I met Bear Bryant at church yesterday. . .

It's true! I met Bear Bryant at church yesterday. He was quite a nice guy even if he wasn't wearing a houndstooth cap.

Now as Paul Harvey would say, "here's the rest of the story."

This started with a phone call. The guy told me he had a shipment for me, and could I tell him how to get to our address. Fortunately, he delivers to the area regularly, so he knew several things close by.

Then he mentioned he was driving an 18-wheeler.

Uh-oh.

I told him no way he was going to be able to get that rig down our road. It's narrow, a dead-end, and there is a very sharp curve into our driveway. The guy who came to clean the ductwork had a van and trailer, and he had a heck of a time getting back out of our driveway!

Well, probably less than a mile from us there is a Church of God ... so we agreed to meet there and he would put the shipment into the back of the pick-up.

As we were working on the bill of lading and laughing over the fact that all it said was "bird" we got to discussing names and that's when I found out his ... Bear Bryant.

So see, I really DID talk to Bear Bryant at church yesterday, even if it was in the parking lot, and not quite the Bear Bryant of AL football fame!

Why I Don't Answer the Phone. . .

I'm not big on talking on the phone. One of my quirks I guess. I much prefer email and snail mail. Positively medieval, I know.

But there's more than one reason why I don't answer the phone, and why we have caller ID. First, let me say if you're family or friends and I recognize the phone number, I DO answer the phone. But otherwise... nope.

Why? Well, here's a list of my reasons not to answer the phone.

1. Solicitations. We're supposed to be on the "do not call registry." But there is a loophole you know, and supposedly a company can call if you have made contact with them. I seem to have made contact with more companies than I remember. Guess it's that Old-Timer's Disease kicking in.

2. Medicare. What's medicare got to do with our phone calls? Well, evidently Jess's previous wife would have been 65 years old this year, and the calls just keep coming and coming, wanting to sign her up for some Medicare supplement plan. I have been very tempted to fill out one of the forms that come in the mail, and put down a cemetery as an address but with my luck some bureaucrat would fail to see the humor and I'd end up in jail.

3. Political calls. I do not want to attend a town hall meeting or listen to the latest spiel. I suppose this is only going to get worse as the presidential elections get closer. Ugh.

4. Wrong numbers. We get a surprising number of them.

Sometimes I'm the one that calls a wrong number. I punched one button wrong last week when I tried to call Jess on my old cell phone and got some guy that I have no idea who it was. I apologized and told him I was sorry for calling the wrong number.

So what happens? About 5 minutes later there's a buzz from my phone for a text message (I can receive them, just can't send any.) I looked to see what it was - it's almost always the phone company - and here there was a message from the dude I'd mis-called. He was wondering where I lived.

Shortly thereafter, a second message arrived from him, wanting to know if I'd like to get together with him. Dude! How desperate are you??? I mean, calling up a totally unknown chick who dialed your number by mistake??? With no idea of how old she is or what she looks like??

I guess there's another reason not to answer the phone any more.

The Impossible Dream

I love Andy Griffith reruns. And if you've ever watched them, you are familiar with Gomer Pyle. Then there was the spin-off of Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C. Always lots of humor there with Gomer driving his drill instructor, Sargeant Carter, round the bend.

But what REALLY amazed me was when this guy who talked like such a hick would open his mouth to sing.... and this incredible voice comes out. Who would have believed such a glorious voice would emerge!?

Here's Gomer (Jim Nabors) in one episode singing "To Dream The Impossible Dream" . .




Of course, Jim Nabors also did a fair number of recordings, many of which were old-fashioned gospel songs. Here's one of my favorites, "Take My Hand". . .



I'm not ready for the Lord to take me home yet, but I sure hope He keeps hold of my hand. Some days you really need to hang on tight!

Rejuvenation and Recuperation

We were on vacation last week. It was a time of rejuvenation. Now I know rejuvenation is defined as:

"the phenomenon of vitality and freshness being restored "

And while physical vitality and freshness might not have been restored, the vacation was a good rejuvenation of the heart and spirit. It was time off from working online, and great fun to visit with the kids and grandkid.

Jess and I walked on the beach a little. Ellie and I dug in the sand and made holes and built sand castles. And at times another little girl joined Ellie in her sand castle building.


We ate out every evening, and enjoyed lots of good seafood.

Jess and I also had a couple of day outings. One morning we went to the Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola. The Blue Angles have practice sessions there on some Tuesdays and/or Wednesdays, and one was scheduled for 8:30am.

There was a HUGE crowd there, and we had to stand the whole time, but it was really, really cool to watch these aircraft put through their paces by ace pilots. It's amazing how precise their maneuvers are!

Another day we were headed to Fort Pickens to look around, but Jess was hungry for Zaxby's Chicken. That was in the other direction, and after we ate we ended up looking around at stuff in that area instead of going back to Fort Pickens.

It was a great week and it's always sad when it's time to say good-bye. Richard, Chrystie and Ellie were headed to Minneapolis for the weekend, and Jesse was headed to Tuscaloosa for a men's conference. He drove from Pensacola Beach to the hotel south of Tuscaloosa and met up with some of the other guys from church.

I punched in our home address and Miss Garmin and I headed north. By the time I made it home, we'd been 9 hours on the road, and somewhere between 3 and 3 1/2 of those I was driving. For most people that's not a big deal, and at one time it wouldn't have been for me either. Now it's a different story. Holding my right arm up to the steering wheel and moving it back and forth for 3 hours is bad news.

That's where the recuperation phase comes in. I drove home Friday. Here it is Monday and I'm just now starting to get back to normal pain levels. And the chronic fatigue syndrome doesn't like such shenanigans either. I've had very little energy to do anything for the last few days.

Hopefully tomorrow that will all change and I'll be able to get more work done!