Official site of Tribune News serving Tomball, Magnolia and Waller

Years ago, my long time friend Leon was the king of his harem. He controlled the comings and goings of his ladies and he was always the head rooster. He has always went where he wanted to go and had eaten from any trough or bucket he had desired. This all changed with the arrival of Jack and Jennie.

Leon was my bull and Jack and Jennie are two donkeys I had bought several years ago. Leon had to stop interfering in everybody else’s feed bucket because Jack and Jennie had two very powerful weapons that kept Leon in line. Their back legs!

I have seen the two donkeys put Leon in his place several times. Now I guess if push ever came to shove Leon could make mince meat out of both of those donkeys, because he outweighs them by probably a thousand to twelve hundred pounds, but in every day functions like getting feed and water Jack and Jennie have first dibs.

One day several years ago, I arrived at the ranch and saw one of my young Brahman heifers had came up lame. She was all alone in the middle of the pasture as I drove up. All of the other cows always come rushing toward my truck when I drive up, but this poor cow was just standing in the field. I could tell right away that something was wrong as I saw her dragging her left front leg. She was a pitiful sight. She had become drawn up and her overall condition had deteriorated. She had a real big knot on the shoulder area of her leg about the size of a grapefruit.

I can’t stand to see an animal suffer and once a cow gets hurt they are hard to nurse back to health. Cattle have been around in some form or fashion millions of years and we have made them into some tender fluff ball that has to be taken care of. By nature cattle are tough, but it still bothers me to see any animal lame or hurt. I knew that my work plans for the day were about to change, as this cow needed some immediate assistance.

After coaxing her to the pen with a bucket of feed I examined the knot on her shoulder. It was very tender to her and it appeared to me she had been hit with something. It was only a couple of days later, after talking to a friend, did he suggest she probably got kicked by Jack or Jennie. After further examination I tend to agree. The size and location of the knot coincides with the donkey’s ability.

I got her loaded into the trailer and knew I had to bring her home for a little R&R. The ranch is about an hours drive for me and I knew I could not give her first hand attention unless I had her near my home.

Bringing animals back to my house in Hufsmith has normally been a problem. I’m just not equipped for taking care of them here anymore and the fencing is not adequate for cattle. The last time I had Leon here at the house when he was young almost turned disastrous. Leon got out one night and if my neighbor, David Ware had not been around, Leon may have been road kill. David and another man, whom I have not met, chased Leon to my home and I wound up keeping Leon in my backyard for several days. Leon loved the swimming pool.

I knew that bringing this heifer back home was going to be trouble, but it was my only choice, short of selling her on the spot. I decided taking care of her for a while would be my first effort. I had no hay at home, no feed and no pens, but I knew this is what I had to do. I loaded up a round bale of hay on the front of my trailer. I placed my four-wheeler in the middle and put the cattle cage on the back with the heifer loaded inside.

Some of you may be wondering what is a cattle cage? Many years ago my dad built a pipe cage that can be loaded by one person on any trailer you want. This saves the need for multiple trailers. You load the cage, tie it down and away you go. The guys at the auction barn still get a kick out of his invention. Just last week I had a man walk around the trailer several times shaking his head while smiling and said he should have thought about that idea. It’s a very practical piece of farm equipment. Thanks dad!

As I drove home from Brenham with my load, I began to wonder what trouble is ahead for me. As I mentioned earlier, bringing cattle home to Hufsmith has never brought good results for me.

Clifford

During Easter of 2003, I had been taking care of a young Brahman heifer I had to bring back from the ranch. She had been injured by what appeared to be a swift kick in the shoulder by one of my donkeys. I couldn’t care for her at the ranch in Independence, so I loaded her up and placed her in a makeshift pen behind my house.

My family had a traditional Easter gathering at my mom’s house. I lived next door to her and I had to pen this heifer in the back yard between our houses to take care of her.

During our family gatherings we always had an Easter egg hunt and the older members in our family would hunt for a money egg instead of candy eggs. A few of the guys in our family are strapping young men who think they are ready to whup the world.    

As always, I like to make things a bit more interesting, so I was going to create a ten-dollar egg for them.  I thought it would be fun to place an Easter egg on the back of this heifer and let the boys try to capture the egg. This young heifer was in the three fifty to four hundred and fifty pound range and she was just the right size for this make-shift rodeo event, or so I thought.

When a person delivers cattle to an auction barn each animal is tagged with a special number. The tags they use are actually glued onto the animal’s back. They take a tube of glue and squirt some on the tag and then they actually throw the tag, glue side down, on the animals back, never touching the animal.  I went to my truck and pulled out the old trusty duct tape and grabbed one of those plastic eggs. I back wrapped the tape around the egg causing the sticky side of the duct tape to be exposed. I figured I could do the same thing with this egg. I simply wanted to throw the egg on the heifer’s back expecting it to stick.

By nature Brahmans are a nervous breed, skittish and sometimes wanting to fight. She had been in my direct care for the past four weeks and fortunately she had become very docile and she had not given me any trouble for the past couple of weeks. I climbed into the pen and with one toss I hit her on the back and when I did all kinds of chaos was started. In one single leap she jumped five foot high onto one of the cattle panels of her enclosure and tore it down like a stack of matches! She immediately bolted from the yard and stood straightway in the middle of Hufsmith Road, staring at the oncoming cars.

As soon as this heifer hit the fence my entire life flashed before me. For the past four weeks I had thought I had broken the life long curse I had carried with animals, because it never fails that if I bring an animal home from the ranch, they are going to get out and attempt to run away! There were only two days left before I was going to take her back to the ranch and this young heifer is about to possibly cause some serious injury or damage to someone. My mind was in a panic.

Some people that have moved into this area have no clue about how to drive near animals. I have seen too many people fly by horses and cattle on the road without giving it a second thought.

As soon my family saw what had happened the men of the family jumped into action. Les, Sonny Wayne, Code Man, Brandon, Justin and Nathan all took off chasing this calf down the road. My neighbor Larry and his wife saw what had happened and they hopped into their truck to give chase too! Cars were stopping and some continued to fly by. People, cars and one animal were all over the road.

The calf ran about two hundred yards east on Hufsmith Road and I jumped on my four wheeler trying to get in front of her and cut her off. I knew that if she ever got down as far as Burroughs Park we might never see her again. Some cars had stopped and people were all joining in trying to corral this calf.  It was a madhouse! 

We soon got her pushed into our neighbor’s horse farm. When the horses saw this strange animal and she saw them, panic once again erupted! These fine show horses started bucking and kicking and running crazy and all I could think of was the potential loss of monetary value to these horses if one of them were to have injured themselves!

She finally ran off the road and inside a fenced area.  I rushed back to the house to get my truck and trailer. We had her cornered around the neighbor’s barn and the guys were holding her at bay, when she suddenly found a gap in the fence and took off again! When I got back with my rig and saw the chaos once again, I seriously thought about putting this heifer down due to the potential hazard she was causing.

As we chased and corralled, ran and waved, hollered and pushed, we even resorted to making a human chain hand in hand, as we tried to corner her. Suddenly one of the ranch hands next door finally got a rope on her and the event was over. My son, Justin tried his hand at roping her too but he ropes like his dad -- not at all! I forgot to teach him you couldn’t stand on the end of your rope while throwing it.

We had no loading chute, but as I pulled from the front with the rope and Les and Justin lifted from the rear we finally got her loaded. She was taken back to the ranch in short order. She is doing fine, but not so for Uncle Les.

After taking an extended body dive at the volleyball earlier in the day he pulled his back a little while lifting the heifer into the trailer and I think he also cut his arm. Once we arrived back at the house with the truck and trailer he stepped off the trailer and twisted his ankle. Poor guy! I just hope he doesn’t abandon me next Easter as it seems this brother in law always gets everybody into some kind of mess.

Clifford

Joy to the World! Peace on Earth! Goodwill toward Men! Joy, Peace and Goodwill. These are three words that were penned in the Bible before shopping malls and mega super stores.

Ok, yes, I do understand that it is not Christmas and no, I am not falling victim to the crush of Christmas advertising that is about to begin. I was just in a good mood because I can once again smell fall coming on and fall brings winter and winter brings the various holidays. I told my wife about three weeks ago that I can smell fall coming on and she thought I was crazy because she can’t smell, but there are probably a few of you that know what I mean.

Many years ago I went to our local Walmart during the Christmas rush and saw an event that made me chuckle about those three words I mentioned above.

During the past several years I’m sure we can all attest to the fact that a lot of common courtesies have went by the wayside. It’s sad but true.

There was a time when real men removed their hats or caps before entering a building. There was a time when a man would open a door for a woman and in return the woman would politely say thank you. Men would give up their seat for a lady and most everybody would give up their seat for a pregnant woman. We would all say ma’am and sir to each other and the young people would always address their elders by Mr. or Mrs. until instructed to do otherwise. Thank you and you’re welcome were part of our every day vocabulary.  Some people call it southern hospitality and I personally still adhere to the old rules of etiquette. It’s sad however that in today’s society these things are missing because each time we lower our standards a little bit something else also tends to fall away and our standards get lower and lower. We are quickly becoming a low standards country.

Look at our driving habits! Have they improved? Our parking habits, our walking habits, our talking habits and many other things have moved further and further towards the lowered bar of living and I think a lot of it has to do with the “me first attitude.”

I was walking through this parking lot when I heard a man hollering something from his truck. His window was down and his arm was hanging out the window and he was thrashing and waving his hands, muttering something about the woman stopped in front of him. He was driving down the parking lot aisles and she was waiting on a parking spot. Problem was however that she had taken up both lanes and she didn’t have her blinker on to indicate her intentions. Now I know some of you think I’m being silly, but if people would just use the signal indicators (remember they are technically called indicators and not blinkers because they indicate your intentions of what you want to do with your car) then this guy may have had a little more patience.

After hearing his mutterings, I stopped to watch. For about thirty seconds he was hollering out the window “all I want to do is get out of this parking lot and she has it all tied up!” 

Common courtesy and common sense would tell me that if I were waiting for a parking spot I would be pulled over to the right hand side of the traffic lane so people could pass me on the left, but not this woman. Her car was stopped right in the middle of the center line and she was waiting on the people in a parked car, so she could take their spot. That’s fine and I know she was probably worried about some sorry dude coming in and jumping in front of her but she lacked the courtesy to think about the people behind her.

Thirty seconds turned to one minute and the traffic behind her had increased to six stopped cars. Six cars went to eight and then within another thirty seconds the people trying to get off the main road were blocked. It was becoming a dangerous situation and all the while the man in the truck was still yelling and hollering because he couldn’t pull around her to get off the lot.

Another woman walking toward her car saw the situation and she politely walked up to the ladies car that was blocking the traffic and gently tapped on her window, as the lady was looking at herself in her vanity mirror waiting for her parking spot. The lady explained to her she was making the traffic situation really bad and the woman in the car simply shrugged her shoulders as if she didn’t care and rolled up her window. She continued to wait, while not one time making any attempt to move over just two foot so everybody could pass her!

After watching this thing play out for about two minutes I was almost to the point of going over to this ladies car myself and asking her to move. She had no clue about the problems that she was causing and by now it seemed obvious to me she was part of the “me first generation.” She really didn’t care!  She finally got her parking space and the congestion was finally cleared without further incidence.

I turned and walked away and began to hum the tune of Joy to the World! I chuckled out loud wondering how many people today are really joyful about the holidays.

As for me, I’ll probably be laboring this Labor Day.  

Clifford

“Throw it!” Throw it!” my Aunt Brenda yelled to my wife. Throw it! Throw it”! She yelled as my wife hollered back, “Where? “Up there, throw it up there under the bridge! Hook the bridge” Aunt Brenda yelled back, as my wife became more and more confused.

For some strange reason my wife decided to go fishing with our Aunt Brenda a few years ago and my wife does not fish! In fact, I really can’t remember the last time, if ever, that I saw her with a fishing pole or rod. My wife does target shoot with me every once in a while but I really can’t remember ever seeing her fish. For whatever reason these two women decided to go fishing on a "no men, two women" fishing trip to an East Texas lake.

You have to understand all of the “first” that have occurred on this weekend for my wife and Aunt Brenda. It was the first time to my memory that my wife drove alone, away from home on more than a one-hour trip. It was the first time that either one of these ladies backed a boat trailer into the water. It was the first time they ever unloaded a boat by themselves, cranked a boat by themselves and drove a boat by themselves. I was really, really worried about them and couldn’t for the life of me figure out why these two grown women decided to take this trip by themselves.

It seems though we men in their lives have been getting on their nerves and they wanted to get away for a woman’s outing. I just wish they would have gone shopping or something. I kept feeling like a mom feels when her kids are out late at night. Are they OK? Did they hurt themselves unloading the boat? What if they get stranded on the lake? What if a storm comes along and they don’t get into shore in time. What if they catch a fish! Who’s gonna take it off the line?

All of these things ran through my mind. I was a bit relieved though when the first call back message I heard on our voice mail was from my wife. “We’re in Wal-Mart and everything is OK!” Wal-Mart! What in the world does Wal-Mart have to do with fishing! Wal-Mart! Can’t they stay at home and go to Wal-Mart instead of traveling to East Texas just to go to a Wal-Mart! Oh well at least they are having a good time shopping I thought.

After hearing their story when they got home I could do nothing but be relieved and laugh at their weekend. The first occurrence was when Aunt Brenda failed to yield to an ambulance! It seems my wife and her have a bad habit of not using all of the mirrors of a car for driving. As my Aunt Brenda was sitting in a traffic jam, an ambulance with sirens blaring came up behind her and needed her to move over to clear the road. Brenda heard the sirens and kept looking from side to side trying to find the ambulance when it was actually right on the tail end of her car and she didn’t see it because she didn’t look in the rear view mirror. The next occurrence was the loading and unloading of the gas tank for the boat. It took both of them to carry it and then they had to figure out how to hook it up! Then they had to unload the boat and finally after figuring out how to crank it they were off for a trial run at fishing.

As they approached the fishing spot under a highway bridge, it was my wife’s duty to hook the rope to the bridge to tie the boat into position. What she didn’t understand though was exactly where she was she supposed to tie the rope. When Aunt Brenda was hollering “throw it” my wife thought she was supposed to attempt to throw this large grappling hook over the side of the rails of the bridge while the cars were rushing by. She was afraid to throw it too hard thinking she might hit a car. What Aunt Brenda really meant was to simply reach up to the bottom side of the bridge and tie off to one of the braces under the bridge and not on top. If I could have been a fly on the wall! The funniest part of the trip however was the “big one” my wife latched on to. After Aunt Brenda had baited my wife’s hook (remember she doesn’t fish so she doesn’t bait her own hook!) my wife let her line over the edge of the boat. Soon she began to struggle with a heavy tugging on her line and they both began to get excited by the bend made in the rod. As my wife pulled and tugged while reeling in the big one, she soon surfaced with a large strap much like a seat belt! I have her trophy on my credenza in my office as a keepsake. Needless to say they both made it home the next day and all is well and yes they did catch a few fish! I just hope their next trip they go shopping!

Clifford

Last week I started sharing with you the fact that I have fine print in my contract to no longer do volunteer handyman work for many people including working around church. It has also come to my knowledge that many people do not understand why. Even though I have ran this story before, many people forget.

I'm a hard worker, I provide for my family, I love my wife and kids, I love God, Country and Apple Pie but for some reason people tend to love me but they do everything they can to avoid letting me do things with my hands. It's really difficult for me to understand why?

Even the little things in life people try to steer me away from. As an example I spent a weekend with my cousins, The Osgood Clan and their kids at our ranch and they wouldn't even let me make coffee! I like my coffee real strong and when we ran out of a pound of coffee after only two pots they made me stop making it! I kept wondering why I caught Uncle Marvin stuck to the ceiling the next morning. He blamed it on my coffee and said it was too strong. It probably gives him gas. Anybody that I have made coffee for has never wanted a second cup.

One Christmas I received a brand new set of carpenter tools from my Mom and Dad for Christmas. I was proud of my tools and I built a brand new tool box as my first project. I was about sixteen and I had already begun my working career as an auto mechanic. I worked for Clement Patzke in Hufsmith and I then went to work for Johnny Reeves on Kuykendahl. Johnny had a lady friend who needed some doors cut off at the bottom as she had bought new carpet for her home.

I informed Johnny I would be glad to do this carpenter work as I had a new set of tools I wanted to try out.

I arrived at the ladies home and promptly removed the door and took it outside carefully cutting off a quarter of an inch. I re-hung the door and noticed it was still dragging. The door was an entry door to her bathroom and was connected to a hallway which made for close working quarters.

I took the door down again and carefully marked and removed another quarter of an inch. I re-hung the door and it still dragged the carpet!

I removed the door again and knowing I had plenty of room for cutting, I then removed one inch. I carried the door back into the house and once again the door still dragged the floor!

The television show Candid Camera was real popular and I really began to wonder about this door and I slowly looked around several corners for a possible camera. I even considered the possibility of the home having a cracked foundation and was settling quite quickly.

Once again I removed the door and promptly removed two inches knowing full well this had to be enough regardless of how fast this home may be settling!

Carrying the door back in, I hung it in place and, well, you guessed it, it was still dragging!!!!

Falling against the wall in frustration I rested my back and head against the sheetrock as my eyes scanned the three plus inches of sunlight shining across the top of the door......  

 The lady was real kind to me. As she tried to keep from laughing her comment was, "I always wanted to look out the top of my door while in the bathroom!!!"

I picked up my tools and politely dismissed myself from her home.

Clifford

"Clifford, come here! Clifford, can you hear me boy, I said get in here!"
"Sir", I said as I entered the unfinished kitchen. 
"Look at this, every one of these styles are a sixty-fourth too short or long."
"What's a style Uncle Speedy and how short did you say they were?"
"I said they were each a sixty-fourth too short or two long and a style is the divide between each door on these cabinets!"
"Ok, but Uncle Speedy, what's a sixty fourth?" I asked.
"Clifford how long have you been working on cabinets?"
"Well Uncle Speedy I've only done this a couple of times before, but I still don't understand what a sixty fourth is!"
"Come here and look at this ruler. Do you see each of these little marks between the inch marks? That's a sixty fourth!"
"Do you mean those little, bitsy, teeny, tiny marks?"
"Yes Clifford, each one of those marks represent one sixty fourth of an inch!"
"But Uncle Speedy what difference does one sixty fourth make? I can't even see it much less cut it any closer!"
"Look at it this way son. If you had a cabinet sixty four feet long and you cut every style one sixty fourth shorter than the one before, how short would your cabinets be?"
Now even though I had to go through Mrs. Beards remedial math course three times to get through high school, I was still able to calculate the answer when I finally confessed to him it would be an inch out of whack! That's a lot when you're working on cabinets and they hadn't invented one-inch caulk yet.
This was one of my first lessons in cabinet making from Uncle Speedy Bogs. Now Uncle Speedy really wasn't my uncle but because all the Mueller Boy's called him Uncle Speedy I called him Uncle Speedy too!
I had often asked my dad how Speedy got his name. He confessed to me that it was a nickname given him by all his boyhood friends. He had one crippled foot and they always had to wait on him when they were running anywhere so they just nicknamed him Speedy! The name stuck, even in light of its original connotation that sounds cruel to some, but was really a sign of friendship between boys. We men are like that you know. We take the worst things about a guy and poke fun at them and as we get older we soon realize the nicknames given each one of us are really a true bonding of friendship. Many men carry nicknames from childhood. Moose, Goose, Unk, Speedy, Shorty, Fat Albert, Dog, Bimbo, Cotton, Squi-rrel, Hoss, Peg, Runt, Blackie, Whitie, Stick, Stinky, Blue, Suds, Shine, Hair, Monkey, Smitty, Rubber Butt and Popeye are just a few of the nicknames that have stuck with men that I have known for their entire lives. Mine was Popeye, because as a child I wore a Popeye outfit at Halloween with a can of spinach stuffed down my shirt. The problem was however the can kept falling down the front of my shirt, past my skinny ribs and wound up either falling on the floor or into my pants which really made a sight for wonderment.
When the name is first anointed on them it is usually at a young age. It is initially intended to poke fun at each other but as we grow older we soon realize the name is no longer intended in harming or poking fun at you, it's simply a way of being accepted by other men with common problems, likes and ideas. I don't expect my female readers to understand the bonding two men have when their nickname is used as an everyday, common expression of friendship and acknowledgement.
Well, now I've got a new name to add. It's Pink Sugar. Pink Sugar works at a Panera Bread location down at Spring Cypress and Tomball Parkway. If the place doesn't advertise in this paper they need to because I will tell you that Pink Sugar has been added to my list of good food and faster service. Just for kicks I have started timing Pink Sugar and the crew that produces my lunch sometimes just for fun.
I will tell you that I recently received a bowl of soup and a handmade half a sandwich in twenty three seconds! Now someone will misunderstand that a sandwich made in twenty three seconds can't be any good, but no joke, it is a regular sandwich that Pink Sugar can put together in a flash!  I am a connoisseur of good food and I have eaten at just about every restaurant in this area and fast is not always good but in this case, it really is. What's bothering me now, however, is how does a guy get a nickname like Pink Sugar? What if Pink Sugar wanted to join a motorcycle gang? Can you see him going up against names like Lug Nuts, Flywheel and Jack Hammer? HA!
"What's your name boy?" "
Ahhh, its Pink Sugar"
It makes me think of cotton candy ….hmmm.

Clifford

The sun began to move lower into the sky and the wind that had been blowing all day was beginning to subside. It has been a good day. Here I now rested under the shade of the big oak tree in the middle of the pasture and not a soul around but for me, myself and I. I grabbed my thermos of coffee I had in my truck and pulled up a chair to the still standing table and began to enjoy a place that is near and dear to my heart, the Family Ranch.
All the guys had left and I was finishing up my cleaning duties and began to just really chill out. As I sat in the silence of nature a few deer appeared in the distance no longer disturbed by the many, many shotguns that had been hammering away at clay targets just an hour or two before. I enjoyed the coffee and then after tying up a few loose ends I climbed back into my truck for my trip home about an hour away.
I had invited the men of my church up to the ranch for a great time of manly fellowship. As I surveyed the crowd that had gathered earlier in the day I suddenly observed that I think I have now become an official, old man in the crowd. I do believe I was the eldest of them all and it brought me pleasure to share with these guys a place that I enjoy. I looked over at my son during the day and realized he will someday be the leader of the festivities up here if he so desires.
Our goal for the day was to shoot some skeet and I had made preparations for twenty to thirty people. I have to admit that I skipped Sunday Morning Church services to make the preparations for everybody and I hope the Lord forgives me. The game plan was for all the guys to head out in a caravan after church being lead by my son and then as soon as they arrived I was to have lunch prepared for immediate consumption. I had purposely kept everyone in the dark about the menu for several reasons. First of all, I know men well enough that they will eat just about anything anybody will make if they are hungry enough and I knew they would be hungry right after church. Not that church makes anybody hungry now mind you, but church always seems to let out just a few minutes after my normal lunch time. Secondly I didn't share the menu because this brings down too many suggestions. The women were not invited and without the women we men can do just about anything we want with our meals. The tables don't have to have center pieces or table cloths, the food doesn't have to be a balanced meal and the food can be cooked as spicy as we want. I did hear however, a few of the guys make comments as to how lost they felt without the women being there.
After we had our lunch time prayer I simply told the guys to help themselves and dig in. I had grilled some sausage and tube steaks and had a choice of bread, bun, flour tortilla or simply a sausage on a stick. It was their choice to create whatever they wanted with the food at hand. Some of them said they were lost. They couldn't hear any woman telling them how to make their plate, what to eat and not eat and to watch dripping grease on their shirt. They even commented about how quiet it was with no talking during the meal. We all simply ate good greasy food and listened to the end of the football game on the car radios with no talking interruptions. The guys had thought all female influence had passed us by that day until I suddenly saw Matt using PINK SHOTGUN SHELLS! I just about died when I saw PINK SHOTGUN SHELLS at the ranch. I could not believe it and they really did not improve his shooting very much either. Actually, after watching this group shoot, I don't think a crook has anything to worry about. David won the grand prize. Ed came in a one shot second. I gave David a cheap gimmie calculator that I have had in my closet for ten years. Actually I gave him two of them. Ed's prize for second place was; not having to carry around a piece of junk that probably did not work anyhow.
Everything had gone real well for me during the earlier part of the day. The fire in my pit was able to burn down quickly enough to put the sausage on at a good even heat and everything fell into place very well except when something literally fell that I haven't told anybody about until now. Well, something fell on the ground. Actually a whole pan of sausage fell onto the ground but I followed the old standby five second rule. I quickly picked it up and thoroughly washed it off before returning it to the pit for reheating --- or maybe I didn't really. You will never know….
Thanks guys for the good memories.


 - Clifford

I got a phone call tonight from a Fellon. She tried to harass me, but people always forget that I can generally have the last laugh. The word is mightier than the sword.

Ok, Ok, now let me straighten out this story. The Fellon that called me is actually my son's mother in law. No, she is not really a felon, but she really is a Fellon. That is her last name. She thought she could tease me about a recent situation that occurred to me. The two of us have recently had similar occurrences in our separate lives that have caused us distress. She has had a real bad sinus infection which has caused her serious and uncomfortable nose bleeds and I have recently had a nose bleed too! The only thing however is she had no control over her sickness, but shear dumbness caused me to create my own nose bleed.

I was trying to show off and accidentally hurt myself. You would think that a guy who just turned sixty would have more sense, but alas, I'm a kid at heart and made a dumb mistake. My son and I went to the shooting range to get ready for opening weekend of deer season. I'm a lazy hunter and really don't even hunt anymore, but I try to push myself into believing I will do some serious hunting. The truth is I don't like getting out of bed early enough to climb into a stand. Just the same, I do go to the range every year for that "just in case" opportunity and the trip is a tradition for my son and I (and my son in law – if I can get him to go).

Well this year I decided to shoot my lever action 30-30 with open sight, at 50 yards. I did reasonably well grouping ten shots in a hands span while my son was on the other end of the range shooting a hundred yards with my scoped 30-30. As I stood behind him watching his shooting techniques, I noticed by his body language that he was not happy with his shots. Finally he turned to me and told me he was having some difficulty hitting the bull's eye.

Great, I thought, here is one way for the old man to one up him and I just calmly asked him if I could give it a try. I grabbed the gun and sat down at the bench. I pushed all the sand bags aside as I knew that sitting in a deer stand would not offer the comfort and resting on a stack of bags. No siree I was going to free hand it! I threw the gun to my shoulder and fired off a nice quick round at the target. In a split second after my shot was made I glanced through the scope again at the target and sure 'nuff a nice clean hole just an inch or so away from the bull's eye.

Well, I thought in a nano second, I better quit while I'm ahead and then suddenly a sharp pain began to develop as I felt a warm trickle run down the top of my nose. Ohhhh, you dummy, my mind screamed, show no pain, as I stepped away from the bench and stepped back for my son to gaze at his dad's well placed shot. I moved to the edge of the dark shadows and took the cuff of my old shirt and pressed it hard against my nose when my son turned to me and saw me bleeding.

If you haven't figured it out by now, my showing off made me hold the gun too loosely and when I fired the scope came back and hit me across the nose leaving a nice clean cut across the bridge of my German sized schnotzel. (Yes, I know that is not the right word but that is what my Grandma called it). The whole incident became funny by that time, as the pain had subsided, but it made me think back to my Great Uncle Teddy Vogt. I seem to recall the time as a kid when he showed up at a family reunion with a very badly bruised eye from the same situation. We got to laughing among ourselves as young kids and nick-named him Uncle Scope Eye. I guess I learned my lesson because payback ain't funny.

All in all, the pain and no gain was a good time for my son and I to be together and the harassing phone call from Mrs. Fellon made for a good story. I just can't wait to give you a deer hunting report. It's probably gonna read something like this: I showed up at the ranch this weekend to deer hunt. I got up early, well before sunrise Saturday morning, to head out to my stand. After several cups of coffee and a bathroom stop I decided to take a quick nap before walking to my stand and didn't get up until noon..

 - Clifford

My daughter recently showed me a picture of Superman. He was in a football uniform except this time he was in a real game. He wasn't dressed up for Halloween as he was the last time I saw him. That was over thirteen years ago and Superman had grown up. Here was a story I remembered from many, many years ago.
Halloween had come and gone and I got into trouble again. It seems that every year that goes by I get in trouble for one reason or another.
Some years I get into trouble for being over zealous in my Halloween activities and then some years I get fussed at for not caring.
If I am in one of my, I don't care years, my wife gets on to me because I don't come to the door every time it rings and ogle and ah at each little candy snatcher that makes their way to our door. If I'm in one of my very active modes she has to get on to me because I tend to go overboard. I can still remember one year at a former church I attended I kinda got into trouble for being too creative.
The Hall family used to live in a location that was way out in the boonies or at least so it seemed.  Tall trees and a lot of underbrush surrounded them and their property had a gully that ran across one area of the land. We decided to have a spook trail and we did all kind of fun scary things. We cleared paths in the woods and I laid some lumber across this little gully that had about two inches of water in it. Once it got dark all of the actors took their various places around the trail and I tended the water crossing.
As the group touring our trail got positioned onto the crossing, I would pour a cup of gasoline on the water as it ran toward the board. I could see the oily skin on the water reflecting in the moonlight and as soon as it got near the bridge I would light the gasoline. The trail of fire trickling toward the board crossing naturally made people scatter. It was fun until the women started getting mad because I was making them get their feet wet while escaping the wall of fire. People got tired of trampling on each other too! Creative panic and controlled chaos is what I called it.
I really felt bad about what happened this one particular year! I always thought Halloween was a time to be so scared it made you wet your pants but apparently that idea went out with bell-bottom pants.
One little trick or treater named Tyler Ligon visited our house along with his mom. I happened to be outside when they drove up and once they made their way inside I hid between some bushes in front of our house hoping to scare everybody that walked out the door. For whatever reason my wife allowed them to exit the side door to our home and little Tyler made his way past my lair as I jumped out and growled real loud. The little fellow was dressed as Superman and as much as he tried not to, he burst into tears, deflating any laughter this old man had. I apologized and my wife got after me with a piece of weed eater string. I guess it just goes to show you that big guys never grow up and all guys, big or little, still need the comfort from the women in their lives.
It was good to see your picture Tyler. I'm the old man that scared Superman.



- Clifford

Editor's Note: This is a reprint of a column published last year. It is being republished by special request.
 
If you sit back and consider your life, are there just a few small things that jump out at you? Have you ever had a split second recollection of a small memory as a child that may literally last just a few seconds in your mind, but it becomes a memory that will forever remain embedded in the corner of your brain? This happens to me occasionally. I can be talking to someone about something or somebody when all of a sudden a small scene plays out in my mind recalling quick short events that bring back good and bad memories. Think about it. I have a hunch everyone has those moments.
I have memories of short events. I can remember the time I cut the muscle in my big toe, while playing in Spring Creek with the Mueller boys during one of our camping trips. It happened in the creek behind what is now Burroughs Park. All I can recall is cutting the underside of my toe, looking at it and seeing some bad stuff but I simply took a dirty sock, wrapped it around the toe and went about my camping trip. It was only years and years later that I realized I had actually cut the muscle under my toe and now I cannot curl my big toe. It remains straight and unable to flex. It is about a five second memory. I remember nothing else about the camping trip – not sure how many of the Mueller boys were there and I'm not sure how long I remained in camp that day after it happened. (In case you didn't know there were seven boys in the Mueller Family, so we did not all go to the same place at the same time and please ladies, now that my mom is gone please don't call me  and fuss at me for wrapping my cut toe in a dirty sock. I now know better.)
Another short event is when my sister Gallbladder hit me in the head with a roasting pan. (I'm sorry, misprint – her real name is Gail) I have no idea why she hit me, but all I recall is this big bong sound coming from my ears as this big, black, speckled roasting pan landed squarely on top of my head. She hit me with the center of the bottom of the pan, so it did not hurt, but in less than one or two seconds I can recall the sound and eventual laughter that arose from the family after she hit me. She says now that I was probably picking on her which I have been occasionally known to do.
I was having a conversation with my neighbor and distant cousin Ruby Vogt a couple of day's ago. I told her that I have a short memory about her mom, Ms Edna Mae.
When I was a young man running the dirt roads of Hufsmith on my bicycle, different people would occasionally ask me to help them with different small chores around the place. I have no idea why or how come I was down at the Vogt home, but all I can recall is that Ms. Edna Mae and I were standing in the yard talking, when suddenly a pole cat (skunk) was running across the pasture.
Seeing this chicken killin', thievin', stinkin' critter she went into a minor semi panic mode. She quickly let out a small sound of shock to see this critter in mid day and she turned and ran up her steps into her house and quickly exited with shotgun in hand. She thrust the shotgun into my hand and hollered "shoot em', go shoot em'" I know I must have already been ten or twelve years old and I had been around guns all my life, but any hunting I did was always with my dad. Here I was, away from the confines of our own property and visiting a neighbor, when she hands me this gun, sight unseen and instructs me to go shoot this varmint. She had it loaded and ready to fire and I took aim.
At this point my memory stops. It's gone! I have no recollection of my shot, no recollection of the end results and nothing else about the whole event, but maybe fifteen seconds of life, as this grown adult woman of whom I admire and love handed me this gun. It was as if I had suddenly achieved the manly, masculine qualities required to protect and serve. Never mind all I was doing was protecting a pen full of chickens. Never mind that I had never used another gun other than my dad's. Never mind that I had never shot a skunk before. All I remember is that moment of life that this lady respected me as old enough to handle the task at hand.
This should teach all of us a small lesson. We humans remember little things. Little spots of life, whether good or bad, are forever etched in our minds, never to be erased. Always strive to leave good memories in peoples lives. Hold back the one bad word or bad comment. Keep that outburst of anger in check. Bite your tongue because somewhere, someplace, somebody is always watching and the memory banks of the brain may never forget.


- Clifford