Month: June 2013

Happy Cows….Until…..

My “Living in the Country” Quest continues….

Here is a good little fact.  Cows Know.

 

You see…. the revelation unfolded like this.  I went to a birthday party tonight.  The Guest of Honor turned three.  Great party. Fabulous food.

 

I took a walk toward the end of the festivities.  And yes.  You know how at some parties… people will “rent” swan or geese for “atmosphere”?  Welllll…. these folks brought in an entire field of cows.

I went to the fence, to talk to the old girls.    At any rate… they seemed a little hacked off.  In fact, they wouldn’t say a word to me edgewise.

Then it hit me.  I had a big ol’ juicy hamburger for dinner.

They knew it.  THEN… I KNEW that THEY KNEW.

Oh my.  And then.  There was a long…… extended……….. awkward silence….. standing there at the electric fence.  Those cows stared at me hard.  They were moving their mouths…. like they were chewing something.   But I knew better.  They were mocking me.

And then I quickly skulked off. (Before the Bulls got the word on the street.)

The next time I will know better.  I’ll either steer clear of the burgers…. or not hang out with the Rent-A-Cows.

“The lesson is that you can still make mistakes and be forgiven.” – Robert Downy Jr.

Bottom of the ninth.

 

America loves baseball.  It is true.  But why do we love it so, I wonder.  It isn’t the fastest-paced game on the planet.  That is for sure.  In fact, at times…. it can be a little boring.  Yet it seems that all of us have played… at some point or other.

Now…. I got my start on the ball field in Little League.    The  roots of baseball…. and Little League …. extend  far back into American History. Heck … way back into the 18th century.  Perhaps that is why we love it so.  It is imbedded in our heritage.

When fighting was slow….. the Soldiers of the Continental Army played a version of ball at Valley Forge during the American Revolution.

Funny.  It caught on with common U.S. citizens.  They began playing more modern versions of the British games of cricket and rounders through the early 19th century.  Back then, they called it “town ball.”

In the 1840s, New Yorker Alexander Joy Cartwright and his acquaintances played a game they called “base ball” that was very similar to the game we know today. So.  That is all how baseball got its go.

But what about the young?  Of course there was the sandlot.  That was about it.  But low and behold….
In 1938, a man named Carl Stotz hit upon the idea for an organized baseball league for the boys in his hometown of Williamsport, Pennsylvania.

Carl devised this whole deal as a way to teach kids the ideals of sportsmanship, fair play and teamwork.

On June 6, 1939, in the very first Little League game ever played, Lundy Lumber defeated Lycoming Dairy, 23-8.

From those humble beginnings, Little League Baseball has become the world’s largest organized youth sports program.

In the space of just six decades….. Little League has grown from three squatty little teams in Podunk, Pennsylvania…. to nearly 200,000 teams, in all 50 U.S. states and more than 80 countries.

I used to be on one of them.
Today I watched some kids play Little League Baseball.
And it is easy to see why we all love it so.  The love of the game. The fun of the game.  The satisfaction of sportsmanship, and a job well done.

And of course, there is nothing like a ballpark frank.  With lots of mustard AND ketchup.

Play Ball.

“When they start the game, they don’t yell, “Work ball.”  They say, “Play ball.”  ~Willie Stargell, 1981″

Plain old good.

I think I have some sort of genetic imprint of a dog.  Maybe, somewhere, in some other life…. I was a dog.  If those sorts of things happen.
Or maybe as a child, I was rescued by a band of dogs….  and they dropped me off at the orphanage.  I was later adopted by Mom & Dad, my human parents.  Or maybe, I just like the way Milkbone dog biscuits taste…. dipped in peanut butter and melted chocolate, of course.
Whatever the reason, I love dogs.

Dogs are cool in so many ways.   They are kind, and loving, and loyal.   Smart. Protective.  Intuitive.  Funny.  Sweet.

But…. they are very fabulous in other ways too.  They sniff out crimes.  They rescue people.  They help those with handicaps.  On and on.

They also have quite a past. Did you know that three dogs survived The Titantic?  Twelve dogs boarded the ship, but only three made it through.  A Bulldog, a Great Dane, and a little Wired Terrier.  I’d love to know THAT story.

As a sidebar…. did you know a dog’s face can indicate the length of its lifespan?  Flat-faced dogs don’t live as long as dogs with sharper, pointier features.  Yet…. when a big boat hits an iceberg, it doesn’t seem to play into the outcome of things.  Bulldogs are pretty flat-faced, after all.  I am thinking they must be good at either swimming, or clinging on to floating debris.

Whatever the case, no matter.  I just hope this little dog here….. sticks around for a long time.   Because flat-faced or not, she is the best kind of dog….. to me.  The Big Heart in a Little Body Kind.  Best of friends….we’ll always be.

“Kindness, I’ve discovered, is everything in life.” – Isaac Bashevis Singer

Zippity. Doo…… Da. Da. Da.

Some days are really good.  You know…. when you can hang out in the trees… zip lining through the air up there …. and the woods.  With three of your favorite people in the world.

With funny yellow helmets on our heads.  2319!  2319!

Ah. The beautiful gifts of life.

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures. – Thornton Wilder

Horse Sense

I am a City Girl.  Admittedly.
There are all sorts of things I continue to learn about country living.  My friends help me  out.
Take for instance…. those funny looking pink tubes that hang out of cows….. well wouldn’t you know …. milk comes out of those things.
And the big round buildings that you see near barns… the ones that look like they are wearing a silver Yarmulke?  Those are not called High Lows.  They are Silos… and farmers put grain and such inside.  They are not missile holders either.

Now horses.  I finally figured this one out for myself.  When you see a couple of them out in a field, with their noses to the ground…. they are not smelling things… like the roses.  No.
You see… one of them has simply lost a contact lens.  And his buddy is helping him find it.
Horses have terrible eyesight.  That is why they are always eating carrots.  Seriously.

Now that…. is a horse of a different color blind.
Yep.  I am getting better at this farm living thing.

As the old John Denver song goes….. Thank God I’m a country girl.

Road Monkey. Bananas.

This my friends… is a sad, but true story.

Seriously.  I found it in the ‘Only in America’ Section of THE WEEK.  (  http://theweek.com/  )

It seems this guy…. a New Hampshire man, to be exact….  lost his life savings on a carnival game.  Here is the deal.  He tried in vain to win the grand prize…. which was of all things….. an Xbox Kinect.

The guy’s name is Henry Gribbohm.  He is 30 years old, according to the report.  Old Henry, was playing a game called “Tubs of Fun,” in which you throw balls into tubs.

He must not have been a very good shot….  as it turns out…. he quickly lost $300.  As if that wasn’t enough.  He then went home to get the rest of his life savings — which he subsequently lost.

All told, Gribbohm lost $2,600 and according to the news report… he was left with only a stuffed banana.

Sometimes life is hard.  Like a lone monkey on an empty road… who would absolutely kill for a stuffed banana.  You win some.  You lose some.

“Rule No.1: Never lose money.
Rule No.2: Never forget rule No.1.”
– Warren Buffet

Let’s Dance.

All my life, I had heard about Barn Dances.

Tonight… on my way home…. I think I finally saw one.

Or perhaps, it was the setting sun.

 

I would believe only in a God that knows how to Dance. – Friedrich Nietzsche

Oh, it is sharp.

I am always wondering about firsts.  I don’t know if everyone is wired that way, or not.  But for me…. well… darn it…… I have to think about it.
Oh…. I don’t know…. like…..
Okay.  Like, who decided to eat the first brussel sprout?  Now that must have been something.    Or who was the first person to skip a rock?  I try to put myself in that person’s place, and figure out how the course of events must have transpired.  Sometimes, it is quite a perplexing consideration.
Yes. But lately, I have really been wondering about this next one.
Who was the first woman who decided to shave?  And what?  And of course, why?

For centuries upon centuries, women had hairy legs, and hairy arm pits.  Just like their male counter parts in the species.  Hair grows on our bodies.  All over the place, albeit some people more than others.  Some places more than others too.

So.  I have to question.  What woman, where, and when…. woke up one day… and said to herself…. I think today would be a great day…..  to take that knife over there, and shave the hair from the fronts of my lower legs.

What prompted her?  And how did it progress to other things… other areas?  Dang.

Oh heck… let us call her Eunice… for the sake of conversation….
Let us say that maybe Eunice is at a dinner party somewhere… and she turns and says to Myrtle…. “You know, I have been scraping the fuzzy hair from my legs with a knife… just because.”  And Myrtle replies… “Well how about THAT!  I have been doing the same thing with my arm pits.”  And wouldn’t you know it?  They became fast friends.

They started a knife company called Schick.    It is Chicks… with the S at the wrong end.

…. …….. …….. oh …. they mysteries of the universe, I’ll tell you.

Now me.  I shave daily.  Because I follow the Way of Eunice and Myrtle and the Schicks.

But seriously.   I think we all may have been just fine without it.
I mean.  Holy Schick.

Shave and a Hair Cut.  Twooooooooooo Bits.

“The difficulty lies not so much in developing new ideas as in escaping from old ones.” – John Maynard Keynes

You aren’t here.

Hardly anyone shows up on a  Sunday…. to peruse Kronytown.  This is the day with the least amount of visitors to the site.

I am not sure what this means.

So.

Since you aren’t here… and since you are not reading this…. I can say whatever I want today.

Hmmmmm.  What to say….what to say…..

 

It was a cold and rainy night.  I found this piece of bark.  It used to be on a tree, and now it is not.  The End.

“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.” – Abraham Lincoln

How do it do what it do?

I love when I come across the very amazing and extraordinary things….

Like little hearts growing on trees.

I just sigh…. and say….”Implausibly Sensational.”

“Could a greater miracle take place than for us to look through each other’s eyes for an instant?” – Henry David Thoreau