The Nebraska / Minnesota game Thursday night was a nail-biter and went down to the last play. Huskers lost, 13-10. The Golden Gophers played a tough game and it took NU a while to get the running game going, but by the end of the 3rd quarter we were moving the ball, but near the end of the fourth quarter we fumbled, got the ball back, and threw an INT in the end zone. Minnesota marched downfield and kicked the FG for the win. Husker Jeff Sims looked good at QB, and his scrambling was a great asset for the Huskers. He threw three interceptions, but he also threw bullets into tight spots. NU’s 3-3-5 defense pretty much squashed Minnesota’s running game until near the very end, when one long run set them up in field goal position. The three on Nebraska’s defensive line kept Minnesota’s offensive line busy. The Huskers pass defense allowed several short completions early, but then they buckled down and I think Minnesota only got 2 or 3 receptions longer than 20 yards and nothing long. It was a clean game with very few penalties. And the Minnesota fans seemed nicer (on tv, anyway) than I remember them being. đ Me? I’ll be at a couple Huskers games later in the fall. Looking forward to it. Go Big Red!
Aunt Ruth, America’s favorite grammarian, has officially come out of her period of silence.
“I am not going to pursue joining the Big Ten football conference. I repeat,” she stated over the already stressed sound system, “the Big Ten will remain (Aunt) Ruthless for the 2024 season. I do realize,” she continued, “that the Big Ten remains in the awkward predicament of presiding over seventy-three ( 73) teams, the prime number thus making fair scheduling a nightmare. Not to worry, though. I have come up with a solution — just a simple twist of ARSE encryption algorithms using wedding ring and cow-field theory, and, (of course), a cello to provide some string theory.”
Instead of clearing the air, Miss Aunt Ruth’s statements only obfuscated things and made life smellier, akin to pouring a bottle of Chanel No. 5 on a sweaty pig. “That’s really gross,” she opined. “While we’re at it, I need to emphasize, emphatically and with extreme emphasis, I am not building a barbecue joint in Memphis.” The crowd murmured.
“Finally, just to clear the air, I have NOT signed up with the transfer portal to quarterback at Nebraska, North Carolina, or Notre Dame, but I’ve nailed a permanent gig with Gladys’s Gastroenterology. Thank you.”
This story occurred in western Nebraska in 1878. That was an adventurous time to be living. Lakota Sioux, Northern Cheyenne, and other Indian tribes sometimes encountered white pioneer settlers. Those encounters didn’t always end on a positive note, but sometimes they did, and friendships could grow.
Saving Arapahoe is an action-filled page-turner that will keep you in the chair until you’ve finished.
So, as it were, I found myself wandering the streets of this magnificent northwest city. Why? I was tired but no sleep would come to me. I had been writing a book and I came to a place where the two main threads collided with each other … and exploded to bits. You know, when the train that crossed the country (what’s that called … I’m drawing a blank … oh it’s the Trans-Continental Railway (or approximately that — I asked my cell phone).
Anyway, the insomnia (I couldn’t remember that word either, so I asked my wife and she told me) drove me out of the bedroom and onto the sidewalks so I could burn off some energy and clear my thoughts. Now, midnight in this Pacific northwest population-magnet is not a quiet time. In fact, there is no quiet time in this haven of fish markets and roasted coffee beans.
I heard noises of trucks and cars and construction equipment; sirens and whistles and car horns; marching band horns and drums and crowds yelling and people shouting, cheering, laughing, or jeering; My ears caught the cockle-doodle-doo of the good-morning rooster and the cluck, cluck, cluck of the truthful hens (i.e, they were not lying, they were laying)I heard the cry of a hawk, the bark of a blue heron, and the shrill, familiar screech of the Nebraska Sandhills Crane. I heard dogs and cats, pigs and bats, sheep, goats; I heard horses and donkeys and cows mooing or lowing or whatever they do. As they say, the ox and the ass were noisy too.
Then, like being struck by ten Yamaha tubas and a Steinway piano falling from the sky, it hit me. I heard absolutely no baby chicks. No, not a one.
Gennesaret Press announced Monday the upcoming release of Saving Arapahoe, the third book in the Johnny Stevens Pioneer Adventures series. The setting is western Nebraska in 1878. This 1st-person story is based on letters and stories from the authorâs great-grand- father when he was a 12-year-old boy. The Indians and pioneers didnât always see eye-to-eye, and that led to some harrowing experiences! Even so, great friendships are formed and alliances made. This is a great book for families to read together. Take a look. The book lists at $17.95 and should become available on Aug 15, 2023.
Teach me your ways, O LORD, that I may live according to your truth! Grant me purity of heart, so that I may honor you. With all my heart I will praise you, O LORD my God. I will give glory to your name forever, For your love for me is very great. You have rescued me from the depths of death. (from NLT)
Ahem! Become celebratory dictators. Enjoy frozen glasses having individual jam kerosene lemondade melting nicely on phony quicksand, raising stylish turmoil under very woeful xylophones yawning zealously.
A desparation is in the airâI guess itâs always been there to some extentâthat I donât remember seeing as a child. Maybe thatâs just because children donât think about stuff like that. There is the ever-increasing hum of a social consciousness that drives us in despair for the need to repair our bodies, and thus our lives, so that we can live forever and ever. If the Bible were true (and I believe it is), then the life on the âother sideâ is going to be more glorious than anything we can imagine. The streets will be paved with gold, cities of marble, and weâll all be in white garments or something. Thatâs fine. The best partâand Iâm serious hereâ will be bowing to the King, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God. Worthy is the Lamb. He has covered all my sin with what he did (and what was done to him) on the Cross. And itâs available to youâfor free. Taking care of our bodies is a commandment, more or less. That is, take care of what God has given you. Donât over-indulge (or is indulgance the same as to over-indulge?). Anyway, we have become increasingly obsessive (or over-obsesive?) in our drive to get in shape (or get back in shape). If only we knew then what we know now. When youâre three years old, you can still put your foot in your mouth and bend your body in crazy ways. One thing I personnally need to work on is stretching ⌠with arthritis, especially, itâs difficult to reach my toes. Putting on socks takes a heroic effort (yes, itâs âa heroicâ (hard h) and not âan heroicâ with a soft h. Think Liza Doolittle.) Anyway, two or three times a week we meet on Zoom (daughter lives in Alaska) and do a stretching workout for 30 minutes. Itâs a good routine for me and it helps me mentally too, but what really encourages me is seeing my seven-year granddaughter and three-year old grandson stretch and curl themselves into magnificent pretzels. Their bodies bend in remarkable ways. So, wouldnât the reasonable mind decide to continue working on stretching every day in order to never lose that ability? But almost nobody does, though a few trickle through, mananging to keep their flexibility. They grow up to become gymnasts or contortionists. Life gets in the way. Itâs exhiliarating going through school, studying what possibly will become your profession and scoping out possibilites for someone who will become your lifelong mate. Youâre on top of the world (regardlesss (almost) of GPA). As the upper classman (whom you have seen passed out, lying face down on the floor in the dorm hallway early on a Saturday morning because he couldnât find his room key) attains respectable employment, you think, âHey, I can do that too.â Then the market crashes and youâre stuck with a âyou didnât apply yoursef for the past three or four years, so hereâs what you get, buddy.â But Iâm off-topic. Back to it. We need to take care of what God has given us, but we arenât called to obsess with it. Oh, certainly, we need (to at least try) to excel at what weâre doing. Our diligence and hard work will glorify the Lord. Over-obsessing, if there is such a thing, can deter the luster of that fire. Hard work can be difficult to discern from mania of some sort. Dear me. Iâm not being clear. Of course, we all have moments where weâve needed to come in and do the impossibleâto do something that solves a major problem for somebody, either at work all
night to make some software perform correctly for a customer demo the next day, or to stay up all night with a sick child, applying cold washcloths every hour to keep the fever down. Itâs not healthy to do this day after day, night after night⌠unless youâre called to it, of course. But what about this obsesion to be perfectly fit? I read recently of a forty-something man taking monthly infusions of blood from his seventeen-year old son, thinking that keeping his blood youngâand having injections of fresh salmon oil in his skin, or something like thatâwill keep him from aging. Of course, heâs a fanatic in the gym. But what purpose does that serve? I understand the tendency . My mom told me once that she was afraid whenever I took an interest in something new because I always became obsessed with it (where âitâ may have been practicing the tuba into the wee hours of the morning, or memorizing pi to 100 decimal places, or (which was not infrequent) was often âmy new girlfriend from schoolâ). A National Review article I recently read said that with the current knowledge in medical science, the average lifespan, at best, will end up being somewhere around 110-115 years. If the organic parts of ourselves canât last any longer, maybe the robotic parts of ourselves can last longer. I spoke with a man at a cookout last night who was told forty-five years ago that his kidneys would fail in less than two years. But ⌠he altered his dietâjust a little, dropping out potatoes and some breadsâand he was in good shape until last fall, when he was hit with Covid. Covid brought him so much vomiting and diarrhea that one of his kidneys failed from the dehydration. Anyway, weâre not really sure what my life expectancy is. Thereâs not a lot of data on people who have had Parkinsonâs Disease for 25 years. Iâm in my 24th year now and managing fine (well, ask my wife for an objective opinion. Sheâs probably more realistic than I). In the initial stages, the physical decline and cognitive decline seemed to go hand in hand. I found I was no longer able to solve the hard problems, to make the right decisions at times, and my perception of priorities and responsibilities was distorted. But it was the physical decline that really took hold ⌠balance issues, dragging my legs, which eventually turned into shuffling feet, then lots of falling. Still, for a while I was feeling strong, and I continued running and walking. I preferred running over walking. My running distances decreased only slightly at first, and I was still running in the thirty to forty miles / week, even climbing to fifty-six miles over Christmas break just months after I was diagnosed. Within a couple of years, though, I was down to ten to fifteen miles/week and soon withered down to five or six miles. When I was twenty-sixâpre-PD, and in fact pre-marriageâI ran a 5K in seventeen minutes. Yes, 17. Actually, that was the second half of a 10K race. The first half was 17 minutes 14 seconds, or a total of 34:14 for the 10K. I impressed even myself with that run. It helped that it was a small race (only 40 some runners) and I started ON the starting line, not way back in the pack. And the race producers were playing inspirational rock-and-roll for the duration of the race. Long live Rock.
And the weather was perfect. And the paved road/trail was perfect. (After I got married, I never again beat 36:00 minutes. I guess priorities changed.) I ran a 5K with my younger daughter just two years ago, and I (well, âWe,â since she stayed with me the entire time) finished in 49 something. Or was it 59 something. I donât remember. I do remember the two emotions I felt that morning as a cold mist fell on us while we were crossing the Finish line. Number one, I was embarrassed at my time. Note that the first time I ran a 5K, with very little training, I ran it in twenty-one minutes. (I was 24 at the time.) I wouldnât get used to this 49-minute stuff for quite a while yet. The second emotion I felt was an overwhelming gratitude for my daughter, who encouraged me and cheered me on, all the way from the start to the very finish. As an aside ⌠my daughter is now a PA, a certified Physicianâs Assistant, specializing in Geriatrics. She handles old folks quite well. I think there should continue to be efforts made to make life as comfortable, affordable, and LIVEABLE as possible. But life canâtânor should it be made toâlast forever. I donât want it to last forever. Why? As I said earlier, life is going to be so much better on the âother side.â As Jesus demonstrated on the Cross, death wonât keep the resurrected body from leaving the tomb. Live however long you can, or how long you are able. Godâs will will be accomplished regardless of your attempts to change his plans for your life. But when you get to heaven, and you discover that you could have been there years ago, itâll be like realizing youâve been eating at Little Caesarâs all your life when you could have been eating at Fearrington House every day. (Not to knock LCâs; Iâm just trying to compare low-cost faire with gourmet. Donât last forever. You donât want to. Where youâre going will be that better place that we were trying to make on our old, dying earth. It will be a new day.
