The FFFF 2013

We just finished celebrating our family reunion on Saturday June 8. at Andrea and Travis's house. There were 54 or 55 people there. As usual it was a beautiful day lots of sunshine and warm breezie air.No matter  where you sit you have a beautiful view when you are outside the house. They have a lovely backporch/deck on the back side of the house. The pool is visible from there. The pool apron has umbrella tables and chairs around it and a grill on the back side of the apron. On the side of the house there is an entrance to the lower floor and it also has a cement aapron with another umbrella table. It over looks the lake. It is a beautiful pasdtoral scene.

There were a few people that were not there. Pauila,Brett , Courtney and Al and their kids and a few more.  We missed them but we all had a wonderful time. Jeanine and son Jack came from Denver, Pat, Kristie and Alex came from North Carolina, Keith, Angela, bridget and Conor came from Sarasota, FL.Carrie, Gabe and Beni came from Seattle, WA.

Forty Years of Bliss

During forty years of my adult life, I was lucky enough to have a job that I loved. I frequently said that I never woke up in the morning and regretted the fact that I had to go to school.(work).

I loved the children that I worked with. I will share with you some of the humorous things they did and said. I preserved hundreds of these witticisms. In many cases their remarks reflect the characrteristic of their 'problem'.

We spent a great amount of time trying to fill in the gaps in their knowledge. For example," Who can name the four directions?" The first answer the teacher got was, "Stop, go, walk, and don't walk."Another answered ,"Left, right, up and down".
"Would you believe North, South, East , West?"  Oh, yeah.

Today's Day

There is a subject that is causing a lot of discussion now adays. Some scientists are sure that we are in the midst of Global warming and other people are sure that the drastic weather changes are cyclical. The Polar ice cap is melting, the polar bears are losing their homes because of the melting ice. Our weather patterns have totally changed. We will have two or three days of weather in the fifties and then have one in the eighties. We are all struggling to adapt to this on again, off again weather,but it is something we have to deal with.

I am quite bewildered about the fact that the polititians have stuck their noses in to the discussion. One party is sure it is just cyclical. They are full of statements like,"My grandpa remembers when it snowed in May one year!" "What about the years of drought when we had no rain for months and months?" Other examples of weather aberations are plentiful but somethings happening today have never been arround before.

Just yesterday a wave of solid ice came crashing into shore in the northeast. It distroyed many houses and did millions of dollars worth of damage to that area. I saw films of it and it looked just like a wall of sea water coming in but it was ice. Many other phenominal events have taken place in recent years that are not cyclical.

Scientists are blaming fossil fuels on the changes in the weather. Plastic ,plastic everything is causing  so much damage. We really need to get serious about recycling. The Indians worked hard at saving the earth and we 're going to have to live a little more like they did to save our world. Ciao

The Champions

1On Easter Sunday the University of Louisville Cardinals played the University of Duke Blue Devils. We had dinner early so that we could devote every minute of our time wataching the game.Two excellent coaches and two excellent teams.The teams seemed to be well matched. They would take the lead then we would take it. It was definitely a nail biter.Suddenly I looked down for some reason or other and when I looked back up there were Cardinals scattered on the floor. My first thought was that we had been victims of a shooting but everyone was shouting, "What happened, what happened?"  It took the anouncers a few minitues to see what was happening and telling us what was going on. One of our players had jumped up to block a shot and came down on his leg so hard that he broke the tibia, About six inches of bone had come through the skin on his leg. It was such a dreadful sight that his fellow team mates fell to the floor on their knees in tears Some  team menbers vomited because of the shock. Coach Patino was crying and the team members all gathered in a huddle and cried. One player, Luike Hancock knelt beside his fallen team mate and patted hhis chest as he led them in prayer. The arena was dead silent until the gurney came and  the medics lifted Kevin (Ware)onto it and wheeled him away. The team had continued to huddle in grief with Kevin's words echoing around them..

"I'll be OK just win the game."

They did  just that! They continued to play well enough to win the game against Michigan on Monday night.They have proven themselves to be humble and kind to one another. They are a good example for all the athletes coming up behind them. We have needed good, clean well spoken young men as examples for the youth for sometime.

We can all be proud of them. I hope they will continue to be good examples from now on.Hail to the Champions!!!!Ciao

Is There Life After Basketball?

I love basketball, despite the fact that I have never been able to throw the ball through the hoop! I have tried many, many times but I fail everytime. Either the ball is too heavy, or the rim is too high or the fact that I can only jump one inch off the ground, when standing still. Any one of these things or a combination of all of them prevent me from shooting a basket! I could do better at football than basketball.

However! I love basketball! I took every opportunity to watch the game whenever I could. When we lived in Ohio, we lived within walking distance of Wittenberg Univ. and they had a good team. The school was very small and it was easy to get tickets.  Ohio is more known for its football but we could watch our share of basketball since we were so close to the school.

There are not nearly as many hoops nailed to garage doors in Ohio as there are in Kentucky. Still there were enough that the sound of the basket ball hitting the cement was very recognnizable. (It sounded like my heart beating.)Maybe that's why I love the game.In the fall of the year I listen for the familiar sound as the kids walk back and forth to school, bouncing  the ball. Grade school, Jr. high and high school, YMCAs and other organizations have teams. If a child happens to be taller than his classmates, he's frequently asked, "Do you play basketball.?" We had a very attractive girl in our eighth grade class one year, she was at least five foot ten and she hated to be asked that question. "Do you play basketball?"  She finally came up with the perfect answer,"No!", she would say, "Do you play miniture golf?"

Most colleges have teams and they belong to different leagues. The Big Ten, The Big East, etc. then at the end of the season The NCAA chooses the top teams in the country to play for the championship.There is also another group that chooses teams that are good but not quite as good as the NCAA teams. NIT, national invitational tournament.

March Madness this year is especially interesting for us because the Louisville Cardinals were the No. 1 pick and have worked their way up to the top rung of the ladder. Tonight they will be playing Michigan and which ever one wins will be the Champions. Our fingers are crossed, eyes, also. I'm going to say Ciao right now because I don't want to jinx them. GO CARDS