YES, I AM STILL HERE peeking out my window on Main Street, and I’m thinking about a memorable scene in that scary movie, “Alien.”
Do you remember the scene where the baby monster bursts out of the tummy of the poor space guy who had been comatose? The baby creature had been growing inside the space guy who then woke up and said he felt hungry.
Everyone was standing around watching the space guy scream and writhe until the monster burst forth out of his stomach. It’s interesting to note that we never saw the space guy’s carcass again.
This is sorta the way many of you have been watching me for the last couple of weeks.
Just standing around watching in horror but still hoping that the #1 Fair Weather Arkansas Razorback Football Fan would burst forth.
And he finally did with about three minutes left in the game against the University of Alabama-Birmingham, Saturday. The Hogs had finally gotten a bit of a lead over the underdogs, and then UAB stormed back to within three points.
The #1 Fair Weather Fan knew exactly what would happen next.
Some genius Hog would commit a needless penalty at precisely the worst time, or someone would fumble the ball and UAB would be set up to score and win. He has seen it happen time and time again.
Well, the #1 Fair Weather Fan finally burst out and began calling the Razorback players, coaches and Pom squad unspeakable and unpronounceable names he learned in the Navy.
He almost felt foolish when the Hogs put up another touchdown on the Jumbotron and that surprising score finally put the game out of reach. But not foolish enough to make him act like a normal person.
Now what happens? After he emerges where does he go? Back into the abdomen of the space guy?
Naw, let’s be serious. Maybe he sneaks into one of the ritzy skyboxes whose owners left the game when the Hogs were behind 17-0. They were the REAL Fair Weather Fans.
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ANIMAL CRACKERS. I swore for the eleventh or twelth time that I would be alert to the fall disappearance of our Mississippi Kites.
So much for innocent swearing. And the reliability of my memory.
I do believe they’re gone until late spring of 2025.
Where do they go? I swear I’ll watch for their departure next year.
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DO YOU BELIEVE in coincidence? I Saw an article that said the enormous bells that were damaged in the fire that burnt Notre Dame cathedral in Paris in 2019 were returned to the church last Friday for installation in the restored church towers.
My friend Saundra Fuentes told me on that very same day that she is going to see a musical performance of “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” in Texarkana this weekend. Esmeralda.
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AUTUMN EQUINOX. It happens Sunday, Sept. 22, this year when day and night are equal length.
A really big event happens every Autumnal Equinox and it’s not when sunlight shines through some rocks in Merry Ole England.
It’s the time of year when I scrub my shower stall.
I usually go through a half-dozen cheap sponges and at least one cardboard can of 20 Mule Team Borax.
The grimy shower stall resists cleaning. But soon there is a sparkling change that is wonderful to sore eyes.
Often, I take visitors back to my bathroom just to show them the glistening shower stall walls.
There is no entrance fee. I just ask them to sign my petition to be designated our town’s Official Downtown J-Turn Enforcement Officer.
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A MATTER OF PERSPECTIVE. ‘LiveScience’ reported that yesterday an asteroid the size of a skyscraper passed dangerously close to Earth.
How big is a skyscraper?
Here in our community, a skyscraper could be the abandoned feed towers of the old Pilgrim’s mill. Or the old abandoned Southern Ice and Cold Storage ice plant on S. Mill St.
I have been to the top of the Empire State Building. Maybe the dangerous asteroid was that size.
You didn’t see it pass?
No wonder. It was moving 26 times the speed of sound.
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A SURE SIGN of the End Times. It’s raining in parts of the Sahara Desert. Some flooding, even.
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THINGS I LEARNED from opening e-mail: “As I’ve gotten older, people think I’ve become lazy. The truth is I’m just being more energy-efficient.”
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WORD GAMES. Nervous topic for the family’s youngsters: Birds and Bees. The toughest talk a parent can make. And maybe the most important.
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HE SAID: “Search others for their virtue, and yourself for your vices.” R. Buckminister Fuller, architect and philosopher
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SHE SAID: “When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, ‘I used everything you gave me’.” Erma Bombeck, newspaper columnist
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SWEET DREAMS, Baby