Golf, Anyone?

   What do an incoming tornado and an Iowa divorce have in common?

   Someone's about to lose a farm.

   These were sent to me as Katrina/Alabama pics, but my man Uncle Joe at Magic Smoke informed me that this was a common "hoax," and that the pictures are actually from a series of Nebraska-type storms in 2002-04. Thanks to www.Snopes.com, as well. We'll credit the real photographer at the end of the piece.

   Funny thing about either Me or Nebraska... take away the storm clouds, and you'd still get a visual of why I would shoot up a Wal-Mart if I lived there. It's too God-love-it flat, and New Englanders need a little definition to their landscapes.

   I suppose I'd also vote for the more fundamentally Christian presidential candidate if I got Wrath of God storms like these MFers every year... or maybe I'd vote Democrat and just live full-time in a sealed concrete bunker.

 

   Only on the Great Plains can you golf in shorts while farms are being thrown into the lower stratosphere a half mile down the road. It's Iowastanding!!

   The Japanese mob (the Yakuza) actually made these storms to slow wheat production... as a sort of pre-emptive strike at buying Kellogg, and replacing Tony the Tiger with a 95 pound rabid Akita (It's grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreat!) to get us back for Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

   This picture (a diff version of a previous pic on this page) was the base of the mail I got with these pics. Notice the visage de la sorcière  off to the right.

   Seeing evil witch faces in storm clouds/WTC smoke is perfectly natural psychological ju-jitsu. Storms are terrifying, and people will have "irrational" reactions to terror. Personally, I see Jay Leno.

   Seeing Jay Leno is indicative of a certain mental instability that we won't go into on these pages.

   I've given out a few ink blot tests in my time, and once you know how those "end," you sort of become too jaded to properly see cloud shapes.

   It's like Freud said: "Everyone who smokes is attempting to satisfy a subconscious oral fixation- a fixation based on the pleasure one took as a baby when breast feeding.... except for myself, as I do it just because I love tobacco.... now that I know."

   If you were watching more gentle clouds drift by on a sunny summer day, you'd probably get between your wife/hub and the kids if your spouse looked up and said, "I see a decapitation, with torrents and torrents of spraying blood."

   I did see a Bunny in the tornado shot a few back, and yes- I'm being vague on purpose. I'm sort of the opposite of the guy in the previous paragraph, which just makes me a different shade of Unusual Blue.

   These images are actually photographs of tornadoes and other extreme weather phenomena taken by storm chaser Mike Hollingshead in Nebraska and Kansas during the summer months of 2002 and 2004. Visit his page... it rocks like taking an armful of heroin and going to an Alice In Chains concert, circa 1994.

N*****, Please...

 

   Some kid (maybe one pictured above) is going to try to get into the NBA Draft next summer, and he will be refused.

   The NBA will point to a rule they drew up, and tell the kid it's nothing personal. David Stern won't tell the kid that American public mentality feels that you can't give a black kid $60 million, or that the same black kid is- genetically and demographically- less qualified to operate in the world than a tennis player, a curveball artist, or a golfer.

   If the kid hasn't figured all that stuff out by the time that he leaves Stern's office... he almost deserves to be smashed into a pile of quivering flesh-Jello as he steps off the curb and gets hit by Michelle Wie's brand new speeding Porsche.

ESPN.com - GOLF - Adelson: What took so long?

   Soceity has grabbed the black man by both ears, and drove its' collective knee into his exposed groin.... again. There's some kid in high school right now who is a better player than whatever stiff the Miami Heat will draft at the end of the first round next summer, but he won't be let into the NBA because they have decided that he is more likely than not no better than a thug n*****.

   Baseball and hockey draft piles of high school players every year. The #1 tennis player in the world is a teen Russian. The oldest person on the next Olympic girls gymnsatic team will be younger than Lebron James. Baseball gets them as young as possible, and literally robs from cradles in some Latin American countries.

   Only genetics and the negative media perception  of steroids (and the same high Black Guy ratio) keeps the NFL from drafting children, and I suppose NASCAR would have a lot of trouble:

A) running a racer who isn't old enough to drive the car, and

B) finding a car owner who will let a teenager pilot his Meal Ticket next to a guy like Dale Jr- who is sort of genetically programmed to Wall the kid, just to teach him a little lesson.

   The PGA/LPGA is now about to let a girl into Professional status who would have to wait until 2008 to earn dollar one if she were a big, dumb power forward from Cabrini Green who didn't play a rich White man's hobby.

   Since most blacks don't golf, play tennis, or skate... America applauds the entry of children into these professional ranks. Maybe someone will get a pic of her going to her Prom with Eli Manning . It's cute.

   It's just when you see an uppity black like Darius Miles driving a Ferrari that you realize that there are some flaws inherent in the system.

   It's kind of sad... because sports should be a place where penis length or what your father does for a living doesn't really have much of a bearing on what happens on the field.

   The sharecropper's son should win the race if he's faster than the accountant's daughter... and if the girl from the rich high school turns out to faster than either of them.... you won't hear a peep out of me.

   What bothers me is when they make the sharecropper's son run an extra mile to reach the same goal.... even if he's the class President.

   This crap you're seeing when you compare the PGA to the NBA is almost like a Bush Tax Cut.... "We're all equal... it's just that some of us are more equal than the others. "

  

"If those n****** had any sense, they would have learned to fish.... instead of robbing that Foot Locker, they could get out on the BASS tour...like me."

Keepin' It Riz-eal

   A lot of people hate the new Welcome Screen, but not me. I look at it as a new toy. Sure, it's not a gram of cocaine or anything... but it kills some time.

   If you don't like what's on your welcome screen, you can change it around a bit. Just look at it long enough, and you'll find the "change this screen" button, or whatever they call those things you click on.

   I went with a Black Voices Welcome Screen, mostly for laughs. Even though I have some Portuguese blood, my skin is whiter than this font you are reading. Still, it'll amuse me for a few weeks... after which I'll use the Spanish one or something.

   I managed to find the Unexpected Benefit, though. Black Voices Welcome Screens are the only one with a Sports section.

   Sure, it's a Black view of sports.... but all the sports I like are mostly black anyhow, and the white sports- golf, tennis, hockey- have just enough black folk playing them (Serena, Tiger, Fuhr, etc...) to satisfy my need for information on them ... which is basically negligible anyhow.

   Still, I only had a Black Voices Welcome Screen for 10 seconds before I had several good articles to read while I blew off church for the 500th straight week. Here's the 411, dawg:

AOL Black Voices: The Player's Life -- Behind the Scenes of the Hip-Hop Sports World at BV Sports - Brandy, Quentin Richardso...

- Doh!

   Things seem to have gone downhill for Quentin Richardson and Brandy, who were engaged about this time last year. My sources tell me that the engagement is Off like mosquito repellent.

   Brandy has a last name, but neither myself nor anyone on my Buddy List can think of what it is. It was going to be "Richardson," but that doesn't look like it's going to be happening any time soon... unless she's working through the NBA in reverse abecedarian order- in which case, Jason Richardson had better watch his Nuggets.

   Q-Rich lived up to his nickname by icing the R+B diva to the tune of ELEVEN karats last year- a solid million dollar ring that reportedly really pissed off Vanessa Bryant. 11 karats feeds a LOT of bunnies, kids... 

   Brandy had to actually move the ring from left to right hands several times a day, as the scrawny right arm looked unattractive when compared to the Big Poppa Pump-sized gun she developed lugging that ill rock around entirely on the traditional engagement ring hand.

   This is on some he said/she said BS... I've heard everything from Infidelity to Bothersome Mothers as the straw that broke the camel's back. Brandy may have also disagreed with the Los Angeles/Phoenix/New York odyessy that Q's last 12 months have been.

   At that rate, she'd be living in Minnesota, Portland, or Milwaukee in a few years, and there's nothing glamorous about walking around in a ski jacket when you're not skiing, being hit by Mount St. Helens lava, or having Serbian neighbors.

( "... raisin' up off the cot ") 

   Alicia Keys doesn't take that kind of s***, and Brandy sure as Hell isn't gonna... especially from the NBA's second best Richardson.

 

AOL Black Voices: BV Sports Feature Programming - Lester Still in The Chase

 

(It really IS my car, officer!)

- Contrary to what my uninformed supposition led me to believe, there are indeed a couple of black guys driving those NASCARs around.

   The South is blacker than the rest of the United States, and it should not, on the surface, seem that unusual to see them involved in- despite the fact that people up here love it, too- what is a predominantly Southern Institution.

   Then again, the KKK is a Southern Institution as well, and they probably don't have a lot of Sir Mix-A-Lot playing on the juke box in the Klan bar.

   While blacks are as into cars as any other American (many of my students were entirely car-focused... even before they were licensed to drive one or wealthy enough to own one, which was often how they ended up in my school), the whole NASCAR scene seems a little too Waylon Jennings-esque for even Republican-voting blacks.

   Well, somebody better get a really baggy sheet and hood, because here comes Bill ("Mo") Lester.

   NASCAR isn't stupid. Any huge company that makes no effort to attract 15% of the United States into their fandom won't be huge for long. Magic Johnson has been brought in, and someone who I believe is a Poston cousin is in the mix somewhere.

   They even run Drive For Diversity- which aims to not only get black people (and Hispanics, women, gays- anyone you can't picture actually being in the crowd) in the stands, but into the cars themselves. They run  a training program that graduated 8 people this year.

   Bill Lester drives the race trucks, which - given the 99:1 front end weight ratio- must be hilarious to watch. He has the backing of both Toyota and Bill Davis Racing, which appears in the article like Bill is a pretty good name to have painted all over your truck.

   Bill is not the first brother on the track in NASCAR's history. The splendidly-named Willy T. Ribbs wasthe first Indy 500 racer with sharecropping descendants when he Started His Engine in 1991, and was the first black full-time CART series driver...whatever the f**** that is. It looks good on a resume, I guess.

   Another guy with a cool name, former Morehouse grad George Mack (this is the guy who should be driving the trucks... tell me Mack Truck wouldn't buy this dude a rig, even if he were as blue as a Smurf), scored the highest brother-driven Indy finish ever- a not-too-shabby 17th place in 2001. He is also Indy's first full time Soul Rider.

   His catchphrase isn't "I make people say 'F*** Burger King,' and start calling me the Big Mac," but it should be.

   The one black racer who can actually lead visitors to his home into a trophy room is (or maybe was... I have no idea) Wendell Scott, who won a NASCAR race in Jacksonville in 1963. Both Lester and Mack look like pretty good bets to win something at some point in their careers... and the good thing about that is, unlike the PGA, if Mack makes everyone eat fried chicken like Fuzzy Zoeller may be worried about after the race, it won't even be noticed.

   These are Southerners, remember... they'd be more upset if my lily-white ass won a race and made everyone eat (and finish) their cauilflower.

   Diecast Dude and the Scottish racer guy would no doubt tell me that even a Race Truck victory would be a significant feather in the CAT cap of any racer, black or white. You can- although I don't have the link handy- wager money offshore on the probability that a black man will win the US Presidency before a black man wins the Daytona 500.

   Either way, I hope a speeding pickup is involved.

- I know a black guy in Monponsett- a carpenter- who drives a truck. While I never saw this in person, it is said that NO ONE rides in the front with him... except for his 130 pound Rottweiler, "Pooh Bear."

   This stipulation is broken for no one- even his wife. "She stopped asking to go down to Hosea's with me not long after I introduced this policy," he is said to say. The dog also makes for a very effective anti-theft device while Earl discusses the matters of the day- all by himself-  with the other small-towners in the tavern.

   If you ever see a truck driving down Rte 14 in Pembroke with a shivering woman holding on for dear life in the truck bed, say "hi" to Earl for me.

(NOW who's riding in the back, Earl??)

- Since the Irish are the blacks of Albion's Empire, I can work this line in:

"Clout" is when your hometown football team plays a California team, and- rather than making the New Englanders wait till 4- they make everyone in San Diego get up before 10 to watch it.

   San Diego must have no Irish population at all. If they started NFL games at 9:30 AM here, people would be starting their pre-game drinking while it's still technically Friday in Asia.

Smashing Through The Snow

CNN.com - Denmark pays for killing Santa's Rudolf - Sep 30, 2005

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) -- The Danish Air Force said it has paid about $5,000 in compensation to a part-time Santa Claus whose reindeer died of heart failure when two fighter jets roared over his farm.

The animal, named Rudolf, was grazing at the farm of Olavi Nikkanoff in central Denmark when the screaming F-16 jets passed overhead at low altitude in February.

The reindeer collapsed and died, leaving Nikkanoff with the prospect of only one animal pulling his sleigh next Christmas.

He complained to the Air Force, which agreed to compensate him for the cost of the reindeer and veterinary expenses.

"We got a letter from Santa complaining about his reindeer's death and looked into it seriously," Air Force spokesman Capt. Morten Jensen said Thursday.

The Air Force checked flight data and veterinary reports and concluded the planes had caused the animal's death.

Nikkanoff said he would use the money to buy a new reindeer before Christmas.

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press.

 

Heyyyyyyy!

   Wow, that wasn't too comfortable, was it?

   Santa wanted me to use the American media to explain a few things to the children who may be frightened/saddened by this news story.

   As some of you may know, I'm a Smurf.

   Smurfs haven't had a whole lot to do since the 1980s- I went to college, wrestled professionally for a spell, and started a family- but we are kept busy for at least part of the year.

   You see, Santa first began to experience difficulties with the Worker Elves- who were driven into the Pole from Europe (mostly Poland) during the period before the Romans- in the 1950s.

   Elves are a minority with a pretty big chip on their shoulder, and they chafed when Santa began working them on 18 hour shifts during the population boom in the 19th century. Santa was in pretty deep at this point, and the Pinkerton detectives he employed to keep order were more than a little heavy-handed.

   There were a few ugly incidents that we don't need to describe here- Hustler magazines in the stockings, sleigh graffiti, milk/cookie thefts, etc... in the end, Santa negotiated a 2 month vacation with then-Teamster leader James Hoffa... who disappeared shortly afterwards. Everybody was happy.

   With a sudden vacancy to fill, Santa- after failing with Pygmies and Liliputians (who were a real PITA)- turned to the Smurfs, who had just finished a successful TV run. We come up every October, and hold the fort down until the Elves (who are admittedly more expert at toy production) return for the big post-Thanksgiving rush.

   But for now until then, we're in charge up here. I was Santa's personal secretary, and have just recently been moved up to Minister of Information.

   Part of my job is emptying the mailbag, and this story from CNN really brought the mail in by the bushel-f*****-basket.

   While I am happy to see letters concerned about one of the Family instead of "I want a pony," we need some sort of closure if we're to get anything done up here this year.

   While the goings-on here are understandably mysterious, Santa has no policy on squashing leaks. He actually encourages us to speak freely to the press... it's just that so very few of y'all get up here.

   Santa doesn't catch cold, avoids taverns, speaks mostly in German or Turkish, hasn't been in rehab, and basically sits home with the Missuss. He's hardly a media magnet- except for one month of the year, when he's too busy to go into any sort of detail.

   So, occasionally we have to come forth and clarify things... usually to comfort children. 

 

  

That said, a letter from a little girl- "Debbie"- in Brookfield:

"Ok, wait so if that cause a heart attack what is the likelihood it would have been able to pull the sleigh this year anyway...probably have a heart attack doing that! Then again maybe it felt it would be out of a job with this new tech sleigh riding overhead!
Comment from psychfun "

   This is a good letter, because it addresses many concerns children have as Santa enters the modern age. They see 8 tiny reindeer, then they see a C-130 cargo plane (a fine model- we use them to supply our bases) and say, "Something's not making sense." And this is after  we get the whole Flying Reindeer thing past them.

   Pulling a sleigh is a slow, gradual exertion... and Santa goes out- just before takeoff- and injects each Donner and Blitzen with a powerful steroid cocktail that features Winstrol, Viagra, Godzilla extract, Androstenodine, B-12, Cocaine, and several muscle relaxant/painkillers. This gets the reindeer all swole, and they can bang out the Mission with ease. If you ever hear rumors of a "magic elven/reindeer dust"... well, now you know.

   This "Magic Dust" is only given on Christmas Eve, at what we call Zero Hour, for very good reasons. Given regular access to this concoction, DEA experts estimate that reindeer would subjugate Lapland in 3 years, if not Finland itself. They would then establish a Deerocracy... and I probably don't have to tell you that it wouldn't be a Christian nation.

   You see, Santa has a pretty free Whip Hand... and by the end of the Mission, he's ripped more a** than a 7'4"  Rump Ranger with a size 22 shoe and no sensitivity whatsoever. Even set loose in the forest to rut afterwards, the reindeer don't really calm down until Martin Luther King Day. So we can only Super Power them once a year, in cold weather (if you look into it, you'll see that Jesus was actually a spring birth).

   Anywho... as for the F-16, that was a sudden, violent shock that the (unmedicated) reindeer simply couldn't handle.

   We keep the reindeer in Northern Europe to graze during the summer months, using some pasture of a distant Santa relative (check the last name of the farmer in the CNN story). The NATO base nearby was just an unfortunate coincidence, and we've already corrected it. That happens more than you'd think... especially with the Russians.

   Before the development of ICBMs, standard Soviet nuclear first-strike doctrine called for a flight over the Pole, which is actually the shortest distance between their Northern Air Command bases and America itself. While test-run Backfire bombers never violated Canadian air space, they raised Holy Hell over the Pole, and we'd lose 3 reindeer a year.

   Unlike Santa, reindeer are not immortal. Most live- even with the steroids- only 50-75 years. We're currently on Prancer 78607.0, for instance. The bombers killed more deer than every Mohawk Indian combined... and those boys could sure swing a hatchet, let me tell you. It's basically why we Smurfs stopped sneaking over to America withthe Dutch.

   This went on until ICBMs were invented, and then it got worse.

   Those SOBs would zoom over the Pole at 490 mph, maybe 50 feet off the ground... I wrecked a few patches of snowfrom them, let me tell you.

   In the 1970s, it actually started cutting into our profits (Got a sh***y gift in 1978? There ya go! ), so Santa had a little talk with Lenoid Breshnev... after which the flight patterns were altered.

   So anyhow, Debby..... that's the Short Version (no jokes, please). I might as well throw in the fact that I peeked at the Naughty/Nice List, and, while you can still botch it up with any further deviance... there's a cute vet who'll be making a housecall this December.

               

Ways To Get Beaten Up By Athletes

(..."or with God as my witness, I'll take off this $500 suit and beat your psychotic black &$$, son." )

This is a lot like that Douglas Adams thing with the answer to the question of the mystery of the Universe... it isn't the How that is the problem here... it's the Why.

Regardless:

- Look at Ray Lewis wrong.

- Take a position as (tall) Jayson Williams' chauffeur.

- Sit behind the bench at an NHL game and loudly disparage "Oh, Canada."

- Secretly replace Barry Bonds' tongue cream steroid with strawberry Jay-Izm Fun Gel from the adult bookstore.

- Walk back and forth in front of the Kansas City Chiefs Player parking lot in full Nazi regalia.

- Practice with the Portland Trail Blazers.

- Spill your beer forward at an Indiana Pacers game.

(Look what you made me do!)

- Ask Charles Barkley for an autograph, and then sneeze on him as he's signing.

- Switch Ratty Palmeiro's Viagra with Ex-Lax, and stand by the bathroom saying, "Don't you dare implicate Cal Ripken."

- Hang around WNBA shower rooms disguised as a Lawn Jockey Towel Rack.

- Jump onto the ice at an NHL game and try to share your popcorn with Tie Domi.

- Look at Ray Lewis in a way that seems fine to you, but that he perceives as threatening/condescending.

- Go to the ESPY's dressed up as Jose Canseco

 

(Stop Snitching!!)

- Be standing near someone who spills a beer on Artest or looks at Ray-Ray "wrong."

- About halfway through the process of meeting Mike Tyson... say, "That face tat looks stupid, you big ape."

- Go to a Made Men concert with Paul Pierce(d).

- Wear a Randy Moss afro wig into Lambeau Stadium, sit among the endzone seats, and loudly make fun of Vince Lombardi's teeth as a Packer scores.

- Throw a box of thumb tacks onto the road in in the path of a large Tour de France pack.

- Get into pit row at the Talladega 500, and break dance to a hip-hop version of "Ring Of Fire" while wearing a "Both Dales Suck" tshirt.

(This is what we call a Talladega Two-Step, son)

- Make a sudden move near Allen Iverson at the Source Awards.

- Expunge a loud, hacking cough over Boog Powell's rib grill.

- Go "Look, everybody... I'm Jeff van Gundy!!" ... then run out on the court at a Heat game and grab Alonzo Mourning around the leg.

- Run into the ring during a Felix Trinidad fight with boxing gloves on, and yell "Three Way Dance" in both English and Spanish.

- Bumper-ski on Jeff Gordon's Du Pont car.

- Infiltrate the Rucker Tournament disguised as a KKK Grand Wizard.

- Dress as a Sasquatch, and disrupt the Winter Olympics ski races by yelling, "Get out of my damn yard!'

 

Massachusetts Checklist

                                  

You Know You're From Massachusetts When...

The person driving in front of you is going 70 mph and you are cursing him for going too slow. (Damn school zones)

When ordering a tonic, you mean a Coke...not quinine water. (I've had detectives look up from their meals in cafes when I asked for Coke.)


You almost feel disappointed when someone doesn't flip you the bird when you cut them off or steal their parking space. (I tell people to **** thmselves when they don't let me pull out quickly enough, and I'm not even a native)

You know how to pronounce the names of towns like Worcester, Billerica, Haverhill, Scituate, Gloucester, Duxbury and Cotuit. (Try spelling it out in the comments section)Add your own

You have driven to New Hampshire on a Sunday in order to get beer. (Blue Laws)

You know that there are two Bulger brothers, and thatthey're both crooks. (Ironically, I would trust the gangster more than the State Senator)

You know what they sell at a packie. (I go to the "liqour store" .... my husband goes to the "packy"... it's the same place.)

"The Garden" is a non-existent concrete train station building

                                                                  

You actually enjoy driving around rotaries. (I stay in them, occasionally.. and Duxbury just built a Roundabout, of all the ****** things)

You know at least one bar where you can get something to drink after last call. (It's called "Every Bar.")

You can actually find your way around Boston. (Well.... that stupid Big Dig thing screwed everything up, right when i thought I had it down!!)

Evacuation Day is a recognized holiday. (I have never taught a class on Evacuation Day, and would take it off even if I taught in Arizona.)

You know what First Night is. (It's actually Last Night, and the following First morning.")

You know at least one guy named Sean, Pat, Whitey, Red, Bud, Sully or Seamus. (If you could combine Sloan and Shea's dating resume into that of one rather prolific sister, she'd have dated a man with each of those names.)

You think the rest of the country owes you for Thanksgiving and Independence Day. (and St. Patrick's Day....and Patriot's Day....and they do owe us.)

You have never been to Cheers. (It's The Bull And Finch Pub, and it's full of yuppies and tourists)

When the words 'WICKED' and 'GOOD' go together. (I was shocked when I learned that this very effective term of emphasis wasn't used nation wide.")Wicked Good Guide to Boston English

You knew that there was no chance in hell that the Pats would move to Hartford. (I'd have rooted for the Giants, like the old timers here used to before we got the Pats)
                                                   

 

You have gone to at least one party at UMass. (I've been to parties at THREE UMasses)

The curse of the Bambino is taught in public schools. (Guilty)

You own a "Yankees Suck" shirt or hat. (I become angry when Southereners refer to me as a "Yankee.")

You think Doug Flutie is the greatest athlete ever. (For Boston, For Boston...)

You remember exactly where you were when the ball rolled through Buckner's legs. (grrr)

You (USED TO) pray for the Red Sox to win the World Series not this season, but in your lifetime.  (I steal from old sites)

You know how to make a frappe. (Watch Southerners get really angry at a Falmouth Dairy Queen when no ice cream is added to their Milkshake.)

You know that "Big Dig" is also a kind of ice cream you can get at Brigham's. (Just may go there this evening, as my schedule brings me past one)

You actually know how to merge from 6 lanes of traffic down to one. (The key is to have your nose ahead of whoever you are cutting off, for insurance liability purposes)

You never go "to Cape Cod", you go "down the Cape".  (My family refers to me as "down the Cape" as a sort of metaphor for "went crazy")

You think that Roger Clemens, Wade Boggs and Derek Jeter are more evil than Whitey Bulger.  (To my knowledge, the Roger Clemens article I wrote for this very blog is the only one that an AOL Employee has had to personally call the author on and ask her to remove it...although I dodged the call for several hours by going to a BarBQ, and my poor husband ended up taking it)

You went to Old Sturbridge Village, Plymouth Plantation, or both, on field trip in grammar school. (Duxbury public schools have 7thgraders take a term entirely full of John Alden, Massasoit, etc...).

You're aware that there is a town, somewhere in Massachusetts, named Brimfield where they have the biggest outdoor antique market in the world. (Monponsett is less than 4 miles from where the Toll House Cookie was invented, and my old home was within sight of the guy who gave us "Kilroy Was here.")

Youcan drive to the mountains and the ocean all in one day. (I knew a fat guy who can roll down Mount Washington and allow his momentum to carry him into the Atlantic, usually off Gloucester... until the truck hit him)

You know that the Mass Pike is some sort of strange weather dividing line. (You can take a map of MA, draw "12-18" in the western half of the state, "8-12"  on everythingup to Boston, "4-8" around the coast, and "Mix to 3" on the Cape... and be right for 76% of Massachusetts' winter storm forecasts)

You know that P-Town isn't the name of a new rap group. (If it was a rap group, they might live three to five minutes at the Source Awards.

You know that Ludlow is 90% Portuguese and that Fall River is 90% Lebanese.  (Huh?)

You do not recognize the letter "R" as a part of the English language. (It's the key to pronouncing "Worcester.")

You've called something "wicked pissa" (Itmeans "good.")

You have driven to either Rhode Island, New Hampshire or Vermont for a tattoo. (You can get them here, now... since all the Lebanese moved out of Fall River)

You see people like Steven Tyler (Aerosmith), Dicky Barret (The Mighty, Mighty Bosstones), Tracy Bonham, Evan Dando (The Lemonheads) and Ric Ocasek (The Cars) in the local supermarket and it doesn't phase you. (I am a fringe Kennedy, by marriage)

You've slammed on your brakes to deter a tailgater. (Only if I don't have a gun in the car) 

                                      

Know at least three Tony's, one Vinnie and a Frank(ie) (I have one in my family)

Paranoia sets in if you can't see a Dunkin Donuts, ATM or CVS within eyeshot at all times.(I was pleasd when I saw a CVS outside my Houstonhotel, because I didn't like my chances of getting them to understand me saying "apothecary" or "pharmacy.")

You keep an ice scraper and can of de-icer on the floor of your car...year round (They come in handy for deterring car-jackers)

You still try to order curly fries from Burger King (The chief benefit of Pizza Boy in Wareham- 508-295-2095- is that they have Curly fries and superb thin crust pizza.)

You order iced coffee in January. (This isn't as wierd as it sounds. Water- the primary ingredient in ice- freezes at 32 degrees. The air outside is 10 degrees. Therefore, iced coffee will warm you in the right weather conditions. This knowledge is essentially why we beat Indianapolis in football every January) 

You know what candlepin bowling is (It used to beat the Patriots' TV ratings right up until Parcells got here. Tt's also a sport I am incapable of playing, for reasons far beyond my refusal to wear second-hand shoes.)

You drive 45 minutes to New Hampshire to save $5 in sales tax. (Until the Bush Administration, this was sound fiscal policy) 

You've pulled out of a side street and used your car to block oncoming traffic so you can make a left. (I once saved a woman and her occupied baby stroller with this tactic... and had a lead pipe waved out the window at me for it by the driver I blocked from Death Race 2000ing her.)

You know what a "regular" coffee is (my distaste for coffee is viewed with disgust more by my French associates than my American ones... but the differences between them are like the 3 and 4 of diamonds in the Iraqi War Criminal Commemorative Card Set)

You've bragged about the money you've saved at The Christmas Tree Shop. (The little nautical Santa lamp you can see on the pictures of my desk was $5.99 at the Pembroke CTS in 2003 or so) 

                                               

By the way:

Worcester = Wuss-ta

Billerica = Bill-ricka

Haverhill = Hay-va-ill, or Hay-vill

Scituate = Sit-chew-et

Gloucester = Gloss-ta

Cotuit = Cuh-too-it

Duxbury = Ducks-bree

Tagged

 

1) Go to your journal's archives.
2) Find the 23rd post.
3) Findthe 5th sentence in that post.
4) Post that sentence with these instructions.
5) Tag five more people 

I think you're wild when you flash that fragile smile.

 

Here's mine:

"The Pistons have 2 chances of winning this scrap:

A) Slim

B) None

...and as for old Slim...he just left town, Jack."

   That was before the 2004 NBA Finals, Detroit vs LA. Detroit won in 5 games, and the team in LA was dismantled afterwards. It cost Shaq Daddy his California house, and sent Phil Jackson scurrying off into Montana to wait for people to forget how badly he was outcoached.

   It also made me look like n ass, although I recovered from this blunder to win the All Star Blogger Contest later that month. It's been Wine and Roses ever since for the blogging force of nature known world-wide as America's Sweetheart.

 

Time To Tag:

Saved By The Blog

 

calling the shots

 

Yannis' Sports Journal

 

Sports Bar & Buffet

 

SPORTZ ASSASSIN'S SPORTS JOURNAL

 

 

I got tagged by the Pastor, too... not like that, you sick eff:

 

The Church That Jesus Built

I wish all of you could experience Trinity church as it is now.  Often it is like Grand Central Station.  People are everywhere.  Tents, RVs, trucks, trailers, and vehicles fill the property.  Inside, children inhabit the educational wing nursery as we continue our new child care ministry for the businesses and community.  The free store has a continual flow of weary refugees from every background you can imagine. Teams from Evangelical Free Churches and other churches are deployed 8 am to 6 pm daily and they eat, sleep, and fellowship throughout the campus.  Makeshift offices with phones and computers are popping up throughout the building as little ministry groups meet to plan and then to launch out in the name of Jesus.  On top of this, 500 people came to church yesterday to honor God who is worthy of our praise and thanksgiving.  This included dozens of brand new people, including new believers and seekers.  The church of Jesus Christ is being built.  I feel like the turtle sitting on the fence post.  When you see this phenomenon, you know the turtle didn’t get there on its own.  When you see what God has done at Trinity, you know we didn’t do it ourselves.

Yesterday, in the service, many newcomers stood and gave praise to God for the teams that have reached out to them.

1.    Marlow had been praying prior to the hurricane that God would redirect her life.  Indeed, she has met the One who gives her life.  This former New Orleans travel guide who lost everything has been so energized by the Spirit she is like the woman in John 4 who is telling an entire town about Jesus and Trinity church.
2.    Michelle lost her home and business and still hasn’t located her 3 and 5 year old grandchildren.  She only had the clothes on her back but she met people in the free store.  Scared to death, she stepped into the service on Sunday and loved it!
3.    Libby arrived back home after the hurricane to find her home half demolished.  This moment of agony was diminished when a ministry team arrived at that moment to pray, comfort, and clean up her yard.  What a divine appointment and God moment.  She has come to Trinity for 2 weeks.  Yesterday, she told the church family her daughter in Knoxville is all alone dying of cancer.  A woman in the church made a call to the Evangelical Free church in that city to make a visit.
4.    The local hospital ran out of juice for patients.  A few of us thought, “Could it be that juice bottles would come on our next truck?”  What came on the truck?  JUICE BOTTLES!
5.    A lady and her 16 year old son fled hurricane Rita from St. Charles.  The woman’s husband had died the day before from brain cancer.  As she left town a woman said, “If you can’t find a place to stay, look for a church.”  Of course, as she drove east there were no hotels available in the region.  She went all the way to Mobile Alabama.  On her way back, she happened to get off at our exit.  She saw the Trinity sign and remembered her friend’s advice.  Upon hearing the story our people ran out to greet them, and said they could eat, shower, sleep, and be cared for as long as they needed.
6.    One man found himself half-dazed and crying out, “God why do you hate me?  Why do your hate me?”  At that moment a team appeared and cleaned up his fallen trees.  He’s been at the church almost every day since then helping others.
7.    One team found themselves in Slidell on Saturday helping at one home but couldn’t miss hearing the neighbors in a huge altercation.  They were arriving for the first time to see their cherished home crushed by water damage.  The sight was too much to bear and they let out all their emotions and anger on each other.  It was unsettling that none of their family had come forth to help.  The team decided to shift their efforts to this couple.  They cleaned up the entire mess.  The couple’s hearts softened and grew large as the day ended with prayer, hugs, love, and thanksgiving.  God loved that couple through a team from California.

I could go on, but I’ll stop here.  I’ll close with this today.

I love the story of the night Michael Jordan scored 69 points in one game.  It was a blow-out and at the end of the game the coach pulled M.J. out and put in a little known sub who scored two meaningless points in the closing seconds of play.  A few weeks later a reporter asked the sub, “What is the highlight of your professional career?”  He said, “The night Michael Jordan and I scored 71 points together.”  This is how I feel about what Jesus is building at Trinity Church.  He is doing the work and it is a privilege to partner with Him in His Kingdom.

Betting the farm on God,

Michael

p.s.  Pray for a member of our church named Leroy.  His brother was killed in the flooding but the body washed away.  They have taken DNA samples from the family to try to identify the body among the many unidentified bodies.  This family shared at church yesterday how agonizing it is to not know.