The Continuing Story of Rocky Raccoon

Your inside is out and your outside is in
Your outside is in and your inside is out
So come on, come on,
Come on is such a joy
Come on is such a joy
Come on let's make it easy
Come on let's make it easy
Make it easy, make it easy,

 Everybody's got something to hide except for me and my monkey.

~The Beatles 

Sorry that this post is a bit late. My reasons are discussed below. 

This picture means nothing. Or does it?

In talking to different associates about the blog, I have found that some people read way too much into the blog. They think I am talking about them when I am in fact not. On the other hand, some people do not read nearly enough into it. They never even realize that I am talking about them. Maybe the latter of these two is the more desirable type of erroneous reading. Nevertheless, suffice it to say that one needs to read these posts through the correct lens. There is a leveled understanding with which this blog must be read. 

Some readers have only recently joined us. Welcome. But you should probably stop reading right now, since this post will make you realize your female associate associates with a weirdo.

So yes, this post will not be for everyone. Be warned that it will seem like a riddle at times. This is because I like having fun with both of the aforementioned groups of readers. Also, as I have indicated a few other times, my readership comes from a rather disparate collection of demographics. I have women in their 80s who read this blog. I also have teenage boys who have been introduced to the blog. For these reasons, this post today could only be for a select readership. But I digress.

Since next week will most likely (?) feature the start of a three part treatise on some of my current research in social statistics, this week's post will pretty much just serve the purpose of filling the gap between last week's post and next week's post. It probably will get 30,000 views, since usually that is how it seems to be: The most inane posts get the most views.

This picture means nothing. Or does it?

Here is how this post works. I am going to list 20 reasons why this post was not published yesterday. Some of them are factual. Some of them are not. Some of them are factual, but are not reasons I was unable to write a post this week. Some of them are just what Peyton Manning calls "Ice Cream."

For the "I like to hike in suits" type of  men.
From my personal study of fashion and the use of blue and maroon.

1.  I had a test on Thursday. It was sort of a big deal, since the professor is also the graduate coordinator and I had to look good. Although I am not sure if I should attempt to impress a 46- year-old man that dresses like Justin Bieber on Tuesdays and like he just had a photo shoot with GQ Style (see above photo for example) on Thursdays. That's what happens when you graduate from an Ivy League school.
2. I had a discussion with one of my black associates about linear regression and analysis of variance calculations for grain consumption data.
3. You never give me your money, you only give me your funny paper. 
4. Because Obama Cares. Even when you need to perjure, he is there for you. 
5. I discovered that if you play Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon along side the Wizard of Oz that the music explains the movie perfectly.
6. Because I live in a one room school house. Okay it is not a school house. But it is only one room. Unless you count the bathroom, which did come with a door. (The bathroom having a door was actually presented by the owner as a selling point).
7. I cannot play the flute. At least not well. I actually learned the flute at one point, but Mr. T wanted a trombone player in his band. So I joined general music and sang about the Sign of the Beaver and rockin' my baby in the bosom of Abraham. This was in sixth grade.
8. Someone wrecked their car into a light pole by the roundabout and I had to walk home because the bus could not get past. The bus driver actually had to call and get special permission to let us off at a place that was not a stop (i.e the middle of the road).
9. Julio and I were down by the school yard and he ended up getting in trouble with the law. Luckily it was not for perjury. (Note that Julio is a boy's name, not a girl's name. Hence it could not be referring to a girl). I just told the officer my name was Al and he told me his name was Betty, which is not a name I personally would use if I was chasing hardened criminals every day. But to each his or her own.
10. D-Wag, the long haired elf. Or maybe it was D-Swag, the long haired hippster elf.



"With Hair Strands"-Pixel on Pixel. © 2015 JMC Inc.

11. Do  you know the Copper Top, the Copper Top? Do you know the Copper Top who lives at Park Place Lane? Most of you do not. Familiarize yourselves with the Cu Top. Some of you will have that chance on October 10th. Others of you will need to wait until after school is over. Others of you have no idea what this even means. (See Matthew 13:9). Suffice it to say that I might just slide in for the clay medal. That is of course unless H.U.G or his sister slide in before me. Or the boy with the triangle head. But remember, you heard February 26th, 2016 from me first, right here on this blog. That is when the bronze is going down. This of course only pertains to a select number of you.
12. I had to spend too much time this week clarifying where I used to live. This in part is because Obama cares, and is also in part because some people insist on calling The Pope "Pope-Vatican." Some things you just do not need to clarify. That is one of them. There are others I will not mention, as to not hurt feelings. (p.s. If I have made it this far without offending every single reader, it would be a literal miracle.)
13. I did not pick up chicks this week. Maybe this weekend I will do so. Some of you are already aware of my forays into agriculture. Others of you are still unaware, even after the past two months of blog posts. Here is a picture of Jak, one of my good associates from Nampa, ID. He chose not to buy the house, however.
    
    

    

    Why Hello! My name is Lil' Jak and I give you a thumbs up.

14. I may or may not have watched a snippet of a Pawn Stars episode where a man is offered $600,000 for a guitar that belonged to Jimi Hendrix. And the man declined the money! Although I think the whole encounter was staged, since later the guitar shows up for sale in a nearby guitar shop.
15. Jay Gilmar and I went up the hill on a short climb. We saw some old people and also a man with an overgrown Abe Lincoln beard.
16. Friday is pizza night. But Thursday is ramen night. Most likely the best ramen I ever ate was on a Thursday night. The type of ramen that I had probably most closely resembled tonkotsu (豚骨) ramen. There perhaps was some mixture of miso ramen in there, but I am admittedly not an expert.. Nevertheless, I have long been seeking to convince people that there is a big difference between ramen cooked by hand and ramen cooked by foot. There also is a big difference between ramen cooked by hand and Top Ramen.  
17. She gave me the crime rate data backwards. Luckily, my black associate figured this out. 
18. Right after I posted last week about my being agricultural, my agricultural college decided to bring ten or so large tractors onto campus and park them. I guess this was just to get people excited for the 2015 Reaper Races. (Three weeks from today. Fontanelle, IA is hosting. And we even get a day off of school).
19. Jeddy G. has resigned himself to running marathons. No words yet on the rest of the children.
20. Finally, I am not going to lie, I did spend a little time this week looking into airfare and hotels. I am currently taking applicants for a vacation next spring. (May 14th or so?).  Be warned, the acceptance rate might be low since admissions are tough. You know where to find me though.

This is a gold mine BTW. A gold mine with lots of copper. Perhaps some of you have already sussed that out.

 

How to Pick Up Chicks.

When I was a little bitty baby
My mama would rock me in the cradle,
In them old cotton fields back home;

It was down in Louisiana,
Just about a mile from Texarkana,
In them old cotton fields back home.

Oh, when them cotton bolls get rotten
You can't pick very much cotton,
In them old cotton fields back home.

~Lead Belly, as sung by CCR. 

Today I will be talking about some benefits of going to an agricultural college. I will at times be comparing my experiences with attending an agricultural college with my experiences attending a meat market college. These comparisons are not meant to incite riot on either side as, after all, I have been a student at both schools. And, as always, let me remind you that these posts are meant to have a degree of sarcasm in them. Hence, if you farm alfalfa, please do not think I am actually making fun of your livelihood. All complaints should be directed to my older sister Brunhilde (brunhilde912_TheEnforcer@gmail.com).

Pickin' up Chicks Like a Boss.

Picking Up Chicks

The good thing about going to an agricultural college is that you have an opportunity to learn certain life skills you really could not learn anywhere else. Take picking up chicks for example. When picking up a chick, you must use care not to crush the small bird in your hands. You do not need to give the chick the Heimlich maneuver. In fact, unsolicited abdominal thrusts usually will result in the chick slapping or biting you. Instead, use a soft cupping motion with your hands and scoop the bird up. Ideally the head of the bird should be oriented to allow the chick to properly draw air into its tiny lungs. This means that the legs of the chick should face down. Also, let me remind you to be careful when picking up chicks, because sometimes you can throw your back out. To wit, I picked up a chick one time and did not observe proper form. I lifted with my back and not my hips! My lower back was sore the next day. Although perhaps this was because the chick fancied herself a chiropractor.

The Alffies
Now these tips on picking up chicks are only a small sample of what you can learn at an agricultural college. There also are a variety of clubs one can join. Take the Alfalfa Growers of America (affectionately know as "The Alffies") for example. They have a strong following here at my agricultural college, with over three-quarters of the students pledging at the "Sprout" level or higher. Furthermore, we are one of only three schools in the nation to boast double digit wins at the annual "Reaper Races." In fact, the current record for the 100-acre harvest is held by Richard "Dickie" Kurtler, a former student of my agricultural college. He now has his own line of designer "work suits," with sales in the tens of millions of dollars. Agricultural college can progress your career in ways you never even imagined. And to think that it all began with a simple desire to cultivate a ditch bank weed.

Buck "The Blade" Jennings warming up before the 300-acre harvest race. (2009)

Side Chops
Another interesting thing about going to an agricultural college instead of a meat market college is that men can have beards without the Po-Po being all up on them. (Women can have beards at either institution by the way, although they do not occur with equal prevalence at both schools). I have seen many agricultural college beards. Long beards with beads. Long beards without beads. Medium beards with braids and curls. Short beards with streaks of green. Beards doubling as hairpieces, as well as hairpieces doubling as beards. You name it. I have even seen something the locals call "Side Chops." I grew these so called "Side Chops" one week and it increased my confidence level four-fold. That is the benefit of growing protruding facial hair. Unlike "The 'Stache" (a meat market favorite), sculpted facial hair is salubrious to both body and psyche. 

Feelin' Good.

Engineering
As is common with land grant schools, many agricultural colleges have a strong engineering department. My agricultural college is no different. You can tell how strong a college is in the field of engineering by how many buildings they devote to the subject. At my current school, I believe that there are 37 buildings devoted to engineering. They have names such as "The Engineering Building," "The Engineering Laboratory," "The Engineering Testing Building," "The Engineering Storage Building," "The Engineering Machines and Gadgets Building," "The Engineering Engine Building," "The Engineering Experiment Building," and "The Engineering Test Subject Storage Building." That last one has been rather controversial as of late, but I hear that they serve a mean omelet for breakfast if you have to stay for more than a week.

At my old meat market college, I think we had three engineering buildings: The new one, the old one, and the storage heap. When I was a freshman at the meat market college, I actually went inside "The Storage Heap." One of the first things I saw were some broken machines (steel presses) being stored in a chicken wire cage under a stairwell. Rumor has it that the Ark of the Covenant is somewhere in that building, hidden behind an old milling machine from the 1950s.


Beans 'n Brew
One thing that should not be surprising when comparing my old meat market college with my current agricultural college is the amount of coffee that is consumed at the latter. Although, let's face it, there are probably only about three colleges (Meat Market, Spud Market, Pineapple Market) in the world where people do not drink coffee. Hence this part of the post is less about my agricultural college and more about select encounters with people who consume coffee. I myself do not drink coffee, but I am aware that there are people in the world that drink coffee. This is not a big deal to me. The fact that people drink coffee is just a fact of life and I deal with it quite well.

Admittedly, I do not know why people drink coffee. I guess it wakes them up or something. (That is what exercise is for. Anyway.) But that aside, I have a girl in one of my afternoon classes that brings a one-liter thermos of hot coffee to class each day and drinks it from a tiny little cup. Mind you, she did this even when it was in the 90s outside. She drinks about 12 cups of this hot coffee through the course of the class. I think she might be addicted.

Photo Credit Wanda Lancaster.

Another encounter I had with coffee came during my recruitment to PhD programs. This school was not strictly an agricultural college in the sense of my current school, but the land for the university was donated to the state by two gamblers and a saloon keeper. During one of my days at this said university, we had a meeting for all recruits. The beverage served was coffee (else this story would not be in this section). But the coffee came in what can only be described as "bladders." We are talking light blue rubber bags, much like those in a CamelBak. And the food served was pizza. Nothing beats a good ol' cup of joe from a bladder and a slice of pepperoni pizza. Anyway. #CoffeePeople.

I Want to Hold Your Hand
As I have strolled the campus of my agricultural college, one thing that I have begun to notice is the comparative lack of hand holding. At my former meat market college, hand holding and kissing were plentiful. Sometimes, even faculty members took part in the festivities. I witnessed such an event once. Let's just say that there is nothing quite as awkward as seeing your professor having a private moment of romance in a Thai restaurant. At least it wasn't with a student. (See this former post).

Your average meat marketer. Photo credit JMC.

"Espionage." Photo Credit JMC

Graven Images
One interesting difference between an agricultural college and a meat market college is the statues and artwork they have on campus. At my former meat market college, the graven images were all of people.

Note the hand holding.

However, at my agricultural college, the graven images are a bit more abstract:

Five-way Arm Wrestle.

Stacks of firewood.

Lips.

French Fries

"Man and Club" Pastel on Napkin.
 It looks like he is aiming for a ravine.
Photo credit unknown. Possibly this random man's spouse.
If it was her, credit to her.

Conclusion
There are many other differences between going to a meat market college and an agricultural college. Time does not allow me to mention all of them. However, I will mention that ever since I became a student at my agricultural college, my ability to pick up a chick has dramatically increased. Perhaps this can be attributed to the wonderful symbiosis between my meat market college and my agricultural college.

Thank you to those of you who provided the images for today's post. You can have 100% of the proceeds from what I make from this blog today. Split it however you like.  

Throw it Away and Go Home: I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For.

Confusion never stops,

Closing walls and ticking clocks.
Gonna come back and take you home,
I could not stop that you now know.

Come out upon my seas,
Cursed missed opportunities.
Am I a part of the cure?
Or am I part of the disease?
You are, you are, you are.

~Coldplay

Before I get going on this post, I need to thank all the people I have stolen photographs from. It can be hard to chase down good photos. You cannot just tear a photo from anywhere you know.

Вот она

---

This is an old post I wrote quite a while ago. I am presenting it now as to clear out my old drafts and allow me move on to other projects on the blog. This post is presented in essence in its exact form from when I wrote it last December. Only slight modifications have been made to a few paragraphs. It may or may not contain current information.

What I write about here is by no means meant to be a new discovery, nor do I claim that the experiences related herein transcend in egregiousness that of other people. In truth, I am a bit hesitant to even use this post, as it seems pretty much just like a big complain and whine post. But, as stated in the first post on the blog, sometimes I just use this place as a catharsis center.

I begin with a prefacing story.

Back in 2012, I met this girl named Tex in a class I had. Her name is of course a code name and is short for the Textus Receptus. (I was writing a paper on the translation of the New Testament then). Now, this girl was not built to perform in the scholastic spectrum. Overall, she was a nice enough girl and had talents in other aspects of life, she just had no academic turgor. The poor girl possessed zero ability to stand in the pocket and deliver a pass. This ended up being a massive frustration since I wound up trying to help her get through the class we had together. However, she did not do homework on Saturdays, so this was naturally rather difficult. But, she did manage to pass the class. And then she let me know that she was not interested in having much contact with me.

It just so happened that as I was leaving town after this said semester that the song "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" by U2 came on the radio as I was crossing the city line. Sort of fitting.

I have climbed the highest mountains
I have run through the fields
Only to be with you
Only to be with you

I have run, I have crawled
I have scaled these city walls
These city walls
Only to be with you.

But I still haven't found
What I'm looking for
But I still haven't found
What I'm looking for

~U2

This relates to children's literature. In the book Days With Frog and Toad, the two main characters attempt to fly a kite. At one point the phrase "Throw it away and go home" is uttered. Sometimes even now I think of that phrase.

As of late I have actually become a rather large believer in throwing things away and moving on to other venues. Most of you know where I went to school. I started school there nine years ago. And I have to say I reached a point where I became rather disenchanted with the social paradigm in the surrounding city (not a unique story of course). My people were consistently socially abused there. And I didn't appreciate it. But many of them have moved far away from there and have had success. The Beast, Mr. Melmac, El Toque, The Mamma.....they all threw it away and went home--then marched on to glory (so to speak) somewhere else. The interesting thing is that most casual observers thought these people somehow "failed" because they never embraced (or were embraced in) the prevailing social folds of the P-town in the Pleasant Valley. But these aforementioned people all have gone on to graduate degrees and have perhaps (dare I say) transcended what there, my former locale, could ever offer them. (Note that this is not a commentary on my former school, but rather the social strata that existed in the surrounding regions).

Now the message here is not that I think that moving to Alaska* will somehow jump start my life and I will end up marrying a young accountant/veterinarian/singer/attorney/beauty queen (all in one) and then also discover an untapped oil reservoir in my backyard. I would be totally fine with the girl only having a few of those jobs, and the oil money is really overkill. I do not require much. 

However, I do think that, given opportunity, it can be clarifying to move to a new place and see some new faces. Now this is a dangerous statement, as I recently have been prompted by some to actually meet new people now. And surprise! They know the "perfect girl for me." If I had a dollar for every time someone has told me that phrase, oil money would be pocket change. And I pretty much have zero motivation to try anything social now that I seem to be the only person in the entire city that is over age 25, not married, and still going to school (Okay, a vast over generalization). Although I did meet a girl once while we were volunteering somewhere together and she gave me a ride in her BMW. So I do participate in social expenditures occasionally. Very occasionally, that is.

Along those lines, I believe that my handlers have scheduled my next social expenditure for roughly May 14, 2016. Once this is approved on Leap Day next year, more details will be forthcoming. Consider arranging your schedules. Please do not wear lime green or yellow to the festivities, as it will clash horribly with the decor. Besides, white people do not look good in yellow.

For what it's worth.

As has been the common trend, my escapades with Miss BMW came to naught rather quickly once she realized that I was "strange."At first, she just took my inability to converse normally with someone of the opposite gender to indicate that I was not fluent at the language. This facade was quickly lifted.

Who knows, maybe some single woman out there is seeking for a curmudgeon/hermit/crazy with a vast amount of books on "Applications of Partial Differential Equations," "Lebesgue Measure and Stochastics," and "Homological Algebra." Perhaps one of you will have a night vision in relation to her. She can be the girl of your dreams. Literally. Maybe she will even let you ride in her BMW. Or her Honda. As long as she is not wearing yellow or lime green.

*To be clear, I have no current plans to move to Alaska.

The Curse.

This post was written in March of this year. I am posting it now because it has become more relevant to events in the near future. I know that a number of you claim to cheer for a different team and that this post will probably incite you to approach the pulpit with an announcement of your affinities. Good luck with that. 

As some of you are aware, I follow college football to a certain degree. I follow one team in particular. This team is in fact one of only two teams I follow in college football, so I would not consider myself a watcher of college (or pro for that matter) football. The other team I follow really deserves as little mention as possible here. So most of this post is about one team in particular. Some of you are going to try to guess which team it is, which will be rather amusing. Certain people have the ability to read between the lines. Others have not been as successful.

In order to perpetuate the code name charade, I am going to refer to the team I principally follow as "Victor Mattingly University" (VMU). Many of you actually attended this university, and its true identity will become clear to those that know any of the basic storyline I address below. I am going to refer to VMU's rival as "The Other Team" (TOT, or The Tots). The Tots is not a Napoleon Dynamite reference, although it could be. If you are unaware who Napoleon Dynamite is, you may be better off in life. But, he is played by a graduate of VMU. Hopefully no one will get lost in the metaphor. That would be about as good as getting a roundhouse kick to the face from someone wearing American Flag pants.

The topic I will be addressing today is the Curse of VMU's football team. Why are they cursed you might ask? I honestly blame a man whom I will call MH. Now MH is famous for some good things and he is also (in)famous for some bad things. His name is only slightly veiled, since he is actually slightly famous.

A little bit of back story is in order. Most of this stuff is pretty well known. MH was the starting QB for VMU for three years, during which he became the winningest QB to ever play for the Victor Mattingly University Ligers. I missed most of his career, as I was elsewhere. So I am skipping his first two seasons and all that 4th and 18 stuff. This brings us to the scene of his final home game. It was the first time in ten years that VMU had worn true Royal blue, not just the "Darkest Shade."

This person is wearing True Royal Blue

After losing to the Tots the year prior, MH came out and beat those Tots in overtime. I was there. I saw him win it. I saw him beat the Tots in overtime. This is something too few have witnessed as of late. Since that day, VMU has not beaten the Tots in football. And I think it is because of the MH Curse.

THE CURSE. The Awful MH curse. 
 
Probably none of this needs rehashing, but after winning the game, MH told the media

"I don't like the [Tots]. In fact, I hate them. I hate everything about them. I hate their program, their fans. I hate everything."

Naturally, the Tots did not like this. But, I am not going to rehash any more of this story. The further reaching aftermath is what I am interested in. Since that day, I think that VMU has been cursed. Different people will point to different sources of this curse. I claim no specific source of the jinx, however here are the results of the curse:

• No wins against the Tots since the MH win.
• An awful 44 point loss against the Tots on their return to VMU's stadium. I was at that game and the only way to describe what I witnessed is "Black Magic." I mean, there really is no other way to describe what I saw.
• No wins when wearing true royal blue (They did win a bowl game the MH year while wearing true royal blue, so I guess you sort of can count that. But not really). 
• A key player being taken away in an ambulance when wearing true royal blue.
• A key player breaking his leg when wearing true royal blue. 
• No wins in overtime since the MH win in overtime (Currently 0-3).
• No QB since MH has started a season as the #1 guy and gone on to play any sort of meaningful minutes in a bowl game victory.
• General QB instability. Broken backs and broken ribs. Five stars turns into five thumbs down.  
• General mass injury strikes the team. This is an ankle biting curse.
• Losses to teams VMU had not lost to since before anyone even knew who Walter Modale was. (Okay, well no one knows who he is anyway, but you get the point.)
• Recruits getting in trouble with the law.
• The Tots begin wearing big boy pants on a new playground.

I think that the curse has even spilled over onto the basketball team to some degree.*

• Again, more losses to the Tots.
• Freak injuries to starters. Last season. This season. 
• Four years ago, we had the number 1 RPI in the country, but......
• Even when we have an incredible season, it ends on a slightly low note when our center gets suspended. And then we just happen to come up against the one team in the tournament that has four starters 6'10" or taller. And then to add insult to injury our point guard cuts his chin on a slippery court. 
• If I have to see one more food hoarding commercial I probably am going to flip. Especially that one with the guy eating mac and cheese from a bucket. Maybe these commercials will continue even if we won a national championship.
• The fish stop biting and I wander in the Sahara. 

How could the MH curse not be real?

Personally, I think that a lot of this transcends any sort of causality by current coaches or players. You may disagree. All I want to know is how to end the curse. What type of reconciliation needs to be made? I already know that redemption does not come from enduring 20 years of pagan proclamations over the pulpit and by the campfire. Been there, done that. What do we need to burn to atone? How will the debt be paid? What will it take? We need to find a solution. Please comment with suggestions if you desire.

*I wrote this post right after a bad basketball loss to a so-so team. The basketball team did get a pretty big win last season, so this is at least a positive sign. And I think that the horizon does look better for basketball. We finally have a few more Mr. Rogers type people. Football......there is still a big question mark for me. 

Family Reunions

She knows her mind all right your Auntie Grizelda
She says she knows my kind she might, maybe so
Oh, yeah, she's raised you right your Auntie Grizelda
You only know the things she wants you to know

I know she's having a fit, she doesn't like me a bit
No bird of grace ever lit on Auntie Grizelda

You can't begrudge her style your Auntie Grizelda
She couldn't budge a smile and do it for free
So righteous making fudge your Auntie Grizelda
So proper judging others over her tea

You look just like her you do, I know by looking at you
That you've been listening to your Auntie Grizelda

~The Monkees - Your Auntie Grizelda

When I originally wrote this post, I had spent the week giving a large number of hours of test reviews for the math class I was teaching. This consisted of standing in front of a class for three or four hours and talking. You never realize how hard it is to stand in front of a class of people and talk for three straight hours without sitting down. Especially to do it for three days. At the end of it all I walked to Domino's and bought two pizzas for $12. They were having a deal. It was actually a student who told me about the bargain. This pizza turned out to be rather useful in the days to come.

Now to get to the actual topic of the blog post today. (See the photo below). We will discuss syngenesophobia (Fear of relatives) today.

Not a photo of my family member.
I hope no one has omphalophobia.

A common event each summer for many families is that of a family reunion. I am posting this at a time of the summer that will dispel thoughts of this post being about family reunions I have personally attended. Since I am aware that a few members of my family read this blog, I must release this disclaimer:  

Disclaimer: Not every weirdo I talk about on this blog is related to me. Hence the persons herein detailed should not be attributed to anyone I personally know, nor should these be taken as descriptions of the members of my family.

First off, while we are on the topic of family reunions, let me just disclose that I am the guy who tries to keep as low of a profile as possible at family gatherings. The last family reunion I went to, I hid in the foliage and hoped no one noticed I was there. I was able to drink four lemonades and two bottles of water, so all was not lost. Experience has taught me that it is usually best to stay on the fringes at family gatherings. This way you can avoid explaining for the bajillionth time why your wife is not in attendance.

"Yo buddy, stop asking that!"

As of late, when I am asked where my "eternal companion" is, I usually just say "I am not quite sure.....you know, now that you mention it, I cannot even recollect the last time I saw her." This usually stumps the attacker long enough that I can slip away. Another one of my favorites (this works especially well at weddings) is to tell anyone that asks where my lover is that "we will make everything official once the Board of Pardons clears her case." It takes someone with a significant grip on their wits to respond to that one. Admittedly, I have an entire arsenal of ambiguous statements about my marital status such as the one above. My brother highly dislikes it when I unleash one on an unsuspecting attacker, yet I have found them to be a rather useful tool.

I am also going to add fast that there was an unfortunate encounter I had once where a relative tried to refer her "beautiful granddaughter" to me. This granddaughter and I even went to the same school! Lo! Behold! We have all it takes! I then had to kindly remind this relative that only states in the South allow marriages between cousins. Well, okay, that hasn't stopped some families. But how do you explain that to inquiring minds. "Oh yeah, we met at a family reunion........" #AwkwardPause. #ThenTheyFigureItOut. 

I have also found that kids and babies tend to be in the inner circle at family reunions. I do not do babies. They are not part of my act and I do not plan on them ever becoming part of my act. Perhaps this is a result of a rather pronounced case of paedophobia. As I want to entirely separate myself from any contact with children, the edges serve me nicely.  You can dart in and out and get the food and beverages you want without having to make conversation. After all, we don't go to family reunions for the people--we go for the food. Let's face it. This is especially true when you are anthrorusticaphobic (Fear of Rednecks). Or if you are cacophobic. Fear of ugly people is certainly a reason to stay on the edges.

Here are a few of the types of people one might meet at a family reunion. Again, remember the disclaimer.

NRA Enthusiast.  This is the relative that comes to the festivities with a sidearm and a big #'Murica shirt on his back. The handgun changes family BINGO, that's for sure. You don't wanna mess with this relative. This is another reason to stay on the fringes of the fold. You never know when that pistol will go off.

Wait Cousin Bubba, that ain't a sidearm....nevermind.

That Don't Potluck. Many reunions are potluck. This means that, upon occasion, something weird gets brought. Kidney beans don't potluck with lemon jello. You don't put cheese in sugar cookies. Mustard does not go on steak. Turnip Stroodle is not a real dessert. In fact, turnips don't potluck, period. These are basic facts of life. Maybe this is a hold over from the Depression era relatives who had to mix whatever they had and eat it. "You kids eat this stuff or else. When I was a kid I ate pea gravel and dirt, and we were darn lucky to have the dirt."

Ninth cousin 27-times Removed. About four years ago I decided that I was tired of not knowing the difference between a second cousin and a first cousin once-removed. (Because this is something everyone wants to understand). This decision was actually brought on by a family reunion I attended, since some of us were trying to figure out how Great-Cousin Chuck actually was related to us in technical terms. Here is how it goes: Ordinal (first, second, third, fourth...) relationships are horizontal relationships. You come from the same lineal generation. So my mother's first cousin's children are my second cousins. On the other hand, removal is a vertical relationship. So my mother's first cousin is my first cousin one-time removed. Note that this can be rather confusing, since this goes both ways. I am also my mother's cousin's first cousin one-time removed. Wikipedia explains this with a lot of diagrams and does a pretty good job of it, so visit there for further questions.

Cousin Great-Grandpa. Have you ever been to one of those reunions where you see some of your parent's cousins and you wonder if they were even born in the same dispensation? I'm not just talking 10 or 15 years. I'm talking 40 years and 40 nights. First cousins with no removal, who are old enough to be the grandparents to your parents. I mean, I have a cousin who is 24 years my junior, but still, I'm barely old enough to be his parent.

Pretzels. A pretzel is someone who has....loops.... in their family tree. As in, a higher-up branch has connected with a lower down branch. Voila! A Pretzel. This is a term I heard from one of my own relatives. He is not a pretzel as far as I can tell. (Based on his provenance, I find it highly unlikely that he is in fact. Although he is browned and salty). Let's hope we never need to deal with pretzels in my family. Although maybe that would be an explanation for those families with the Cousin Great-Grandpa action going on. One way to test for pretzels is if you see your parent's cousins at reunions or if you see your parents' cousins at reunions. The punctuation is critical here.

Change of Face. This is the relative that you have not seen for 20 years who shows up and has drastically changed. This change can occur in many fashions. Maybe they put on 80 pounds. Maybe they lost 80 pounds. Maybe they are no longer your aunt, but your uncle. Pick your poison. If you have metathesiophobia, this relative is one you should avoid.

The Moochers. As a kid, I am pretty sure that I mooched at someone's family reunion by mistake. Now you might wonder how you can mooch by mistake, but here is how it happened. My own family was holding a reunion in a park in Idaho and my cousin and I were wandering and we somehow got into the wrong pavilion. We were probably about seven or eight years-old at the time. The family reunion we had originally come to attend (i.e. the one for our own family) was one of those reunions where some of the aforementioned "27-times removed" type people were in attendance. Being young, we had no idea who our "people" were. We just saw food and old people. We ate a few of their doughnuts (powdered) and played with some of the kiddos there. After 20 or so minutes we realized that our (immediate) family was at the next pavilion over. Ironically, we probably were more closely related to some of the people in the pavilion we mooched from than the pavilion we were supposed to be at.

The Lovers. Okay, I am going to admit it. I could not through this post without mentioning the lovers. These are the relatives that show up with lover en tote. This can be highly exciting when it is the first time that the relative has brought their lover. You could actually count "seeing the cousins' lovers for the first time" as a major reason I go to reunions. But after the same relative has brought a different girlfriend to each of the past four reunions, it starts to lose its excitement. And when your grandmother insists that the lover be in the family photo, it always creates issues........("Granny, we have had to shred the last three family photos because Clint keeps changing girlfriends.") 

Maybe one of these days I myself will have the privilege of marching in with full pomp and circumstance to the lauding salutations of family members as I present my lover for their examination. Praise, honor, and glory will then be poured out in full upon me and I will finally have my name emblazoned on the family wall of fame. Or at the very least I can stop hiding in the foliage every time I go to a family event because of the shame that otherwise will be bestowed upon me.  #WeShallSee.

Who's Your Daddy. This is not so much a person as an event. I have found myself at times introducing myself at a family reunion as "I am the son of _____, who is the sister to _____, whose wife is _____, whose father's mother's son's wife is your third cousin." So in other words, I am probably more related to the aspen trees in the park than some of my relatives. 

Do Not Mix. Occasionally there are relatives that cannot mix and mingle. For example, if your aunt is ablutophobic (fears bathing), she should not mix with your second cousin who is blennophobic (fears slimy things). You should definitely keep them at separate tables. In fact, if your aunt ain't bathing, you probably should give her her own table. 

Bufonophobic. Fear of toads can be a crippling phobia. If you or a relative is afraid of toads, seek medical help immediately. 

Did I miss any of your relatives? Comment below.  

When It's Over

When it's over,
That's the time I fall in love again.
And when it's over,
That's the time you're in my heart again.
And when you go go go go,
I know
And it never ends
It never ends.
All the things that I used to say,
All the words that got in the way,
All the things that I used to know,
Have gone out the window.
All the things that she used to bring,
All the songs she used to sing.
All the favorite TV shows,
Have gone out the window.

~Sugar Ray.

Here is a stream of conscience babble. I hope to by next week have grabbed my tail and be back on the strait and narrow path of my normal blog routine. We shall see. Although maybe people do not want the normal blog, since it usually involved drawn-out diatribes and large lexicon.

---

This week is the end. As in, the end of my time at the university I have gone to since 2006. That was nine years ago (if for some reason you were unable to do the math). Quite a bit has happened in those nine years. I have gone from high school graduate to graduate degree. In some senses it means nothing. All of this was just expected. The overall plan is not complete. I am barely over half way perhaps. In some ways, I feel as if I was just running on a treadmill--running to stand still.

But in terms of the details, much has transpired. I have had a bajillion roommates. I lived during Jimmermania. I changed my major three times. Homework was done, grades were earned, a thesis was written. I even earned some degrees I did not originally plan on obtaining. And I married the most beautiful woman in the world. Okay, that last one is not true. Truth be told, one can actually complete a master's degree at this university and not be married. I darn near made it without even talking to a girl. That's the glory of being in two majors that have almost no women. Sure, a few cute redheads threw themselves at me. And yes, once or twice I got a girl to actually remember my name was not Russell. But really the only contact I had with females was when I taught a school course. And dating your students is against the Honor Code. Or maybe the Morse Code. Something like that.

Another thing I was just realizing is that, for the first time in almost a decade, I can go an entire week without shaving and I will not be in trouble with the Boo-Boo police. Although, full disclosure, I have gone an entire week before and not shaved. This was usually at a time when I could sequester myself away in a far away country like Wyoming. And I have also been busted by a vigilante for having a beard on campus after I finished an undergraduate degree and had not started school again. However, I'm sure that there still will be people who keep me in line at my new school.

Enough said.

Furthermore, with this being "The End" and all, I had to move apartments. I have spent the last four years in the same apartment. I have had 10 roommates there over the course of these four years. To my count, four of my former roommates at this place have gone on to get married. Six of them have not. This can be calculated by what we call "process of elimination."

Now fours years seems like nothing in terms of time spent living in the same place. My grandparents lived in the same house since the 1950s I think. But four years of living in the same two bedroom (shared) apartment is a rather long time. Suffice it to say that I had a lot of digging to do. If you see my bedroom at home you might not believe this, but I threw out probably 150 pounds of  "stuff" from my apartment. And I'm not talking couches or something--I'm talking bent silverware, dozens of Amazon boxes, and roughly a 200-year supply of cumin. We also had a large stockpile of potato flakes and soup ladles. Good thing my associate was there to help. If those potatoes had reconstituted I might have been engulfed. Throw in the 8 pounds of cumin and they might have never found me. As for the ladles, all I can say is that it is better to be up late with the ladles and ladies than it is to have no ladle at all. And we sure had a lot of ladles. But only one lady.

There is not really much more to say here. The last two weeks have been such a whirlwind that I never even had time to think about the fact that the life I used to live was sort of over. This is true in more way than one. Honestly I try not to even think about it. It sounds sappy, but I have almost experienced a paradigm shift. The only way to describe it is to picture boarding a sea-liner and going down to the lower decks for years, then finally emerging. You finally come up on deck and ask "What does it even mean?" I feel as if several worlds are now being forced to meld together.

This is getting too philosophical, so I am just going to end here. But for the record, my apartment number is now #7 instead of #6. #WishMeLuck.

Not the Original Post

Every breaking wave on the shore

Tells the next one there’ll be one more

And every gambler knows that to lose

Is what you’re really there for

Summer I was fearless

Now I speak into an answer phone

Like every falling leaf on the breeze

Winter wouldn’t leave it alone

Alone

If you go?

If you go your way and I go mine

Are we so?

Are we so helpless against the tide?

Baby every dog on the street

Knows that we’re in love with defeat

Are we ready to be swept off our feet

And stop chasing

Every breaking wave

~U2. "Every Breaking Wave"

Why Hello! I had intended to post something else, but the past days have been too much of a scramble and my batteries did not have enough juice.

The Cute Photo.

Let's hope that next week is more peaceful, since I need to find some copper tops that last at least five years.

But right now, the end of school and losing sleep because of the issues my students cause me and  grading tests and passing a 300 bullet point cleaning check has put me behind on time and sleep. I could not brush my teeth for an entire day since the sinks and mirrors had to remain spotless. At least I had a student admit to me that she was afraid to come to office hours because I was a crazy old man, so that's out of the way. I'm walking a fine line.....although I think she did mention something about sending her mother after me. The harassment these people put me through. I might need an entire day just to decompress now.