Tuesday Twitterdeedum

Foster was in an unusually happy mood this morning, so happy he was wiggling his little rear end and wagging his stub tail every time I looked at him.  He even grabbed his bed and took it around the living room

Sheer happiness is evident whenever Foster grabs his bed and shakes it with his teeth.

Bill said he was probably just as thrilled as we are with last night's ZAGS after-our-bedtime victory.  We were not at all happy during the first part of the game.

Granted, we thought it was really nice that Stanford upset UConn in women's NCAA basketball, but all those time-outs and that overtime with more time-outs and more time spent at the foul line.  

That added up to our missing more than half of the first half of the ZAGS game.  I received one phone call from a friend, asking "What the heck" and suggesting that I use a bad word like her frustrated husband was using.

She just wanted to vent, and she found a willing audience.  Then, she said, "Okay, I'll hang up."  

Minutes later (seemed like years), I received a text message from my daughter-in-law Debbie who knows how Mom Love is if anyone interrupts either "60 Minutes" or a ZAGS game.

"Howya doing" the text read.

"Damn mad," I texted back.

"You can get it on the sports news channel. I think it's 207," Debbie's next text read.

So, we switched over and steam immediately quit coming out of my ears.  I called my friend and told her to turn to Channel 207.

"We don't have that channel," she said.

Well, duh, Dish Network as opposed to DirecTV.  I don't know if she ever found the game, but we did, and it was a great one, making for a good night's sleep and a happy morning for humans and for Foster.

As if we needed anything else to brighten our day, I brought the papers in and, lo and behold, there was Willie on the front page!

Later, Bill yelled upstairs, "You're all over the paper today." 

Guess I missed the "50 Years Ago" in Bonner County History where KT Littlefield had opened up her kindergarten on South Huron as a babysitting venue for weekend skiers.

Yes, KT tapped my classmate, Andrea Balch, and me to watch the kiddies on Saturdays and Sundays while their parents went up to Schweitzer to ski.

At that facility, I met the May brothers, Ron and Bert, and one of the Farmins, Kristi, and Bobby Nelson, among others.  I won't say which May brother bit me because 50 years can often cloud the misery, luckily for the biter of the hand that fed him his sack lunch.

The only other bad memory I have of those days was that they were long because some skiers must have been skiing well past dark, and I'd finally make it home around 7 p.m.

Funny that such an item should show up in today's paper, as KT's daughter-in-law Peggy sent me a friend request yesterday.  For the umpteenth time since we attended the University of Idaho together, we have reconnected.  

It's always good to catch up with Peggy, who took the time many years ago, when my mother was out of town, to teach me to drive our Ford station wagon with its standard shift.  

I had taken drivers' training, but back in those days, instruction included only vehicles with automatic transmissions, probably so the instructors would not have to be given hazard pay.

Anyway, I was pretty much out of luck about driving cuz every vehicle on our place had a standard transmission.  My mother fully remembered the time I drove the tractor and got the mower stuck in the gate and summoned two strange men to please put it back before my parents got home, only to have my parents arrive precisely when one strange man was driving my dad's tractor across the barnyard and the other stood with me observing.

Let's just say that moment of introduction was awkward at best.

Anyway my mother had developed an anxiety about my driving skills, and it was especially noticeable the one time she relented to let me practice driving the car with her emphatically and actively sitting next to me in the passenger seat.

She actually spent most of her time, gasping, shrieking and trying to climb out of the car as I fumbled my way down the road, managing to stay out of the ditch every time my mother let out another loud sound.

Calm and cool were not my mother's strong suits.  She never allowed me to practice again, but then Peggy came along.

In roughly 15 minutes, I was shifting gears and driving that Ford down the road as smoothly as if I'd been at it my whole life.

So, I have Peggy to thank for starting me out on a lifetime of hopping in the car and enjoying the ride. 

Got a class reunion meeting today, so I'd better shut up and get on my way. Later, we'll watch Swiss Miss in her basketball playing debut, so I'll end with "Go, Bulldogs!  Go, Swiss Miss!"  

Happy Tuesday.