Almost Freaky Timing

While I have mixed feelings concerning Facebook I love Facebook Messenger. What I love about it is that my family uses it throughout the day to maintain a conversation. Seriously, Pam, Adam, Noah, and my Mom talk about meaningful and basically meaningless things all throughout our day. Yes, we talk on the phone and video conference for family discussions (Thanks Google Hangouts) but this ongoing daily chat keeps me feeling connected to my family throughout the day.

Sometimes the chats lead to humor. Today it led to a kind of freaky series of events.

It began with Pam randomly posting that Noah should consider applying to the University of Northern Iowa for grad school. Since Noah is a graduating Senior this year in Communication Science Disorders graduate school is a common topic of conversation for us. I’ll not post the rest of this conversation but it was basically Noah asking why Pam thought he should apply to UNI and Pam explaining why she believed it would be a good fit.

This conversation took place around noon.

When I arrived at home around 4 pm I checked our mail and discovered a letter addressed to Noah from the University of Northern Iowa. This was pretty odd timing so I posted this photo in the group chat.

Since this was Noah’s letter I wasn’t going to open it but I did think that if he knew of it he would probably want me to open it up for him. I was correct. He asked me to open the letter and tell him what would be in this letter from a university that he had had no contact with but which we were talking about earlier in the day.

I bet you also want to know what the letter was about. Well it was an invitation from UNI for Noah to consider applying to one of their “outstanding graduate programs”.  Seriously.

I know this letter doesn’t really mean anything. It isn’t an acceptance letter. It’s just an invitation to apply. Still the timing was amazing.

I love what happens in our Terrell family ongoing group chat.

Goats Rampage

There is a company that rents out goats (WeRentGoats) to control weeds and such on private property whose “employees” went on a rampage, left their job site, and began eating a local neighborhood. I wish I had a random hundred goats come through our neighborhood. That would be a ton of fun … until you had to clean up after them.

Here’s the Washington Post story on the incident.

 

See Curling is a Real Sport

Every now and then I get picked on by my friends concerning being a curling. Yes, along with Adam H, Brian O, and Marc M, I am a proud member of the Stevens Point Curling Club. Anyhow the times when I get picked on for curling the general tone is that curling isn’t a real sport. “Anybody can curl.” “No real sport involves a broom.” That’s bogus.

Two days ago a Russian curler at the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics failed his drug tested and has now been accused of taking performance enhancing drugs. Here’s an article concerning the accusation.

Now taking performance enhancing drugs is bad and I in no way want to encourage such wrong behavior. I will, however, say that I feel that an athlete getting caught doping in order win proves that curling is a real sport. 🙂

Returns Christmas Tree to Costco

I saw articles concerning this incident a few days ago and thought it was a joke, but apparently it isn’t. A woman in Santa Clara, California was spotted returning a Christmas tree to the Costco at which she bought it because it was now “dead”. Scott Bentley took the above photo of the woman returning the tree.

Seriously I am all for being cheap, I try not to spend money that I don’t have to and I am all for working the system, but there is working the system and then there is basically taking advantage of a lenient return policy to be a crook. You can find articles concerning this all over the web now. Here’s the Fortune article I read concerning the incident. This Reddit thread of odd returns that Costco employees have dealt with is also pretty fun.

 

You Have A Bird Stuck To Your Bumper

I drove along side a gentlemen today who was driving a red Ford Fiesta. The only reason I remember him or his car is because while we were at stop light on Post Road/Church Street/Division Street (the name of the road is an entirely different story – this stupid road changes names 3 times in the length of 4 miles and thus makes it nearly impossible to give directions to anyone who doesn’t live in the area). While we were stopped at the light I noticed a small movement on the Fiesta’s front bumper. The guy had accidentally hit a robin and it was stuck in one of the air holes built into his car’s bumper. The poor little creature was obviously almost dead and I am pretty sure there was no possibility of recovery for it.  Still I thought the guy would want to know so I started to signal him.

This is where I need to say that there isn’t really a universal  gesture for “Hey you have a bird stuck in car’s bumper.”

I started out with an understood friendly, small, double honk to get his attention. Then I rolled my window down and shouted “you have a bird stuck in your bumper!” The guy didn’t roll his window down but looked at me smiled and nodded. I was sure he didn’t get the message. So I tried again. This time I pointed to the front of his car. I was sure the point would work. After all, I just wanted to make the guy aware of the situation. What better way than a point? Once again, he smiled and nodded. In fact, I am pretty sure that he added a thumbs up to the nod and smile. The light turned green and we both started to drive.

I went along side him trying to get his attention, but this guy was apparently very serious about road safety and thus kept his eyes focused on the road ahead of him. I decided to follow his lead and waited till the next stop light (there are plenty of them on Post Road/Church Street/Division Street) because while it is physically one road surface the city planners apparently thought it should have enough street lights for 3 separate roads, since it has three road names.). Once we stopped I pulled out my best form of communicating the truth of the basically dead bird stuck in his bumper.

I screamed, pointed, and I began to flap my arms like a bird. I even made a few bird sounds while I was doing this. Since I don’t really know the sound a robin makes I went with crow and dove sounds. An interesting combination of caws and coos. While not technically accurate for a robin stuck in a bumper, I did think it would still communicate the message more effectively than not including the sounds. I was very convincing. Unfortunately this guy most have been listening to a very interesting radio show, because he was too engulfed in whatever he was listening to for me to grab his attention. His eyes stayed forward. There most have been a segment of the radio program that caused him tension because I also saw his hands grip the steering wheel a little tighter. When the light turned green he turned left and I lost him.

So if you see an older gentlemen driving a red Ford Fiesta can you look and see if he has a bird stuck in his bumper still? Maybe you could also caw and coo at him so he will get the message about the bird.

I Promise It is a Chocolate Muffin Stain

This week’s sale item at Kwik Trip (a company I really like) are their muffins and I am a big fan of their double chocolate muffin.  So Tuesday I bought a double chocolate muffin for a treat on my drive over to Marshfield and Pittsville to visit some of the companies that I chaplain for. When I made it to my first company I noticed that I had dropped a few crumbs on my car seat. I didn’t think it was any big deal. I went through all my visits and had a great day.

When I made it home and swapped into some running clothes I discovered that I had a double chocolate muffin stain in the butt crack of my pants. Apparently I had been walking around all day with this stain in a location where a chocolate mark conveys a very embarassing message.

I promise it was a double chocolate muffin stain. Really.