AI Season 10
The sisters need a place to gab about American Idol, this is it. Let the comments begin…..
John’s In Mexico City
Debbie is in Halifax visiting our long lost friend Jill and I’m wandering the streets (and Pyramids) of Mexico!
Click here to go to the photo page and see pictures so far…
Donna Turns the Big 5-0!
It was all in fun, but a handful of the Horn kids, directed by Denise Hansford, and Produced by Debbie Baley presented to Auntie Donna Ann Horn Brock a barely scripted, completely improvised version of “This is Your Life”! Although we now wish we had video taped the whole thing, see the Photo Gallery and Video links for some good memories of the skit and the party.
Please click here for pictures!
Please click here for Funny Videos!
Our Aunt Susie, who we recently reconnected with, surprised Donna with a gift of some old pictures of the family (hoping to get more, because a majority of them seemed to be of me, but I think that was just because I am the one that asked for them).
Corny Joke Time!
Q. Where does a general keep his armies?
A. In his sleevies.
Q. How did Hitler tie his shoes?
A. In little knotsies.
Q. What did the farmer say when he lost his tractor?
A. “I lost my tractor.”
Q. What’s a Shitzu?
A. One with no animals in it.
Q. What’s blue and smells like red paint?
A. Blue Paint!
Q. Why didn’t the bicycle get up on time?
A. He was two tired.
Q: What’s the opposite of Christopher Reeves?
A: Christopher Walken
A dog walks into a telegraph office and asks to send a message. “Woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof.”
Clerk records it, and offers, “You know, for the same price, you can fit one more ‘woof’”.
Dog looks at him, puzzled. “But that wouldn’t make any sense.”
Q. What’s brown and sticky?
A. A stick.
Q. What’s pink and slippery?
A. A slipper!
Q. What do you call a blind dinosaur?
A. A Do-you-think-he-saurus
Q. What do you call a blind dinosaur’s dog?
A. A Do-you-think-he-saurus Rex
Q. How do you spot a dogwood tree?
A. By it’s bark.
Two fish are in a tank. One turns to the other and says, “You man the guns, I’ll drive.”
Two muffins are in a oven. The first muffin says “Wow it’s Hot in here!” The second muffin says, “AGGGHHH, TALKING MUFFIN!”
Q. Want to hear a short joke followed by a long joke?
A. Joke joooookeee.
Q. What do you get when you drop a piano down a mine shaft?
A. A flat minor (miner)
Q. What do you call a pig that does karate?
A. A pork chop.
Baleys do Greece – Oct 6th – 17th
Details pending…
Athens, Mykonos, Santorini, Rhodes and back to Athens
Stay tuned for when me and Deb find a moment to add the gory details…. Until then, talk amongst yourselves…
We Visit London – Oct 2nd to 6th – 2009
We have returned to London! The last time we were here, it was our honeymoon and Deb was really sick! She woke up the day after we were married with the mother of all cold/flu bugs and it took the first half of our honeymoon for her to get over it. We spent 6 days in London on that trip and most of what my sweet bride could remember was sleeping in Hyde park with her head on my lap. Luckily, the weather then was a truly uncharacteristic for London – it was early September and the sky was clear with temperatures in the 80s.
This has been Deb’s chance to see the true London – (Cold and rainy) but she’s not sick and we’ve been having a great time. We are staying right it the heart of the theater district between Covent Garden and Leicester Square. We’ve been spending our days wandering the streets, we visited the parks, Covent Garden, Buckingham Palace (the queen say’s hi to you all, and wants you to know that she’s happy George Bush is out of office). We went to the Churchill Museum that opened in 2004. It’s in the underground bunkers that were used by the UK government during WWII. Churchill was a really interesting guy. I think our modern day politics would make it hard for a guy like him today and that’s probably a little sad, but then again, maybe he was right for that time and not now…
More to come – Time for me to refill my coffee!
Take A Poke At Leukemia and Lymphoma – 2009
We want to thank everyone who came out to this year’s Take A Poke At Leukemia event. The night was a lot of fun and with the help of so many good friends, it was also a great success! We went from 27 poker players last year, to 38 this year and the Loser’s Lounge was better than ever with a real Blackjack table and the help of Breanna dealing for us. The top two Poker Players were Gary (1st) and Dave (2nd). See below for incriminating pictures of the big event…
Thoughts for Father’s Day
This Sunday is Father’s Day and as I sit in my comfortable chair on a beautiful sunny California day I am thankful for my dad…. I believe that I am inherently no different than others, but our fathers do leave a mark on us and I think that my dad somehow transferred some positive traits into my thick skull and helped me understand how to live my life in a positive way. I haven’t won a nobel prize or anything, but all my bills are paid, my wife still wants to wake up next to me and my friends seem to keep coming back for more abuse. Dad must have done something right.
Every now and then, when us kids were growing up, Dad would recite a poem by Robert Service called “The Cremation of Sam McGee”. I always enjoyed it when dad started with his recitation. He would sit back and really let go with what was (for him) a lot of drama. A few years back, Dad gave me a book of poems by Robert Service. Today, in honor of Father’s Day I present two of my favorite Robert Service poems below. I also need to give credit where credit is due and provide a link to another blog that Brian Colburn brought to my attention; artofmanliness.com It was on this blog that I was reminded how much I appreciate Robert Service. Thanks for the book Dad.
The Quitter
By: Robert Service
When you’re lost in the Wild, and you’re scared as a child,
And Death looks you bang in the eye,
And you’re sore as a boil, it’s according to Hoyle
To cock your revolver and . . . die.
But the Code of a Man says: “Fight all you can,”
And self-dissolution is barred.
In hunger and woe, oh, it’s easy to blow . . .
It’s the hell-served-for-breakfast that’s hard.
“You’re sick of the game!” Well, now, that’s a shame.
You’re young and you’re brave and you’re bright.
“You’ve had a raw deal!” I know-but don’t squeal,
Buck up, do your damnedest, and fight.
It’s the plugging away that will win you the day,
So don’t be a piker, old pard!
Just draw on your grit; it’s so easy to quit:
It’s the keeping-your-chin-up that’s hard.
It’s easy to cry that you’re beaten-and die;
It’s easy to crawfish and crawl;
But to fight and to fight when hope’s out of sight-
Why, that’s the best game of them all!
And though you come out of each grueling bout,
All broken and beaten and scarred,
Just have one more try-it’s dead easy to die,
It’s the keeping-on-living that’s hard.
The Cremation of Sam McGee
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows.
Why he left his home in the South to roam ’round the Pole, God only knows.
He was always cold, but the land of gold seemed to hold him like a spell;
Though he’d often say in his homely way that he’d “sooner live in hell”.
On a Christmas Day we were mushing our way over the Dawson trail.
Talk of your cold! through the parka’s fold it stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we’d close, then the lashes froze till sometimes we couldn’t see;
It wasn’t much fun, but the only one to whimper was Sam McGee.
And that very night, as we lay packed tight in our robes beneath the snow,
And the dogs were fed, and the stars o’erhead were dancing heel and toe,
He turned to me, and “Cap,” says he, “I’ll cash in this trip, I guess;
And if I do, I’m asking that you won’t refuse my last request.”
Well, he seemed so low that I couldn’t say no; then he says with a sort of moan:
“It’s the cursed cold, and it’s got right hold till I’m chilled clean through to the bone.
Yet ’tain’t being dead — it’s my awful dread of the icy grave that pains;
So I want you to swear that, foul or fair, you’ll cremate my last remains.”
A pal’s last need is a thing to heed, so I swore I would not fail;
And we started on at the streak of dawn; but God! he looked ghastly pale.
He crouched on the sleigh, and he raved all day of his home in Tennessee;
And before nightfall a corpse was all that was left of Sam McGee.
There wasn’t a breath in that land of death, and I hurried, horror-driven,
With a corpse half hid that I couldn’t get rid, because of a promise given;
It was lashed to the sleigh, and it seemed to say: “You may tax your brawn and brains,
But you promised true, and it’s up to you to cremate those last remains.”
Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code.
In the days to come, though my lips were dumb, in my heart how I cursed that load.
In the long, long night, by the lone firelight, while the huskies, round in a ring,
Howled out their woes to the homeless snows –O God! how I loathed the thing.
And every day that quiet clay seemed to heavy and heavier grow;
And on I went, though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low;
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
And I’d often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin.
Till I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge, and a derelict there lay;
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice it was called the “Alice May”.
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit, and I looked at my frozen chum;
Then “Here”, said I, with a sudden cry, “is my cre-ma-tor-eum.”
Some planks I tore from the cabin floor, and I lit the boiler fire;
Some coal I found that was lying around, and I heaped the fuel higher;
The flames just soared, and the furnace roared — such a blaze you seldom see;
And I burrowed a hole in the glowing coal, and I stuffed in Sam McGee.
Then I made a hike, for I didn’t like to hear him sizzle so;
And the heavens scowled, and the huskies howled, and the wind began to blow.
It was icy cold, but the hot sweat rolled down my cheeks, and I don’t know why;
And the greasy smoke in an inky cloak went streaking down the sky.
I do not know how long in the snow I wrestled with grisly fear;
But the stars came out and they danced about ‘ere again I ventured near;
I was sick with dread, but I bravely said: “I’ll just take a peep inside.
I guess he’s cooked, and it’s time I looked”;. . . then the door I opened wide.
And there sat Sam, looking cool and calm, in the heart of the furnace roar;
And he wore a smile you could see a mile, and he said: “Please close that door.
It’s fine in here, but I greatly fear you’ll let in the cold and storm –
Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it’s the first time I’ve been warm.”
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
Robert Service
Cool Breeze 2009 Kicks Off
Take a look at the great group of people who are going to join us in training to ride 100 miles and raise funds for blood cancer research. After meeting most of our riders at kick off, I am really excited about the team. This is going to be good. In the imortal words of our great Lupe, “Lets Do This!”
