A Snow in New England

Snow!!! I have lived in the quaint New England town of Marblehead for 3 1/2 years and I still cannot figure out if I love the stuff or hate it. I know, a guy should have figured out by now if he loves it or should he praying that Global Warming is real and it gets here really quick.

I live in the perfect New England town, the kind you see on post cards and the kind of place that movies try to make people think all of New England is like. I do love my town, the beaches, the people, the friends and the arts but I am not sure on the snow.

Living most of my adult life in either Oklahoma or Southern California means that when I see 4 inches of snow I think it is a blizzard. I really can only remember one white Christmas in my life (not counting living here) so I do get a kick when I see the white stuff. I still get a thrill when the winds pick up just a little and the big flakes come tumbling down.

The problem I have is that I am the only guy in our household, even counting the pets so I am the one who gets to dig the driveway, sidewalks and porches clean of the magical white stuff. Listen up (I do not want to get beaten when my family reads this) all of the women have volunteered to help shovel but I am a guy and it hurts my ego to think I need help with a "mans" job be women.

So as I sit here looking over the weather forecast for the next few days I am torn, do I want a White Christmas and all of the beauty and joy that comes with it or do I want to be able to relax on Christmas. I guess after this rambling I will vote for as much White Stuff as possible...... I am still a kid at heart.

Help a Nice Lady

I have a close friend whose 81yo mother has recently been hospitalized, then taken to a nursing home for rehabilitation. His sisters who called the ambulance did not even bother to let him know what had happened. He had to search for her until she was found in the Emergency Room of the local hospital. He wants to let her know how many people care about her as it appears she will be spending the holidays away from home and under care. So with his permission I would like to organize holiday cards or get well wishes to be sent to either or both of her daughters who live nearby and will forward them to her. Her residence is uncertain at the moment due to her changing medical needs and her recent attempt to find new accommodation. Holiday

Cards or Get Well wishes to:
Jean(or Nana) Yoder c/o Jacque Hollinger
234 Main Street
Terri Hill Pa 17581 USA

Jean(or Nana) Yoder c/o Dori Noecker
615 W. Bellvue Ave
Reading Pa. 19605 USA

His mother would love the envelops to be adorned with rainbows or dolphins, on mine I simply drew a rainbow on the back side but stickers or whatever would be nice.

An Okie in Boston

 People who know me in real life knows full and well that I am not just an Okie but a Proud Okie. It does take a bit of bravery to wear an OKC Thunder t-shirt around Boston Celtic fans or put on an OSU sweatshirt when Boston College is playing a game but a guy has to do what a guy has to do. This line of thought brings me to something that is genetically ingrained in me simply from the Oklahoma red dirt having leached into my DNA, the red dirt slowly alters a person and transforms them into a proud Oklahoman. Since the pride actually comes from your DNA even if you move that swelling pride of being an Okie always stays with you.

This brings me to the subject of what it is like to be an Okie in Yankee Land. In the Boston area there is a dearth of REAL college football, a breeze is considered a major wind storm and tasty smoked meat, BBQ and other meat requirements simply pale to what I am use to having back in Oklahoma. It is not all bad, I love living here and can handle watching OU and OSU on TV and I still chuckle to myself when my friends and neighbors are scared about the 25 MPH wind gusts but the thing I had the biggest problem with was finding great meat. In Oklahoma I never had to cook it myself because every neighbor, family, friends and most restaurants were pretty adapt at it. Once I moved to New England I was left alone in the wilderness with no help.

This problem set me off on the next part of the saga, I had to become a king of the grill and smoker myself. I tried remembering back to the days I was a kid and watched my dad cook but after trying my hand at some chops and having neighbors over who were pretty sure it was made from raccoon or skunk meat I decided it was time to get a bit of help. I did what any modern guy would do that is to embarrassed to ask people who could actually help them..... I googled it.

Now, I am not knocking Google but I ran into more sites that had no idea that meat was supposed to taste good. There were ones that every recipe required 5 pounds of sugar and a burger with a 1 inch crust of sugar just is not right. There were others that were hip and cool and bragged that they were Californian, please remember that in California tacos made from fish are not only acceptable but considered good eating.

I finally fumbled across a site that was perfect, it gave great directions, it had real recipes for real guys and simply was something that worked., after telling my wife about the great site I found she looked over it and laughed...... it is ran by a guy in Oklahoma. I now understood why it was great, he was an Okie and understood great meat.

 I am now the kind of New England guy that while a Nor'ester is blowing through I have my smoker and or grill going. I might have to keep shoveling a path out to the cooking meat but I finally feel like I belong here. I can now love New England and still have my meat. I can even smoke lobster tail now.

I want to be VERY clear, this is NOT an advertisement, I was NOT paid to write this, I actually emailed Jeff to see if it was OK for me to write about his site.

If you want to checkout the site yourself it can be found at www.smoking-meat.com

Nasty Evil Step Daughter

People who follow this blog understands that I have found the love of my life and have lived happily ever after BUT the love of my life also came with a couple of extras "problems". Judy, the love of my life, was a widow with two daughters when I met her. Ok, anyone who has a "blended" family will get that I was not in a good position. There is NO way that a guy can live up to the image that a girl has of her father who has died.

I will have to say at this point that Jimmy (the girls father) was a great guy. He did have problems, he could not walk on water, he never did bring down the Berlin wall all by himself nor was he ever an opening act for Bruce Springsteen but he did help raise two great girls. His girls turned out all right, scholarships to great schools, jobs (Ari, because she has graduated) and simply nice kids.

Now  I know you are wondering where the nasty evil part comes into the story. Ari and Heather are great to have as family to the point that I am thankful that Alexis (my biological daughter) has them as sisters. Here is the problem with these girls...... ok, I cannot come up with anything but if I could it would have to do with monkeys and bacon simply because those are funny things.

By the way, if you think Howard Stern is one of my daughters then you are sicker then I am.

I want to thank my entire family, Judy, Ari, Heather and Alexis for making my family complete..... Thanks.

Viking Funeral

Today I am commemorating a woman who was grand. I totally get that only people who actually know me will understand what this blog entry is really about. My Grand Mother died a few days ago.......

I could not go to her funeral so many miles away but we are going to celebrate her life this evening in New England, she lived in Oklahoma. There will be no tears, there will be no sniffles there will be nothing like that at all. We are going to celebrate her life, her love and know she has simply moved on.

Annette Burgess (my grandmother) over the last few years, seriously only wanted me to know one thing, I am Swedish! Yep, the same folk who killed and maimed the entire known world a thousand plus years ago but I am still a proud decedent of the Vikings.

Tonight I will respectfully acknowledge her life, I will remember her name and I will know that she is in Valhalla (she was a TRUE Christian so Heaven). I am so thankful that she "pushed" me into being proud of my heritage, even though others in the world consider me and my people blue eyed devils. I am thankful that she was a woman of convictions who taught her daughters (my mother and aunt) the values needed in life.

I am so pleased that she taught me that being Swedish and a Viking was something good...... tonight my Dear Grandmother, I will promise to carry on the tradition of who we are.

I miss you but I also know that we shall be feasting together soon enough........

Why People Kill Kids

There will always be crazy people that do things that the rest of civilized society simply does not get. It is human nature to try and make order of chaos so we grasp onto our beliefs, ideas and religion and run with it like an Inca trying to make sense of all the white guys that showed up on big boats.

I am NOT saying that these things did not help push the crazy man over the edge but it is time to be honest, none of these things MADE him do it. We take our preconceived ideas of the way the world runs or should run and then insert our beliefs into everything that does not make sense.

This is a small list of things people tend to blame for what they do not understand.


1) Guns did not make the guy a killer, they were simply a tool.

2) Video games did not make the guy a killer, people have played army, cowboy and Indians and other violent games for eons.

3) Music did not make the guy a killer. Listening to Elton John will not make you gay, listening to Snoop Dog (I know he changed his stage name) will not make you black and listening to Goth will not make you a killer.

4) TV did not make the guy a killer. Not one show on American TV simply hypnotizes you into becoming a killer.

5) The lack of Prayer in school did not make him a killer. There are people who lived in hard core atheistically inclined countries where it was wrong to pray, not just in school but anywhere that never did became killers.

6) Discrimination did not make him a killer. ALL people are discriminated against yet all people do not snap.

7) Hollywood did not make him a killer. Movies have been blamed

8) The news media did not make him do it.

9) Obama, Bush or any other politician did not make him do it. You may HATE the politics of someone but they do NOT have super powers to make people go off and kill children.

10) Gay people did not make him do it. Everyone has an opinion on LGBT people but they do NOT make you a killer of children.

I totally understand that some of these things can push a mentally unstable person over the edge but they are not the root cause of the evil committed. Bad exists in the world and there will always be bad people. Lets not try and blame one thing that fits our beliefs for everything and simply understand that evil exists.

Lets be careful not to start banning everything we do not agree with. As soon as we allow banning to begin then what you hold dearest will be  what is banned next.

What Makes a Family?

Everyone talks about picking friends and say you cannot pick your family but that is simply wrong. There are people who legally are family but I honestly do no care for or care about. I am not going to trash people so this blog is simply about love and what it means.

I am a married guy, thus the name for this blog, and I married a woman who is a widow. To get the "fluff" out of the way I love my wife and her biological daughters are my daughters as well. My biological daughter is hers as well, no doubt about it, daughter of hers and all three girls are honest sisters.

This rant is simply about a conversation that I had with my wife this evening. I had a brother who died in a car accident when I was a teenager. It was horrible, it hurt and while I had friends who tried to comfort me it did not help much. There is nobody that can step in and make things better even though many tried. I am thankful for all who tried but it did not make the pain any easier.

This is where it gets interesting to me, I have a TON of aunts and uncles which also means a bazzillion cousins. When I went to the hospital when my brother was there I had an Aunt show up who was there for my younger brother and I.

Lets add a bit to the story here. My Uncle had divorced her previously ( I do NOT care about the details ) but she came because she was family. It had nothing to do with ill feelings or longings for my Uncle but simply that she was an important part of my dying brothers life and my younger brother's and my life as well.

After many years I am so thankful that she understood that you do pick your family. I know it must have been hard for her to show up with so many people who knew she had divorced but my AUNT did so and I am so glad she did.