Thanksgiving in Kauai!!!

This Thanksgiving the wife and I went to Kauai with three other couples for about five days. We all left on Thanksgiving morning, and we didn't end up eating until almost midnight due to the renting of the cars, shopping for the groceries, driving to the cabin, and the cooking of the food. Thankfully a member of our party had called a local grocery store there and set aside a turkey for us to pick up once we got into town. We had to rent jeeps because the cabin is out in the middle of nowhere with awfully bumpy/muddy dirt roads. The meal was amazing and we ate left overs for the rest of the time we were there. Each night one couple cooked up a feast for everyone else. We ate very well! We did a few hikes, one along the Na Pali Coast line for about a couple miles in. It was a very beautiful hike. We did some other sightseeing around the island but spent a lot of time in the cabin just relaxing, playing games, and completing a couple puzzles.

That's my boy!

Just recently our puppy, Benson, graduated from puppy school. This was a surprise because we had not been in about a month. Benson was in recovery. Lets just say he will never be a father. We finally decided that he was healed enough to go back to class. Class was every Wednesday evening in town at the local middle school. I arrived there about a half hour early because Benson wouldn't stop staring at his leash hanging on the wall, like he knew we were going to go to class and wanted to go now. So I figured why not. I'll get him there early and tire him out a bit. I arrive and another guy with a really cool husky informs me it's graduation day and every dog and owner has to go one on one with the instructor. I was going to sit it out but said what the heck. Well he passed the requirements, which wasn't much besides sit, stay, and down. Then there was the trick contest and I will let the video speak for itself. Needless to say Benson won first place. That's my boy!

This little Piggy....

Let's just say he didn't go to the market.

Here is what a normal day consisted of when I was a wee lad. I would get up rather reluctantly (still do). My mother would turn on the lights in my bedroom. After getting dressed in a pre-approved outfit I would mosey on downstairs for breakfast which was usually cereal with fresh milk and syrup. Yes, syrup. It's great on Cornflakes. Then we would do the waiting game for the bus. When the bus would come into view up the street the scramble to make sure we had everything would begin. Backpacks? Check. Garfield lunch pail? Check. Shoes and a coat? Check. An hour bus ride to school, some learning, a recess, and a hour bus ride back home and that was that.

But... every once in a while something out of the norm would happen and change your life forever. Something so absolutely random and bizarre that it would be impossible to forget.

For example: One day my brother and I were riding the bus home probably excited that the school day was at an end. Maybe it was a Friday and we were looking forward to the weekend. Who knows?! The only thing that I can remember about that particular day was the pig. The pig that was hung up by it's ankles right out side the barn door. Which happened to be right where the bus turned around. Thankfully the pig was already dead before the bus arrived. I would have hated to see how that went about. Unfortunately though the butcher was there ...........with a chainsaw..........that happened to be working its way down the center of the pig's belly. Morbid I know.
I was surprised the bus didn't tip over because immediately after realizing what was going on all of it's occupants crowded to the side facing the carnage with their little faces pressed up to those little windows, mouths agape, maybe even a few tears from some, hoots and hollers from others. My brother and I got off the bus and I made the mistake of looking again at the pig just in time to see the butcher lop off it's other two hooves. Looking back at the bus I see nothing but faces. It seemed like every inch of the windows were covered with them. I'm sure there were a few of them that would have been better off not witnessing that. I would have liked to have missed it, but it was after all, just another day on the farm.

I think we had pork chops for dinner.

Up To No Good

When I was a wee tyke in elementary school I would go out into the barn and say goodbye to my dad and grandfather before the bus would come and pick me up. Our farm was at the end of the line for our bus route and it would come down our long driveway and turn around in our barnyard. It was like playing a game of hide and seek every morning. Well at least it was a game of seek for me.

Usually my grandfather would be tending the calves in the morning so it was pretty easy to find him. If he wasn’t in there he was probably helping my dad milk the cows so I could kill two birds with one stone. But some mornings dad and Pager (my grandfather’s nickname not to pronounced like the beeper thing worn on your belt. Pa like as in ‘papa’.) would mix things up and my game of seek would get interesting. For example: one morning I found Pager milking the cows and no sign of dad. I was told he was “around here somewheres.” So I went exploring which was difficult because I was really trying not to get poop on my shoes. I didn’t want to be the smelly kid in school. But something tells me I might have been regardless. Oh well.

I finally found dad in one of the holding cells with a cow in stanchions. Yep there he was, two legs, two arms, a head, torso, no…wait, I only see one arm? What happened to the other one? I couldn’t see the other one because dad was shoulder deep in the rear end of the cow. Funny thing was that this was no big deal to me, just another day on the farm. I wasn’t shocked or disgusted or thrown into a state of projectile vomiting. I probably thought the cow did something bad and was being punished and deserved it, but now that I look back on it he was probably artificially inseminating the cow since we didn’t have any bulls on the farm.

In case anyone is wondering: Yes, he wore a glove.

A horse is a horse of course of course.

Growing up with animals was great, especially the horses. Lets face it. Cows are not that much fun to hang out with. Calves maybe, but the big girls not so much. They had that super long tail usually covered in their own poop and when that thing started swinging -look out! I was glad when dad had all their tails removed. No farmer deserves to get whipped in the face with a poop soaked tail when they’re trying to milk a cow. Horses on the other hand were tons of fun (less poop). We had several while I was young: Nutmeg, Kahlua, and Tiffany to name a few. I have a special memory for each one of them. Here we go…

 

One spring I took Tiffany out for her first ride in a very long time. I decided I didn’t need a saddle (bareback=bad idea). We start off into the field when she gets all prancy dancy. I’m thinking sarcastically, “Great, this should be fun” when she goes from prancy dancy straight into Hi Ho Silver Awayyyyyyy.  She ends up bucking me off into oblivion yet I managed to still have the reins gripped in one hand. I miraculously land on both feet like a gymnast dismounting off the double bars, grab the reins with both hands and jerk her head and body back down to earth all in one fluid motion. It was like a movie stunt perfected on the first shot. I think she was surprised by this because she didn’t fight back a bit as I was pointing my finger in her face saying in my most half guttural half terrified voice, “don’t ever do that again!” We walked side-by-side back to the horse barn. You know that old saying when you fall off your bike you gotta get right back on it? No way!

 

I remember riding with my mom up in the sugar bush. I can’t remember what horse she was riding but I was atop Nutmeg. A ways into the ride we came across a downed tree lying directly across our path. I was little so my skills with a horse were still in training and in a situation like this I would usually just find a way around it. I don’t know if there wasn’t a way around it or if Mom suggested I jump over it but that’s what I did. Anybody who has ever ridden in a western saddle knows what the horn is, right? No? Well it the giant stump of leather that is hard as a rock that sits directly in front of the rider’s unmentionables. Interesting design you might say and I imagine there is a reason for it though I just used it as a handle or in this particular situation a crotch smasher. Nutmeg and I started off just fine. It was the landing that did it. I ended up on the ground, both hands cupping my goods while screaming, “ my dink, my dink!” (this is edited). I could see mom through blurred eyes trying not to laugh as she asks if I’m ok. Thanks mom!

 

Kahlua was a great and gentle horse that would let me lay on her back as she walked around the pasture and while she ate in her pen. She liked to eat. Which brings me to my favorite memory of her. One day I decided to take her out for a ride bare back. No, I didn't learn my lesson. We didn’t get very far away from the stable when this all went down, or to put it correctly I went down… face first!  She started galloping through the field towards where my dad happened to be out working when I guess her belly rumbled and she figured she could run and eat at the same time! I slid right down her neck and managed to face plant into the only rock in the field which in turn shoved my 'before braces' buck teeth through my lip…awesome. If I had used a saddle I could have hung on to the crotch smasher….. I mean horn.

Prank-a-Pal

The PBCB. Yes it's about a decade and a half later but there are some things you just never forget. Lets get everyone up to speed. The PBCB is a mythical creature much like the Pegasus, Yeti, and Keebler Elf. It is the acronym for peanut butter and cotton balls. Odd? I know. I am not sure of it's creator but it could only be one of a handful of my high school cronies. They know who they are.
What is a PBCB you are probably wondering. Well, I'll tell you.
First you take a coffee filter, put a mound of peanut butter in it and top it off with a handful of cotton balls. Then with a little force you smear it into the face of the first poor soul who falls asleep. You use a coffee filter because its light, easy to handle, and doesn't hurt the face. Plus, as you are bringing the PBCB down to the unsuspecting sleeper the filter opens like a parachute to aid in engulfing the face. The peanut butter is used bacause is sticks together well and won't fall out of the filter. And, its a real pain the butt to dig out of your eyebrows! Creamy works the best. The cotton balls shred apart as well, and just add to the mess on your face. It could be that these things just happened to be close at hand and were used for lack of a better idea.
Now that you know what one is I will tell you my favorite PBCB story.
It started late one night around 1am when me and one other buddy were just sitting around with nothing to do in our little town. Everything was closed already and we were far from tired for some reason. We got it in our heads that we needed to prank somebody. This was after high school so most of our pals were off to college. One of our closest pals was going to school 2.5 hours away in New Hampshire. So we decided that it was time for a road trip. We put together our little filter of fun and off we went not caring if we even got into his dorm room. We just wanted something to do. Well, we got there and we got in thanks to his nerdy roommate awake at 3am. Our pal was asleep on the top bunk probably deep in sleep with no idea he was about to get nailed. And nail him we did! Then..... we ran! We ran and we giggled like little school girls all the way out the room, down hall, the stairs, the door, and most of the car ride back home. Picturing him in the bathroom in front of the mirror picking the peanut butter out of his face and eyebrows made us laugh even harder. The best part was we didn't get to see him very often and we didn't even stay to say hi. It was a 2.5 hour trip just to rub peanut butter in his face. It remains one of the best PCBC ever given and I am proud to have been that bored.

Opps, I just Forted!

Like most young boys I had a fort, or two, or dozens.

In our back yard there was a giant maple tree with branches perfect for building a tree fort in. So I did, with some help of course. It wasn’t a grand tree fort or tree house, what ever you want to call it, but it was a place to get away and hide. I think back now and wonder just what I thought I was getting away or hiding from. I can only guess that it was probably chores. I cannot really remember playing in it too often. The only thing I remember vividly is climbing up the trunk and falling backwards on the stonewall when one of the steps gave way. I think maybe I hurt my rear so badly I didn’t use the fort very much after that. Luckily this was only one of several places I escaped to. During the summer months I had choices. I could go climb up into the tree fort, go in the hay barn and build a hay fort if there wasn’t one already there, or if it was too hot I would stay inside and build a blanket fort. Blanket fort? What’s that? Well… a blanket fort is made out of blankets, obviously. You first have to arrange your surrounding. Chairs worked the best but pretty much anything you could crawl under was what you were after, and what you wanted to move around to give you places to drape the blankets over. I would construct these forts in the basement where it was cool and as you walked downstairs you wouldn’t be able to see the floor anymore just a bunch of blankets being propped up on tables and chairs or whatever. The closest thing I could use to describe it is that it looked like the aerial view of a slum village with all of its mismatched rooftops covering everything. Underneath them though is where the fun happened. (Unlike the slums I imagine unless you’re a millionaire! Get it?) Typically I ended up creating a series of tunnels that I would crawl through as fast as I could without getting rug burn preferably. Like most things though when you’re young you get bored with quickly and eventually, you just need to stand up!

There was a camper that our families shared and every time it came to our house that was where my brother and I would sleep. It was outfitted with two nice sized sleeping pads on each end but we often didn’t sleep on them. Instead we would pull them off their perches and stack them over the center area of the camper’s interior and sleep on a couple sleeping bags underneath our fort inside the camper. What was the point of this? I have no idea, but it was fun and isn’t that what being young is all about?

As I mentioned earlier we also had hay forts. In the barn there were two sections where my dad stored hay bales (AKA perfect fort building blocks, great R value!). It was hard work making the forts because it required so much rearranging of the bales and sometimes these things were pretty heavy for a little tyke like myself, but what a sense of accomplishment when you got done. One of the facets I liked most was to make the entrances secret and easy to miss to the untrained eye. This was fairly easy since I was so small already. The slightest gap between bales and I could wriggle myself through them in a blink! During the hay harvesting season, as my dad would stack bales into the lofts, and with enough begging, he would build a fort for us as he went. These were my favorite because you never knew what to expect. I remember needing a flashlight because the tunnels seemed to go on forever until I got to my little lair. Hay forts were also nice in the winter because they kept you warm. The other alternative in winter time was to build a snow fort, which we did often. We had a big driveway that required lots of plowing and where there was plowing there were snow banks. Having all the snow in one great big pile meant you were half way to your fort already. All you have to do is dig it out. I will admit at times I felt a little bit claustrophobic. The forts usually turned into tunnels to the other side with a bigger carved out section in the middle that I could hide in. The greatest snow fort I ever build was with one of my classmates. We used a 5-gallon bucket to make the bricks. It ended up being about 4 feet tall inside with a small crawl door, window, and a shelf to store snowballs. The shelf and window were so we could throw snowballs at girls going by. What girls? This was the farm not the playground at school! We didn’t have time to toss any anyways. That night there was a storm and I swear I thought lightning struck close to the house while I was in bed. Next morning, get up, and guess what…..the sweetest snow fort of all time had blown up. I knew this because the boards we used to brace the door and window had been burned. I was sad I’ll admit, but not because my fart had blown up, butt because I didn’t get to see it happen!

And yes, fart jokes are still funnyJ

X marks the spot

I remember a trip to Cape Cod.

I must have been somewhere between eight and eleven years old. I wish I had a better memory but they say it’s the second thing to go when you get older, I forget the first. Bada bing…Anywho. Myself, my brother, father, and mother decided to go to Cape Cod for a mini vacation to visit some relatives. Technically my brother and I had nothing to do with the decision. We were in grade school and if we were even allowed to stay home, as soon as that cookie jar was empty we would have been screwed.

I remember nothing about the trip there or the trip back. I fall asleep real easily in a moving vehicle, except planes. I get gassy. There I said it. So if you are they lady who was sitting in 21F on my last flight I am truly sorry. I tried to play it off by looking around for the perpetrator but deep down I know that you know it was me.

Back to the Cape.
The only think I do remember about that trip is going souvenir shopping in some open marketplace. I wasn’t a fussy shopper. How could I be? I didn’t have any money. I was allowed to get one thing to bring back to the farm with me. What ever should I get? I looked and looked. There were the usual trinkets with Cape Cod plastered on them. Most of these things did not appeal to me. What did I need a shot glass for? The giant novelty pencil would have been a hot topic when I got back to school. I could imagine the ohhs and ahhs from my fellow classmates. Now I knew what my souvenir had to do. It had to make me cool. And what make a grade schooler stand out more than anything? Anyone…anyone? Clothes! Whether it be new shoes, a cool hat, or some jams (remember them? They were really long shorts.), clothes made someone stand out. So what was it going to be for me? A new pair of shoes I could get anywhere so they were out. Plus I think if I asked my dad for new Jordan’s he would have laughed at me. What about a new hat with Cape Cod airbrushed into it? That could be cool. Oh wait, I can’t wear hats in class. They’re out too. So I was down to clothes. Was it going to be a t-shirt, sweatshirt, shorts, pants, maybe some cool sock gloves with the little toes pockets in them. Probably not the socks.

So here’s me the little farm boy searching through rack after rack of cheap Cape Cod clothes. I don’t know if I looked long or I saw it right away but when I saw it I knew it was the one. You ever see in a movie how they portray someone moving towards the camera like they are floating? No bobbing from walking just a smooth glide like the actor was floating on a cloud. When I think about seeing it for the first time and walking up to it this is what I picture in my head.

It wasn’t just one piece of clothing. It was a set. Like a salt and pepper shaker. It would seem odd to see one without the other. The shorts were your basic shorts. Nothing special. Deep red in color with a cheap elastic waist band. It didn’t even have pockets. The top was a baseball jersey style shirt. Buttons down the center. Matching the color of the shorts on one side and dark green on the other. The buttons weren’t the only thing attached to the jersey. Stitched down the side of the front of it was a name. A name I was not familiar with but it had a big X at the end of it so I thought it was pretty cool. And if I thought it was cool then my classmates must too. Right?
Written above the X was the name MALCOLM. So there I was. This little white farm boy begging his father who is trying politely to say no and not look like a racist for a shirt that really shouldn’t be worn by a little white farm boy. I had no idea who this person was or what he stood for. It looked cool and that was the only thing important to me. I begged and begged and finally my parents caved. YES! It was a small victory but one I still remembered to this day. The only thing I can’t remember is what happened to that damn outfit once we got back to the farm. This is purely speculative but I think my folks caved only to shut me up knowing all along that they could easily dispose of my victory once we got home. I don’t even remember getting to wear it to school to hear those ohhs and ahhs. My victory sure didn’t last very long.

I should have gotten the giant pencil.

My Alaska 2009 Trip

The crazy looking one holding the knife is my father-in-law.......I slept in a locked vehicle!
That is the deck we worked on. Looks good doesn't it!?
Look close and you can see the two cubs. This was a difficult shot to pull off seeings how I was running for my life!
Me and the Kenai
Momma bear fishing/eyeballing me
The one halibut I felt was big enough to keep
It serious business up here. Combat fishing they call it. We all fished way down river from this nonsense.
Our sweet campsite. Note the upside down red folding chair on the end of the camper to keep the tarp high. Genius!
Doing a little fly fishing in the Russian River
The halibut do get heavier and heavier but somehow smaller and smaller....time to hit the gym again!
First Mate Pat, Captain Mike on the left, and the gang to the right!

This year I was fortunate enough to be able to go back to Alaska. I had figured last year was a once in a lifetime experience, but a very gracious friend of the family helped me with the airfare. It was his way of saying thanks for helping out with the construction of a deck last year and for any help I might participate in this year with another deck on the backside of his house. Thanks again you two!! Well the deck went together smoothly but I had to fly back to Hawaii before the finishing touches were put on. The rest of the time was spent fishing. I, my father-in-law, and a few of his cronies camped at Cooper Landing down on the Kenai Peninsula for a week and we fished, and fished, and fished. We went out on summer solstice at 8pm and didn't come back to camp until 6am. It hardly got dark at all. That night we had to fillet and carry back about 42 fish. I ended up taking 100lbs back to Hawaii with me. I had to buy a small chest freezer and put it in the garage because there was so much fish. We also went out on a halibut charter. It was beautiful, calm, and loads of fun. We pulled up one after the other until our forearms burned. Nothing very big but its like pulling a five gallon bucket or a sheet of plywood off the bottom of the ocean. So I got a buch of that in the freezer along with all the red slamon. I should be set for 6 months or so. Oh, and I almost got eaten by a big brown bear. Here's the best advice I can give on the topic: when you see a momma bear in a small brook getting fish for her 2 cubs that are watching from the path you need to use don't assume that you can sneak past the cubs while momma is on the other side eating a fish. They will see you. They will cry out for momma. And she will be back across that river in a millisecond! Good thing she was more concerned about her cubs than chasing me back up the path. That was only one of a few encounters with bears on this trip. They were everywhere. They would be in the woods watching us fillet fish. They would walk up and down the river eating fish remains . The one time we thought we would be okay they were there too. We went for a walk down the highway that runs past the campground. Its pretty busy but that didn't stop another brown bear from clomping out of the wods in front of us. Luckily it went the other way. You are definately not at the top of the food chain when you go out into the wilderness in Alaska. But, there is a kind of humbling feeling that I enjoy about that fact. And if you have never been there...GO!