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June 20, 2011 - Monday | 7:49 AM, CST
Happy belated Father's Day to all those fathers among my regular readers. Happy belated birthday also to Bryan, who turned twenty-eight yesterday. I'm very excited about seeing Bryan's birthday gift - a magazine holder chest rig with MOLLE straps and room for a hydration bladder. I suppose if Bryan adds a hydration bladder he will probably use it to keep himself clean every time he looses his own bladder, but that's ok by me because at least he is enjoying his gift.
We had a cookout at Mom's Saturday as a birthday / father's day celebration. Bryan delighted us with some of his barely-cooked boiled burgers fixed atop a gasified hydrocarbon grill. Yum yum! While there, Dad decided he would try to entice Evan to pull out some of the few remaining hairs from the dwindling supply atop my head. Enjoy it while you got it, kiddo, it runs in the family!
I hope all and sundry who attended the fireworks Saturday night enjoyed themselves. Although the Bunkum fireworks are certainly tiny compared to other locations, they've always been one of the highlights of my summer. I can remember all the times Mom took Bryan and me to the fireworks as kids, and we always enjoyed ourselves quite a bit. One thing I always enjoyed was the ride home, looking behind the car and seeing headlights stretching for over a mile.
This year Kelly didn't attend the show due to some back pain she's been experiencing. Since I have to attend as part of the fire department, she wasn't looking forward to climbing into and out of fire engines, or sharing in the invidious task of telling the local yokels that yes, that road closed sign really means what it says. And no, you can't sit past the caution tape because you could get hit with an errant firework which would cause you to sue the township.
It did seem like a decent turnout, however. I'm always glad to see small town events such as this enjoy some measure of success. I was somewhat surprised when using the restrooms. I entered the men's room to see a pair of high heels dangling from behind one of the stall doors. Thinking that I'd either made an embarassing mistake, or that The King was back from the dead, I checked the sign on the door. I was relieved to find that I was, indeed, at the right spot, so I presumed it was merely an overflow from the ladies' side and went about my business in the adjacent stall. Going on four years of marriage it is no longer any problem to use the facilities in front of the opposite sex. Neither, it appeared, was it a problem for the lady in question. When she'd finished her business she opened the stall door, cheerily called out "Sorry!" to the male patrons, and headed back to the beer tent.
After the fireworks, Kelly and I built a cozy fire in the backyard to enjoy all by ourselves. While we were outside, a car pulled to the side of the road adjoining the north end of the property and sat at idle for a little over a minute. We then heard a car door slam and the sound of someone vomitting into the ditch. A little too much time at the beer tent, perhaps? After the fire died down a bit we decided to take a late-night cruise to enjoy the almost-full moon. Kelly and I always enjoy late-night drives - especially when a full moon is present. Sometimes I will stop and shut off the car to experience the view of the almost otherworldly landscape in the moonlight. Out in the cornfields was a little bit of low-clinging patch fog that shown with an iridescence and crept slowly over the milky gravel road.
Amazing.
I feel very sorry for those who lack the capacity to appreciate the visual richness of such a scene, or the haunting, lonely silence, or the fresh scents from the fields and small bodies of water. Kelly and I frequently cruise out in the country on nights such as this, and we are never disappointed.
Tomorrow is, of course, the summer solstice. The day of the most sunshine of the year. The day when Old Wives are encouraged to stomp down their onions to ensure bigger bulbs. (Note: I've experimented with this before, having two rows of onions side-by-side with one stomped and one left alone. I didn't notice any difference at harvest, but I also didn't weigh my onion bulbs at the end of the year to have any exact data to present. Who knows?) Enjoy tomorrow as best you can, because in terms of sunshine, it's all downhill from here until the winter solstice.
Some bad news - I broke my digital camera. I had it in a small case in the lower pocket of my cargo shorts all of Saturday, and later that night when I attempted to take a picture I noticed the viewscreen was entirely white with a conspicuous spider-web crack in the lower righthand corner. Darn! It'll still take pictures, but any sort of review or adjustment of the settings is useless. I guess it's time to begin the hunt for a new camera. I was thinking something waterproof. Not necessarily fancy in the sense of a zillion megapixels; it should be simple, yet rugged enough to be brought virtually everywhere I go.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Comments:
Name: The Mom
Date: Monday, Jun 20th 2011, 9:21 PM
There is just about nothing better than a late night drive through the country! Love to shut off the lights and just look and listen and enjoy - guess that must run in the family as well.
Name: Matthew
Date: Tuesday, Jun 21st 2011, 5:51 AM
Mom, you are really talented to be able to drive with your lights off and holding both your cellphone and a fifth of whiskey!
Must run in the family!
Name: Bryan
Date: Tuesday, Jun 21st 2011, 12:12 PM
Oh yeah sorry about the puke in your yard!!
Name: Matthew
Date: Wednesday, Jun 22nd 2011, 8:13 PM
No problem, it makes up for all the roofing nails I throw in your driveway.
Name: Zach
Date: Saturday, Jun 25th 2011, 1:57 PM
I might be a bit biased, but I'm really, really partial to Nikon cameras. They admittedly aren't the toughest in the world, but I've had two of them now and they've both performed very well.
The only problem with them is the cheaper ones tend to take kind of poor low light pictures unless you tweak the settings quite a bit. The prices are fairly nice though, and they take great daylight pictures and video.
Name: Matthew
Date: Sunday, Jun 26th 2011, 2:08 PM
Thanks, Zach. We have a Nikon right now, and the quality is very good. If they have a waterproof one for a decent price, I might go ahead and stay with the brand.
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