Ya, the days are gone by where bench clearing brawls were the norm. The game of hockey has been revised considerably from the time where the sticks were up and elbows were flying. Hell, you can’t even tap a guy with your stick anymore without getting two minutes – I think that they’re calling that “hooking”.
Hell, I’ll show you “hooking” any day of the week and twice on Tuesdays.
Hockey has always been a rough sport. Lots of bruises, stitches, knocked out teeth, an occasional broken bone or dislocated joint is standard fare from a season on the ice. I’ve certainly had my fair share of injuries from playing the greatest game in the world. Lets see, this has included stitches from pucks and sticks to the face (had my lower lip completely split in half and took a stick blade to my right eyeball to name a few), broken wrist, broken humerus (that’s the upper arm bone ya noggin heads) from a cross check, torn knee cartilage, separated shoulder, and complete right hip joint replacement (my demise).
And I have played some dirty hockey too. The sin bin has been my refuge upon occasion. It is the bane of many a determined player too. You play your ass off and you still get beat in your own end; so you trip the guy to stop him from going in one on your goalie.
Was it worth it?
Ohhhhh ….. you’re damn tootin it was Olie!
So you’re doomed to the box for two minutes again. Your teammates give ya shit later for letting the guy beat ya. Yeah ya hear them say “Wheats, ya get beat on the right side every time. Ya gotta move em to your left before they cross the blue line you dumb-ass!”
What’s worse the box and maybe a missed shift or the razzing?
Fuck the razzing. It’s that missed time on the ice, baby.
Oh yeah and how about the intensity of getting a little rowdy and taking coincidentals only to jump back onto the ice and take up where the two of ya left off a couple of minutes ago? The fans love that shit, ehh?
I coach a bit ya know. I teach the kids to go in high, keeping their elbows up. Sure don’t want them skating like a damn Texas armadillo with their noses down to the ground now do ya? Keep your head up, go in hard and come out with the puck.
The worst of all penalties, though is too many men on the ice. Man, that is just a mistake to get that kinda shit-ass call. Whoever is running the bench should have to eat two donuts or something to serve that fool penalty.
Another one of my gripes is that goalies don’t serve penalties. Now to me, that is a real crock of shit. I think it would really open the game up. Ehh?
Have ya ever wondered about the guy that’s taking care of the box? In the NHL, he’s an official and has to keep track of the time and other sorts of pricy shit (that’s why ticket prices are so high – it ain’t the players’ salaries). In youth hockey this person is usually one of the parents that volunteers or is coerced into the position by the domineering team mother. In the infinite number of beer leagues out there it’s usually just an interested fan that just wants to help out – maybe loves the game but can’t play anymore – maybe never played but is the biggest wanna-be in the world. Kudos to these folks cuz they walk with wood too.
I’ve got a story to tell about the penalty box official at the tournament I played in last week. Got to play in the Snoopy games out in Santa Rosa, California. Wild Bill knew some guys down in Marshall, Minnesota that needed a couple of players to fill the roster for the over 45 team they were putting in the tournament. We decided that it’d make a fun little vacation, so we coughed up the bucks each and told the guys that we’d hook up with them out west. Wild Bill was coming down from the northwest with his wife and daughter and I’d be heading out of the back woods with my honey. All to play a minimum of three games with the Marshall Meat-Packers.
The honey and I flew into Sacramento, rented a car and drove over to Santa Rosa via Napa and Sonoma Valleys so that she could do some mighty fine (and awfully damned expensive) wine tasting. You guys know that I don’t drink the stuff (brewskies brothers – pour me another!) but if it makes her happy it makes me happy.
The Meat-Packers had made arrangements for all of us to stay at the same hotel which gave us a fair discount over normal rates – and I’ll tell you that’s awfully danged important when your staying in a hotel for over a week. Good group of folks, those Meat-Packers, though they were a little disturbed that Grain Belt wasn’t on tap at the hotel pub and that they couldn’t find it in the liquor stores either. We had a team meeting the first night to get introduced to all and lay down some strategies and shit. As I figured most didn’t play on the same team but had gathered for the tournament from a beer league in southern Minnesota. I brought a couple of cases of Moosehead to the meeting to appease their Grain Belt withdrawal. I had found it at a Bevmo liquor store that we had driven past and turned back to as we had driven over from Sacramento (sheeeet – I was looking-out for myself cuz the honey – I just knew – was gonna be really wined up). The meeting went well and it seemed like the dude, Mike, that was running the team, was afraid that we all would spend too much time in the penalty box. Warned us to play “nice” and kept referring to all of us as “ya bunch of brawlers”. The first time he used the phrase I glanced over at Wild Bill and gave him the thumbs up. Our kinda guys. Could be this whole team was composed of close relatives of the Hanson brothers, ehh?
Wild Bill and I told them that we’d prefer to play defense mainly. Bill had been a forward from my days of playing with him back a generation or so ago but had now maybe slowed down to my pace or something. I really think that he wanted to skate as my partner – which was really cool. Our first game was going to be Sunday evening and Mike said that we’d be wearing numbers 2 and 3, he’d bring the jerseys and socks.
I don’t know, but we really didn’t click in that first game. It’s about ten or twelve minutes left in the third and were down 6 to 2. Wild Bill’s playing left and I’ve got right de. The opposing team’s center whipped the puck back into my corner from the opposite side outside the blueline as their left week jammed in skating like a Junior A allstar. I turned and skated like hell to try to cut it off behind the net. Wild Bill was tracking their rightwing as he came in hard too. I realized that I couldn’t make the cutoff and turned to the slot as their center started to pick a perch high. Wild Bill must have had the same thoughts as me as we both punched to the high slot to pick this guy – both of us clobbering him full blast in an ass sandwich like the old days (got to do something to rile the old team – cuz right then we sure for shit hadn’t been skatin with wood). Oh and don’t you know it - the fuckin whistle blows.
Both of us get called for roughing ………….
Running time: three minutes each. It’s the shit!
The gate keeper at the box opens the door and Bill goes in first; swearing up a storm. I jump in and sit down with my stick out in front of me and start to take my gloves of when the dude shuts the gate and turns to us, (damn if he doesn’t look just like Ernie Rucks from the old days of skating Sunday pickup – in retirement, Ernie was an NHL goal judge down in LA and came from the Canadian north woods) oh yeah lost my train of thought there, ok so he turns to us and says “You boys ought to play nice now”, taps the right side of his nose two times with his index finger and ………….
Holy shit its cold! I look over at Bill and he’s looking back at me. What the fuck????
We aren’t in Santa Rosa anymore. Were outside and it feels like it’s about 50 below. Were standing next to the gate at a crude outdoor rink with some sort of antiquated equipment on. Our uniforms are harsh wool sweaters and socks with about twenty stripes on them. My gloves have got hardly no padding or length to them and on the jersey it says “St. Paul Hockey Club”. And my skates are pretty wobbly feeling – all leather it looks like.
In and instant, I knew it and I know Bill knew it too – that we had been somehow transported back in time. To another era, to another game. Utterly amazing. But we had a game to play and we knew that we both had to jump on the ice.
And off we went, skating our asses off playing with sticks that looked like they had been made from a single piece of wood. The game was seven on seven with a rover. Somehow we knew. It all came together in an instant. Our rover was Francis “Moose” Goheen, probably the second best if not best American hockey player of the time, next to or equal alongside of Hobie Baker. What a deal. This guy’s was from White Bear Lake, Minnesota – Herb Brooks’ hero when he was growing up. Silver medalist from the 1920 Olympics. This dude was good! And he walked with wood from one end of the ice to other. Untouchable.
I figure its got to be somewhere around 1925 based on the way the folks were dressed that were watching and the looks of cars that we could see over at the street.
Wild Bill skates across my lane and yells at me as he passes, “Jasper do you see who’s skating rover for Boston over there?”
Bewildered I look around and astonishingly realize that the visitors’ rover was none other than Bobby Orr. Damn if this ain’t something. He musta been somehow transported here from the late ‘60’s or ‘70’s. And oh, could he skate. He was made for the position of rover!
The scoreboard, being manned by a guy with a handlebar mustache, fur coat and the weirdest hat that I’d ever seen, said that we were tied at 4 to 4.
Game on kids!
The puck skittered up the boards on the rough ice to Wild Bill and he took off on a meandering journey into the opposing end. Shit he was skating damn near as good as young Moose Goheen. He got in about 40 feet out – and I could tell – he tried to take a slap shot. No dice – it couldn’t happen – the slap shot wouldn’t be invented for another forty years or so. Bill fell flat on his chest like he’d been close-lined.
Orr picked up the puck and took it behind his net to apparently regroup and eye the up-ice layout and off he went. Smoothly left, smoothly right … Goheen swooped in to cut him off and Orr just went horizontal in flight mode or something with the puck almost slipping through Moose’s skates. He kicks it forward and heads after it. Orr, still horizontal, spins in midair and takes off superman style after Goheen, sweeps in with outstretched downward angled stick and takes it off Goheen only to come back down to ice behind his own net again smooth as silk.
Orr eyes up ice again and takes off through the center. I pick him up as he cuts to the boards to my right. Again the smart bastard goes airborne to my left and picks up the puck off the boards on the other side of me. WTF! I’m all over myself and Orr’s on net. Oops, did he lose the puck on the rough ice or is it a deke. Wham – bam – thank you mamm– if he didn’t stuff it in the puck from between his own legs and he’s off flying again.
The fans start booing as Orr keeps flying around celebrating his goal but the game is different. No face off after goals – just pull the puck out and take it behind the net while everyone gets on side and take off skating again. Mr. Moose Goheen picks up the puck while Orr is still celebrating. He seems pumped, the crowd’s booing now sounds excited rather than angry. A teammate skates by and yells “Watch him now. His family calls him “Boo” and that really riles his ass!”
He weaves, he dekes, elbows out, he stiff arms one guy like a running back and goes in on net like a bull in a matador’s outfit. He’s putting a little drift to the left and I can tell he’s got it set to pull the goalie with him with quick plans to go upstairs in the right corner.
Its in my mind – I know it …. And poof – Wild Bill and I are back in the box in Santa Rosa. Ghosts of Charles Schulz or what. Damn! I look over to Wild Bill. “You go on first.” He’s white as a ghost and as the penalty box time keeper opens the gate he steps on the ice and falls flat on his face. Not realizing what happened I stumble over him as I hit the ice. Both of us out there like a big pile of shit.
Bill twists his bloodied up face back towards me and asks “Wheats, what the fuck just happened?”
“Sheeeesh! I don’t know, but we better get back in the game, ehh.”
The center that we had crunched getting our penalties stopped in front of us and tapped us each on our helmets with his stick and laughed as he said “You turkeys, ya might as well head back to Marshall and get back to that business of packing meat.”
Ya know you guys – some days ya walk with wood and some days you sure for shit don’t.
Jasper here. Skate hard! Stay out of the sin-bin ….. or not.
Showing posts with label north woods. Show all posts
Showing posts with label north woods. Show all posts
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Saturday, February 2, 2008
I APPROVE THIS
Hey puckheads! How’s your week been? Enjoy the NHL All Star game last Sunday? Yup, me too. It was a lot of fun to watch from my living-room at the cabin on my small-screen non-HD TV. Didn’t miss it this year like I did last year, nope.
Sheeeet! I’d like to #@#*%#% former President Clinton for passing that piece of legislation. Do you know how many stinking non-HD TVs there are at my place between the cabin and the barn? I’ve got five of them puppies. It’s gonna cost me a bunch to replace them with High-Definition versions and then they’re gonna kick my ass as I go out the door – oh forgot to tell ya that you’ll get charged for disposing you’re old sets too dumpkoff. Well kiss my ass. The TV’s I’ve got work just fine. WTF do I need HD? Shit my vision ain’t that great anymore so why would I want some new fangled piece a shit, ehh. The economy is on the skids and this bull crap is just gonna make it worse.
The weather has kinda sucked through the week. Pretty much has been snowing constantly which has made my drive to and from work one hell of a mess. It’s a shame how many dipshits don’t know how to drive in this winter wonderland. Damn, I learned how to drive in the snow. Did my driver’s training way back when in it. Slid into a plowed over ditch taking my practice examine with my high school driver’s-ed instructor. Kids in the back seat laughed their fool asses off, but I’ve never done it since. Passed my first driving test to get my license while driving on top of snow-packed and iced over roads in mid March back before most a your parents even knew how to do the nasty. Yup. Why can’t you guys learn how to drive in winter weather?
But this fowl weather has kept Stinky busy shoveling out driveways and parking lots. He hasn’t been by since last weekend when we went out and did some fool-ass stink-agagoning and crashed myself all up. It was a blast but I’m still sore.
Without Stinky’s help, the honey has been doing the drive way. She’s pretty hardy for the teensie little thing that she is. She takes good care of me and feeds me well. Keeps the cabin damn near spotless which pretty near amazes me cuz I’m such a turdball messy old fart. But she pretty much does it all and is cute as a button besides. So I can’t complain too much. She’ll sit in some times when we need a goalie for pickup. But her one weakness is that she ducks on high shots, and being as short as she is, especially in her goalie crouch, those damn high shots go in over her head. Craziest damn thing. She’s pretty good in the nets otherwise.
Thursday she had to clear out a deadfall in the driveway so that she could go into town for groceries. Didn’t even complain about it much. Said she was glad the chain saw worked fine in the cold temp but didn’t enjoy trying to find a long enough chain in my mess in the barn so that she could pull the cut up outta the way. Oh well … she did just fine and I love the little honey just a whole mess.
Tonight, she and I are sitting in front of the fire just enjoying a sittin around the fire drink. Nope I ain’t havin a beer and I ain’t tellin ya what it is I’m drinkin cuz you’d laugh your fool heads off. She fixed up some special dinner earlier tonight that she had seen while watching Rachel Ray on the tube. It was a potato-leek soup with a pound of bacon in it. Damn it was yummy! More like spiced up thin green mashed potatoes then a soup – but hit the spot on a cold winter night.
The craziest thing though happened during dinner. The phone rang and the caller ID said “OUT OF AREA”. The honey had picked it up and normally would not answer unless the ID said it was someone that she knew. She took a chance and answered this time thinking it might the daughter calling from a friend’s that she was visiting over in Washington or Oregon somewhere like that. Well it wasn’t.
Damned if it wasn’t John McCain. Nope, it wasn’t some canned message that John McCain had recorded, but was the presidential candidate himself. I started laughing thinking it was canned (she had the phone on speaker) because I had answered one from Hillary earlier in the week (Oh, don’t I wish that that call had been her live – she’d have caught an earful from me on Bill and the HD shit, ehh.).
I’m telling you it was really John McCain and the honey starts chatting him up. She tells him that, yup, she’s going to vote for him in the primary and in the fall too. She told me she was last week so I wasn’t too surprised. She gets him going about Vietnam and flying fighter jets. She’s working him pretty good I’m tellin ya and after getting him into talking about the jets and all she just pops out “Well ya must have some pretty big balls, ehh?”
I’m hearing this right? He picks up on here accent and not missing a beat says to her, “Honey, where are you from?”
She says, “Well Mr. McCain I live up here in the north woods with my husband Jasper. And if you’ve got such big ass balls why don’t you come on up here some time and play some puck, I mean hockey, with me, Jasper, and the rest of the guys. Oh heck, maybe you don’t skate being from that snowbird destination, Arizona, and all. But we’d sure like to have you at least come watch sometime. (She’s getting all embarrassed a bit now.) You know I’d like to meet you sometime. You could pass for Garth Brooks’ younger good looking brother. Oh my goodness. Shit! I didn’t say that did I? (Really embarrassed now.)”
Well old John McCain said that he’d love too. Seems he has some puckster blood in him. Said he wasn’t worth a shit – was more of a windmill then a winger.
The honey about shit. I didn’t interfere one bit, no sirree. They exchanged cell phone numbers and he’s got our address now. So will see. So wouldn’t that be great if sometime we have a president that likes to lace em up skate a little puck.
So, regardless of the weather it’s been a damn fine and an interesting week.
Guys, just remember to skate hard and gals to skate your little asses off cuz sweat is sweet.
Yup, I’ll be walking with wood until next time.
I’m Jasper Wheats and I approve this.
Sheeeet! I’d like to #@#*%#% former President Clinton for passing that piece of legislation. Do you know how many stinking non-HD TVs there are at my place between the cabin and the barn? I’ve got five of them puppies. It’s gonna cost me a bunch to replace them with High-Definition versions and then they’re gonna kick my ass as I go out the door – oh forgot to tell ya that you’ll get charged for disposing you’re old sets too dumpkoff. Well kiss my ass. The TV’s I’ve got work just fine. WTF do I need HD? Shit my vision ain’t that great anymore so why would I want some new fangled piece a shit, ehh. The economy is on the skids and this bull crap is just gonna make it worse.
The weather has kinda sucked through the week. Pretty much has been snowing constantly which has made my drive to and from work one hell of a mess. It’s a shame how many dipshits don’t know how to drive in this winter wonderland. Damn, I learned how to drive in the snow. Did my driver’s training way back when in it. Slid into a plowed over ditch taking my practice examine with my high school driver’s-ed instructor. Kids in the back seat laughed their fool asses off, but I’ve never done it since. Passed my first driving test to get my license while driving on top of snow-packed and iced over roads in mid March back before most a your parents even knew how to do the nasty. Yup. Why can’t you guys learn how to drive in winter weather?
But this fowl weather has kept Stinky busy shoveling out driveways and parking lots. He hasn’t been by since last weekend when we went out and did some fool-ass stink-agagoning and crashed myself all up. It was a blast but I’m still sore.
Without Stinky’s help, the honey has been doing the drive way. She’s pretty hardy for the teensie little thing that she is. She takes good care of me and feeds me well. Keeps the cabin damn near spotless which pretty near amazes me cuz I’m such a turdball messy old fart. But she pretty much does it all and is cute as a button besides. So I can’t complain too much. She’ll sit in some times when we need a goalie for pickup. But her one weakness is that she ducks on high shots, and being as short as she is, especially in her goalie crouch, those damn high shots go in over her head. Craziest damn thing. She’s pretty good in the nets otherwise.
Thursday she had to clear out a deadfall in the driveway so that she could go into town for groceries. Didn’t even complain about it much. Said she was glad the chain saw worked fine in the cold temp but didn’t enjoy trying to find a long enough chain in my mess in the barn so that she could pull the cut up outta the way. Oh well … she did just fine and I love the little honey just a whole mess.
Tonight, she and I are sitting in front of the fire just enjoying a sittin around the fire drink. Nope I ain’t havin a beer and I ain’t tellin ya what it is I’m drinkin cuz you’d laugh your fool heads off. She fixed up some special dinner earlier tonight that she had seen while watching Rachel Ray on the tube. It was a potato-leek soup with a pound of bacon in it. Damn it was yummy! More like spiced up thin green mashed potatoes then a soup – but hit the spot on a cold winter night.
The craziest thing though happened during dinner. The phone rang and the caller ID said “OUT OF AREA”. The honey had picked it up and normally would not answer unless the ID said it was someone that she knew. She took a chance and answered this time thinking it might the daughter calling from a friend’s that she was visiting over in Washington or Oregon somewhere like that. Well it wasn’t.
Damned if it wasn’t John McCain. Nope, it wasn’t some canned message that John McCain had recorded, but was the presidential candidate himself. I started laughing thinking it was canned (she had the phone on speaker) because I had answered one from Hillary earlier in the week (Oh, don’t I wish that that call had been her live – she’d have caught an earful from me on Bill and the HD shit, ehh.).
I’m telling you it was really John McCain and the honey starts chatting him up. She tells him that, yup, she’s going to vote for him in the primary and in the fall too. She told me she was last week so I wasn’t too surprised. She gets him going about Vietnam and flying fighter jets. She’s working him pretty good I’m tellin ya and after getting him into talking about the jets and all she just pops out “Well ya must have some pretty big balls, ehh?”
I’m hearing this right? He picks up on here accent and not missing a beat says to her, “Honey, where are you from?”
She says, “Well Mr. McCain I live up here in the north woods with my husband Jasper. And if you’ve got such big ass balls why don’t you come on up here some time and play some puck, I mean hockey, with me, Jasper, and the rest of the guys. Oh heck, maybe you don’t skate being from that snowbird destination, Arizona, and all. But we’d sure like to have you at least come watch sometime. (She’s getting all embarrassed a bit now.) You know I’d like to meet you sometime. You could pass for Garth Brooks’ younger good looking brother. Oh my goodness. Shit! I didn’t say that did I? (Really embarrassed now.)”
Well old John McCain said that he’d love too. Seems he has some puckster blood in him. Said he wasn’t worth a shit – was more of a windmill then a winger.
The honey about shit. I didn’t interfere one bit, no sirree. They exchanged cell phone numbers and he’s got our address now. So will see. So wouldn’t that be great if sometime we have a president that likes to lace em up skate a little puck.
So, regardless of the weather it’s been a damn fine and an interesting week.
Guys, just remember to skate hard and gals to skate your little asses off cuz sweat is sweet.
Yup, I’ll be walking with wood until next time.
I’m Jasper Wheats and I approve this.
Sunday, January 13, 2008
EXCHANGING FLUIDS
Good morning all. Heck maybe its evening as you’re reading this but you understand the gist of my greeting, ehh.
Been damn near snowed in for a while here. Damn storm came up from the southwest all full of moisture and it hit a cold front coming down from Siberia, or somewhere, right over the cabin for shits sake. Never seen anything like it around here before – snowing like crazy with wind – blizzard conditions I’m telling you, you guys. And the strangest ass thing about it was the thunder and lightning. You usually don’t see that kind of bizarre meteorological behavior around here in the dead of winter. Must a dumped a couple of feet of a heavy wet mess. Great for snowballs but really sucked otherwise.
It definitely just destroyed the ice down at the pond. Once we get some sub zero weather again, and after we shovel it off, that top surface layer is going to look like that porous lava rock that I’ve seen in museums. Ain’t worth a horse turd for skating on.
But its Sunday and I’ve been looking at the local paper. Sort of a ritual, sipping coffee and waiting for the honey to get up and laugh at me about making some breakfast. But it’s what I do, in the winter, sit around the fire with my rag to read and a cup of joe to clear out the cobwebs. How about you guys? What’s your weekend morning routine like? I always put up a thankful blessing request to the Good Lord for the cabin we have. Makes for some sweet coziness.
The fire’s popping cuz I put in some nasty old knots – makes it kinda exciting you know and the honey has now joined me. She asks me why I’m all dressed up. It’s a joke. Cuz I’m still lounging around in my light grey union suit. Winter time that’s my sleeping gear. Don’t usually use em for hockey. There it’s a t-shirt and long johns under my gear. But sleeping and hangin around the cabin on weekend mornings I gotta have my union suit on. Buttons up in front and’s got a flap in back. Now days it seems everbody’s in sweats and hoodies but mercy if Sears & Roebucks, Woolworths, Monkey Wards, and JC Pennys weren’t selling these look before the sweat sets ever got invented.
The honey says, “Jasper, you weren’t wearing those when you went out to the road to pick up the paper again were you. You don’t know what might been flapping out.”
I said, “Well, yes, I sure for shit was and you know as well as I do that there ain’t much left to flap about anyway. I just slipped on my boots and that old red stocking cap and high stepped it out there to get it. Plus as I usually do, I faced back towards the cabin when I bent over to pick it up giving old Agnes McGhee a nice peek of my hiney if she’s so inclined to look.”
“She can’t see you from there, you old fool of a fart.”
“Oh yes she can, and she does. I’ve seen that pair of binoculars sitting on the window sill over her kitchen sink when we’ve been to visit. That old bitty spies on me all the time from her little perch of a stool in the kitchen. Stinky even said that she’s hired him to clean brush that was blocking her view of the end of our drive.”
“She’s a nice old lady, now shut your trap!”
“Yup, she’s a nice old frustrated lady, uh yup.”
The conversation dies on that note and I’m back to my paper.
But I’m thinking what do you guys think? Should a grown man run around in his underwear? I mean, the alternative is to run around naked, right? I sure for shit am not a bathrobe type guy. What a waste of fabric, ehh.
I hear some noise outside, sounds like Stinky’s truck and then some. He said that he was going to come over later to move some snow from between the cabin and the barn for me. Damn, it’ll be nice when I can finish my basement and dig that tunnel between it and the barn.
I get up to see about Stinky Duvall and pour him a fresh cup of joe. He seems to be a happy camper today. He made some good money clearing snow cuz of the storm and he tells me that he made himself one haulin-ass snow blower. So figurin that I’ll be outside for a while I throw on my parka for this excursion.
We get out to his truck and back on the trailer is some hacked up piece a machinery like ya might a seen in one of Mel Gibson’s early Aussy movies.
“What the fuck is that, Paul?” I query and spit.
He gets a bit excited explaining it to me. “Well, it’s the front end of Craftsman forty inch snow blower that some one brought out to the yard last spring that I married to the back end of that old Honda Blackhawk that Alan Oveson used to have. I had to re-gear that pup so that it runs in reverse direction, and only first gear.”
“Well that’s one hell of a contraption.” I respond as I walk around the trailer looking it over kind a careful like. “What’s all this other shit?”
“I had to cut the turning stops off of the front end so that I could turn the handle bars backwards, pulled the front wheel off and attached a broken snow board that I fixed with epoxy to the forks that I extended. I can stand right on it while I’m blowing snow, self-propelled.”
I said, “Yup, all ya need now is a fairing from a Gold-Wing and you’re all set!”
“Jasp, ya musta been reading my mind!” He gets even more worked up over this touch of genius. “See how I extended the rear axle so that I’ve got the sprocket there to drive the blower in between the two wheels. Yup. Added a second wheel back there, I mean on the front of it. I mean, you know what I mean. And I shot over a hundred Hilti pins through the rims to provide good traction. No tires, you can see.”
“Yup, Paul, I think you’ve got the ultimate death machine here if anybody gets in front of you. You ought to apply for a job with Toro or maybe them folks at Zamboni. Get a job in their design department, ehh.”
“Shit Jasper, I just pieced it together. Oh, and look up here at the front of the blower. I added a couple of busted up goalie sticks on each side to help funnel more snow into it. Ain’t it something?”
“Yup, but does it blow snow?” The snorkel was laying down but it looked like it was about six or seven feet long and about a foot in diameter.
“Or shit yes, Wheats. I added a Dayton DC motor-blower combo into the pipe that your brother Bronzy gave me. Had to add a truck battery to run it, but I had a ton of them at the yard. Let me fire it up and clean that section back to the barn for you.”
So he fires this thing-a-ma-jig up. And ohhh, did I mention he was running it with open pipes I think. Louder then a friggin jet engine. Guess he had hydraulics for the snorkel cuz that pup went up smooth as can be with out even a bit of a snag. And off he went. He cleared what must a been close to an acre of open space in a little less then a half hour. At first it looked like a blizzard again but he started in the middle and worked the north side first blowing to the north then did the other half blowing to the south. Slick-titty-boom. But I think I lost my hearing.
“What ya think, Jasper?”
“Huh? I can hardly hear you. Pretty sweet! But awfully damn noisy. You wearing ear plugs?”
He pulls some stuff outta his coat pocket and shows me his shooting muffs and foam plugs both. “Double protection.” He’s walking with wood. Purty damn proud of this snow beast.
“How about your customer’s ears?”
He just shrugs his shoulders.
I invite him in for something more to drink.
We go inside and I microwave a couple of half mugs of eggnog and top em off half and half with some no-name peach brandy and Cap’n Morgan’s. Good shit for this time of year if ya ain’t playin hockey but just fartin around.
Each of us taking sips I grab the paper again. Damn if there ain’t some fool ad for 20% off for exchanging fluids. Sounds like a pick up line if ya ask me. I show it to Paul and he about does a reverse-through-the-nose chuckle.
He asks, “What the heck, is that an ad for a hooker or something?”
I yell to the honey, she’s in the bedroom I guess, “Sugar, me and Stinky are going down to Meg’s. Seems as that skank whore Annie-Poo that hangs out there is running a 20% off special on exchanging body fluids. We can’t pass this up.”
Wise-ass that she is she yells back, “Paul I can’t speak for you but that old fart Jasper better not have a spare drop of fluid left in him after that romp I gave him last night. You keep your tail-end right here, you hear me, Jasper Wheats.”
“Shit honey, it was just an ad that we were looking at for Ole’s Garage over in Patterson. He’s sure going to catch some crap for the way he had it worded.”
“Well you’re going to catch some crap if ya don’t bring in some more firewood. Give Paul something for clearing the snow and send him on his way. Ok?”
I walk Paul back out to his truck and suggest that he head down to the pond if he gets a chance and clear it off. If we have to then will bore a hole like we did a couple of years ago and use that gasoline powered pump to flood it over again on the next sub zero night.
Good stuff here in the North Woods. Wish ya could be here to enjoy it!
Until next time, Jasper here - walking with wood.
Been damn near snowed in for a while here. Damn storm came up from the southwest all full of moisture and it hit a cold front coming down from Siberia, or somewhere, right over the cabin for shits sake. Never seen anything like it around here before – snowing like crazy with wind – blizzard conditions I’m telling you, you guys. And the strangest ass thing about it was the thunder and lightning. You usually don’t see that kind of bizarre meteorological behavior around here in the dead of winter. Must a dumped a couple of feet of a heavy wet mess. Great for snowballs but really sucked otherwise.
It definitely just destroyed the ice down at the pond. Once we get some sub zero weather again, and after we shovel it off, that top surface layer is going to look like that porous lava rock that I’ve seen in museums. Ain’t worth a horse turd for skating on.
But its Sunday and I’ve been looking at the local paper. Sort of a ritual, sipping coffee and waiting for the honey to get up and laugh at me about making some breakfast. But it’s what I do, in the winter, sit around the fire with my rag to read and a cup of joe to clear out the cobwebs. How about you guys? What’s your weekend morning routine like? I always put up a thankful blessing request to the Good Lord for the cabin we have. Makes for some sweet coziness.
The fire’s popping cuz I put in some nasty old knots – makes it kinda exciting you know and the honey has now joined me. She asks me why I’m all dressed up. It’s a joke. Cuz I’m still lounging around in my light grey union suit. Winter time that’s my sleeping gear. Don’t usually use em for hockey. There it’s a t-shirt and long johns under my gear. But sleeping and hangin around the cabin on weekend mornings I gotta have my union suit on. Buttons up in front and’s got a flap in back. Now days it seems everbody’s in sweats and hoodies but mercy if Sears & Roebucks, Woolworths, Monkey Wards, and JC Pennys weren’t selling these look before the sweat sets ever got invented.
The honey says, “Jasper, you weren’t wearing those when you went out to the road to pick up the paper again were you. You don’t know what might been flapping out.”
I said, “Well, yes, I sure for shit was and you know as well as I do that there ain’t much left to flap about anyway. I just slipped on my boots and that old red stocking cap and high stepped it out there to get it. Plus as I usually do, I faced back towards the cabin when I bent over to pick it up giving old Agnes McGhee a nice peek of my hiney if she’s so inclined to look.”
“She can’t see you from there, you old fool of a fart.”
“Oh yes she can, and she does. I’ve seen that pair of binoculars sitting on the window sill over her kitchen sink when we’ve been to visit. That old bitty spies on me all the time from her little perch of a stool in the kitchen. Stinky even said that she’s hired him to clean brush that was blocking her view of the end of our drive.”
“She’s a nice old lady, now shut your trap!”
“Yup, she’s a nice old frustrated lady, uh yup.”
The conversation dies on that note and I’m back to my paper.
But I’m thinking what do you guys think? Should a grown man run around in his underwear? I mean, the alternative is to run around naked, right? I sure for shit am not a bathrobe type guy. What a waste of fabric, ehh.
I hear some noise outside, sounds like Stinky’s truck and then some. He said that he was going to come over later to move some snow from between the cabin and the barn for me. Damn, it’ll be nice when I can finish my basement and dig that tunnel between it and the barn.
I get up to see about Stinky Duvall and pour him a fresh cup of joe. He seems to be a happy camper today. He made some good money clearing snow cuz of the storm and he tells me that he made himself one haulin-ass snow blower. So figurin that I’ll be outside for a while I throw on my parka for this excursion.
We get out to his truck and back on the trailer is some hacked up piece a machinery like ya might a seen in one of Mel Gibson’s early Aussy movies.
“What the fuck is that, Paul?” I query and spit.
He gets a bit excited explaining it to me. “Well, it’s the front end of Craftsman forty inch snow blower that some one brought out to the yard last spring that I married to the back end of that old Honda Blackhawk that Alan Oveson used to have. I had to re-gear that pup so that it runs in reverse direction, and only first gear.”
“Well that’s one hell of a contraption.” I respond as I walk around the trailer looking it over kind a careful like. “What’s all this other shit?”
“I had to cut the turning stops off of the front end so that I could turn the handle bars backwards, pulled the front wheel off and attached a broken snow board that I fixed with epoxy to the forks that I extended. I can stand right on it while I’m blowing snow, self-propelled.”
I said, “Yup, all ya need now is a fairing from a Gold-Wing and you’re all set!”
“Jasp, ya musta been reading my mind!” He gets even more worked up over this touch of genius. “See how I extended the rear axle so that I’ve got the sprocket there to drive the blower in between the two wheels. Yup. Added a second wheel back there, I mean on the front of it. I mean, you know what I mean. And I shot over a hundred Hilti pins through the rims to provide good traction. No tires, you can see.”
“Yup, Paul, I think you’ve got the ultimate death machine here if anybody gets in front of you. You ought to apply for a job with Toro or maybe them folks at Zamboni. Get a job in their design department, ehh.”
“Shit Jasper, I just pieced it together. Oh, and look up here at the front of the blower. I added a couple of busted up goalie sticks on each side to help funnel more snow into it. Ain’t it something?”
“Yup, but does it blow snow?” The snorkel was laying down but it looked like it was about six or seven feet long and about a foot in diameter.
“Or shit yes, Wheats. I added a Dayton DC motor-blower combo into the pipe that your brother Bronzy gave me. Had to add a truck battery to run it, but I had a ton of them at the yard. Let me fire it up and clean that section back to the barn for you.”
So he fires this thing-a-ma-jig up. And ohhh, did I mention he was running it with open pipes I think. Louder then a friggin jet engine. Guess he had hydraulics for the snorkel cuz that pup went up smooth as can be with out even a bit of a snag. And off he went. He cleared what must a been close to an acre of open space in a little less then a half hour. At first it looked like a blizzard again but he started in the middle and worked the north side first blowing to the north then did the other half blowing to the south. Slick-titty-boom. But I think I lost my hearing.
“What ya think, Jasper?”
“Huh? I can hardly hear you. Pretty sweet! But awfully damn noisy. You wearing ear plugs?”
He pulls some stuff outta his coat pocket and shows me his shooting muffs and foam plugs both. “Double protection.” He’s walking with wood. Purty damn proud of this snow beast.
“How about your customer’s ears?”
He just shrugs his shoulders.
I invite him in for something more to drink.
We go inside and I microwave a couple of half mugs of eggnog and top em off half and half with some no-name peach brandy and Cap’n Morgan’s. Good shit for this time of year if ya ain’t playin hockey but just fartin around.
Each of us taking sips I grab the paper again. Damn if there ain’t some fool ad for 20% off for exchanging fluids. Sounds like a pick up line if ya ask me. I show it to Paul and he about does a reverse-through-the-nose chuckle.
He asks, “What the heck, is that an ad for a hooker or something?”
I yell to the honey, she’s in the bedroom I guess, “Sugar, me and Stinky are going down to Meg’s. Seems as that skank whore Annie-Poo that hangs out there is running a 20% off special on exchanging body fluids. We can’t pass this up.”
Wise-ass that she is she yells back, “Paul I can’t speak for you but that old fart Jasper better not have a spare drop of fluid left in him after that romp I gave him last night. You keep your tail-end right here, you hear me, Jasper Wheats.”
“Shit honey, it was just an ad that we were looking at for Ole’s Garage over in Patterson. He’s sure going to catch some crap for the way he had it worded.”
“Well you’re going to catch some crap if ya don’t bring in some more firewood. Give Paul something for clearing the snow and send him on his way. Ok?”
I walk Paul back out to his truck and suggest that he head down to the pond if he gets a chance and clear it off. If we have to then will bore a hole like we did a couple of years ago and use that gasoline powered pump to flood it over again on the next sub zero night.
Good stuff here in the North Woods. Wish ya could be here to enjoy it!
Until next time, Jasper here - walking with wood.
Saturday, December 15, 2007
CHRISTMAS TOADS
Hey you guys, here’s a Happy Good Holiday to you!
It’s been a fair week so far for me. Been back home for most of it instead of being on the road. The company Christmas Party is tonight, so I’ve got that going for me, which is nice. Me and the honey will get dolled up and have some fun. She bought me some nice dress slacks and had them tailored so that my short leg doesn’t have a damn pile of fabric hangin on my boot. It helps to look spiffed up for these things ya know. She’ll look stunning as usual - damn I love that lady!
So being in town I got a chance to coach a couple of games with my Norris’s Nightmares. Jingles and Bronzy have been doing wonders with them. They looked tight and are two games out of first place in their division. They split the games with the Red Dogs over in Wateca. The Red Dogs have got that hotter then shit girl goalie. She’s got that glove hand that every guy is looking for around midnight if ya know what I mean - fast. Tanker bullnosed through the slot for a couple of goals in the second game knocking her on her keister both times. Just a tiny bit of fisticuffs erupted as would be expected. But the bitch is tough, and takes her teeth out when she plays. She knows what she’s up against every night. Our defense finally looks like their working as team-mates now when they’re out on the ice. Seem to know where each other is at or at least where they’re supposed to be at. It looked good. I was real pleased. These guys have really been working hard and I gotta say that they’re walking with wood right now.
I also managed to hook up for a game with the Outlaws last night. Woody moved out of state earlier in the season so I played as him. He’s my drunken twin to most folks who have ever seen us together, ’cept his short legs are both the same length. I don’t have his skills either, but who cares - nobody gives a rats ass. It was fun. We went over to Maggy’s and closed the place like old times. Nothin like chugging brewskies and having the barmaid bringin ya free shooters, ehh. I hadn’t hung out with these guys for a while so It was the tits of a good time.
Maggy’s parking lot is gravel and this time of year ya can’t see much of it due to the snow. Stinky comes over and plows it out for her and gets free lunches a couple a times a week for helping out. So anyway ya gotta kinda watch your step out there cuz one step ya take might be on some packed ice or re-melt with a bit of a slip and the next ya might hit exposed gravel grabbin your foot fo a nose dive. It’s a little dicey.
We call it a night inside but Jingles and Bronzy continue some small talk as we head towards my truck. I pull my gear out the cab to throw into the bed when out of the dark Tidwilly and the Wanker boys jump me. Oh shit! What a mess that was. Jingles just about ripped Tidwilly apart. He picked him up at one point and threw him completely over the hood of my truck. The dude just has an Irish mean streak that comes out sometimes and when he’s pumped there’s some unbelievable strength lurking beneath that mellow nature of his. Bronzy, too, don’t believe I ever seen him fight with such vigor. Me, I slipped on the packed snow at the first blow but by the time I was up, Jingles was on Tidwilly. So I squared off with one of the Wanker boys, I can’t tell em apart. They’re both just no good sons of a bitches. We took our blows but I truly believe we pretty much pounded the shit outta them before the sheriff deputies showed up.
Deputy Skolyan took charge of the situation and had dictated cuffing us all. Man was I pumped! After a few minutes while he was on the radio we sat in crusiers waiting to get hauled in. Then he came over to the car that me and my brothers were in and said “Un-cuff the Wheats’. Jasper, you, and your brothers, head-on on home now. Don’t get in anymore shit. These dirt bags that ya whooped on have got some recent warrants against them. I ‘spect that they’ll do thirty days or so. Gonna be Christmas Toads back at our little county lockup. Now git outta here.”
I looked over at Jingles and he had one of his shit eattin grins on and was looking at his bloody knuckles and then I looked over at Bronzy. The dude looked like he was on speed or something. His eyes were so dilated - I realized he was just as torqued as me.
I said, “Hey, sleep ain’t gonna come easy tonight. What say we go down to Denny’s for Grand Slams?”
Jingles smirks, “I think we just had one, but that suits me just fine, Jasper. Lets roll.”
Over to Denny’s we get our chow and like Jingles likes to say “The thousand assorted jellies.” Damn it’s good to be hangin out with my brothers.
Jingles is eight years younger then me. He was born in early January and I like to think that he is one of the best late Christmas presents I ever got. I had been the only boy in the family until he came along - shit having five sisters up until then. I remember how proud I was of him when I was just a kid. I remember the first Christmas present that I bought for him. Cost me a whole dime. It was a blue plastic bear, about five or six inches long. I thought it was just the coolest thing to give your baby brother. Yup, you ain’t real smart when you’re just a kid yet. But he was special to me. Seems as though in fourth or fifth grade I took him with me on the last day of school for show-and-tell. Damn, using your brother as a show-and-tell piece. Crazy, ehh?
We jabbered about all the old time shit while we ate our breakfasts. I told em that watchin Jingles throw Tidwilly reminded me of the time when Bronzy was snooping around under the Christmas tree as a kid and it pissed me off so much that I picked him up and took him outside and threw him into junipers in the front yard.
Bronzy responds, “Yeah, Jasp, you’d go a little crazy now and then didn’t ya?”
Jingles joins the chew on me and says “Shit, remember when I was your jinx whenever you were working on your car. I remember you throwing me around a bit too.”
“Fuck you, you guys. Nobody knew it back then, that I had a blood sugar problem that would make me damn cantankerous if I didn’t eat with regularity. That’s what most of the problem was. I’ve come to figure out that that’s why I’d get so angry about having to wait to eat dinner after Dad got home from work.”
Bronzy about spews his Tabasco’d eggs, “Nine o’clock?”
“Yeah, nine o’clock, Jasper! You still got that clock that Lori and Jim gave you for Christmas that year that only has nine’s on it? Shit, you always were screaming at Mom, “When are we gonna eat, nine o‘clock?“”
“Damn right I still have it. Keep it in my office at home along side some other treasured stuff. I replace the battery in it every year or so and never had any problem telling what time it is with it.” And I jab back, “Ya still got those Nuclear Briefs that I made for you that one Christmas?”
We had made Christmas lists back then and he had written "Nuclear Briefs" on his list. So I made him some. Bought a jock strap and spray painted it gold and threaded an electrical cord into the waist elastic. Made a semi-professional label for a box and wrapped it all up for him. It was hilarious.
“Did anybody ever take a picture of you wearing it? I’d love to post that on a website.”
“Eat shit Jasper. I have no idea what happened to that thing. I figure that one of these years Ry-Ry will surprise me with a new pair.”
We carried on for some time talking about the old days.
Family is something great and I gotta tell ya (not tryin to be all mushy and shit) ya gotta cherish every single moment. Like country singer, Kenny Chesny‘s song “Don’t Blink.” It all goes so fast and every moment can create a hell of a memory for ya. Hang on to them. Tell the stories later and you’ll be walking with wood in the eyes of your future kids or grandkids.
I think back at Christmas’s when I was a kid and the few gifts that I got. We weren’t rich and there sure were a bunch of us in the family. As I recall these items mentioned next were my main gifts in any particular year.
A model airplane, Navy Trainer, made of thin webbed plastic with a rubber band driven prop. Dad could make it fly further then I could. Guess it was because of his height - the plane had more altitude to start with. Me, I’d just wind the rubber band as tight as I could to help it out. Broke the rubber band a few times. Took forever after breaking this gift for me to figure out how to fix things.
An orangish-yellow sweatshirt that had either Daniel Boone or Davy Crockett on it. I’ve never had a yellow sweatshirt since then but wear grays, blues, blacks and whites all the times now days.
An eighty power Gilbert reflecting telescope. Still like looking at the sky at night and all sorts of other heavenly bodies.
Mark Twain’s book “Tom Sawyer”. Probably this tale has had more influence on me then much else. Am I not a little Tom Sawyer or Huck Finn myself, ehh? Could I become the new Mark Twain?
‘Course I got to pick out a new hockey stick one year and we know where that took me.
Oh yeah, those past holidays of gift giving and receiving were great times. Are the physical gifts more lasting then the emotional ones? Nah I don’t thinks so.
What kinda memories of your past holidays can you dig up?
Like I mentioned earlier, I want all of you to have a great Christmas. There’s no point in moping about over bad times. Make your own good times. Have a blast! You just gotta skate hard and walk with wood.
Don’t be a Christmas Toad, ehh.
Now I got some knuckle bumps to heal and some sleep to catch up on before tonight’s company party. So I’ll see ya later.
It’s been a fair week so far for me. Been back home for most of it instead of being on the road. The company Christmas Party is tonight, so I’ve got that going for me, which is nice. Me and the honey will get dolled up and have some fun. She bought me some nice dress slacks and had them tailored so that my short leg doesn’t have a damn pile of fabric hangin on my boot. It helps to look spiffed up for these things ya know. She’ll look stunning as usual - damn I love that lady!
So being in town I got a chance to coach a couple of games with my Norris’s Nightmares. Jingles and Bronzy have been doing wonders with them. They looked tight and are two games out of first place in their division. They split the games with the Red Dogs over in Wateca. The Red Dogs have got that hotter then shit girl goalie. She’s got that glove hand that every guy is looking for around midnight if ya know what I mean - fast. Tanker bullnosed through the slot for a couple of goals in the second game knocking her on her keister both times. Just a tiny bit of fisticuffs erupted as would be expected. But the bitch is tough, and takes her teeth out when she plays. She knows what she’s up against every night. Our defense finally looks like their working as team-mates now when they’re out on the ice. Seem to know where each other is at or at least where they’re supposed to be at. It looked good. I was real pleased. These guys have really been working hard and I gotta say that they’re walking with wood right now.
I also managed to hook up for a game with the Outlaws last night. Woody moved out of state earlier in the season so I played as him. He’s my drunken twin to most folks who have ever seen us together, ’cept his short legs are both the same length. I don’t have his skills either, but who cares - nobody gives a rats ass. It was fun. We went over to Maggy’s and closed the place like old times. Nothin like chugging brewskies and having the barmaid bringin ya free shooters, ehh. I hadn’t hung out with these guys for a while so It was the tits of a good time.
Maggy’s parking lot is gravel and this time of year ya can’t see much of it due to the snow. Stinky comes over and plows it out for her and gets free lunches a couple a times a week for helping out. So anyway ya gotta kinda watch your step out there cuz one step ya take might be on some packed ice or re-melt with a bit of a slip and the next ya might hit exposed gravel grabbin your foot fo a nose dive. It’s a little dicey.
We call it a night inside but Jingles and Bronzy continue some small talk as we head towards my truck. I pull my gear out the cab to throw into the bed when out of the dark Tidwilly and the Wanker boys jump me. Oh shit! What a mess that was. Jingles just about ripped Tidwilly apart. He picked him up at one point and threw him completely over the hood of my truck. The dude just has an Irish mean streak that comes out sometimes and when he’s pumped there’s some unbelievable strength lurking beneath that mellow nature of his. Bronzy, too, don’t believe I ever seen him fight with such vigor. Me, I slipped on the packed snow at the first blow but by the time I was up, Jingles was on Tidwilly. So I squared off with one of the Wanker boys, I can’t tell em apart. They’re both just no good sons of a bitches. We took our blows but I truly believe we pretty much pounded the shit outta them before the sheriff deputies showed up.
Deputy Skolyan took charge of the situation and had dictated cuffing us all. Man was I pumped! After a few minutes while he was on the radio we sat in crusiers waiting to get hauled in. Then he came over to the car that me and my brothers were in and said “Un-cuff the Wheats’. Jasper, you, and your brothers, head-on on home now. Don’t get in anymore shit. These dirt bags that ya whooped on have got some recent warrants against them. I ‘spect that they’ll do thirty days or so. Gonna be Christmas Toads back at our little county lockup. Now git outta here.”
I looked over at Jingles and he had one of his shit eattin grins on and was looking at his bloody knuckles and then I looked over at Bronzy. The dude looked like he was on speed or something. His eyes were so dilated - I realized he was just as torqued as me.
I said, “Hey, sleep ain’t gonna come easy tonight. What say we go down to Denny’s for Grand Slams?”
Jingles smirks, “I think we just had one, but that suits me just fine, Jasper. Lets roll.”
Over to Denny’s we get our chow and like Jingles likes to say “The thousand assorted jellies.” Damn it’s good to be hangin out with my brothers.
Jingles is eight years younger then me. He was born in early January and I like to think that he is one of the best late Christmas presents I ever got. I had been the only boy in the family until he came along - shit having five sisters up until then. I remember how proud I was of him when I was just a kid. I remember the first Christmas present that I bought for him. Cost me a whole dime. It was a blue plastic bear, about five or six inches long. I thought it was just the coolest thing to give your baby brother. Yup, you ain’t real smart when you’re just a kid yet. But he was special to me. Seems as though in fourth or fifth grade I took him with me on the last day of school for show-and-tell. Damn, using your brother as a show-and-tell piece. Crazy, ehh?
We jabbered about all the old time shit while we ate our breakfasts. I told em that watchin Jingles throw Tidwilly reminded me of the time when Bronzy was snooping around under the Christmas tree as a kid and it pissed me off so much that I picked him up and took him outside and threw him into junipers in the front yard.
Bronzy responds, “Yeah, Jasp, you’d go a little crazy now and then didn’t ya?”
Jingles joins the chew on me and says “Shit, remember when I was your jinx whenever you were working on your car. I remember you throwing me around a bit too.”
“Fuck you, you guys. Nobody knew it back then, that I had a blood sugar problem that would make me damn cantankerous if I didn’t eat with regularity. That’s what most of the problem was. I’ve come to figure out that that’s why I’d get so angry about having to wait to eat dinner after Dad got home from work.”
Bronzy about spews his Tabasco’d eggs, “Nine o’clock?”
“Yeah, nine o’clock, Jasper! You still got that clock that Lori and Jim gave you for Christmas that year that only has nine’s on it? Shit, you always were screaming at Mom, “When are we gonna eat, nine o‘clock?“”
“Damn right I still have it. Keep it in my office at home along side some other treasured stuff. I replace the battery in it every year or so and never had any problem telling what time it is with it.” And I jab back, “Ya still got those Nuclear Briefs that I made for you that one Christmas?”
We had made Christmas lists back then and he had written "Nuclear Briefs" on his list. So I made him some. Bought a jock strap and spray painted it gold and threaded an electrical cord into the waist elastic. Made a semi-professional label for a box and wrapped it all up for him. It was hilarious.
“Did anybody ever take a picture of you wearing it? I’d love to post that on a website.”
“Eat shit Jasper. I have no idea what happened to that thing. I figure that one of these years Ry-Ry will surprise me with a new pair.”
We carried on for some time talking about the old days.
Family is something great and I gotta tell ya (not tryin to be all mushy and shit) ya gotta cherish every single moment. Like country singer, Kenny Chesny‘s song “Don’t Blink.” It all goes so fast and every moment can create a hell of a memory for ya. Hang on to them. Tell the stories later and you’ll be walking with wood in the eyes of your future kids or grandkids.
I think back at Christmas’s when I was a kid and the few gifts that I got. We weren’t rich and there sure were a bunch of us in the family. As I recall these items mentioned next were my main gifts in any particular year.
A model airplane, Navy Trainer, made of thin webbed plastic with a rubber band driven prop. Dad could make it fly further then I could. Guess it was because of his height - the plane had more altitude to start with. Me, I’d just wind the rubber band as tight as I could to help it out. Broke the rubber band a few times. Took forever after breaking this gift for me to figure out how to fix things.
An orangish-yellow sweatshirt that had either Daniel Boone or Davy Crockett on it. I’ve never had a yellow sweatshirt since then but wear grays, blues, blacks and whites all the times now days.
An eighty power Gilbert reflecting telescope. Still like looking at the sky at night and all sorts of other heavenly bodies.
Mark Twain’s book “Tom Sawyer”. Probably this tale has had more influence on me then much else. Am I not a little Tom Sawyer or Huck Finn myself, ehh? Could I become the new Mark Twain?
‘Course I got to pick out a new hockey stick one year and we know where that took me.
Oh yeah, those past holidays of gift giving and receiving were great times. Are the physical gifts more lasting then the emotional ones? Nah I don’t thinks so.
What kinda memories of your past holidays can you dig up?
Like I mentioned earlier, I want all of you to have a great Christmas. There’s no point in moping about over bad times. Make your own good times. Have a blast! You just gotta skate hard and walk with wood.
Don’t be a Christmas Toad, ehh.
Now I got some knuckle bumps to heal and some sleep to catch up on before tonight’s company party. So I’ll see ya later.
Saturday, December 8, 2007
HASH
Hey, you guys. Sorry I missed ya last week. Just have been ’streamly busy with my real job. I’ve had to travel a quite a bit recently and then had problems with the company vehicle that really clobbered the old gumption to tell ya a new story here. Besides work, Christmas is fast approaching and the season makes my mind wonder a bit. Start thinking about the old days, ehh, and holiday hockey out on the pond again. Those were the times! You guys can relate to that?
But I’ve also been really tied up in an old rag knot with a new endeavor. I’ll be teaching a university class this spring and have to do a lot prep shit for that too. With all that’s going on I sure hope that someday I’ll have sacked away enough money that the honey and me can afford to quit milkin the cows, if ya know what I mean.
So here goes this week’s trip into my world. Hang on, cuz I sure hope ya got an appetite for some excitement and dad-burn foolishness.
HASH - you’re familiar with the word, ehh? Yah. A shortened version of the word hashish that Webster says is “unadulterated resin from the flowering tops of the female hemp plant that is smoked, chewed or drunk for its intoxicating effect.”
Oh yeah!
Put it simply it’s the illegal drug that the youth of world toked up in bongs and hash pipes long before all this chemical crap got invented that kids are getting fucked up on nowadays. Yup, it’s the flowering sap from pot plants. A smelly, brownish, little turd looking substance that’ll get ya high.
Experience says it works. But my drugs of choice these days only include the caffeine in my coffee or cola pops, alcohol in my beerskies (or during this Holiday Season a little Irish Cream and Kahlua), prescription meds that the doc gives me to let me live to a ripe ass age, and ibuprofen for all my ding-dang aches and pains.
But in the day I wasn’t no panty-waist. I did the shit. Makes me wonder, though, thinking back a few years that how much I enjoyed the morphine after they replaced my hip. Just surprised that I didn’t end up a geezed out street druggy instead of the upstanding old fart that I am today.
But back to HASH, ehh. Like pot, it gives ya the munchies. Now the munchies are something we can probably talk about. You guys really know what I mean here, ehh? I mean come on, you’ve seen that Jack in the Box commercial where the dude is trying to figure out what to order and he’s talking to the bobble head Jack on the dash of his van … “Yeahhhh….. That’sss what I wasss thinkinnnn.” Sure for shit when ya got the munchies ya just gotta eat. That’s it! Flat as a pancake and time to scarf.
Well, I’ll be damned if I don’t wake up with the munchies every morning. Don’t you?
Its been that way since I was a fool kid not even tall enough to look over the kitchen table. I can remember a time when I was just a little tike and Mom had fixed chili for dinner. I wouldn’t eat it. She kept me sitting at the table until bedtime and then had me sit with that cold bowl of chili in front of me in the morning too. I wouldn’t eat it - no way - no how. I didn’t like chili and I sure for shit didn’t like anything with tomatoes in it back then. Sure I was starving big time. Munchies galore.
Being a bit pissed off while I was sitting there, I poured all the salt from the shaker into the sugar bowl and later on when Mom finally relented and let me have a bowl of Cheerios I plumb forgot. Egads - that was the biggest waste of breakfast cereal that ever happened in my lifetime I’m sure.
Breakfast is the stuff of life. Cures that morning munchy and leaves ya set for the day, ehh. A good breakfast and ya can be walking with wood all day long.
When I was a kid, cold cereal was definitely the standard. Cheerios first then I moved on to Wheaties. General Mills products - good stuff from a good company. They sponsored my Babe Ruth baseball team (wished it had been my hockey team, ehh). Now that’s a story. Had that big G on my uniform. Wanted to be a catcher but the coach’s son played that position. Fat chance for that opportunity. I must have really sucked anyway cuz I only got to play in one game and that was for the opposing team on an account they didn’t have enough guys show up. A real ego booster - that was - Babe Ruth Baseball. Huh?
It was always a real treat if we got sugar coated cereals when I was kid. But occasionally we would get some Frosted Flakes, Sugar Pops, AlphaBits or Sugar Smacks. Mmmmm mmmmm mmmm! I sure loved those sweet morning bowls filled to the brim with milk.
My school buddy, Girbin, just loved those Sugar Smacks and the old sugar bear that they used in the advertisements. We’d get nuts-o after school eating a bowl or two together.
Coulda been a sugar fiend I guess too, if not a morphine addict. Maybe most of us were. Some of us still are. Gotta have our fix.
Mom was pretty strict about that sugar consumption though. Or at least with me anyway. Around the time Jingles and Bronzy were around she musta lightened up a bit. Damn, they ate Cap’n Crunch. Is it still around? I don’t know. Turned the milk yellow in the bowl and I think it was 40 to 60 percent sugar. Each of em used to eat a whole box for breakfast. You didn’t have to add more milk - just add more cereal. Poor Mom, I’m sure she had to deal with the sugar high that these little junkies took off on.
I still wake up with the munchies every day and I still occasionally fix myself a bowl of cold cereal to remedy that need. ‘Cept now days I start with about a third of a bowl of crisp rice (all generic no name brands any more), a sliced up half a banana, a third a bowl of wheat bran, a couple of table spoons of raisins, and then topping out the bowl with some sugar coated corn flakes. All that scrunched down to make room for that good old 2% milk. Good stuff, Maynard! You’re set for the day after a munchy buster like that.
Now up here in the North Woods that kind a breakfast won’t suit ya too well durin the late fall and winter. Ya don’t want to be puttin too much cold shit in your body so early in the day. Ya need something a little more substantial. Something warm and I ain’t talkin about no damn oatmeal or Malt-O-Meal slop.
Ya need to add some eggs and such to your meal. Now Denny’s, I can vouch for, makes a damn fine breakfast. The Original Grand Slam will suit me just right. Ya get some eggs, pancakes, and choice of meat. Me, I usually go “all bacon and eggs over medium with coffee and a glass of milk with the meal“. Now this meal works great for a morning breakfast, as I figure, my family that hangs out in the city got together again this morning and probably sat down to eight or so orders of Grand Slams this morning. But it also works for filling your gut after a good game of late night hockey and then closing the bar. Done that enough times for sure!
But then there’s my other choice from Denny’s or any other reputable greasy spoon and that’s “bacon and eggs over medium with hash browns, toast and coffee with milk with the meal”. Now Denny’s has a little one up-manship here over others in that they’ll offer their “a thousand assortments of jellies” for your toast (if ya like the three flavors that they’re serving that day - that is). Ya can’t beat it, ehh?
Munchies, uh huh! I sure had them this morning again. I got up pretty early and the honey allows me to make my own breakfast and mess. Its one of the few things that I’ve been able to carry over into marriage from my years of bachelorhood besides hockey.
But it was too damned cold in the cabin to think about cereal. I figured that I’d fire up the stove and make myself something warm, tasty and filling. I checked out the refrigerator and saw that we had eggs. That’s good. Now there might be some leftover red potatoes from the roast beef earlier this week. Yup. That’s good. Now for the meat I see we’ve got some ham, roast beef and meat loaf leftovers, and a bag of salad bacon bits. Hmmm? Looks like the meat loaf and I’ll make some hash.
HASH?
Yup. You guys, it’s the same word - just a different meaning. Now hash as from hashish we know now is a drug, ehh? I don’t know where it gets that “ish” on the end of the word but its probably like Turkish, or English, or Berkleyish; but more then likely it comes from Mendocinoish. I mean cuz like the best shit comes from there, ehh!
But hash for the kitchen fixin, now that’s something else! Again, Webster, my good bud, says “to chop, as in to small pieces; chopped meat mixed with potatoes and browned”. Yeah that’s the stuff!
So, I’m makin some hash you guys. The meatloaf was the heal end out of the pan stuffed into a baggy. I just crumbled that all up while it was still in the baggy. Fired up a large skillet with a mess a olive oil in it. Diced an already cooked red potato and started browning those pups. Dumped in the crumbled meat loaf, diced up a quarter of a bell pepper, kept the fire going and started stirring and flipping. Added a couple of heaping tablespoons of those bacon bits and shook a shit load of black pepper over the top. Smells damn good! Normally I add onions but the meatloaf already had enough in it for my tastes. While this was browning to perfection I got the heat under an egg pan and fried up a couple over medium. All finished I slop the hash on a platter size plate and set the eggs over the top - all to be chopped and mixed up together for a fine morning feast with a little salt and a glass of moo.
Now I use a plastic spatula for flippin the hash in the pan. When the honey makes this or similar dishes like fried potatoes she uses a little wooden thingy. Not quite a wooden spoon and not quite a wooden spatula. I personally hate the thing, but she likes it. After I sort of did my post cooking cleanup I noticed some unusual utensils on the counter that I’d never seen before. The honey must a got them when I was outta town or something. They look like white porcelain but are melamine, whatever the fuck that is, and were made in Thailand if ya can believe that. I had to ask her later where she got them and said she said at the grocery store. I didn’t believe her. They look like they came from a sci-fi store. The first one that I saw kind of looked like a fat tonged table fork with only two tongs. But not really functional as a fork - too fat. What it really looks like is a miniature electronic probe/jabbing gizmo that an alien might have used in Star Trek, Star Wars, or other sci-fi flick. She said its for poking things. I told her, I got the tool for poking things and it sure don’t look like that. This damn thing evens rings when ya tap it, like I said fine porcelain, uh huh. Scary! Now the other utensil looks kind of like a wide blade skinning knife but again that melamine shit. Must be a set or something. Before I talked to her about them I thought, well maybe its new silverware, but if the first one is the fork then this one could be the knife or spoon. Neither too functional. Too flat for a spoon - wouldn’t hold a bit of cereal, and too dull for a knife. She said its for spreading stuff for like icing on a cake. I don’t know though. Could be alien instruments if ya ask me. I’ll have to watch her for a while, ehh.
I’m going to tell ya - hash is a damn good pre-game meal. Ya just wanta make sure that ya scarf it down a couple hours ahead a lacing em up though, cuz it can sit pretty heavy and also cause ya to burp up them peppers and onions. I used to fix it with lard instead of the olive oil like I use now. Moves through ya quite quick that way with the lard and makes ya light for the game if ya know what I mean.
Hash is good fixins for camping too. I fix it for the guys when we go fishin and shit. Makes for a one pot meal that ya can have for breakfast or dinner alike.
I’ve been fixin it for years now, I made it with every kind of meat ya can think of: chicken, fillet mignon, pork chops, ham, steak, hamburger, elk, trout, bacon, leftover sloppy-joe, sausage, turkey dark meat. Its really a “leftover dream meal”.
So here’s the word from Jasper here, ya wanta push a little poop through the shoot and energy up for your pond hockey game tonight in the subzero weather then fix yourself a big old batch of HASH. You’ll be walking with wood like the big boys do!
Keep your sticks down and skate hard!
But I’ve also been really tied up in an old rag knot with a new endeavor. I’ll be teaching a university class this spring and have to do a lot prep shit for that too. With all that’s going on I sure hope that someday I’ll have sacked away enough money that the honey and me can afford to quit milkin the cows, if ya know what I mean.
So here goes this week’s trip into my world. Hang on, cuz I sure hope ya got an appetite for some excitement and dad-burn foolishness.
HASH - you’re familiar with the word, ehh? Yah. A shortened version of the word hashish that Webster says is “unadulterated resin from the flowering tops of the female hemp plant that is smoked, chewed or drunk for its intoxicating effect.”
Oh yeah!
Put it simply it’s the illegal drug that the youth of world toked up in bongs and hash pipes long before all this chemical crap got invented that kids are getting fucked up on nowadays. Yup, it’s the flowering sap from pot plants. A smelly, brownish, little turd looking substance that’ll get ya high.
Experience says it works. But my drugs of choice these days only include the caffeine in my coffee or cola pops, alcohol in my beerskies (or during this Holiday Season a little Irish Cream and Kahlua), prescription meds that the doc gives me to let me live to a ripe ass age, and ibuprofen for all my ding-dang aches and pains.
But in the day I wasn’t no panty-waist. I did the shit. Makes me wonder, though, thinking back a few years that how much I enjoyed the morphine after they replaced my hip. Just surprised that I didn’t end up a geezed out street druggy instead of the upstanding old fart that I am today.
But back to HASH, ehh. Like pot, it gives ya the munchies. Now the munchies are something we can probably talk about. You guys really know what I mean here, ehh? I mean come on, you’ve seen that Jack in the Box commercial where the dude is trying to figure out what to order and he’s talking to the bobble head Jack on the dash of his van … “Yeahhhh….. That’sss what I wasss thinkinnnn.” Sure for shit when ya got the munchies ya just gotta eat. That’s it! Flat as a pancake and time to scarf.
Well, I’ll be damned if I don’t wake up with the munchies every morning. Don’t you?
Its been that way since I was a fool kid not even tall enough to look over the kitchen table. I can remember a time when I was just a little tike and Mom had fixed chili for dinner. I wouldn’t eat it. She kept me sitting at the table until bedtime and then had me sit with that cold bowl of chili in front of me in the morning too. I wouldn’t eat it - no way - no how. I didn’t like chili and I sure for shit didn’t like anything with tomatoes in it back then. Sure I was starving big time. Munchies galore.
Being a bit pissed off while I was sitting there, I poured all the salt from the shaker into the sugar bowl and later on when Mom finally relented and let me have a bowl of Cheerios I plumb forgot. Egads - that was the biggest waste of breakfast cereal that ever happened in my lifetime I’m sure.
Breakfast is the stuff of life. Cures that morning munchy and leaves ya set for the day, ehh. A good breakfast and ya can be walking with wood all day long.
When I was a kid, cold cereal was definitely the standard. Cheerios first then I moved on to Wheaties. General Mills products - good stuff from a good company. They sponsored my Babe Ruth baseball team (wished it had been my hockey team, ehh). Now that’s a story. Had that big G on my uniform. Wanted to be a catcher but the coach’s son played that position. Fat chance for that opportunity. I must have really sucked anyway cuz I only got to play in one game and that was for the opposing team on an account they didn’t have enough guys show up. A real ego booster - that was - Babe Ruth Baseball. Huh?
It was always a real treat if we got sugar coated cereals when I was kid. But occasionally we would get some Frosted Flakes, Sugar Pops, AlphaBits or Sugar Smacks. Mmmmm mmmmm mmmm! I sure loved those sweet morning bowls filled to the brim with milk.
My school buddy, Girbin, just loved those Sugar Smacks and the old sugar bear that they used in the advertisements. We’d get nuts-o after school eating a bowl or two together.
Coulda been a sugar fiend I guess too, if not a morphine addict. Maybe most of us were. Some of us still are. Gotta have our fix.
Mom was pretty strict about that sugar consumption though. Or at least with me anyway. Around the time Jingles and Bronzy were around she musta lightened up a bit. Damn, they ate Cap’n Crunch. Is it still around? I don’t know. Turned the milk yellow in the bowl and I think it was 40 to 60 percent sugar. Each of em used to eat a whole box for breakfast. You didn’t have to add more milk - just add more cereal. Poor Mom, I’m sure she had to deal with the sugar high that these little junkies took off on.
I still wake up with the munchies every day and I still occasionally fix myself a bowl of cold cereal to remedy that need. ‘Cept now days I start with about a third of a bowl of crisp rice (all generic no name brands any more), a sliced up half a banana, a third a bowl of wheat bran, a couple of table spoons of raisins, and then topping out the bowl with some sugar coated corn flakes. All that scrunched down to make room for that good old 2% milk. Good stuff, Maynard! You’re set for the day after a munchy buster like that.
Now up here in the North Woods that kind a breakfast won’t suit ya too well durin the late fall and winter. Ya don’t want to be puttin too much cold shit in your body so early in the day. Ya need something a little more substantial. Something warm and I ain’t talkin about no damn oatmeal or Malt-O-Meal slop.
Ya need to add some eggs and such to your meal. Now Denny’s, I can vouch for, makes a damn fine breakfast. The Original Grand Slam will suit me just right. Ya get some eggs, pancakes, and choice of meat. Me, I usually go “all bacon and eggs over medium with coffee and a glass of milk with the meal“. Now this meal works great for a morning breakfast, as I figure, my family that hangs out in the city got together again this morning and probably sat down to eight or so orders of Grand Slams this morning. But it also works for filling your gut after a good game of late night hockey and then closing the bar. Done that enough times for sure!
But then there’s my other choice from Denny’s or any other reputable greasy spoon and that’s “bacon and eggs over medium with hash browns, toast and coffee with milk with the meal”. Now Denny’s has a little one up-manship here over others in that they’ll offer their “a thousand assortments of jellies” for your toast (if ya like the three flavors that they’re serving that day - that is). Ya can’t beat it, ehh?
Munchies, uh huh! I sure had them this morning again. I got up pretty early and the honey allows me to make my own breakfast and mess. Its one of the few things that I’ve been able to carry over into marriage from my years of bachelorhood besides hockey.
But it was too damned cold in the cabin to think about cereal. I figured that I’d fire up the stove and make myself something warm, tasty and filling. I checked out the refrigerator and saw that we had eggs. That’s good. Now there might be some leftover red potatoes from the roast beef earlier this week. Yup. That’s good. Now for the meat I see we’ve got some ham, roast beef and meat loaf leftovers, and a bag of salad bacon bits. Hmmm? Looks like the meat loaf and I’ll make some hash.
HASH?
Yup. You guys, it’s the same word - just a different meaning. Now hash as from hashish we know now is a drug, ehh? I don’t know where it gets that “ish” on the end of the word but its probably like Turkish, or English, or Berkleyish; but more then likely it comes from Mendocinoish. I mean cuz like the best shit comes from there, ehh!
But hash for the kitchen fixin, now that’s something else! Again, Webster, my good bud, says “to chop, as in to small pieces; chopped meat mixed with potatoes and browned”. Yeah that’s the stuff!
So, I’m makin some hash you guys. The meatloaf was the heal end out of the pan stuffed into a baggy. I just crumbled that all up while it was still in the baggy. Fired up a large skillet with a mess a olive oil in it. Diced an already cooked red potato and started browning those pups. Dumped in the crumbled meat loaf, diced up a quarter of a bell pepper, kept the fire going and started stirring and flipping. Added a couple of heaping tablespoons of those bacon bits and shook a shit load of black pepper over the top. Smells damn good! Normally I add onions but the meatloaf already had enough in it for my tastes. While this was browning to perfection I got the heat under an egg pan and fried up a couple over medium. All finished I slop the hash on a platter size plate and set the eggs over the top - all to be chopped and mixed up together for a fine morning feast with a little salt and a glass of moo.
Now I use a plastic spatula for flippin the hash in the pan. When the honey makes this or similar dishes like fried potatoes she uses a little wooden thingy. Not quite a wooden spoon and not quite a wooden spatula. I personally hate the thing, but she likes it. After I sort of did my post cooking cleanup I noticed some unusual utensils on the counter that I’d never seen before. The honey must a got them when I was outta town or something. They look like white porcelain but are melamine, whatever the fuck that is, and were made in Thailand if ya can believe that. I had to ask her later where she got them and said she said at the grocery store. I didn’t believe her. They look like they came from a sci-fi store. The first one that I saw kind of looked like a fat tonged table fork with only two tongs. But not really functional as a fork - too fat. What it really looks like is a miniature electronic probe/jabbing gizmo that an alien might have used in Star Trek, Star Wars, or other sci-fi flick. She said its for poking things. I told her, I got the tool for poking things and it sure don’t look like that. This damn thing evens rings when ya tap it, like I said fine porcelain, uh huh. Scary! Now the other utensil looks kind of like a wide blade skinning knife but again that melamine shit. Must be a set or something. Before I talked to her about them I thought, well maybe its new silverware, but if the first one is the fork then this one could be the knife or spoon. Neither too functional. Too flat for a spoon - wouldn’t hold a bit of cereal, and too dull for a knife. She said its for spreading stuff for like icing on a cake. I don’t know though. Could be alien instruments if ya ask me. I’ll have to watch her for a while, ehh.
I’m going to tell ya - hash is a damn good pre-game meal. Ya just wanta make sure that ya scarf it down a couple hours ahead a lacing em up though, cuz it can sit pretty heavy and also cause ya to burp up them peppers and onions. I used to fix it with lard instead of the olive oil like I use now. Moves through ya quite quick that way with the lard and makes ya light for the game if ya know what I mean.
Hash is good fixins for camping too. I fix it for the guys when we go fishin and shit. Makes for a one pot meal that ya can have for breakfast or dinner alike.
I’ve been fixin it for years now, I made it with every kind of meat ya can think of: chicken, fillet mignon, pork chops, ham, steak, hamburger, elk, trout, bacon, leftover sloppy-joe, sausage, turkey dark meat. Its really a “leftover dream meal”.
So here’s the word from Jasper here, ya wanta push a little poop through the shoot and energy up for your pond hockey game tonight in the subzero weather then fix yourself a big old batch of HASH. You’ll be walking with wood like the big boys do!
Keep your sticks down and skate hard!
Sunday, November 25, 2007
4 DAY WEEKEND
Apres Thanksgiving
Jasper here - just sittin around the fire, the honey and me, enjoying the end of a fine four day weekend. Our Thanksgiving was great, stuffed myself like a durn fool and crashed out way to early for a man of my young age. One of my nephews on my honey’s side of the family had us over where his wife and her mom put together one heck of a nice meal. Turkey, ham, spuds, dressing, beans, dinner rolls, pies and cookies with ice cream and wine. Could a had brews but no one else was drinkin them so I stuck with the beverage of the evening.
I collected a mess a deadfall during the summer - ya know just a random assortment of hardwoods and pines - and split it up for the winter nights. Feels purty good to have the heat from the fireplace warming your soul. Sure brings back so many great memories of sittin around the campfire, drinkin brews and shootin the shit on all those fishing trips with buds before I met my honey. Course her and me have done our share of some damn fine enjoyable camping together too. Just really like sitting by the fire as ya let it burn down to just coals before crashing and looking up at the stars and wondering about the immensity of our universe.
Speaking of that, have any of ya seen that new comet that exploded? I’ve spotted it twice so far. From my local at about 9:00 pm its maybe 10 to 15 degrees north and 5 to 10 degrees east of my zenith (that means directly overhead for you dim wits out there). It’s looks like a small circular cloudy spot fairly near a yellowish star. I read somewhere that after it exploded it became larger then our sun making it the largest celestial body in our solar system. Of course it is so damn far away right now that you’d never know it, ehh.
Pretty cool stuff, that astronomy and sky watchin. I keep hopin that I’ll get to see a flying saucer, maybe, before I die. I just know that there is other intelligent life out there. The Good Lord didn’t just create his kind here on this planet, I figure.
I remember one time I got so caught up in star gazing around a dying campfire that I munched up a whole box of cinnamon graham crackers all by my lonesome. I’ll tell you, you guys, that is not something that ya want to do when you’re out camping away from civil facilities. Damn if I didn’t get the worst case a the shits that I can ever remember. If ya don’t believe me then you go eat a whole family size bag of teddy grahams all by yourself and see what happens.
Hey, I just wanted to say “Hi!” to all my friends over at myspace.com. You’re all good puck heads, ehh! Dudes and dudettes just living for the best sport in the world …. hockey. You guys have gotta just keep on skating hard and walk with wood when ya can. Ok?
Some a ya are probably still wondering about the continued activities involved with those bones that were found while hand excavating my basement, ehh. The sheriff still has it cordoned off and they braced up the end wall of the cabin like he said they would. We haven’t moved out cuz most a the work they do is during daylight hours and me and the honey are away that time a the day anyway. We’re both still having our weird-ass dreams or nightmares though. Shit, them puppies might never stop happening.
The sheriff and the county have put a pretty strong case together so far against Mr. Oscar Pederson. I guess that they’re going to try to extradite him from Argentina with the help of federal authorities. I’m wondering if they would take me on as a short little lopsided sheriff’s deputy. If they’d bring me on board to bring him back in, tear him away from that little hoochie mama down there, and hold him in the local pokie here I’d just be bejiggered with joy to do it. Shit howdy! Maybe I could get in a little side trip to cast a fly for some a those trophy browns that they got down there around Patagonia. Wouldn’t that be something, ehh, you guys?
As I know more - I’ll tell ya more. No secrets and no bull shit here, ehh.
Thanksgiving is over and that means we’re on the home stretch to Christmas. I gotta tell ya I went out and did some shopping early Friday morning. Nah, I ain’t no fool spending all day doing early Christmas shopping. Just needed some things for myself. Saw that K-Mart had flannels on sale for six bucks. Shit ya can’t beat that, ehh. So I headed over at 6:00 am and got four extra-large ones before they sold out. Already, that early in the morning, what a nut house that place was. Yup, I figure that these guys are going to shrink after washing so I’m just going to wear them as dab-gone long as I can before that happens.
I’ve been thinkin about getting the honey some perfume for Christmas but that went to hell in a hand basket since Thanksgiving night. That night her sister gave her a whole stack of women’s magazines that she’s apparently got subscriptions to and every one of them fashion mag’s has got about five or six perfume ads with them foldover scent page doo-hickies. She just tore those right out and folded each page up and put it separately into individual baggies for future use.
Shit, she’s set for the year, ehh. Now what am I going to do? You guys got any ideas?
I always try to put something together for the county’s children’s center this time a the year. Doesn’t seem to be as many parentless kids over there as there used to be but I still like to do something for them for Christmas. This year I had, what I thought, was a heck of a good idea. I’d make them sock puppets. Shit, I figured, I’ve got just whole slew of old hockey socks that I could use and the honey could help me. So, the night before last, I dug em up. I had some Ranger’s, Bruins, Golden Seals, North Stars, Blues and no-name socks. We ran em through the washer to make sure they were nice and clean. Then we started trying to put them together. Crap, some of these old socks had stirrups but that wasn’t the worst of it. Ya know ya can’t make a decent sock puppet from an open ended sock! Cripes did I feel like one stupid shit. Guess I’ll either have to give these old socks to Stinky or use em as car rags.
Another Christmas idea down the drain, ehh. I’ll have to figure something else out to give these kids.
The fire’s going down, guess I’ll have to stoke it up cuz the night's still young.
Speakin of stokin-up, shit, who lit the fire under my LA Kings last night? They went and beat the San Jose Sharks 2 to 1. Nice! Very, very nice! Its been a while coming. I’d really like to see them turn this season around and quit hanging out in the cellar. And shit, how about that goalie that Gretz picked up from Anaheim for his Coyotes. I think he’s got four wins in a row now. And the Caps are maybe turning it around too as they’ve got two wins in a row for their new interim coach.
You know, I’d just like to see some things spin in the NHL once in a while
Back to the duties of a Thanksgiving four day weekend. I put up Christmas lights today. I got sap on me up to my damn earlobes. Used to be so easy to hang them lights on the house when we lived in town. Now you can’t hardly see the cabin from the road so we light up two trees that we got out at the end of the drive. They’re kinda nice shaped and all so they look real good when I get done, but holy mackerel if them pups weren’t just coated with fresh sap for some un-natural reason. And me too for a while. Had to use turpentine to get most of it off. But like I said these trees look awfully damn nice. Its sure helps that when I had them run power for the cabin that I had them put a 100 amp pedestal out along side the drive. I’ve had to use that for all sorts a shit and it works just fine when ya got ten strings of lights on each tree, ehh.
How about you guys? Did ya have a great Thanksgiving weekend? Keep up traditions from your past? Damn I hope so.
I really wanted to get in some holiday pond hockey like the old days. Just some sweet pickup - three on three would a been fine. But it’s been so mild though so far that we haven’t had a decent freeze - nothings frozen over yet and if this global warming crap is for real then maybe nothing will ever again. Who knows, ehh?
Alrighty, enough for this week. Appreciate all of ya that read this north woods humor that’s been spiced up a bit with hockey and other tidbits of wisdom that ya can … never …. take to the bank.
Keep the snow outta your boots by staying on the shoveled path! Walk with wood and skate hard!
Jasper here - just sittin around the fire, the honey and me, enjoying the end of a fine four day weekend. Our Thanksgiving was great, stuffed myself like a durn fool and crashed out way to early for a man of my young age. One of my nephews on my honey’s side of the family had us over where his wife and her mom put together one heck of a nice meal. Turkey, ham, spuds, dressing, beans, dinner rolls, pies and cookies with ice cream and wine. Could a had brews but no one else was drinkin them so I stuck with the beverage of the evening.
I collected a mess a deadfall during the summer - ya know just a random assortment of hardwoods and pines - and split it up for the winter nights. Feels purty good to have the heat from the fireplace warming your soul. Sure brings back so many great memories of sittin around the campfire, drinkin brews and shootin the shit on all those fishing trips with buds before I met my honey. Course her and me have done our share of some damn fine enjoyable camping together too. Just really like sitting by the fire as ya let it burn down to just coals before crashing and looking up at the stars and wondering about the immensity of our universe.
Speaking of that, have any of ya seen that new comet that exploded? I’ve spotted it twice so far. From my local at about 9:00 pm its maybe 10 to 15 degrees north and 5 to 10 degrees east of my zenith (that means directly overhead for you dim wits out there). It’s looks like a small circular cloudy spot fairly near a yellowish star. I read somewhere that after it exploded it became larger then our sun making it the largest celestial body in our solar system. Of course it is so damn far away right now that you’d never know it, ehh.
Pretty cool stuff, that astronomy and sky watchin. I keep hopin that I’ll get to see a flying saucer, maybe, before I die. I just know that there is other intelligent life out there. The Good Lord didn’t just create his kind here on this planet, I figure.
I remember one time I got so caught up in star gazing around a dying campfire that I munched up a whole box of cinnamon graham crackers all by my lonesome. I’ll tell you, you guys, that is not something that ya want to do when you’re out camping away from civil facilities. Damn if I didn’t get the worst case a the shits that I can ever remember. If ya don’t believe me then you go eat a whole family size bag of teddy grahams all by yourself and see what happens.
Hey, I just wanted to say “Hi!” to all my friends over at myspace.com. You’re all good puck heads, ehh! Dudes and dudettes just living for the best sport in the world …. hockey. You guys have gotta just keep on skating hard and walk with wood when ya can. Ok?
Some a ya are probably still wondering about the continued activities involved with those bones that were found while hand excavating my basement, ehh. The sheriff still has it cordoned off and they braced up the end wall of the cabin like he said they would. We haven’t moved out cuz most a the work they do is during daylight hours and me and the honey are away that time a the day anyway. We’re both still having our weird-ass dreams or nightmares though. Shit, them puppies might never stop happening.
The sheriff and the county have put a pretty strong case together so far against Mr. Oscar Pederson. I guess that they’re going to try to extradite him from Argentina with the help of federal authorities. I’m wondering if they would take me on as a short little lopsided sheriff’s deputy. If they’d bring me on board to bring him back in, tear him away from that little hoochie mama down there, and hold him in the local pokie here I’d just be bejiggered with joy to do it. Shit howdy! Maybe I could get in a little side trip to cast a fly for some a those trophy browns that they got down there around Patagonia. Wouldn’t that be something, ehh, you guys?
As I know more - I’ll tell ya more. No secrets and no bull shit here, ehh.
Thanksgiving is over and that means we’re on the home stretch to Christmas. I gotta tell ya I went out and did some shopping early Friday morning. Nah, I ain’t no fool spending all day doing early Christmas shopping. Just needed some things for myself. Saw that K-Mart had flannels on sale for six bucks. Shit ya can’t beat that, ehh. So I headed over at 6:00 am and got four extra-large ones before they sold out. Already, that early in the morning, what a nut house that place was. Yup, I figure that these guys are going to shrink after washing so I’m just going to wear them as dab-gone long as I can before that happens.
I’ve been thinkin about getting the honey some perfume for Christmas but that went to hell in a hand basket since Thanksgiving night. That night her sister gave her a whole stack of women’s magazines that she’s apparently got subscriptions to and every one of them fashion mag’s has got about five or six perfume ads with them foldover scent page doo-hickies. She just tore those right out and folded each page up and put it separately into individual baggies for future use.
Shit, she’s set for the year, ehh. Now what am I going to do? You guys got any ideas?
I always try to put something together for the county’s children’s center this time a the year. Doesn’t seem to be as many parentless kids over there as there used to be but I still like to do something for them for Christmas. This year I had, what I thought, was a heck of a good idea. I’d make them sock puppets. Shit, I figured, I’ve got just whole slew of old hockey socks that I could use and the honey could help me. So, the night before last, I dug em up. I had some Ranger’s, Bruins, Golden Seals, North Stars, Blues and no-name socks. We ran em through the washer to make sure they were nice and clean. Then we started trying to put them together. Crap, some of these old socks had stirrups but that wasn’t the worst of it. Ya know ya can’t make a decent sock puppet from an open ended sock! Cripes did I feel like one stupid shit. Guess I’ll either have to give these old socks to Stinky or use em as car rags.
Another Christmas idea down the drain, ehh. I’ll have to figure something else out to give these kids.
The fire’s going down, guess I’ll have to stoke it up cuz the night's still young.
Speakin of stokin-up, shit, who lit the fire under my LA Kings last night? They went and beat the San Jose Sharks 2 to 1. Nice! Very, very nice! Its been a while coming. I’d really like to see them turn this season around and quit hanging out in the cellar. And shit, how about that goalie that Gretz picked up from Anaheim for his Coyotes. I think he’s got four wins in a row now. And the Caps are maybe turning it around too as they’ve got two wins in a row for their new interim coach.
You know, I’d just like to see some things spin in the NHL once in a while
Back to the duties of a Thanksgiving four day weekend. I put up Christmas lights today. I got sap on me up to my damn earlobes. Used to be so easy to hang them lights on the house when we lived in town. Now you can’t hardly see the cabin from the road so we light up two trees that we got out at the end of the drive. They’re kinda nice shaped and all so they look real good when I get done, but holy mackerel if them pups weren’t just coated with fresh sap for some un-natural reason. And me too for a while. Had to use turpentine to get most of it off. But like I said these trees look awfully damn nice. Its sure helps that when I had them run power for the cabin that I had them put a 100 amp pedestal out along side the drive. I’ve had to use that for all sorts a shit and it works just fine when ya got ten strings of lights on each tree, ehh.
How about you guys? Did ya have a great Thanksgiving weekend? Keep up traditions from your past? Damn I hope so.
I really wanted to get in some holiday pond hockey like the old days. Just some sweet pickup - three on three would a been fine. But it’s been so mild though so far that we haven’t had a decent freeze - nothings frozen over yet and if this global warming crap is for real then maybe nothing will ever again. Who knows, ehh?
Alrighty, enough for this week. Appreciate all of ya that read this north woods humor that’s been spiced up a bit with hockey and other tidbits of wisdom that ya can … never …. take to the bank.
Keep the snow outta your boots by staying on the shoveled path! Walk with wood and skate hard!
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Wood to Smitty
We had some days of Indian summer and then winter came back with a vengeance. We had an ice storm first that took down the phone and power lines. I didn’t get any of that restored until just last night. So those of you who live and breath by my blog’s news and humor, I do wish to apologize and hope that this one’s a real good dinger for you.
I was snow bound for a couple of days but after that the roads got opened up and I was heading into town and catching some good hockey at my favorite watering hole. I did get to see the NCAA Division I final of the marketable Frozen Four series. Some really good hockey there. And I got to see some of the last games of the season that the NHL kicked out for us. Now were into Stanley Cup Playoffs which can only mean that I’ve got only about two more months to watch the sport that pumps my blood. Hang in with me folks – I can’t say that I have any favorites this year and as typical of my behavior I’ll be rooting for the underdogs in any game that I get to watch. I believe that a games going to be on in about an hour so I’ll see how much of this I can knock off before then.
If you read my blog on a regular basis you’ll notice this time that my north woods jargon is not being used. It may slip through if I don’t catch myself today but because this is such a somber work that I figured that I owed Smitty that much.
Being snow bound these past couple of weeks brought back the joyous memories of a time many years back where the snow and the cold and the woods had also held my vital spirit at bay.
Back in the ‘80’s I had a job that had me traveling a bit between here and there down in the lower forty-eight. Texas seemed to be one the predominate states that provided me with a survivable income. If it wasn’t San Antonio then it was Arlington or Houston where I set my bags down. The job was good but days out left me a bit drawn and in need of sober activities or I couldn’t face the next morning.
I had spent many a day in small communities doing my business and had discovered that the local Walmart was always a good place to meet and talk with the local folks. You guys know that I’m no uppity sort of guy so this level of socialization fit me just fine. Most of my heavy beer drinking and carrying-on happened when I was home and after a good skate. The metropolitan areas of Texas had their Walmarts too and my type of folks hanging around at them.
During one trip to the Houston area I hit up a short but good conversation with a sweet young thing working the cash register. Her name was Vickie and she was getting off work in about a half hour. I asked her if she’d join me for dinner at a barbeque joint up the street. She was a bit nervous I could tell and I just let it go when she said that she wasn’t sure if she’d be able too.
I took my purchase of a horror paperback back to my hotel and headed over to the BBQ joint figuring that she wouldn’t show but hanging on to the hope of her use of the word “able”.
I was about half done with my first fill-up of sweet tea when she showed up to my anxious surprise. She didn’t want to eat anything but would have some sweet tea too. We chatted for about an hour and I found out that she was only seventeen and dating a guy named Billy, a goalie for one of the New York teams. It seemed as though she was pretty much hung up on Billy but was seeking some fatherly advice from me because he was about my age. She had met him in the same sort of way that we met each other, but it had been in the off season when Billy was in town doing some fishing. Being the benevolent character that I am I was glad to counsel her. I don’t know why but the young ladies have always opened up this way with me. It must be my bear-huggish physique or something of that nature.
We chatted a few more times together during my stay and exchanged addresses and phone numbers. She knew that I played hockey too and said that someday she wanted to see me play. I’d looked her up every time that my travels brought me back to the Houston area. She was gorgeous but so young and wanted my great hug at the end of every visit together.
Vickie ended up marrying Billy and he gave her a son, Daniel Wayner Smith. Their marriage didn’t last too long though and she got pretty messed up over the crumbled matrimony. Our letters and phone calls were now more frequent and were much longer in length then earlier.
Billy was gone (the jerk) and she needed to support herself and little Daniel. The pregnancy had changed her body and she’d begun partying heavy. Her breasts had remained huge from the pregnancy and she decided that the only way she could make ends meet was to use what she’d got and started working at Little Ricky’s Cabaret. She tried using stage names of Robin the Hood and Nikita Kay but finally settled on Anna “Nickel”. My own thoughts now reminiscing: “Silver Dollar” would have been more appropriate.
It wasn’t until much later that I would realize the road that this divergence would be taking her and to her eventual demise and my pain. But still being quite young at heart at the time I too also enjoyed and partook of the lifestyle she had now taken on. But she still has such down times and I had the opportunity to lift her back up on occasion. One such time was that that is the one of this story.
She had finally decided that she had to see me play so I booked her a round trip ticket for a two game weekend. She got her mom to watch little Daniel and I picked her up at our local airport on Friday afternoon with hugs and kisses. We drove back to my cabin in the woods and I got her settled in. We were playing the Skukumchuck Selects at 7:30 so we didn’t stay long before heading off to the arena.
The Selects were a pretty fair team and gave us a good game. I checked for her in the stands at each time my defensive pairing went out on the ice and was pleased to see that she was both watching the game and seemed also to be fitting in good with the other gals. We won when Jingle’s tipped in a cross ice pass from Bronzy with a little over a minute left to play. Those brothers of mine have always played so well. I can’t believe how much I’ve enjoyed the fact that they decided to play hockey instead of becoming professional wrestlers or tennis players as part of their athletic skills.
Terry’s Tavern was cooking after the game and I can’t believe how stinking drunk Vickie and I each got. It was a wonder that we got back to the cabin without crashing somewhere along the way. She rode all the way back in my pickup snuggled up against me. Good wood was on my mind and she wasn’t acting in any way negative to the notion.
Yup, though strong desires and too much alcohol don’t allow fruition sometimes we crashed that night without any action only to wake up to the start of a hell of a snow storm. A real doozie of a storm had swooped in down from the Bering Sea and by the afternoon was just pounding us. By 6:00 pm when I like to leave for my games we had taken over three feet of fresh snow. With the wind blowing the way it was I knew that some of the low areas from the cabin to the main road would be completely drifted in maybe seven or eight feet or more. I figured that the game would be called because no one would be able to get out even in town and I wasn’t too worried because I kept the cabin well stocked and had plenty of fire wood.
Vickie was a bit worried though not being from the North Woods. So I did my best to alleviate her fears not realizing that in doing so I was also rousing her libido. Need I say more then for the next few days being snowed into my cabin we shared some of the greatest love making and pure sex of my life. She revealed to me her stage presence “Anna Nickel Smith” and just drove me nuts. We enjoyed each other for those few days and we joked with each other so much. She kept whispering in my ear “Come on Jaspy give some wood to Smitty,” taking on her own secret hockey player nickname with me.
Oh those days were wonderful! After one really tender moment she grabbed an empty Labatt bottle and spit some backwash into it, sort of recapped it and quickly set the bottle outside where it was about sixty below. She said that she wanted to preserve it for maybe future use. I laughed and said “Vicki, you are so nuts!”
She said, “Jasper, you have so many great qualities but I’m not ready for another baby. You’re getting old and when I’m ready again you might not have it. I’m going to keep that on ice until then and when I’m ready again for another child I want it to be yours.”
I just laughed it off but when she was finally able to head back to Texas she repacked that bottle in dry ice and had UPS send it to her gynecologist after a lengthy phone call. He said that he’d store it in a sperm bank for her.
We stayed in touch over the years but her lifestyle continued to change as she got famous. She ended up marrying some really rich guy that was way older then me. He died several years back and Vickie’s been fighting with his family over the inheritance. She called me once and said that it was time. My seed in cold storage was still viable and she was going to give it a try. I was pretty worried because she had now gotten way overweight and was doing some awful drugs due to the stress in her current life. She got way strung out and then wasn’t talking with me anymore. But she did have a baby girl; Danielynn she named her. I thought well maybe she is mine. Maybe it worked. I figured that I could be a good dad this late in my life; as opposed to earlier when I too was a party animal. She wouldn’t talk to me, she wouldn’t substantiate that I was Danielynn’s daddy. I kind of let it go, a little hurt but our flame I realized had burned out a long time ago. Never having a lot of money myself, I never considered trying to prove paternity.
Daniel Wayner Smith, her son died at twenty while in the Bahamas. Vickie completely fell apart after that and died of an overdose within the same year. She had become so famous and so rich that her death filled many a news report. Danielynn’s paternity became big news too because of this. I guess the courts finally ordered identification of her father and I became awfully anxious folks, let me tell you. Ends up it wasn’t me. I guess my little soldiers lost their oompf over the years.
Yeah life’s a bitch and then you die.
Sad for Vickie … sad for Anna Nickel Smith … sad for Smitty.
Sad for Daniel Wayner and Danielynn her kids.
Sad for Jasper Wheats for a short little bit.
But I’m still walking with wood. No doubt about that folks – no sirree! Ehh?
I was snow bound for a couple of days but after that the roads got opened up and I was heading into town and catching some good hockey at my favorite watering hole. I did get to see the NCAA Division I final of the marketable Frozen Four series. Some really good hockey there. And I got to see some of the last games of the season that the NHL kicked out for us. Now were into Stanley Cup Playoffs which can only mean that I’ve got only about two more months to watch the sport that pumps my blood. Hang in with me folks – I can’t say that I have any favorites this year and as typical of my behavior I’ll be rooting for the underdogs in any game that I get to watch. I believe that a games going to be on in about an hour so I’ll see how much of this I can knock off before then.
If you read my blog on a regular basis you’ll notice this time that my north woods jargon is not being used. It may slip through if I don’t catch myself today but because this is such a somber work that I figured that I owed Smitty that much.
Being snow bound these past couple of weeks brought back the joyous memories of a time many years back where the snow and the cold and the woods had also held my vital spirit at bay.
Back in the ‘80’s I had a job that had me traveling a bit between here and there down in the lower forty-eight. Texas seemed to be one the predominate states that provided me with a survivable income. If it wasn’t San Antonio then it was Arlington or Houston where I set my bags down. The job was good but days out left me a bit drawn and in need of sober activities or I couldn’t face the next morning.
I had spent many a day in small communities doing my business and had discovered that the local Walmart was always a good place to meet and talk with the local folks. You guys know that I’m no uppity sort of guy so this level of socialization fit me just fine. Most of my heavy beer drinking and carrying-on happened when I was home and after a good skate. The metropolitan areas of Texas had their Walmarts too and my type of folks hanging around at them.
During one trip to the Houston area I hit up a short but good conversation with a sweet young thing working the cash register. Her name was Vickie and she was getting off work in about a half hour. I asked her if she’d join me for dinner at a barbeque joint up the street. She was a bit nervous I could tell and I just let it go when she said that she wasn’t sure if she’d be able too.
I took my purchase of a horror paperback back to my hotel and headed over to the BBQ joint figuring that she wouldn’t show but hanging on to the hope of her use of the word “able”.
I was about half done with my first fill-up of sweet tea when she showed up to my anxious surprise. She didn’t want to eat anything but would have some sweet tea too. We chatted for about an hour and I found out that she was only seventeen and dating a guy named Billy, a goalie for one of the New York teams. It seemed as though she was pretty much hung up on Billy but was seeking some fatherly advice from me because he was about my age. She had met him in the same sort of way that we met each other, but it had been in the off season when Billy was in town doing some fishing. Being the benevolent character that I am I was glad to counsel her. I don’t know why but the young ladies have always opened up this way with me. It must be my bear-huggish physique or something of that nature.
We chatted a few more times together during my stay and exchanged addresses and phone numbers. She knew that I played hockey too and said that someday she wanted to see me play. I’d looked her up every time that my travels brought me back to the Houston area. She was gorgeous but so young and wanted my great hug at the end of every visit together.
Vickie ended up marrying Billy and he gave her a son, Daniel Wayner Smith. Their marriage didn’t last too long though and she got pretty messed up over the crumbled matrimony. Our letters and phone calls were now more frequent and were much longer in length then earlier.
Billy was gone (the jerk) and she needed to support herself and little Daniel. The pregnancy had changed her body and she’d begun partying heavy. Her breasts had remained huge from the pregnancy and she decided that the only way she could make ends meet was to use what she’d got and started working at Little Ricky’s Cabaret. She tried using stage names of Robin the Hood and Nikita Kay but finally settled on Anna “Nickel”. My own thoughts now reminiscing: “Silver Dollar” would have been more appropriate.
It wasn’t until much later that I would realize the road that this divergence would be taking her and to her eventual demise and my pain. But still being quite young at heart at the time I too also enjoyed and partook of the lifestyle she had now taken on. But she still has such down times and I had the opportunity to lift her back up on occasion. One such time was that that is the one of this story.
She had finally decided that she had to see me play so I booked her a round trip ticket for a two game weekend. She got her mom to watch little Daniel and I picked her up at our local airport on Friday afternoon with hugs and kisses. We drove back to my cabin in the woods and I got her settled in. We were playing the Skukumchuck Selects at 7:30 so we didn’t stay long before heading off to the arena.
The Selects were a pretty fair team and gave us a good game. I checked for her in the stands at each time my defensive pairing went out on the ice and was pleased to see that she was both watching the game and seemed also to be fitting in good with the other gals. We won when Jingle’s tipped in a cross ice pass from Bronzy with a little over a minute left to play. Those brothers of mine have always played so well. I can’t believe how much I’ve enjoyed the fact that they decided to play hockey instead of becoming professional wrestlers or tennis players as part of their athletic skills.
Terry’s Tavern was cooking after the game and I can’t believe how stinking drunk Vickie and I each got. It was a wonder that we got back to the cabin without crashing somewhere along the way. She rode all the way back in my pickup snuggled up against me. Good wood was on my mind and she wasn’t acting in any way negative to the notion.
Yup, though strong desires and too much alcohol don’t allow fruition sometimes we crashed that night without any action only to wake up to the start of a hell of a snow storm. A real doozie of a storm had swooped in down from the Bering Sea and by the afternoon was just pounding us. By 6:00 pm when I like to leave for my games we had taken over three feet of fresh snow. With the wind blowing the way it was I knew that some of the low areas from the cabin to the main road would be completely drifted in maybe seven or eight feet or more. I figured that the game would be called because no one would be able to get out even in town and I wasn’t too worried because I kept the cabin well stocked and had plenty of fire wood.
Vickie was a bit worried though not being from the North Woods. So I did my best to alleviate her fears not realizing that in doing so I was also rousing her libido. Need I say more then for the next few days being snowed into my cabin we shared some of the greatest love making and pure sex of my life. She revealed to me her stage presence “Anna Nickel Smith” and just drove me nuts. We enjoyed each other for those few days and we joked with each other so much. She kept whispering in my ear “Come on Jaspy give some wood to Smitty,” taking on her own secret hockey player nickname with me.
Oh those days were wonderful! After one really tender moment she grabbed an empty Labatt bottle and spit some backwash into it, sort of recapped it and quickly set the bottle outside where it was about sixty below. She said that she wanted to preserve it for maybe future use. I laughed and said “Vicki, you are so nuts!”
She said, “Jasper, you have so many great qualities but I’m not ready for another baby. You’re getting old and when I’m ready again you might not have it. I’m going to keep that on ice until then and when I’m ready again for another child I want it to be yours.”
I just laughed it off but when she was finally able to head back to Texas she repacked that bottle in dry ice and had UPS send it to her gynecologist after a lengthy phone call. He said that he’d store it in a sperm bank for her.
We stayed in touch over the years but her lifestyle continued to change as she got famous. She ended up marrying some really rich guy that was way older then me. He died several years back and Vickie’s been fighting with his family over the inheritance. She called me once and said that it was time. My seed in cold storage was still viable and she was going to give it a try. I was pretty worried because she had now gotten way overweight and was doing some awful drugs due to the stress in her current life. She got way strung out and then wasn’t talking with me anymore. But she did have a baby girl; Danielynn she named her. I thought well maybe she is mine. Maybe it worked. I figured that I could be a good dad this late in my life; as opposed to earlier when I too was a party animal. She wouldn’t talk to me, she wouldn’t substantiate that I was Danielynn’s daddy. I kind of let it go, a little hurt but our flame I realized had burned out a long time ago. Never having a lot of money myself, I never considered trying to prove paternity.
Daniel Wayner Smith, her son died at twenty while in the Bahamas. Vickie completely fell apart after that and died of an overdose within the same year. She had become so famous and so rich that her death filled many a news report. Danielynn’s paternity became big news too because of this. I guess the courts finally ordered identification of her father and I became awfully anxious folks, let me tell you. Ends up it wasn’t me. I guess my little soldiers lost their oompf over the years.
Yeah life’s a bitch and then you die.
Sad for Vickie … sad for Anna Nickel Smith … sad for Smitty.
Sad for Daniel Wayner and Danielynn her kids.
Sad for Jasper Wheats for a short little bit.
But I’m still walking with wood. No doubt about that folks – no sirree! Ehh?
Sunday, March 18, 2007
Being Gavin
Ya the days are gone now from my short life when I could lace em up and skate with the best of em. Ehh? You guys are thinking that I’m over the hill though. Well that ain’t quite right. I'm still walking with wood and kick some shit when I can. The north woods have been good to me and the years have been equally good as they’ve been equally rough.
I had some two goal games, hell I’ve even got a rookie of the year trophy from my first year in the men’s league. Most a ya that read my shit probably weren’t even a twinkle in your folks’ eyes yet back then. We won some league titles and we lost some too. It was all some good shit – no matter what. I mean I can even write ya a good story or two about injuries. Its all good stuff when ya been on the ice.
After my third year in the league and having completed my second season with Terry’s Tavern’s Sharks I got traded to the scum bags of the league – Happy Jacks Good Time Saloon Seals. We wore those damn yellow and green colors of the Golden Seals. Our sewn on emblems were these damn huge fifteen inch diameter, thick, son-of-bitches that didn’t breath to well and left ya hotter then hell. Crap I didn’t want to play for them. They always got their butts whipped and I figured I didn’t think that I’d be enjoying that.
Well the game a hockey bounces ya like a good board check and you come back from the impact with more vigor and vitality then you can imagine sometimes. Happy Jacks Good Time Saloon’s Seals is one fine example of this sorta bounce. We went from being the hacks to being regular winners if ya know what I mean. We went through a gradual transition to get there but we did. Some of the boys hung in for a heck of a time. Others passed through for a season or two. Kenny kept us together for many years. He went through some hell himself which is a story that I’ll tell you guys someday. We had Shep or “Suitcase” that’s gone on to become the mayor of some town in the Sierra foothills. Shit, I saw him about a year ago and he looked like he was as old as the hills himself. We had another infamous character Pete “Knuckles” Viger. For those a ya in the know – he was foiling up before foiling up became respectable (thank you “Slap Shot”).
One a best dang things we did as a team was to change our name to the Outlaws. Yeah the Outlaws are walking with wood boys and that ain’t no shit. Sure we spent a good deal a time pounding em at Happy Jacks but even they changed ownership and names. Sure we found other places to drink after that time but the Outlaws just kept on staying bound together pretty tight. And I’ll tell ya this every one a those boys that put on the yellow and green or the later black or white and gold are Outlaws. Ehh? Yep, Outlaws! And every Outlaw’s got a story.
Gavin was one those Outlaws that had been there for the long haul. He was on the team before I came on board and carried a bit of reputation with him. Solid and able to bring up an easy scowl he was always intimidating. Playing center with brute determination overwhelmed any weaknesses that he brought with him to the game.
He came from
If my memory has it right he drove a V-dub van back then and owned a small catamaran. He kept the sailboat in the driveway at the house over on
Mikey and Gavin got an apartment together down about a block from the ocean but it was never the same. We really never had a team house after that. Damn shame it was I’m tellin ya. I guess Kenny sold a bunch of the properties that he owned around that same time and banked the proceeds. Bragged a couple of years later that just from the interest alone he was able to buy a Mercedes for his gentle wife, Mary Rose. Now ain’t that a nice name – aw sorry guys, didn’t mean to be getting soft with ya here.
Well Gavin was a boisterous son of bitch. Don’t hold that against him though. Serves a purpose on a team to have a few like that. I told ya about T-Ball in some earlier story and these two guys carry the same weight in this department. Gavin would come into the locker room just all pumped and ready to roll. If his spirits were up then he was gonna pump up yours too. He was always shuvin and joking around with us before the games gettin us lit. I told ya folks a time or two how I needed one of my bro’s to blindside me in warm up to get my juices flowin, but Gavin didn’t seem to need any outside influences. Guys like that are good stuff for a team, ehh?
Shoot, one time he comes into the locker room and says that one team or other finishing up their game ahead of ours is just getting slaughtered. If that don’t get him all riled. He’s got his t-shirt pulled over his head now and starts tellin us about how way back when his great or great-great grandpa had instigated some horrific slaughter back in
One of Gavin’s other little tricks took place during team pictures. He always lined up in the back row behind the guys that were kneeling. Then he put on his nastiest and grimmest facial expressions which I’ve already told ya was a damn ugly scowl. Ehh? And all the time while waitin for the camera dude to take a couple of shots, he’d be standin up on the tips of his blades adding about three or so inches to his appearance. Always the actor that way, sneakin in a punch on a guy in a melee and actin like he’d done nothin when the ref starts dishing out the time. Just totally full of it but we loved it just the same.
Some of the craziest damn stories he told us was from a time when he was still back in
Another time he said that his crew had noticed an abandoned car in the neighborhood. Nobody had messed with it for a while so they got inside and painted the windows black. Used it for drinkin beer and other stuff that underaged punks ain’t sposed to be involved with. Gavin said that they pushed that car to a different spot every couple a days to keep it from getting towed away. Kind a reminded me of some guys I knew in my hood that went together and rented a small little run down store front place for their party shack. Gavin’s place was jus a might cheaper to maintain.
One a the best little stories about Gavin was again his rushin into the locker room all pumped and gettin ready to skate. We knew he’d been out huggin the boards watchin the game ahead a ours. We’d heard the final buzzer before he came in so we knew the game was over. Somebody says “Hey Gavin what was the score?” Without any hesitation he yells back “Three two tie boys, three two tie”, not even realizing the mistake he’d just made.
Years later he got all of his gear stolen and didn’t really skate too much after that. He had awfully wide feet and getting new custom skates that didn’t give him a lot a pain was a costly proposition to his part time job at the local paper. He’s stayed athletic over these years surfing and running marathons. It’s a good life and he’s still walking with wood.
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