think of it that way.

1. Crying is blackmail.

1. Ask for what you want. Let us be clear on this one. Subtle hints do not work! Strong hints do not work! Obvious hints do not work! Just say it already!

1. 'Yes' and 'No' are perfectly acceptable answers to almost every question.

1. Come to us with a problem only if you want help solving it. That's what we do. Sympathy is what your girlfriends are for.

1. A headache that last for 17 months is a problem. See a doctor.

1. Anything we said 6 months ago is inadmissible in an argument. In fact, all comments become null and void after 7 days.

1. If you won't dress like the Victoria's Secret girls, don't expect us to act like soap opera guys.

1. If you think you're fat, you probably are...Don't ask us.

1. If something we said can be interpreted two ways and one of the ways makes you sad or angry, we meant the other one.

1. You can either ask us to do something or tell us how you want it done, not both. If you already know best how to do it, just do it yourself.

1. Whenever possible, please say whatever you have to say during commercials.

1. Christopher Columbus did NOT need directions. Neither do we.

1. All men see in only 16 colors, like Windows default settings. Peach, for example, is a fruit, not a color. Pumpkin is also a fruit. We have no idea what mauve is.

1. If it itches, it will be scratched. We do that.

1. If we ask what is wrong and you say "nothing," we will act like nothing is wrong. We know you are lying, but it is just not worth the hassle.

1. If you ask a question you don't want an answer to, expect an answer you don't want to hear.

1. When we have to go somewhere, absolutely anything you wear IS fine....Really.

1. Don't ask us what we're thinking about unless you are prepared to discuss such topics as baseball, the shotgun formation, or golf.

1. You have enough clothes.

1. You have to many shoes.

1. I am in shape. Round IS a shape.

1. thank you for reading this. Yes, I know, I have to sleep on the couch tonight... but did you know that men don't really mind that? It's like camping.

Now, I will freely admit that a lot of these don't apply to Kel... she's one in a million and not into most of the (what she feels is stupid) girly girl woman attitude and mind games that can go on in a relationship. So now that I have given that caveat, maybe I WON'T have to sleep on the couch tonight. I don't like camping.

Motorcycles accidents, God, and prayer...

Hey guys, sometimes you just have to sit back and watch what God can do. As some of y'all know, I am very involved in Promise Keepers, a Christian men's evangelistic and discipleship movement. For the last year I have become a volunteer for PK as an Ambassador, and have met some absolutely fantastic men of God. though I took a bunch of guys to the PK even in Mobile, AL, back in June, a bunch of my fellow Georgia PK guys went to the Columbia, SC, event last weekend. Monday night I got an email from Hal Taylor, our Eastern PK Ambassador representative who i have had the pleasure to meet on a couple of occasions. Below is the first email I received:

I want to thank you guys for being men of prayer. We need you tonight!!! While coming home from the Columbia event 4 of our ambassadors who arrived on motorcycles we struck by a car and 2 of them are in critical condition. We need you guys to start praying right away!

Mike and Bob please get this news out to the ambassadors in the Mid and Western US for us!

I will be driving down to Macon Ga. in the morning where they were taken for surgery. I will let you know how they are doing!

Satan never rests long after joy rocks hell like it did this weekend!!! But he is defeated and we all know it! He can’t rob our joy!!!

I have been in prayer for our guys since then, and just last night received this wonderful follow up email from Hal describing in more detail what happened and how God surrounded these men with powerful and prayerful brothers and sisters in Christ and just the right mix of people to help them in their most dire time of need....

Guys!

God is great!!! This has been a story of miracles.

Our brothers hit a car going 55 miles an hour without pressing the brakes. They struck the car with 2 passengers (one who was 2 months pregnant) who were turning into their AME church for services. They hit the car so hard that it moved the car 15 feet. Both passengers were OK as well as the baby.

The congregation heard the crash and came running out to assist. In the crowd there were 3 EMT’s and a minute later a vacationing doctor from North Carolina who was “sight seeing” on the back roads of Ga. arrived on scene. All gloved up and started administering medical attention immediately. All the while the parishioners began laying on hands and praying all around them. They said they had church all over the highway.

It never ceases to amaze me how we never see race in time of crisis and emergency. Heaven watched while an African American church ministered to the souls and bodies of white men laying in the middle of an almost forgotten highway in the deep south. Angels stood to cheer as the two groups, one in shorts and the other in suits, stood arm in arm and petitioned for God’s intervention. The power of God’s healing was unleashed during the faith driven prayers of the unified brothers and sisters in Christ normally separated by race.

On August 5th, 2007 Sunday afternoon the sight that was witnessed by heaven was also witnessed by hell. God allowed the enemy to do his worst and then all of eternity watched as God’s children did their best. The Father’s greatness was being observed in an event that Satan wished for evil. God turned it and used it for His own glory!!!

The names of the men in the accident this week are

Mike Podskoc- Severely broken leg with multiple fractures and crushed heal/ other numerous injuries, he has steel rods in leg and hardware in his ankle. They are (surgeries yet needed, still in hospital) room 539

Eric Armor- Had a brain bleed that this afternoon has stopped bleeding. Other various broken bones (doctor released this evening at 6:00pm) this was a major miracle

Mike Wade- many bumps and bruises (released today)

Jay Henson- many bumps and bruises (released today)

Medical Center Of Central Georgia
777 Hemlock St
Macon, GA
31201-2155
478-633-1000

I don't care what anyone says, God can use anything, no matter how seemingly dark and dangerous and scary, to glorify His name and bring people together of ANY race, nationality, background, or whatever. I just thought this was an amazing story, and just wish I had been able to be there to be part of it all. My prayers still go out to all these guys, especially Mike (who I met recently at a PK Ambassador retreat) who still sounds like he has a long road ahead of him.

If so inclined, I'd appreciate it if you included these guys in your prayers for continued healing. Thanks.

River trip 2007 Slideshow...

River Trip 2007.... Paddle Faster, I Hear Banjos...




I'd write more, but I am tired and have reports to write for work tomorrow. Suffice it to say, it was another great trip. No bad weather at all and the only problem was the new guys running out of gas because they wouldn't listen to people telling them to fill completely up the last morning of the trip. Luckily we only had to tow them in the last mile or two. Great bunch of guys! Lots of bad jokes, old jokes, old stories, confederate and SEC college football history stories, and general good ol' Southern Redneck fun! And only about 5 or 6 alligators to deal with this year...LOL

I promise y'all... when I can afford my own boat and take my own crew, y'all (and you know who you are) will have an open invitation to partake in classic redneck river fun!

Oh, and by the way, sorry about the quality of some of the pics... they were all taken with my Treo, which ain't the best cameraphone in the world...LOL

Chattahoochee, baby!

Well, in T-minus 3 hours, 32 minutes I will be heading out for the annual "River Trip". This year we are doing our standby trip, the Chattahoochee (we've done the Tennessee and Alabama rivers in the past).

What the River Trip is not:

• We don't canoe.
• We don't go down rapids in rafts.
• We don't ski.
• We don't fish.
• We don't camp in tents.
  

What the River Trip is:

• Bunch of guys.
• Boats.
• Beer.
• Bad Jokes.
  
• Power boats.
• Sand bars.
• Riverside motels.
• Hamburger steak in the evening.

We have had a couple of motto's for the River Trip over the years.....

• What Goes Down, Stays Down.
• The River Trip: Doing Men Things in a Manly Way.
• (and the unofficial one that no one has been brave enough to put on a t-shirt):
• Chicks Dig Guys Who Go Down On The 'Hooch...

The trip has definitely dwindled and become more sedate over the years (they've been doing this for 25 years or so), however. Whereas the trips used to involve 8-10 boats full of guys (and on occasion the bailing out of one of them before the trip could start), the numbers and activities have dwindled as the guys get older. I keep telling my dad who is the main organizer of the trip now that they need to infuse the trip with younger guys to liven it up, but no luck so far. Guess that won't happen until I can afford to buy my own boat and bring my own "crew". Now the tip consists mainly of tooling down the river at a leisurely pace, hitting every good sandbar along the bank to relax in the water, tell bad jokes, and hear stories that my dad tells every stinkin' year about all the stuff that happened on past River Trip's (most of which we are all present for anyway...LOL).

The trip really is a blast though. I am not really into the whole "get stinking drunk and get arrested" thing like some of the old gang used to do years ago anyway....LOL... It is really just a time for guys who have to be upstanding citizens all year (business owners, attorneys [including the D.A.], sheriffs, doctors, etc.) to just kick back, relax, and be a guy. We have always done a three day trip:

• Head down to Eufaula, AL, on Thursday afternoon
• Put in the water Friday morning and head all the way to Apalachicola, FL by Friday evening (trust me, that is a HAUL...not much sand bar hopping on Friday)
• Head back from Apalachicola on Saturday morning and come halfway back upstream to Lake Seminole on the GA/FL border
• Come on back to Eufaula, AL, on Sunday, get out, unload, and head home.

Last year and this year, though, we are only doing a two-day trip... only go halfway on Friday to Lake Seminole, then head back to Eufaula on Saturday. It is a more laid back, relaxing trip because you aren't hauling your butt on the river from 9 am til 8 pm on Friday to make it all the way to Apalachicola. Those Fridays' could be rough, especially if anyone had any boat trouble...still both my dad and I kind of miss the long haul days...

Anyway, some of y'all need to come with me on this trip one of these days... Heck, some of you are already close by, and I know there are others that would fly down for something like this.... And you all know who you are...LOL Network connectivity is an issue on the river, but I will try to post some stuff while on the river if I can...

Oh, and by the way, these are the kinds of things you can run into on the Chattahoochee or in either Lake Eufaula or Lake Seminole if you don't keep your eyes open...Yes, that is a deer it its mouth. Welcome to the River Trip, baby!

The Camping Vacation

So, summer is almost over and we haven't really done much in the way of a family vacation. So, because we have a bunch of boys who like to play outside, I talk Sean into going camping. We pick a state park in Birmingham because that's where my sister and her husband live with their four kids, so we figure we'd have more fun squeezing 11 people into a 10-man tent than just 5.

The planning begins. First of all, I have to do a tent repair on one of the tent door zippers that Connor broke. Then comes all the lists of what each family is bringing so we do as little duplication as possible. The forecast calls for thunderstorms all three days, but we decide to chance it anyway. But, just to be on the safe side, everything is packed in plastic tubs and bags because there's no way all our gear is going to fit inside the tent with 11 folks if it does rain.

I probably should mention that neither family are avid, experienced campers and we have little to no camping gear either. So, our adventure begins. We show up at the park and they tell us there is a limit of 8 people per camp site. Hmmmm. So, I say "We only have one tent. Does that mean that 3 people have to sleep on the dirt next to us to get eaten up with mosquitos all night?" Since 3 of our campers are 6 years old and under, they let us slide.

Before we even get everything unloaded, Mitch takes off for what he can see as water through the trees. The rest follow and end up playing in a muddy bog before we even set up camp. We walk down a little farther and see a small beach area where some of the water is roped off for swimming. All 7 of the kids are water bugs, so that is where we spent the majority of our time...especially since it never rained and the temperature was in the 90's.

I wont bore you with any more details of the trip, but suffice it to say I am a bit more experienced at this whole camping thing. As a result, I am compiled myself a list of important things to remember the next time we decide to embark on another camping adventure.

1. 11 people can drink a whole heck-of-a-lot of water in 3 days....even when one is drinking mostly breast milk and another prefers Mellow Yellow and GatorAid.
2. Canadian nightcrawlers will disintegrate into mush if not kept in the cooler.
3. Check carefully for rocks at the tent site before putting down the tent. Somehow a small pebble becomes a boulder when you're sleeping on it.
4. Squirrels like powdered lemonade in those little single serving "sticks" that you pour into bottled water.
5. Crocks do not cause blisters as bad as flip flops.
6. Even when the forecast calls for rain, don't forget the sunscreen.
7. Kids like playing in fires even when it's 100 degrees.
8. Grown-ups go camping ONLY because their kids think it's the coolest thing in the world.
9. Fish like to nibble on freckles and moles.
10. You can never have too much light. There's not much to do sitting around in the dark.
    

All in all, it was a great trip....even though Sean ended up sleeping in his truck the last night, the wimp. Next time we'll add an air mattress to our gear.

Michael Yon Online...

Well, this is long overdue...

I have heard of Michael Yon for months. He is a freelance journalist/blogger who is embedded with US Forces. For the left-leaning folks out there, he is not your typical mainstream liberal media always down on the war. The mass media political Left is so anti-war that it almost seems as if they want to undermine our troops even when there are signs the troop surge is actually working. There was even a Democratic congressman from either North or South Carolina that was asked about the latest reports from journalists that the troop surge is having positive effects. When asked what affect this would have, he literally said "it would be bad for us [the Democratic Party]." How can anyone root for the troops to lose?!

Anyway, Michael's blog gives what I think is a more down-to-the-minute, on-the-ground view of what is going on over there rather than what we have been used to - mainstream media agenda and bias - and I think is a good read. Though I have known about it for sometime, I have only just started to read it. Definitely an interesting read. You all oughta check it out... both the lefties and righties... interesting stuff!