Even in Alabama

Yes, I know. It's from Super Bowl XXI, not XLV. But the number of Packer fans in Alabama this past month knew what it was all about. The days I wore my Packer T-shirt, I got lots of great comments and conversation. Again, I assert, THIS is America's Team!

(Actually, since the month started with Packers, I figured it might as well end that way, too.)

6:05 PM Eastern Time Today

The Twins and the Red Sox play baseball.

See, I told you spring was alive and well.

I Have Seen Spring...

...and it is ready to move north.

Early spring flowers, Bon Secour Refuge, Alabama

For the past two weeks we have been enjoying a remarkable vacation in Gulf Shores, AL, where we have had wonderful spring weather. Yes, all northerners who have been struggling with this winter, spring is alive and well and is on its way.

Now I am told that spring moves north about 16 miles/day or about 100 miles/week.

Water lilies in bloom, Bon Secour Refuge, Alabama

A fairly straight shot north to Minnesota from the Gulf of Mexico in Alabama is about 1200 miles. Let's see... 100 miles/week, 1200 miles- that means 12 weeks. No, tell me it ain't so! That would be the third week in May. Arrrggghhh.

Which is actually about the right time for the temps to hit the low 70s. May 21 is the date, on average, when the high temp should be 70. I guess that makes sense, although I know there will be warmer weather before then.

I have seen it- it exists- and it will not be stopped.

So here are some more pictures of spring beginning its northward hike. Enjoy. I have.


 Actually it was quite a fun vacation. Lots and lots of pictures and lots and lots of relaxation. Plenty of pictures and fun to come. Watch for it.

Wildlife Behaving Well

Wildlife along the Gulf coast can be downright hospitable. This Great Blue Heron was just as willing as can be to let me take pictures on two different occasions. First, he just kept right on eating at his favorite buffet-place. He let me get to within 30 feet and just kept one eye on me and the other on the stream.

Then a few days later on another bike ride I see him just sitting there on the bank. Again, I got to within 30 feet and he just kept sitting. I swear he was posing.

Meanwhile, overhead, the Osprey on the way to the nearby nest just swooped by as nice as could be.

On another bike ride through the woods this friendly armadillo just kept on eating, ignoring each biker that pedaled by or, like me, who stopped to take a picture. He wasn't in the least bit concerned.

But perhaps the most willing wild animal to have a picture taken was this fine specimen of a sand turtle. Funny, I went back the next day and he was gone.

Other-Worldly

But the world is that of jellyfish in Mobile Bay....

I got these pictures at the Estuarium on Dauphin Island, AL. I got some nice video as well that may one day make it to You Tube. But the silky, other-worldly sense of these is amazing.

By the way, the spots around the fish which add that cosmic sense, are bits of food floating around the tank.

A 30-Year Memory: Democracy Wins

February 23 – Antonio Tejero, with members of the Guardia Civil, enters the Spanish Congress of Deputies and stops the session where Leopoldo Calvo Sotelo is about to be named president of the government. The coup d'état fails thanks to King Juan Carlos.

Read 'Em Once

These are not signs I would have to be told twice about. I hope...

A Thought for Thinking

Egotism: The anesthetic that deadens the pain of stupidity.
--(sign on the wall of a restaurant in Orange Beach, AL)

Almost Look Alikes

But only almost.....

Ice on Trees (Elba, MN)

Not Ice on Trees (Gulf Shores, AL)

Supper Time for the Birds

As the tide comes in, so does the food.....

Looks Like Overkill...

Unless it's a turkey named bin Laden?

Pollution of Different Kinds

The warnings are clear.They want you to be aware.

Fortunately there are also people out there who are working on keeping the beaches clean. All day long they go up and back collecting whatever may be polluted with the tar balls from the Deep Water Horizon oil spill.

But there is the good, old every-day human pollution that is still around. That piece of red in the gull's mouth here on the right?

That's a piece of a bag of chips or whatever that the gull has picked up and is carrying back to land. That's why they remind all of us that the pollution that you and I carelessly throw out the window of the car can be just as deadly as the disasters that strike.

Spring Begins Today

The pitchers and catchers report today.

Spring has arrived.

(Oh, yes, and it's only 10 days until the first pre-season game.)

Look Alikes...

Snow (Whitewater State Park)

Not Snow (Gulf Shores, AL)

....But that's as far as it goes

Not So Tough a Question:

Guess which generation is now getting older.....

from Gulf Shores, AL

Happy Valentine's Day

Here's a CLASSIC video of The Boss in 1975 singing Mountain of Love.

(I know it's about lost love, but, hey, it has the word love, Springsteen's singing, and today is Valentine's Day. What more can I say?)




People were doing this long before cell phones.

Okay- Here's a Real Love Song

Classic Mickey

This one's from 1935 and shows the interest that Disney animators had in developing cartoons with class. This is pre-Fantasia but is showing some of the spirit that the Disney studio would develop. According to the notes on You Tube:

The cartoon is notable for being the first Mickey Mouse film in Technicolor, although two more Mickey cartoons were made in black and white before they were produced in colors on a permanent basis; Mickey's Service Station and Mickey's Kangaroo. It is said that when conductor Arturo Toscanini first saw the cartoon in a movie theater, he was so delighted with it that he ran up to the projection booth and asked the projectionist to run it again.

In 1994 it was voted #3 of the 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field. Also, according to Leonard Maltin in a commentary for this film when it was included in one of the Walt Disney Treasures, The Band Concert was remade (somewhat) years later as Symphony Hour.

Ah- Looking Ahead to Spring

Root River Trail, MN

"When the spirits are low,
when the day appears dark,
when work becomes monotonous,
when hope hardly seems worth having,

just mount a bicycle
and go out for a spin down the road,
without thought on anything
but the ride you are taking."
- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1896

Soon. Sooner than it seems!

A Great Picture Worth Thousands Of Words

Cairo, Egypt

February 11, 2011

When News Changes Fast

Mubarak steps down; revolution celebrates in Egypt. The world very seldom goes through momentous change following a well-planned, long-term blueprint. I am not sure that we can plan for momentous change like a revolution over the long-term. Sure, big change occurs that way, but the BIG changes are breaks in time.

The real work, though, now begins. It is harder to do than any of us may believe, but with a deliberate and hope-filled willingness, it is possible.

May the Egyptian people and leaders be willing to work together and turn today's joy into reality.

Defeating the Demons

I had my own "super bowl" win this past week along with my Packers.

I have had difficulty playing solos since, well, since I graduated from high school quite a few decades ago. I have continued to play trumpet all these years. I have played solos in church, duets with organ, that kind of thing. But I have seemed to have this innate ability to screw something up in the middle of it. A slurpped note, a few too many cracks in the sound, losing a beat or what have you.

Over the past year I have had several opportunities to solo in a song our Big Band does on a semi-regular basis. I play it well, hitting it right-on in rehearsals. But come the performance? Nope. It has happened three or four times. But, thanks to the group, they kept encouraging me.

Monday evening at our most recent gig I just laid back, kept it relaxed and got it right. For the first time in a long time I hit it- I was in the right groove and slid right through it.

After we were done, one of the other trumpet players, knowing my history with it, congratulated me. He then said,

You felt it instead of fearing it.

That sums it up. I know tensing up is not good. I know that in order to be "in the groove" you have to feel it, lean into it, let it take you as you go with it. Finally I was able to do it.

That is also a pretty good summation of how to deal with life as well. Feel it, lean into it, let it take you as you go with it. Anything else will only lead us into fear.

A 40-Year Memory: Justice in Baseball

February 9 - Satchel Paige becomes the first Negro League player to become voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.

A 50-Year Memory: A Legend Begins

February 9 – The Beatles perform for the first time at the Cavern Club.

The Season Is Done

Oh- and what a season it was. Sure I'm a biased Packer Cheesehead. And darn proud of it. Sure, it turned out the way I wanted. That's WHY it was such a great season. But others think so, too. Or at least the ending of it was-

The largest TV audience in history watched the game on Sunday. Quite an accomplishment, actually. It sure gives the lie to the old Cowboys idea that they were America's team. I think the Packers and the Steelers can lay claim to that today.

But it was the Pack who showed the class and heart from day one. I know, they were the odds-on favorites at the start of the season. Everyone expected them in the Super Bowl- until the season started. Then things went downhill really fast. Some close losses which seemed to say they didn't the the stick-to-it heart. Then came injuries, and more injuries, then a lot more injuries. 14 or more (I lost count) on the injured reserve.

Then Super QB Rodgers gets a concussion- and then another concussion. They had to fight it out to the last day of the season- with reserves and no-names- to get a bottom (6th seed.) Only one team had ever gone from 6th to champion- the Steelers back in 2005. The odds were long.

Yet they kept playing and the odds kept getting shorter and shorter. Until the Big Game when - yep, more injuries in the game. But they kept playing. Rodgers kept calm and cool even as his receiver dropped easy passes. He stayed on game as a leader should.

And they took it all. Titletown- the smallest city in the NFL- kept its title.

What more can we ask for?

It's been 14 years since the last Super Bowl for the Pack. It feels good. Very good.

Thanks, guys, for a never-give-up season. See you in September.

Now That Football Is Over....

People ask me what I do in winter when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring. ~Rogers Hornsby

It is Now History

Final Score:
Pittsburgh Steelers 25
Green Bay Packers 31

Half Done

Super Bowl XLV

Halftime

Packers leading 21-10.

A long way to go....

SB XLV : Today's the Day - Again

Super Bowl XLV

What else is there to say but:

Green Bay Go Pack

And one more time:

Go Pack Go

In Case You Were Wondering

Yesterday I commented that the dark years between Super Bowl 2 and the early 90s were not all that great for the Titletown Green Bay Packers. Even with 12 Championships over their years of existence (all-time stats: 654 winning, 518 losing, 36 tie. .558 record), there were some very lean years when they were seen as a joke, a shell of their former selves. Had they not been owned by the community, they very well could have been sold and moved in those years.

Here are the stats:

• 1968 - 1991: 5 winning seasons, 16 losing, 3 tie. .410 record

But history did not allow such a great franchise with such a rich legacy to die.

• 1992 - 2010: 15 winning seasons, 2 losing, 2 tie. .618 record

But even in those lean years, Packer fans, with their incurable green and gold bloodlines, were supportive and present. Every year was sold out. Season tickets have a years-long waiting list.

Which is simply a long way to say:

Go, Pack, Go!

SB XLV -1 : Almost There

Super Bowl XLV

Everlasting love of the green and gold..

When You Are On Top...

Yahoo! Sports had the top 5 Packer jokes earlier. They were mean, in general. But when you are a team like the Packers, you can be the butt of jokes. My favorite on the list was:

"The best way that Brett Favre can get revenge on the Packers is to play for them."

For you youngsters out there, by the way, just an historical reminder that even though the Pack has been an NFL powerhouse for a good number of years now, there was a time in the 70s and 80s where the line went:

If you want to move somewhere with no pro football- move to Green Bay.

Oh, how far we have come, how far we have come.

Go Pack, Go!

SB XLV -2

Super Bowl XLV

Green and Yellow....

A Vision of Spring

Last Sunday was the annual Twins fan day known as Twins Fest. It was originally scheduled at the Metrodome, but the Vikings Season at home was ended as the roof collapsed on them in our December blizzard. So twins fest headed north to Blaine and the National Sports Center.

Fortunately we had a relatively nice weekend and we all got to get that first taste of spring indoors as the Minnesota Boys of Summer, all tanned and ready, showed up to get us psyched. That they did.

Amid all the booths and vendors seen in that picture, the centerpiece of the three-day event is the players. You pay a fee (usually $15) for the chance to get autographs. The fees go to support the Twins Foundation, their charitable arm. We didn't plan for anything in particular since this was my daughter's and my first Twins Fest. But we did get to see some of the players.

Michael Cuddyer signing autographs

And got our share of autographs on a baseball.

Jason Kubel at the autograph table

Pat Neshek with a big smile

L-R Jason Kubel, Jason Repko, Jim Hoey, Nick Blackburn

I have to say that this is probably the first time I have ever met professional baseball players. And it is the first time I have met them up close in street clothes. Without the uniforms and ball caps which give them that ageless quality of baseball history I was struck by....

HOW FREAKIN' YOUNG THEY ARE!

In order, the Twins we met in these pictures are:
28: Hoey and Kubel
29: Blackburn
30: Neshek and Repko
31: Cuddyer.(The Old Man of the Group)

And at my age- they look even younger than that!

Remarkable.