No rest for the weary.

Not only did I have to drive to San Saba on Friday, to make up for one of the days I missed fishin' the other week, but there was a Rodeo Parade in San Saba on Saturday. My buddy John and his family were gonna be riding mules (they raise and sell them) in the parade, and then there was gonna be a cook-out at John's place.

I'd told my other buddy Dave, who I teach with in Florence, and he'd pitched the idea that he bring a few of his horses up and that we both ride with John in the parade. Best laid plans...



It turned out that Dave had truck trouble, and couldn't haul his horses all the way to San Saba. He could have brought one, but that wouldn't have been as much fun, so we ended up just planting our folding chairs under some tall trees by the big bank in town and waited for John and them to ride by. As you can see here, he brought his son Ryan, and Ryan's girlfriend Jennifer. Denise came with me, but she's in the witness protection program.



The parade was nice. It wasn't as long and drawn out as the Fourth of July parade in Belton, but it had the same country feel to it.



One of the great things we noticed was as the floats went by, the folks in the trucks would toss candy out onto the street. The little kids would dart out into the road to pick it up. Yea, yer thinkin' "Uh, isn't that unsafe?" Well folks, this here's San Saba, and the whole thing was as safe as can be.



We even had Zorro on patrol, in a rented Batman costume. He was advertisin' a local Mexican food place called Pepperbelly's. Yep, Pepperbelly's. Remember, this is San Saba, out in the middle of nowhere, Hill Country of Texas, and folks are less likely to be easily offended. And you know, if they are offended, they get over it.



Eventually, John (far right) and his mules came near. The wagon with the yellow wheels was going to advertise the liquor store that he and his wife Elizabeth own.



But when the time came for the money shot, my camera's auto-focus pooped out on me. I had a hell of a time with my old camera Saturday. You can see in some of these shots, an unfocused haze around the edges of the shot. Pissed me off no end, and made me wish I'd remembered to bring the new one.



All I got was a clear shot of his mule's ass as he rode on, after tellin' us where to meet them after the parade.



We ended up driving out into the country, south of San Saba, and relocating the party to John and Elizabeth's back yard, which is covered by oak trees, shielding you from much of the summer heat.



I walked around and got a few pictures like this one, from a flower in one of their little ponds. It's a beautiful place, with all sorts of animals runnin' around. There were dogs, cats, chickens, guinea fowl, goats, llamas, mules and horses. And that was just a hint of the number of animals they have out there. What with bein' a full time guard out at the prison, AND runnin' the liquor store in town, now I really see why John is always so damn busy.



While we just sat around talking, I took my crock pot full of queso into the kitchen and heated it up, and Denise whipped up a batch of her Southern Comfort Punch. While we ate and drank, John got the fire going. After a while, the rest of the family arrived. The conversations became more animated, and John started heating up the corn.



Once the corn started to heat up he started cookin' the burgers. Now and then he'd draw his hand back quickly and shake it. The heat from the fire was singing his hand. I thought at the time, he needs a longer set of tongs. I told him, he needs a friggin' pool too. It would'a been nice to sit in some cool water and watch him burn himself cookin' my dinner. Not sure if he understood the subtle wisdom there.



I tell ya, the burgers and tater salad were wonderful, and the corn-on-the-cob was wonderful too.



After everyone finished eating, the conversation shifted away from what Dave and I do for a living to "Lets ride some mules." Dave really wanted to get up on one. You see that unfocused haze at the top of the shot? Man, I was pissed.



Before you know it, just about everyone was mounted up and headed for the back 40, or in this case, the back 100.



Dave was mounted up, as were Ryan and Jennifer. I wasn't dressed for riding, having worn shorts and sandals to the parade. Plus, I was red as a beat from the sun and pooped. Well, let's say I had to turn the car keys over to Denise. I was in no condition to ride, and Denise didn't want to. Hasn't in something like 20 years. Anyway, it'd been a long, hot day, and Denise and I were both ready to go home.

So, as the others explored the back country of John's ranch, Denise and I packed up the goods and headed home. It was a nice drive, seein' as how I could drift off now and then and not have to worry about runnin' off the road.

All in all, it was a wonderful way to spend the day. I hope that John, Dave and everyone had as much fun as I did. It was great to see their cool house and ranch, and the wonderful menagerie of critters they run. It was nice meeting Elizabeth's family too. If you want to see more shots of the parade, the people and the critters, click here. Cheers!

Fishin' stories.

Finally gettin' around to posting this stuff. It's been a busy week, and it's not over. I have to go to San Saba tomorrow, and next Friday, to make up for the classes I missed last week when I flew to Syracuse NY to go fishing with my cousin Bob and the guys.



I fly in and they drive by from Pensylvania the next morning and pick me up on the way to Gananoque, Canada. It's always great to see Bob again. You can get a great feel for our relationship from this little video.





The lake is beautiful, and the fishing is usually good.



We upgraded to a little nicer cabin this time, paying a little extra for a place right down by the water and the dock.



The food is always great too. I knoiw, you're thinkin' "hotdogs and mac-n-chese out of a box?" Yea, but it's all cooked with love! And this is just the first nights meal.



The second night we had Pike filets (from two decent sized fish the guys had caught), and more mac-n-cheese out of a box (LOVE that stuff).



The third night we had steak and baked potatos cooked on the grill, and the last night we had chili. So, as usual with anyone in my direct vascinity, we ate well!



We fish hard when we go on these trips... Up early and out on the water, back for lunch, then out again till dinner, and then out again till sunset. But in the meantime, we relax. We're probably better at that than we are at fishing. Well, I am anyway. And when we relax by the shore, there are usually critters there to join us.



This Blue Heron is a regular visitor. When it's not taking Chipmunks or Bluegills from near the water, it's wolfing down scraps from out table.



A few Seagulls even joined in on the fun. And we even had another little visitor who slithered by a few times.



We even saw this one, or one like it, slitherin' across the lake towards out dock one day.



Of course, we also love the scenery up there (click on this one, or any of the others, for the larger version). The natural beauty of the place is amazing to behold.



There's nothin' like slowly drifting down a river, lookin' for just the right spot to wet a hook.



When it comes to bringing in a good fish, there's no tellin' how many hundreds of casts can go into each catch. But in the end, it's all worth it. Now and then, the gods reward your patience.



Like last year, I didn't catch too many big ones this time. But nether did the other guys, so I didn't feel so bad. I caught enough to have a great time, and that's what really matters.



Anyway, most of the fun I derive from these trips is found in the quiet times, sittin' around after a great meal with a cigar in one hand and an adult beverage in the other, or a spare brat, solving all the worlds problems with my friends.



Eventually, sadly, the time always comes to hit the road for home. I Hate that road, but I also look forward to the welcome home I'll get from my special little lady. And then I look forward to the next years adventure. We've been coming up here for a long time, and there's no sign of it ending. In a few years, it'll all be made that much more special when Bob's Grandson (Scot's son) Gabe gets old enough to join us.



Sunday morning, after paying the bill, we drove back into the USA and back to Syracuse, where my return flight was awaiting me. Who knew the return flights would be so screwed up by this very rainy weather? I didn't get home until almost 4AM Monday morning, but that's another story.

The trip, Gananoque 2010, was a wonderful time. If you want to see more pictures and captions, click over here. Enjoy. Cheers!

Goin' Fishin'.

Time to head back up to Canada again, as I do every year (most years) about this time. Time to get together with my cousin Bob, his son-in-law Scott, and Bob's long time buddy Jim, drink some good booze, eat some good food, smoke some good cigars (maybe even a few Cubans), and see if we can catch the mother pike... Pikezilla.



We're goin' back to the same lake and lodge we always go to... Griffin's Lakeside Lodge on lake Gananoque, near Kingston Ontario. It's a beautiful place, with nice folks runnin' it. We've been goin' there for about five or six years now, so we pretty much know the lake, and where the fish are. It makes it really fun, goin' back year after year.



While the other guys use their high dollar fancy gear, baitcasting reels, with a birds nest for every eighth or tenth cast, I stick with my trusty spinner. Well, Bob's spinner. He provides the gear. I just have to show up, cigars in hand. Pretty good deal if you can get it.



I was really lucky a few years ago (this was maybe 2007 or 8). You're lookin' at the largest Pike of that trip. I went through several years where I really didn't catch much of anything, and then all of a sudden I was catching all the fish and the guys were pissin'. That felt GOOD.



Last year though, I was the only one who didn't catch a big one. It sucked, but I had fun anyway. After all, it's not just about bringin' in the big ones.



Hell, when things get slow I pull out a little ultralight rod and hit the pan fish along the bank. Maybe try dippin' for Croppy. I have just as much fun catchin' them as I do the big ones.



Well, no, that's bullshit. I do have fun with the littluns, and with a few illegal lunkers that hit the little worms I toss for the pan fish (they have a season on Large and Small Mouth Bass up there, and this ain't it). But it does suck when my luck runs dry and I have to see all the other guys bringin' in the nice fish.



One of these days... One of these days I'm gonna hook ol' Pikezilla. That bitch is gonna die and go on my wall. It's gonna be mythic... Homeric... Old Man and the Sea type shit.

But, until then, I'll just enjoy the good times, and great company, and the blessings of my life as it finds me these days. I love my cousin Bob to death. He's like a big brother to me, which is something I always yearned for but never had growin' up. But hell, now I have a hand full of close friends who fit that bill. Have I said that it's really, really good to be me right now?

So, you guys try to have a good week while I play. I'm takin' the laptop with me, so maybe I'll be able to post a few good pictures during the week. We'll see. You guys enjoy yourselves and we'll get together again on the other side of this one. Cheers.

Happy Memorial Day!

I figured this is as good a time as any to show you some old shots of my dad. Mom gave me a box of old pictures a while back, some of which I'd never seen before. Included were several official shots from the Air Force.



This one is my favorite. It shows dad the way I remember him as a kid. He was a Lt. Colonel in this one, taken in the mid 1960s.



Here he is, tryin' to look HARD, as a Captain in the summer of 1956. I think my folks were stationed in Austin then, having just moved back to the states from England. The future Priscilla Presley was babysitting my sister then, who was about two years old. Priscilla was in junior high and just about to move to Germany with her mother and step father, where she'd meet you-know-who. Cool eh?

Dad told me once that her stepfather was an asshole, and that he'd taken a LOT of money from the guy in poker parties. I tell ya, growin' up like he did, dad didn't take prisoners. Of course, I wasn't even a glint in his eye then. Won't be born for four more years or so.



This one cracks me up. It's like he's thinking "Are they gonna take the fuckin' picture or what?" By the time this was taken dad had been promoted to Lt. Col. and I was almost four years old. You can see he's aged a bit. Was it me, or the job in Bermuda?

There were also several hilarious shots of what may well have been a Memorial Day pick nick in Bermuda, where I was born.



Check out these outfits. Can you find dad there, in the golf hat and shades? They must have set up a party and shrimp boil for the enlisted guys. Dad would have jumped in and played hard. No one was more competitive than he was.



Here he is hittin' the ball. Apparently the fellas decided to have a volleyball game on the beech. I'm thinkin, that's not gay at all. Nope, not at all. Naaa, it's like that scene in Top Gun, right?



Thing is, what the hell were these guys thinkin'? Check out the one dude with his shorts all hiked up like a speedo. And all the dark socks and leather shoes... ON THE BEACH? White people, sheeesh!



Here's dad in his element. He loved golf almost more than anything else in his life. He's probably playin' with his commanding officers here, and probably taking money from them. He was a shark on a golf course. I think it was one of the great disappointments of his life that I didn't enjoy the game the way he did. But that's a long story.

Finally, I surfed through a lot of patriotic sounding stuff on YouTube before I found this video to post for the holiday. I always loved this tune.

Lets think about what our soldiers have been through over the last seven or eight years, and the generations who served before them. Let's reflect on their achievements, and lets enjoy some awesome AC~DC. Crank those speakers people. For those about to rock...



Happy Memorial Day folks, and thanks for serving. Cheers. You know who you are. I love ya.

I know at least one dude who'd shit himself if he had one of these in his living room.

Of course, his loving wife would probably make him move it to the basement, but there you go.

Yep, at least one, maybe two or three. But I'm with the guy that posted it. I think it'd be way cooler if it was an Apache gunship simulator. OK, we're all in agreement then.

Where's Waldo?

Hm, headed straight down the shitter with the rest of us. And we've got these fuckers to thank for it. Drink up!

Click on this if you need a closer look.

Check this shit out.

Rednecks will fix this shit.

One down, two to go.

I finished up classes in Florence yesterday morning. I'd given the kids their finals Monday, but had to go in to finish grading, post the grades to both the high schools web site and CTCs, and finish up some paperwork.

Thing is, the folks there didn't think I'd be comin' back. The janitor was already washin' down the white boards and cleanin' the gum from under the desks. I got myself situated there at my desk and got to work, but soon received a text message.

My buddy Dave (Willingham), who teaches down the hall, thought I was done and sleepin' in. He sent me a text reading "Slacker!" That's a little joke between us. Now and then when I get down there and see that there's a substitute in his room, that he's taken the day off, I text him and call him a Slacker.

I immediately walked over to his room, busted in and said "Like hell I am!" he laughed his ass off when he saw that I was there. He and I are thinkin' that we want to ride his horses in the San Saba Rodeo Parade on the 12th. John Hoenow, my buddy out at the jail, told me Monday that he and his wife are gonna ride mules in the parade. I told Dave about it and he said that if they can get us registered, he can drive some horse up and we'll ride. Wouldn't that be a hoot?

Anyway, I got the stuff done that needed to get done, all posted, signed and finished, and was out of there by 10AM. That means I could make it to San Saba in time for the Dairy Mart to open it's doors at 11AM.



Yep, I made it there in time for a nice, calm sit down lunch (my only real meal of the day). When the proprietor brought me my usual, a jalapeno sourdough bread bacon cheeseburger and large order of onion rings, he said somethin' like "That's a hungry man." I laughed and told him this burger was a friggin' work of art. That he needs to be written up in Texas Monthly.



Here's and old close-up, just in case you're hungry or anything (Sully, this is for you). Look at the size of that bacon strip. Mmmmmm, good.

I finished eating and got out to the jail early, givin' me time to relax a bit before the convicts descended on me. That's always nice... Havin' time to take a relaxed shit and get a drink before the bum rush of rusty-assed losers forces me to go to class.

I got the class through the Constitution and part way through Federalism, and ended up getting out of Saba late, about 3PM. I stopped at a local grocery store for something to drink and then headed strait to Fort Hood. It was rainin' like CRAZY by then, at times blockin' my ability to see the road. But the rain abated by the time I got to the base and I was able to get to my classroom without gettin' soaked.

Once I got there I realized that they'd finally hooked up the Internet in my room. It's handy to be able to check my mail, both official and private, when I'm not lecturing. Of course, I have this laptop there in class with me. I like to play Freecell while I lecture. I find it slows me down. Less chance of the students getting Carpel Tunnel.

I had to finish both Fort Hood classes last night... Finish up the lectures and review the classes for their finals, which will be given on Thursday. So I was there later than usual. Didn't get home till about 10:15PM. So it was a long day. But without that drive to Florence, I get to relax now in the morning. I still get up when Denise does, fix her her morning milk coffee, and then I sit here and vegetate on this thing until it's time to drive to Saba.

It's time to go now. I've got to shower, go over to the local pharmacy to renew my blood pressure meds, and then head to Saba in time to eat before I get to the jail. That'll give me more time in the afternoon to relax at the library until my evening class.

So, Florence is over (I'll got to their graduation ceremony Friday night, but won't go back to class until late August), Ft. Hood is almost over (It'll end Thursday and then I'll have 10 weeks off from there), and I've got about six weeks left of San Saba. When the semester ends there, mid July, it'll be road trip time again.

In the meantime, next week is gonna be a whole different kind of blast. I'll tell you about that later. Cheers.

The weekend.

Since I had to work here in San Saba all day last Friday, Denise and I didn't have time to go get mom and take her out to eat. So, after sleepin' in and relaxing, she and I drove over to Temple Saturday night and made up for it. It was my turn to pay, so guess where we went?



Oh yea, and it looked just like this too (Yep, I'm reusin' and old shot... Hell, it doesn't get any better lookin' than this, and this way the ladies don't get all snitty with me for takin' pictures). The food at Dynasty in Temple was fresh and delicious, as I hoped.

The shrimp were scarce in the Shrimp Fried Rice, but I made up for it with shrimp and crab meat (wanna be) from another dish. The Generals Chicken was as good as ever, and the egg rolls were good too. There was even fried chicken wings and fried scallops on the side. I'm tellin' ya, one plate just about did me in.

After dinner we went to the Dairy Queen by the mall and got three small Heath Bar Blizzards for desert. That just about did me in. Like a lion that's just gorged itself on a gazelle, all I could do was lay on mom's bed and vegetate. I may even have had a short nap. I can't remember.

Denise and I had plans to go to the multiplex and see Robin Hood after dinner, but something went wrong there. We got back to Mom's place with those Blizzards, sat (or laid) down in front of the TV and didn't budge until it was too late. We made plans to see it Sunday, but those caved in on us too.

Denise got a wild hair and decided to clean off my front porch. She dug out all my planters and used to hose to wash everything off. I was doin' laundry and pissin' around on this thing. At one point, midway through the afternoon, I called Mom and told here I was comin' over. She'd had a project for me Saturday night, but I didn't have the energy then.



I drove over, with the sun roof open and the cigar smoke wafting out. The tunes were blaring too. I recently picked up the latest CD from the Black Keys. It's wonderful, if you're into them. Check it out.

The project turned out to be an air conditioner that she'd bought for my sister back when she was living with mom a while back. Sis had taken the unit with her when she moved to Oklahoma City, and then had returned it when she moved into a place that had good AC.

The upstairs room at mom and dad's place is always hot. Really unpleasantly hot in the summer, so mom went out and got this AC unit that plugs into the window and circulates all the warm air out as it generates cool air for the room.



You should'a heard me cussin'. I had a HELL of a time fittin' that long plastic part into the window. I tried to call my sister, who had originally set the thing up, but only got her voicemail. Sheit! But in the end I figured it out, and now the thing is coolin' the room so that my cousin Sue can come up from Houston and visit mom and not swelter in the heat.

There's other stuff to cover, but I'll have to wait for another day to take you there. The library is closing and it's time to head back to the jail. I'll take the class from about 1652 to 1748 today. Fast and furious. Y'all be good. Cheers.