What an interesting weekend for those of us born in the Seventies and grew up in the Eighties. There was the finale of the Starwalker saga with the release of the new Star Wars movie and then we got to witness Eddie Murphy’s return to Saturday Night Live. If there were ever a weekend to recapture the past, this was it. I feel a bit like Ebenezer Scrooge visiting Christmas past and present.
If you didn’t set out of this world expectations for either Star Wars or Eddie Murphy and simply tried to enjoy the moment and be thankful these events actually came to fruition, you had a good time.
We watched a bit of the Texas high school football championship game between North Shore and Duncanville at my in-laws. One of my in-laws follows high school and college football very closely, but he kept telling everyone how Duncanville had a “true freshman quarterback” which perplexed me but I tried to let it pass. About the fourth time, I had to question him about it. I started off saying I don’t follow high school football and still adjusting to 5A no longer being the top-tier of school size, but didn’t understand what was a “true freshman quarterback” verses “non-true freshman quarterback.” He realized his flub, that he was confusing college and high school, and we all had a good laugh.
My neighbor, the widower, is dating the widow of the neighborhood, and he called with an interesting request for assistance recently. They found hidden cameras in her house, which were hidden in the smoke detectors. He asked if I’d come over and help them find any other possible hidden cameras and wanted to lean on my knowledge on such things. He tends to think I’m a techie and really resourceful, and was wondering if I had an app or device to help. I politely suggested they contact the police who would actually have the proper resources which would provide peace of mind that all monitoring devices were found.
You know one group I have heard about in a while, Anonymous (don’t confuse them for Wikileaks, Eric Snowden, or the author of a recently published book about the current White House administration.) I have a tremendous amount of fearful respect for them. I’d figure with Trump, Russia, Epstein, and everything else, you’d be hearing a lot from them. Maybe they like being below radar.
For some reason, I can vividly remember sitting in Mrs. Andrews’ fourth-grade class and her teaching me the meaning of a palindrome using “radar” as an example. And if I had my druthers, “palindrome” itself would be a palindrome.
Not enough people use “druthers”.
I like to use the word “swell”. I’ll use it in reply when someone is asking how I’m doing and things are going okay. However, I am one of those who like to be truthful when it comes to that question. If someone asks how I’m doing, I don’t pass it off as an unregarded greeting,
Two commercials which have been getting on my nerves because they are overplayed: (1.) The Old Navy commercial with Neil Patrick Harris about wrapping/rapping and (2.) the Amazon “Everybody” commercial with the little girl playing a toy piano.
A sentence I never thought I’d read was in this article about the possible location of the future Trump Presidential Library – “Vanilla Ice ran it by Donald Jr.”
This kickoff return in one of the state championship games got a lot of attention. When I was in a sophomore in high school, we ran this play about eighty-percent of the time and I think it worked zero-percent. It was called “starburst” but a lot of the fathers in the stands called it “panty-ball” since it never worked. In my freshman year of football, we played a team that ran that kickoff return every time. It was well scouted and we practiced all week on how to properly defend it. The freshman football coach was the head basketball coach and was doing double duty most of the time (actually, he just focused on basketball during that time of the year when seasons overlap), so the assistant coach had us all prepared for it, and we were confident. Basically, we just squibbed kicked it and made sure the main return man didn’t get the ball to start trickery. Come game time, the head basketball coach shows up, the first time he was with us all week. We were about to kickoff and the assistant coach told us to do what we’ve been practicing all week. However, the head basketball interjected, pulling rank, and told the team to kick it straight down the middle. We did, and they returned it for a touchdown. I bet a lot of enlisted military men, NCOs in particular, have experienced this with officers.
I’ll be watching the 8:00 AM showing of the new Star Wars movie today. It’s not so much that I’m really excited to see it, I just happen to have the day off and thought I’d “get it out of the way”. At least this way nothing on social media will ruin it for me. I don’t like how the story line has evolved in this third set of series, I’m not a fan of the new characters, I don’t like what they’ve done with the old characters, Adam Driver annoys me, J.J. Abrams has a tendency to do too much in too little time, and I could certainly go on. But hey. at least The Mandalorian is great even though there’s no merchandise to purchase for Christmas.
Speaking of Christmas, we’re traveling to East Texas this weekend. The weekend before Christmas is always set aside for all of WifeGeeding’s siblings and their families gather and have their Christmas. I’m setting the over/under on the number of MAGA or pro-Trump related bumper stickers I’ll spot once I hit Terrell at fourteen. Thankfully, there’s no big political news going on at the moment so there’s absolutely no danger of any awkwardness with my very politically conservative in-laws.
Sometimes I tease WifeGeeding how lucky she is that my parents are deceased and I’m estranged from my siblings, she has absolutely no in-law commitments or issues to worry about, she doesn’t even have to buy a present or send a card.
In all seriousness, all my in-laws are good people. I compare it to being in high school. We’d interact with one another in class and have a good time doing so, but we wouldn’t be eating at the same lunch table or hanging out after school. I do have a strong suspicion one of the grandparents will gift Sugar Bowl tickets to all kids and grandkids. Either that, or we’re all getting Peletons.
Every year I have been a part of their Christmas, I’ve given my MIL a Christmas themed display of flowers. I like to give tulips when given the chance and if they look nice. Roses are nice, but a bit prosaic, but WifeGeeding forbids me to buy carnations. Personally, I avoid calla lilies because I associate the with death. Actually, I refer to them as the “death flower” when I’m around WifeGeeding. They are even shaped like a tear drop.
I recently heard that if lines at a Disney park are getting too long, the park will send out characters to draw a crowd and shorten the lines. If you see obscure or characters which aren’t very popular, then you know the park much be super congesterd.
Investigators believe his wife, Jeanne Souron-Mathers, 75, had put her husband in the freezer after he died between February 2009 and March 2009. They also found a notarized letter signed by Paul Mathers stating his wife was not responsible for his death.
In 1989’s National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, Clark Griswold puts down a $7,500 deposit on a swimming pool. Using the Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation calculator, I estimate that amount to be $15,929.48 in today’s dollars.
When I was a kid, I thought all commercial planes would like something like the Concorde jet or something very sleek and stealth like. I understand the economics of why the Concorde is no longer in the air and fitting in the most passengers as safely as possible, but I’m saying in general. I thought all commercial airlines would look cooler or different as we enter the third decade of the 2000’s. I know the modern plane has advanced in technology in terms of engines and materials, but the design is basically the same as what we saw in the Sixties.
NASA’s X-59 supersonic jet is cleared for final assembly
This is NASA’s first large-scale, piloted x-plane (or experimental aircraft) in more than three decades, and its goal is to reduce the loudness of a sonic boom to more of a sonic thump. When the long, slender jet transitions to supersonic speed, it will make about as much noise a car door closing, and since it will be flying 940 MPH at 55,000 feet, that could be essentially inaudible. NASA will test the X-59 over select US communities to gather feedback, as it has done with the F/A-18 Hornet aircraft over Galveston, Texas. Those tests will help establish new rules for commercial supersonic air travel over land.
There was a fire at the Rangers new ballpark. I’m predicting some sort of accident will happen after it opens and it will be tied back to the fire citing, that things were overlooked or sacrificed to meet a deadline so the park will open on time. I do hope I’m wrong.
We ate at Panda Express recently, I got a kick out of the fortune in my fortune cookie.
DaughterGeeding is a happy little camper, she had her braces removed yesterday. Our orthodontist gives patients a treat bag of items they couldn’t eat when they were wearing braces. The only item missing in the bag were Tootsie Rolls, so we stopped at the grocery store to pick a small package of them up. Personally, I’ve never liked them, always thought of them of fake or substitute chocolate. Our local grocery store just happened to have the Planters NUTmobile parked in front of it. I’ll be honest, I didn’t know it was a thing, I guess they are trying to be like the Oscar Meyer Wienermobile.
I watched the Kennedy Center Honors on Sunday and during the Linda Ronstadt honor, Aaron Neville and Trisha Yearwood sang “Don’t Know Much“. I forgot how much I liked that song, which led me to do a little research and got me trapped in an Internet wormhole. To my surprise, that song was recorded at Skywalker Ranch. One of the authors of the song is Barry Mann. Other than writing the songs for songs for National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, Mann also helped write “Somewhere Out There” for An American Tail and “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin”.
I recently read that the star on the California flag was there to honor Texas but didn’t believe it. However, this is what I found on the state of California’s official website:
I never heard of this prank until yesterday, but that’s some high comedy.
Joe Carter pranking Derek Bell by driving his car onto the field mid-game while the PA announcer reads off a "winning" raffle ticket number might be the best prank in sports history. pic.twitter.com/XT5EBb3t3p
