(the return of) THE FRIDAY FUNNIES

My fellow smartphone addicts, today's edition has a common theme. See if you can detect what it is.

It's an unhappy commentary on modern life with a funny slant. Thanks to my contributors, have a great weekend, pray for some rain in Arizona (and California) and remember to always keep laughing!

THROWBACK THURSDAY

I was best man for my old buddy, Karl, when he married the love of his life, Cathy, a "few" years back. (Think my glasses are large enough?)

Coincidentally, today is another big day in Karl's life. It's his birthday. Happy day, pal.

ROCKIN' ROBIN

Here's what I want you to do. Turn up your audio and take a time travel trip back to the days of your youth. You'll see some familiar faces in the video, though much different than they are today.

And why, you might ask, did I ask you to take that journey with me?

Simple, (he said.)

I had a new visitor at the bird bath outside my window the other day.

The original rockin' robin.

Robins are famous for their wild and seemingly-frantic bathing in bird baths. But this fellow was content just to sit by the edge of the "pool" and take an occasional sip. Might have been too early for his swim.

TUESDAY TRAVELS

CHRISTMAS IN JUNE

Regular readers of this blog may recall SWMBO's struggles with her Christmas Cactus, which was showing real signs of life around St. Patrick's Day. You can re-read that short post here.

Eventually she placed the cactus out on the back patio and just look at it now.

Apparently it is more cactus than Christmas as it has burst into bloom in the high 90 degree temperatures of recent days.

The blossoms are beautiful to behold. The BRD's plant bloomed properly at Christmas last year but its blossoms were white. These are all this gorgeous orange-red color.

It's kind of nice to have Christmas during this pre-monsoon period of intense heat.

CELEBRATE!

To all of the dads in the world lean back, relax and have a great day of being honored today.

Oh wait! 

It's also the first day of summer so get thee to the grill and burn some meat for dinner.

Speaking of summer and burned meat, the period (hopefully brief here in the mountains or high desert) of "extreme heat" is upon us. Be careful of it and remember . . .

THE ANNUAL WARNING

Contrary to what you may have heard, the 15-year drought in Arizona is not over. It is dry out there.

And with that dryness comes the annual fire danger warnings. Right now there are no fire restrictions in our local forests but 24 abandoned campfires have been reported in this area in the last two weeks. With hot dry weather just one of those could spell disaster.

It is true that we had a wet spring but that has turned into a dry summer, with temperatures already reaching 95 degrees F. and humidity as low as 6 percent. It doesn't take many days like that to totally dry out the forest. And it's not even summer yet! The solstice doesn't hit until just after mid-day tomorrow.

So as Smoky the Bear always said: Only you can prevent forest fires.

And as Sergeant Esterhaus used to say on Hill Street Blues "Let's be careful out there."

FRIDAY

I'm not posting the Friday Funnies this week.

I don't feel funny.

I feel sad about my country.

Instead of laughing this weekend, join me in a few moments of meditation on the tragedy at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

THROWBACK THURSDAY

Father and Son

Some years back, two Taylors - - Bruce and Scott - - in an Italian restaurant in Scottsdale. I don't know whether the meal put him to sleep or it's just relief that I have my wallet out ahead of him. It was a fun evening.

UN LAPIN MALADE

The other day I wrote about our wildlife in the neighborhood and mentioned that SWMBO was mourning the lack of bunnies this year. Well it wasn't two days later that we were watching the warblers taking turns flying to their nest over our front entryway feeding a new baby when a bunny hopped right into our front yard. He then found a spot partially sheltered by some shrubbery and parked himself.

To SWMBO's delight, he then assumed a rock-solid equanimity and barely twitched a whisker for about half an hour as she watched him and the warblers.

This second picture is taken from my unsteady stance and through a screened window, hence the fuzziness. But, come to think of it, fuzzy might be just right for a bunny portrait.

Which brings to mind a bit of doggerel from my childhood:

Fuzzy Wuzzy was a bear.

Fuzzy Wuzzy had no hair.

Fuzzy Wuzzy WASN'T fuzzy,

was he?

With that bit of second-childhood nonsense I'll close this and leave you alone for awhile.

Oh and if you don't read French, the title of this blog post is Francaise for "a patient rabbit." (And I do know that it can also be translated as "a sick rabbit" but this one was definitely healthy. And, for the moment at least, free of bobcats.)

TUESDAY TRAVELS

Contrary to the signs, I think this was in West Missouri.

But I could be wrong. Show me.

ALIEN VISITORS

I have recently learned that we should have one of those huge signs that states, in very black letters, capitalized with an exclamation point, kind of like this: YOU ARE NOT ALONE!

What brings this to mind was an elderly couple (well, elderly like me, probably) driving very slowly past the front of my house in a bright blue Volkswagen Beetle convertible the other day. Wondering if they were looking for someone that I might be able to help them with, I stepped out. They backed up and the man asked me if I had seen the bobcat. 

"Bobcat?", said I. "No. Where?"

He said there had been a bobcat sitting in either my front yard or my neighbor's the night before and that it had then turned and leaped over the wall between our houses and disappeared.

Well!

Now another neighbor who works nights and comes home in the early, early morning had told me once that if I was up very early I might see bobcats, deer, coyotes, javelinas (wild pigs), and assorted other wildlife just walking down the alley between the houses or in the middle of the street. But I never have. Seen any of them or been up that early.

Oh, wait. One time a couple of months ago when SWMBO and I had been on a rare nightime outing and were coming home after dark our car's headlights had picked up a coyote at the side of the road. But that was in a ravine, not real near to houses.

Back to the fellow in the VW. He was a chatterer. He told me had lived in 31 different places in his life, around the United States and in Europe and Asia and he believed this was the best place he'd ever been. When I admired his car, he said it was his wife's toy. I jokingly said to her "but he doesn't let you drive it, eh?"

They laughed and he said that she calls him her chauffer.

He also said that they had been married for 62 years and that she was a Texas girl who he had chased and chased and chased until finally she caught him!

Anyway, he asked if I had any small animals. I replied that we had two cats but they were "inside cats" and he said "don't let them out or that bobcat will get 'em. They go after cats, rabbits, even small dogs."

Later, it occurred to me that I should alert my neighbor, a lady who lives alone but is presently caring for two medium-sized dogs. She was quite surprised about the bobcat but then told me that she had come home fairly late one night recently after attending a play and saw a pronghorn (frequently and mistakenly referred to as an antelope) standing in her front yard.

Well!

I'd have loved to have seen that. Or even the bobcat. Through a window from inside my house.

I did see a herd of cows in the savannah the other day. And I occasionally see a cottontail or a jackrabbit. But that's been about it so far this year.  SWMBO has been mourning the absence of "her" bunnies. Last year she had a steady group of them in our yard that she was feeding with carrots and lettuce. But this year none at all.

Maybe the bobcat got 'em.

YOUNG TORBECK . . . ISN'T!

My baseball buddy Steve looked like this when I first met him.

I'm surprised his back lasted with all the toting of that big old Auricon camera. But in time the cameras grew smaller. This is one of the few times I remember Steve wearing a tie.

Before he became Baseball Steve he was beer drinkin' Steve. That may have been why he was such a lousy pool player.

He's the guy in the corner trying to figure out which one of those balls is the cue ball.

Probably because of my huge influence on Steve, he grew a beard.

Looks happy doesn't he? He kept the hirsute look for many years before he finally shaved it off one day. It doesn't look like it made him happy.

I have tried to get him to grow it back over the years.

So far his wife Debbie has had more influence over him than I have.

But I'm glad to say that he has regained his sense of humor. Maybe it was that duet with Jimi Hendrix in Seattle.

Whatever it was, the irrespressible Steve Torbeck smile is back again.

A couple of months ago, I celebrated a big birthday and here's how Steve showed up for it.

Still a whack-oh! 

He's celebrating his 66th birthday today but he told me on the phone last night he still won't stop the Old Taylor lines.

Oh well. After 40-some years, I still love yuh, buddy. Have a great birthday.

AN EVENING MEDITATION

Another week is nearing its end and the sky is darkening with the setting sun lighting some clouds.

The wind has quieted and the wind chimes are still and silent for a change.

A tiny hummingbird stops by for one last drink, only his tail visible from this angle.

Soon the arms of darkness will wrap around the land and all will be quiet.

Except for these two idiots.

Sigh.

Perfection is difficult to attain.

die Freitag Funnies

So, all of you German students out there will understand the title of today's post translates to . . . the Friday Funnies!

And after that historical and educational post about General Lew Wallace yesterday, that means it's time to lower the level.  Here goes!

Here's a t-shirt for my pal up in Montana who blogs as Should Fish More, when he's not fly fishing.

To those of you who hate puns, that one is my last.

O.K. So I lied. But that pun really is my last one. (This week.) They give me a certain . . . feeling. I can't really define it. Or can I?

Or maybe it's . . .

What the hell was this sign painter thinking?

Maybe an acronym for Shut Off The Power??? At any rate, he must have been embarrassed.

What I don't like about hikes:

Actually, what I don't like about camping:

Yesterday I was reading other people's blogs and ran across one by the proprietor of Cranky Old Man who was complaining about his new hummingbird feeder that goes completely empty overnight. The hummers that come to our feeder scold and scold if anyone is sitting out in the immediate area. I don't speak hummingbird. A squirrel, now, he would just tell you when he has a complaint.

Isn't he polite? Unlike me, I'm afraid.

Oh well. I've got to go take a shower. For some reason my cat doesn't seem to like it when I do that.

And that's all, my friends. Thanks to all of my contributors (and theft victims), have a fantastic weekend and always keep laughing.

THROWBACK THURSDAY

This time we're going real far back. This is a photo of Lew Wallace of Indiana.

According to Wikipedia, he was a lawyer, author, politician, diplomat and a Union general in the Civil War. He and General Ulysses S. Grant had a longtime disagreement over whether he had followed orders at the battle of Shiloh. Wallace later resigned from the Army and became a major general in the Mexican army. After his service there he was appointed governor of the New Mexico Territory and later served as U.S. minister to the Ottoman Empire in Turkey. When the Spanish-American war broke out, Wallace offered to raise a force of troops which he would command but he was turned down by the War Office. He then went to a local recruiter and tried to enlist as a private but again was rejected, probably due to his age. He was 71 at the time.

During his time in New Mexico Wallace dealt with Billy the Kid in an attempt to have him renounce his outlaw ways. He offered him a full pardon if Billy would testify in a murder trial. The Kid took the deal and testified but the local district attorney refused to recognize the deal and set him free. Billy then escaped and continued his life of crime until he was shot by Pat Garrett.

Wallace retired to his home in Crawfordsville, Indiana, and wrote until his death in 1905. His most famous of many published books was Ben Hur.

Now, why, you might ask, am I posting about Lew Wallace? Because of a newspaper clipping my wife found in family papers of her ancestors on her mother's side. You may have to expand it to make out the words.

That newspaper clipping is 154 years old and was folded into a piece of paper with the handwriting of Judy's grandmother saying: "Please notice this clipping. This is our own Lew Wallace who wrote Ben Hur."  The family had arrived in Indiana in the early 1800's and probably knew Wallace personally.

So there you have it. A Throwback Thursday and a history lesson all rolled into one. It is sometimes amazing what one can learn from one's own family history.

TUESDAY TRAVELS

The leaning tower of Taylor (and Kansas).

DINNER

You want to know why I refer to my Judy as She Who Must Be Obeyed?

Because she can turn out stuff like this on the grill.

That's a tri-tip roast and sliced sweet potatoes.

Oh, yeah, baby!

Not shown are some peppers and onions and zucchini that were also done on the grill.

Here's how it all came onto the plates.

Delicious!

I think she deserved a Tony for this performance.