One Cʘsmos: Another Open Thread

Thursday, October 27, 2011

Another Open Thread

while I cope with this annoying viral syndrome of the indeterminate sort. Can sill master the basics, but not the extras.

33 comments:

julie said...: That sucks. I hope you feel better soon!; 10/27/2011 09:14:00 AM
John Lien said...: Get well soon Bob! We will try not to make too much of a mess of the rec room.; 10/27/2011 09:47:00 AM
John Lien said...: (looks around, eyes the glass bowl between the Laurel & Hardy decanters)

Ooo, a matchbook collection...; 10/27/2011 10:19:00 AM
julie said...: Oooh, careful - you never know what Dupree might have left in there....; 10/27/2011 10:21:00 AM
mushroom said...: The preacher came by
With a tear in his eye
Said his wife had come down with the flu
We told him he ought
To get her a quart
Of that good ol' mountain dew; 10/27/2011 10:22:00 AM
mushroom said...: Great new picture, Julie.

When my 16 yo granddaughter is hauling her 20-month-old little brother around, she has to keep telling people, "No, he's not mine. He's my mom's. I'm only 16!"

Looks like you might have the opposite problem.; 10/27/2011 10:26:00 AM
julie said...: Thanks, Mush. I don't have that problem, but I figure it's mostly because everyone wants to talk to Liam, not me ;); 10/27/2011 10:39:00 AM
mushroom said...: Liam's awwww-fully cute.

When M. was down here a few weeks back, he brought a couple of dinosaurs. I sat in the floor with him and would have one dinosaur sneak up and bite the tail of the other causing the victim to flip in the air like a mortally wounded armadillo and emit an authentic saurian screech.

I usually accompanied this with a shout of, "Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!" (Firefly ref).

M. found this hilarious. Now if you play dinosaurs with him, you have to play the way the Old Man does it. I wouldn't have thought he would have remembered it for fifteen minutes.; 10/27/2011 11:44:00 AM
John Lien said...: @mushroom.

The raccoon points north. Repeat, the RACCOON POINTS NORTH!; 10/27/2011 11:47:00 AM
Open Trench said...: Anybody have a good story?; 10/27/2011 01:55:00 PM
julie said...: Today's schadenfreude.

One can only hope the experience will have a beneficial impact on at least a few of the folks there.; 10/27/2011 02:56:00 PM
John Lien said...: @julie. Oh, that's sweet. It's the Western Civilization Lab course they didn't take in college.; 10/27/2011 03:23:00 PM
John Lien said...: I do have another true story involving Appalachian hill folk and a raccoon. But instead of putting one over on the revenuers, magic is involved.

It starts like this. Twenty years ago when our family lived on a mountain farm west of Bristol TN/VA, on the Virginia side, Our neighbor Steven was walking down the dirt road in front of our house chewing on something. Steven was one of three teenage boys who lived next door. Imagine your worst Appalacian hill folk nightmare and that would proabably accurately describe those particular neighbors. (I'm thinking that may have been one reason we got the farm so cheap)

I'll continue if I get an "up twinkles."; 10/27/2011 03:38:00 PM
julie said...: :D
Please do! I meant to say, I liked the other ring-tale as well.; 10/27/2011 03:40:00 PM
julie said...: Oh, fine: ✌ ✌

Best I can do - my symbol library doesn't carry jazz hands...; 10/27/2011 04:22:00 PM
John Lien said...: Ok, well, so Steven is chewing on something like a chicken leg and I don't know why I would ask him outright but it turned out in our exchange of pleasantries that he was snacking on some raccoon and he asked me if I wanted some. I politely declined and he headed on down the road.

Fast forward a few months and we are having a small bonfire in the bottomland next to the dirt road and creek that ran in front of the house. It was a small party of, maybe eight of us. Two of them were contract programmers we were working with and befriended that had come up from Research Triangle in NC. One of them was a practicing witch. You may know the type, long hair, very intelligent, programmer, D&D, witchcraft. Nice guy, and I'm not being sarcastic. So, we are hanging around the bonfire, singing songs, telling jokes, playing with the fire when out of the shadows appear the immuminated faces of Steven and his two brothers....; 10/27/2011 04:28:00 PM
John Lien said...: Crap! I mean illuminated faces...; 10/27/2011 04:30:00 PM
julie said...: I figured, and yet it seems as though "immuminated" ought to be a word...; 10/27/2011 04:32:00 PM
John Lien said...: Where was I? So Steven and his two brothers appear out of the shadows.
So I say, "Oh, Hi guys". Now that I think about it, it may have been the fireworks we were setting off that attracted them. (I really miss the Tennessee fireworks). So we continue on with the fire prodding, jokes, singing, fireworks when Steven kneels next to the fire. He then, I believe, holds up a stick or something and says, "This stick (or whatever) represents somethingortheother." and tosses it into the fire. Then he pulls out a small plastic baggie containing a raccoon foot and says "This raccoon foot represents somethingortheother." and tosses that into the fire. My guess is that it was from the same raccoon he was snacking on a month or two before. Then he pulls out another small baggie and sprinkles a substance onto the flames. He says, "This is sugar and this represents somethingoranother."

We were all staring in silence when
Steven gets up and says, "Well I just put a curse on my girlfriend." That was a buzzkill, to say the least. I'm standing next to my witch friend and say quietly, "Can he do that?" My friend says, "Yes but not to worry, I grounded the spell." What a relief!

But there's more to the story...; 10/27/2011 04:53:00 PM
John Lien said...: Fast forward a couple of months and I'm giving their mother a ride over the ridge to the general store that will extend her some credit until the checks arrive. On the trip over we were engaged in small talk, she mentioned that she didn't like the Virginia death penalty laws because she was concerned for her boys. She also mentioned that Steven's ex-girlfriend got sick with "the cancers."

Very odd.; 10/27/2011 05:05:00 PM
mushroom said...: My dad was a very skeptical person. However, he got a work horse in a trade that had "fistulo" -- that is, fistulous withers or "poll evil" -- it's kind of like inflammatory bursitis that breaks open. To the old-timers, it was more or less incurable. Figuring he had nothing to lose, Dad took the horse over to a woman known to be a faith-healer, which, of course, he had no faith in.

While Dad talked to the woman's husband, she took the horse around out of sight. When she returned, she instructed Dad to turn the horse out in the pasture and not look at him for, I think, two weeks. Dad figured he could at least follow the rules, so if the horse came up around him while he was in the field, he would look the other way and walk off.

After two weeks, the horse's withers were completely healed -- no sign of the "fistulo" at all. Dad would always end the story by saying, "I guess my faith wasn't too strong. I took him and traded him without ever putting him back in the harness."; 10/27/2011 08:58:00 PM
julie said...: Wow - I've known some "interesting" folks in my time, but you two might have me beat.; 10/27/2011 09:11:00 PM
mushroom said...: To John and me, "The Beverly Hillbillies" was a reality show.; 10/27/2011 10:00:00 PM
mushroom said...: Wow,that was a good Game Six. During Game Four, I said to my wife -- who is a fan of Nolan Ryan and the Rangers due partially to this -- that David Freese was a dangerous hitter. Now she believes me.; 10/27/2011 10:05:00 PM
Cond0011 said...: No worries, Bob.

I will be lightly tethered in high orbit, near the celestial fire pole, ready to seize the wheel of the cosmic bus when you get better.

http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/warriorshtm/bong.htm

Wow... two out of 4 of my favs out of commission. Life is gonna be soooo dull for a while. :D

Take your time, I'm going 'nowhere'. Come to think of it... where is 'somewhere' on the internet?

Hmmmm.... :); 10/27/2011 11:43:00 PM
julie said...: Mushroom - I finally just now watched the first episode of Firefly. That dinosaur line is a lot funnier now... :); 10/28/2011 12:22:00 AM
Van Harvey said...: John, and anyone else needing to know which the Raccoon points....; 10/28/2011 08:07:00 AM
mushroom said...: What is it Brigid says? Another Browncoat.; 10/28/2011 08:07:00 AM
Van Harvey said...: *way*, which *way* the Raccoon points.

Good thing there are always signs.; 10/28/2011 08:08:00 AM
John Lien said...: Good story mushroom!

I do miss the VA/TN hills. When you made that left turn off the main road that went up the valley and followed the the twisting road up and over the small gap and into our holler you passed through a stationary wrinkle in time which popped you back 40 years.; 10/28/2011 08:15:00 AM
Van Harvey said...: Mushroom said " "The Beverly Hillbillies" was a reality show."

Lol.; 10/28/2011 08:15:00 AM
Van Harvey said...: "... reality show", or as we like to call it, turning the wrong way on Hwy 79.; 10/28/2011 08:17:00 AM
John Lien said...: @Van. LOVE IT!; 10/28/2011 08:19:00 AM

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

The First Word Shall Be Last: