2009, It's About Gone

If this looks a bit familiar it should because it is very similar to the post I wrote last year with the exception of a few changes here and there, such as the dates and some of the things that I predicted would happen that actually happened.  No, that doesn’t make me a Nostradamus or a prophet of any sort.  It just makes me someone who happened to be paying attention.

Last year I wrote about a couple of foolish folks who were going to do some rather stupid things such as jump a truck over a sand pile and another who risk becoming a scrambled brain omelet on the side of a building by jumping a motorcycle to the top of a building.  They both made it since there was no notice of anyone dying needlessly just to achieve a few seconds of fame and I also see that the poor misguided person who drove the truck over the sand pile is now part of the “team” of reporters who will report of another young misguided individual who plans on driving a car up a ramp and jumping it over some kind of body of water to another ramp and barge anchored a daring distance away.  At least he will only risk getting wet if he fails or at worst drowning if he fails and can’t get out of the car. Of course hopefully there are divers ready to rescue him should that occur. 

Just as last year, I have no desire to watch some one drop the ball from Times Square in New York since I have spent the last year watching a bunch of folks drop the ball over and over again in Washington DC.  It certainly has not created any excitement for me to watch these folks drop the ball and attempt to pick it up again and explain just why it ain’t bouncing they way they predicted it would.  I am afraid they are going to continue having difficulty explaining why things are not all well as they predicted. Of course I expect to hear the same story I heard last year and the year before, it was someone else’s fault.  No folks, this time you dropped the ball and no one else is to blame and you still haven’t figured out how to pick up the ball and start over again.  You are just going to continue dropping the ball over and over, it seems until it is busted, flat busted.  Sure nothing exciting about watching “the ball get dropped”.  I am sure that I watched that occurrence in Times Square for at least fifty years but for the life of me I still can’t figure out what was so exciting about it. 

I heard a few fireworks going off in early celebration just a few minutes ago and went to the door to see where they might be coming from and all I got was a surprise of seeing more snow. Yep, folks, it snowed again tonight in North Texas and may snow a bit more since the temperature is only 34 degrees and is expected to drop. It has not cleared as forecast so that we could see what was mistakenly called the “Blue Moon”.   I wonder how the Left Reverend Al and all his converts are feeling about this “global warming”, errr, excuse me, it’s climate change, since global warming doesn’t seem to be occurring but just the same all this cold and snow here in Texas and the rest of the country is being blamed on this fiasco.  I believe Al attempted to blame Bush for the snow just the other day but I still haven’t figured out how Bush managed to make it snow when they claimed he couldn’t do anything else right. Besides, being from Texas, he doesn’t like snow any more than I do, or at least I figure he doesn’t.  I haven’t met too awful many folks here in this neck of the woods who do like snow but we don’t usually complain much about it since it is all melted before noon the following day.

I wrote last year about the local water department needing to move into into the 21^st century and making it so I can pay my water bill on line. They haven’t managed to do that so I will once again have to remember to change the date on the one lone check I write each month. It took me about three months to remember to write 2009 last year. Hopefully I can do better this year, 2010.  Perhaps that should be a New Year’s Resolution for me but then I don’t make those useless things either since I can’t remember ever keeping any of them and don’t know a lot of folks who get around to doing what they so fervently swore to do as the ball was dropping in Times Square.  Opinion wise and from observation most of the folks who made those resolutions didn’t remember where they were much less what they pledged to do on New Years Eve.  About all many of those folks will remember is that on January 1 they had one heck of a headache and a few of them will remember hugging “john” for a better part of the night.  From what I have been told “john” is a very cold and unyielding “lover”.

I do happen to have about three quarters of a bottle of “Wassail” which I opened Christmas Eve and the three of us, the wife , our son and myself, shared about two ounces each of this warm, spicy wine. According to the book which came with the bottle that we purchased two years ago at a winery in Fredericksburg, Texas  the sharing of a small cup of this wine is a tradition from the Old Country during the celebration of Christmas.  I re-corked the remainder and carefully placed it back into the refrigerator until next year.  It had a pleasing flavor but none of us really cared enough for it to have more than the one small cup and the wife and I will not be opening it tonight in order to celebrate the New Year . Our celebration will be because we are alive and able to enjoy each others company for another wonderful day.  Of course that is not exactly a new thing with us since that is something we do each and every day.  We can say with certainty that we have been truly blessed this past year despite some illness at our house and the death of some very good friends.  I don’t reckon one could ask for much more than the blessings that have been poured out on us this past year. I bet if you look back you will find that to be true in your life as well and the blessings have far outnumbered the lesser times.

Folks, that is about all that is happening here in Corinth, Texas at 11:53 PM on this New Year’s Eve, 2009.   We will both take the opportunity to wish each of you,  the regular readers of the blog , the friends which we have known for years or those of you who just happened to drop by and read this post, a very Happy and Blessed New Year.