Rambling Josh

2005 is gone. It’s now categorized, labeled, and filed away into the ‘Years Gone By’ vault. There it is already accumulating a fine dusting of memories which, in time, will build into a thick layer of nostalgia. Exactly how long it takes for a particular year to ripen into full blown vintage nostalgia I’m not sure.

I guess it may be different for everyone, depending on what went on in your world that particular year. So now that you’ve flipped the pages on another year, just what do you have to show for it? Besides, rug burns, indigestion, and blood shot eyes from the New Years Eve party. Not to mention a napkin with the phone number of that little honey that kissed you at midnight, “Phil, thanks for a wonderful time. Love Frankie”

Did you accomplish everything you set out to do this past year? Eat better? Eat less? Exercise more? Make lefsa? Eat lefsa? Quit smoking? Lose weight? Relax more? Stop being scared of clowns? Watch less TV? Stop making obscene phone calls? Lower your cholesterol? Raise your wife’s blood pressure? Win the Nobel peace prize? Compete in a triathlon? Cure baldness? Find a women that appreciates you for more than your chiseled good looks?

Yes? No? Maybe? Don’t want to talk about it without your lawyer present? Well I tell you what, you think it over and get back to me. I like to hear stories of people overcoming great odds and adversity to successfully complete their yearly ‘to do’ list.

Here’s a valuable tip for your yearly ‘to do’ list. Never share it with anyone that will hold you to it or remind you of it on a regular basis. This allows you to quietly dispose of it at the end of each year without ridicule or a need for lame excuses.

I came upon this little pearl of wisdom the hard way when I blabbed the ‘run a marathon’ portion of one of my ‘to do’ lists to everyone I knew. I cursed myself and that stupid ‘to do’ list the entire 26.2 miles.

Speaking of pearls of wisdom. I spent the past week in Lignite enjoying Christmas with family and friends. A few of those nights I became disorientated and somehow found myself in the 109 Club. I was under the impression that it was a club for people that planned to live to be 109 years old. If this is the case this clubs methods are very enjoyable compared to other methods I’ve read about in health journals.

After my resume was reviewed a brief interview was conducted and I was granted a probationary club membership pending further investigation and back ground checks. The club president told me that with my pedigree I should have no problem becoming a full blown card caring member.

During the club meeting Uncle Buck informed me of these simple rules to live by: If you’re going to work, you work. If you’re going to church, you pray. If you’re going to the club, you drink. And my personal favorite, “Sometimes all you need is a little change in latitude.”

An occasional change in latitude may be all you need at the top of your ‘to do’ list to make 2006 not only memorable but reeking of nostalgia.

From my club to yours, Happy New Year.

Well it happened. I was flipping through radio stations the other day trying to avoid car and furniture super blow out sale advertisements and happened upon a station playing a lot of pretty good music.

Music that, much to the dismay of my kids, I knew all the words to. Music that made me feel like I had a mullet again. Music that made me think about the 12,000 pound 1970 Pontiac Bonneville I used to drive that seated 15 comfortably. Music that lifted my spirits and brightened my day.

Then it happened. From out of nowhere the DJ’s voice cut through the last few notes of the song and uttered the words that hit me like a sack of cassette tapes. “Your listening to all ‘oldies’ all the time, none of that ‘new’ ‘modern’ ‘not old’ music that ‘young’ people listen to, just ‘old’ stuff all the time.”

My eye’s got misty, my lip quivered as I yelled at the DJ, “Those are not oldies, those are songs that came out when I was a kid. It’s only been 20 years….” My voice trailed off “20 years?” Can’t be. Let’s see it’s 2005 minus 1985, carry the two.. 20 years! This wasn’t supposed to happen.

My kids patted my on the back, told me it was okay, all of their friends parents are old too. I dried my eyes, and for the sake of my children, decided against jerking the wheel into on coming traffic.

I’m thinking of introducing legislation that enforces the phrase ‘Your Generations Music’ rather than ‘Oldies.’ With the swiftness of our political system ‘My Generations Music’ will be considered ‘Classical" by the time it’s approved. I like the word classical. I won’t mind so much if my kids ship me off to the ‘classical’ home where I can listen to ‘My Generations Music’ real loud. Not because I want to because I have to.

I was doing some Christmas shopping the other day and overheard some teenage girls having a scholarly discussion on how much they loved 80’s music. You know why they love it so much? Because they don’t ‘have’ to listen to it, they have options. They have a two decade buffer at their disposal. Enough about my ill-feelings towards being closer to 40 than 20.

I have been looking forward to this week for a long time because, I’ll be home for Christmas, huh, sounds familiar. I haven’t been to Lignite since September, which is probably the longest I’ve ever been away from the friendly confines of the northland. It will be nice to settle in for a week or so and visit with friends and family.

Christmas at the farm of course is of highest priority for the venture north. The farm, being Grandpa Ardell and Grandma Rose’s house, where Christmas has been for as long as I can remember. Much of my childhood was spent at the farm so it holds more memories for me than just about any place. Good memories of good people laughing and enjoying one another’s company. ‘Classical’ memories.

Have a Merry Christmas. Chat with you next year.

First off I would like to wish the greatest photographer in Upstate North Dakota a very happy birthday. My lovely mother climbed up another rung on the rickety ladder of life this past Monday. Happy Birthday Mom.

As I’m writing this my daughter is down stairs entertaining three of her friends. About a week ago she approached me about a sleepover. Her timing proved to be impeccable because I had recently taken a large dose of Nyquil to ward off the effects of a lingering cold.

With the fog of medication numbing my senses and sensibility I agreed to allow her to invite four friends for a sleepover. Seeing how the good lord looks over idiots, one of her friends couldn’t make it. That left three.

In the brief time they have been here I have noticed that they all appear to be aspiring auctioneers. They talk, a lot, and at the same time. They also seem to possess extraordinary lung capacity, allowing them to dispose of those silly little pauses in conversation that occur when you are forced to breath.

Saving my son some mental and more than likely physical abuse, I encouraged him to sleep over at a friend’s house. I figured that females have administered about as much damage as they can to my mental well-being, but he’s just a boy. He will have plenty of other opportunities to experience that special anguish that females bless us with.

Speaking of blessings. We had a prayerful trip back from Vermillion the Sunday after Thanksgiving. It was 50 degrees and raining when we left at about 11:30, and by 12:30 it was 30 degrees icy and snowing with a stout prairie wind. Traffic was slowed to about 50mph and dropping on the interstate.

In a 150 mile stretch I counted about 20 cars in the ditch, 6 of which were rollovers. I noticed that the rollovers were all SUV type vehicles, which is what I was driving. More than likely SUV vehicles driven a little to fast due to the four wheel drive fueled confidence of their drivers.

I to probably would have been driving a little too fast if it weren’t for my two children in the backseat. Every time I saw a vehicle in the ditch or rolled over I would glance in the rearview mirror at my passengers and slow down little more.

That made me wonder how many times being a father has kept me from doing something stupid or dangerous or at least made me concentrate a little more while doing it. My kids will never know how many times they have saved me from myself. I have come to rely on their faces popping into my head as an early warning that what I’m about to do might not be such a good idea.

Thanks to the combination of heights, chainsaws, and questionable construction, I thought of them a lot while building my log cabin. Their images also seem to make regular appearances on my bike rides. It’s a wonderful little alarm system.

I think I’ll do a study to see if fathers suffer fewer injuries due to ‘stupid’ or ‘not well planned’ behavior’s than those without children. The study will have to wait for now though, I’ve got a slumber party to chaperone.

Where’s the Nyquil?

The dishes are done, the floors are washed, the laundry is done and put away, the carpets are vacuumed, the toilets are scrubbed, the sinks have been descummed, the kids have showered, I shaved.

Did I mention my wife is coming home for the weekend? Have you ever been watching a major league baseball game when the manager calls down to the bullpen to get a new pitcher ready to come into the game?

The pitcher on the mound is struggling a little, and you see the manager pick up the phone in the dugout and tell the yahoos in the bullpen to get warmed up and ready to come in and pitch. As soon as the manager hangs up the phone in the dugout you’ll see a flurry of activity in the bullpen, or as close to a flurry as you can get from overpaid and overrated athletes.

Well the same sort of scenario happens when my wife, the manager, calls from her dugout, Vermillion, and tells me, the yahoo, that she’s coming home for the weekend. Goodbye’s, final salutations, and such are cordially exchanged, the phone is hung up, and the flurry begins.

A bonafide caffeine induced, wild eyed, flurry. The dust flutters off of various cleaning products as they are wrestled from their hiding place behind the stack of “recycle when I get around to it” stuff. In the time it takes to chug a cup of coffee, ooohh that burns, the scent of bleach fills the air.

Since I have been deprived of the sense of smell since birth, I deduce that the scent of bleach is in the air by the burning sensation in my eyes, nose, and throat. Fortunately for me, when I passed out from the fumes my head hit the refrigerator hard enough to open the door.

The crisp, cool draft wafting from the fridge was quite refreshing. As I lay basking in the soft glow of the fridge light, snacking on a carrot I was able to retrieve from the crisper, I thought to myself, “Aren’t carrots supposed to break when you bend them?” I’ll clean the fridge while I’m here.

I made my way to the bathroom, nasty toilet scrubber in one hand and a machete in the other. Judging by what I found in there we have a family of Yeti frequenting our bathroom while we’re out. I was able to knit some nice sweaters and a couple tea cozies for Christmas gifts out of the hair that was collected.

We’re all set for the inspection, I mean arrival. We look forward to the weekends Dawn gets to come home, and I don’t mind inhaling a little bleach so that she can relax and enjoy her time with her family without worrying about cleaning when she’s home.

So for a few days now I can greet people into our place and say, “You’ll have to excuse the mess,” and not really mean it.

Enjoy the tea cozies.

Halloween is here and gone, nothing left but candy wrappers, belly aches, and costume rash. Hope yours was a good one. Did your windows get waxed or were you the waxer? Did your garbage cans and picnic table turn into a roadblock or were you the blocker? Did you get any rotten produce or eggs hurled your way or were you the hurler?

Either way it’s all part of the experience and I would be sadly disappointed if none of the above happened in Halloween friendly Burke County. Any upstanding youngster that doesn’t take advantage of a day that is specifically designated for petty vandalism is going to have problems later in life.

Problems with what I don’t really know, but I’m sure there would have to be some ill effects. Nobody I ever associated with abstained from enjoying the full extent of the trick in trick or treat. So I can’t rightly say what happens to the poor souls that merrily go about getting sugary treats in their special little outfits.

Parents here’s a little tip. When junior heads out the door for Halloween dressed like Rambo, complete with face paint, the dangers of sugar ruining his teeth should be the least of your worries. The only candy he’s going to get is when he snags a tootsie roll from Spongebob just before he pushes him into the hedges.

Another thing you’ll notice is that his bag will be full when he leaves the house and empty when he gets back, or when you go pick him up at the police station. Which if that’s the case he obviously didn’t have enough training and should dig his Buzz Light Year costume out again until he’s ready for the rigors of ramboing.

In all my years in the Halloween business I never once saw a cutesy little costume kid commit trickery. For one thing it would be impossible to be sneaky or run away in a half frozen plastic costume with ill fitting eye holes. It would be interesting, and somewhat disturbing, to come out and find Dora The Explorer and Bob The Builder dragging your picnic table out into the road.

Maybe it’s because you take on the mindset of the costume you are wearing. I know when I dress like a women I, I, well, that’s not a good example. You ever tried running in stiletto heals and a heavily padded brassier? Heals aren’t designed for speed, so you better have a quick sashay.

You ever sashay? Okay everyone up, lets sashay a little, come on, don’t be shy. Allright, allright, knock it off, someone’s going to get hurt.

As for my family. Sierra dressed as “The Scream”, Jackson was a Ninja and me, well I chose a timeless classic, “Mullet Man.” My wife is still successfully masquerading around as a college student and wondering how she ever got mixed up with Mullet Man. I think it was the sashay that reeled her in, no women can resist a manly sashay.

So if you didn’t get chased, yelled at, or threatened this year, there’s always next year. Until then may the egg break ‘after’ you throw it and the spirit of Halloween be with you always.

Something is going on around here. This weekend I awoke to the clatter of my kids bringing me breakfast in bed, both Saturday and Sunday morning. I can barely drag them out of bed for school but somehow they muster the strength on the weekends to get up early and feed their father.

Saturday morning they prepared my favorite, Frosted Mini-Wheats. Nothing kick starts the intestines like bowlful of sugar coated fiber. Top that off with some coffee and you’re as regular as Old Faithful, minus the tourists, park rangers, and gift shop.

Sunday morning they brought me a plate full of the monkey bread that I had made for them the night before and a glass of chocolate milk. Jackson informed me that the chocolate milk was homemade by his sister. If you don’t know what monkey bread is it’s a bunch of little pieces of dough that are thrown in a bunt pan, topped with caramel, and baked for approximately 25 minutes at 375 degrees.

You would know why they call it monkey bread if you saw me in the kitchen tearing little pieces off and poking them in my mouth as quickly as the hot caramel will allow. You use the bunt pan so you can eat a section and slide it together and nobody will know. Well enough cooking tips from Billy Crocker. We had french toast and chicken noodle soup for supper so don’t contact me for any culinary advice.

The french toast was made from bread that I made in the bread machine. It was supposed to be ‘light’ wheat bread, but light is not the word that would come to mind when you hefted it up for a bite.

The bread reminded me of a squirrel that made an attempt on my life last year. I came out of our apartment and as I was walking under a branch I noticed a squirrel poised on it holding what appeared to be a rock. I thought, “Oh no it’s starting.” They’ll start by using primitive weaponry like rocks but soon enough they’ll be pillaging the neighborhood on dogback with hubcap shields, tin can helmets, and yard dart spears.

Before the terror completely griped me I noticed that the rock was actually the heal from the loaf of bread I had thrown out the day before. Honest mistake, the breads DNA was closer to granite than Sweatheart. As I watched the squirrel drag it to his home I hoped that his buddies new about the Heimlich maneuver or there would be one less squirrel to carry out their plan to overthrow the neighborhood.

Maybe my children are softening me up for an overthrow. Keep feeding the old man so that in a few years they’ll have to come and tear down a wall to get him out of bed. If they switch my frosted mini-wheats to bacon wrapped sausages dipped in butter I’ll start to worry and accuse them of being in cahoots with the squirrels.

Until then I’ll just be thankful for being blessed with thoughtful, loving children.

Did you know that October 6th is “National Slam Your Bedroom Door Day?” It is also “Scream At Your Rotten Brothers Day”, “Punch Your Rotten Brothers Day”, “Kick Your Rotten Brothers Day”, and “Don’t Ever Listen To Your Rotten Brothers Day.”

It also happens to be my sister Amanda’s birthday. She began laying down the ground work for the establishment of these days back in 1978 when Mom and Dad brought her home from the hospital to begin the painful process of growing up with to Neanderthal older brothers. About six years later Mom and Dad helped crank it up another notch with the introduction of a little Neanderthal in training.

The “League of Sisters With Brothers” caught wind of the developing situation and tried to intervene on Amanda’s behalf but were unsuccessful. The three stooges thwarted their plan by moving in swiftly to administer snuggies to the concerned sisters. They were last seen pedaling their “My Little Pony” bikes south towards the hills, defeated, the tassels on their handle bars fluttering in the breeze and the waist band of their underwear rumpled at about shoulder height.

A favorite game amongst us three goons was to see who could get our sister to storm off to her bedroom and scream “I hate you” as her bedroom door crashed to a close. Jarvis was undoubtedly the master of this little slice of fun with an unbelievable success rate.

Amanda was well aware that Gabe and myself were easily distracted and would forget what we were doing relatively quickly, but Jarvis was focused. He was relentless. He wrote the book on, “Effective Little Sister Button Pushing.” Well actually he didn’t write it, he posed for the majority of the illustrations, and provided the bulk of the statistics.

But then something horrible happened one day. Amanda started to fight back, and she didn’t fight the same way we did. We relied purely on aggravation techniques like name calling, disfiguring Barbie dolls, and just basic pestering. She went right to the heart of the matter, actually a little lower, and relied on a series of well placed kicks. When your sister discovers the debilitating power of place kicking you suddenly become much more cordial when in close range.

You know when someone’s sister has made this discovery because all name calling by the brother is suddenly only performed while passing quickly atop their bicycle. She has won, and she smiles smugly as you peddle for all your worth glancing nervously over your shoulder. You soon learn that she won’t chase, no girls don’t do that, they just wait, and they never forget. Scary isn’t it. Gives me the willies just thinking about it.

I don’t get to see my sister much. For some reason she refuses to reside in the same state as her brothers, not sure why. If she did live here her neighbors would question why a grown man pedals his bike quickly by her house everyday calling her names. She would smile smugly as she laced up her steal toed boots, and say, “Oh that’s my brother, inviting me over for my birthday.”

This is gonna hurt.

Someone, I don’t know who, once said that bad things always happen in three’s (or fours). I shared that little law of the universe with my daughter Thursday morning to put her at ease about the previous days events.

Monday morning after I dropped the kids off at school I came back home and noticed that Sierra’s bike wasn’t where I parked it the night before. Not only was it not where I parked it, either it had rendered itself invisible or it had been stolen.

Later that day my cell phone rang while I was on my noon hour bike ride, it was the school nurse. Sierra had decided to stop a monkey ring from swinging by blocking it with her head, which left her with a sizeable bump and a mild concussion.

On the bright side I thought that maybe with the haze of the concussion clouding her memory I could convince her that she was a sixty year old midget named Mavis and never had a bicycle. I think it would have worked but her medalling little brother kept calling her by her real name.

Tuesday Mavis had an eye exam and found out that she needs glasses, which explained why she didn’t see the metal ring swinging towards her melon the day before.

Wednesday the phone rang at work and the school nurse was once again on the other end. Mavis reeling from her poor vision, stolen bike, and monkey ring mishap, tripped over someone’s foot on the playground and landed on her wrist. My professional opinion was that there could possibly be a fracture; my fatherly opinion was that x-rays, doctor visits, eye glasses, and a new bike are making for an expensive week.

Listening to my professional advice I opted for x-rays, which thankfully revealed a fracture free little hand. We left the doctors office and went in search of a bubble store. Mavis was concerned kids might stare if she showed up to school in a bubble and that it wouldn’t fit through the doors. Taking her concerns into consideration I compromised and opted for bubble wrap, a helmet, and protective goggles (prescription of course).

The rest of the week was incident free, and she is gradually getting used to me calling her “four eyes.” Just kidding don’t get yourself in a huff. I’m not sure if she completely bought into the concept that we need bad days to appreciate the good ones.

She did have some good news in the middle of her mess of a week. Out of the 300 students at her school Sierra was one of the 28 chosen by the teachers to be a student ambassador. Student ambassadors are designated students selected to work with the new students. They are selected because of their positive attitude, friendliness and kindness to others, and willingness to help others. Insert picture of proud bragging father here.

This past week was a testament to those attributes. Through all the bumps and tumbles Sierra remained positive and never once let it get the best of her. For that, I am proud of her.

Off to the bike shop.

Trees are a living organism, and the ones that were cut down to be a part of my log cabin seem to harbor a little resentment. Maybe they all don’t get along and don’t care to be saddle notched together providing warmth and protection to the vary person that chainsawed them into submission.

Or possibly since they are South Dakota trees they aren’t comfortable being placed in a Montana forest. I don’t know, but whatever it is they are a disgruntled bunch of timber. I guess you could say they have a chip on their shoulder, please forgive the lameness of that statement.

How do I know this? They are relentless in their quest to maim or injure all that come in contact with them. This past weekend my brother Gabe unwittingly put himself in harms way by agreeing to come to Montana and help myself and my good friend Paul put our cabin together.

Thankfully nobody sustained any serious injuries although there were NUMEROUS close calls. You know the kind of close calls that make your eyes wide and voice high followed by hysterical laughter. The laughter only antagonized the logs to be more creative in their attempts to render one of us unconscious.

I’m not sure why close encounters with the grim reaper made Gabe, Paul and myself laugh like idiots. Other than the fact that after three days without shaving, showering, or changing clothes we resembled three carnies training for some sort of midway log rolling game. Step right up folks, plenty of thrills, spills and stench.

I apologize to any carnie folk that I may have offended with that last statement. I’m sure your jobs aren’t all the glitz and glamour that we believe them to be and in no way do I believe myself to be qualified for the rigors of your profession. I tried living the dream but I never made it past the first round of interviews, it seems that my full set of teeth were a major disqualifier.

Anyway, back to the timbers of terror. Paul and myself have been working on this cabin for about 2 years and it is finally nearing completion. I’ve wanted a log cabin ever since I watched my first episode of “Grizzly Adams” about 25 years ago. The dream is slowly becoming reality now I just have to grow a beard, befriend a bear, and find a skunk named Joshua. Feel free to insert your own smart comment here.

I’m sure my parents are pleased that I chose to pursue the Grizzly Adams childhood dream over the Evil Kenievil option. Gabe seems to have pursued that one, either that or he mistook his snowmobile for a row boat.

His daredevil help was greatly appreciated by his not as young brother. Thankfully all we have to show for the trip to Montana is some sore muscles and a cabin. Oh yeah and lots of stories of harrowing deeds ending in hilarity.

On that note, when you ask Gabe about what happened in Montana please keep in mind that he will exaggerate anything that pokes fun at me. For instance, I do not scream like a girl when a log threatens my life.

We moved my wife to Vermillion South Dakota this past weekend. She finally pushed me too far so I told her to gather her things and get out. A man can only take so much, I mean I’ve been taking out the garbage since I was 8 years old.

Do you have any idea how many bags of garbage that is? Neither do I, I was hoping you could tell me. I’m sure it’s a lot. Why me? Is it because I have no sense of smell? Yeah that’s what I thought, pick on the handicap guy.

For those of you that may not know I was born with no sense of smell. It seems that my mother was exposed to the fumes emitted from a 1969 Plymouth Road Runner while she was pregnant with me. Plymouth has since addressed the problem and to my knowledge no other child has had to suffer as I have.

Back to me putting my foot down with my wife. Actually if I were to put my foot down she would more than likely put hers up.

Dawn recently got accepted into the Doctorate of Physical Therapy Program at the University of South Dakota in Vermillion. It is a 3 year program, the first two years are classes at Vermillion and then a year of clinicals which she can do in Rapid City.

Those of you with knowledge of South Dakota geography or access to a Rand McNally can see that Rapid City and Vermillion are not in close proximity to each other. About 400 miles separates them.

Now how many of you are thinking that you would like to send your spouse to live 400 miles away for a few years? Not me that’s for sure. I like to have my wife close all the time so I can hear her scoff and giggle every time I mess up. Have her right there so she can slap my hand when I’m trying to write a check for a life sized statue of Jimmy Buffet that plays Margarittiville when you pull his finger.

For all concerned parties we’re going to see how it goes with her being there and me being in Rapid City, raising the kids. That’s right, I will be solely responsible for the upbringing of two young impressionable little people. Don’t breathe a word of this to Oprah or Dr. Phil.

What could go wrong? I like them, they appear to like me, we’ll have a little competition to see who grows up first. The smart money is on Sierra. I’m not an oaf like the sitcom dad’s, I am perfectly capable of handling this. Actually Sierra once told me after watching an episode of the ‘Simpson’s’ that I was a much better dad than Homer.

“A much better dad than Homer.” Do you need a better vote of confidence than that? Other than crying herself to sleep at night while muttering prayers for our children Dawn seems okay with it too.

I’m very proud of my wife and I know she’ll make an exceptional physical therapist. I also know that this is going to be a challenge for all of us, but I’m confident that with the love and support of our family and friends we’ll get through just fine.