And This Is Why...

I love fall golf...look at that view...everything is so beautiful, calm and peaceful...well, until that treacherous water hazard lived up to its billing and swallowed my golf ball whole...

But to be fair, it was my 2nd tee shot...my first one was a line drive that drew to the left and since I wasn't satisfied with it, I teed up a mulligan, and...well, that's why they say don't insult the alligator until you've crossed the river.

Other than that little bit of unpleasantness I had a very enjoyable round.  I was able to par a couple of holes, bogeyed a few, and since it's not polite to swear in mixed company we won't discuss the others.

In Michigan in October sunshine is strictly rationed only to those souls who really need it...

...and I guess we qualified this weekend...

no, I did not make that putt...

course was too wet for carts, so I had the place all to myself...

The season will soon be over so I'm enjoying as much of it as often as I can.

Gotta give a happy birthday shout out to # 1 son, Micah...

...I won't say which one it is, but tomorrow is a big celebration for the 11th anniversary of his 29th birthday.

Happy birthday, Micah...as the Scriptures say, "...thou art my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my strength, the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power..."

God's richest blessings to you, my son...hope it's a great day for you.

Karen and Sarah toured the Holland power plant this week...

they have different scenes you can choose for your background...

Sarah modeling for the appreciative crowds...

Holland is one of the few cities in North America that uses hot water runoff from the power plant...

...to melt snow on the downtown streets and sidewalks during the winter.

Ain't we special?  You bet we are.

Watched a traditional favorite for this time of year...

What a fabulous send up of the 5 Frankenstein movies...the best being the original 1931 version of course.

Everyone in this classic does a great job, but this is Gene Wilder's movie from start to finish...

You should see this flick if only for the many "tribute touches" to the wonderful movies from the past...including a scene of the monster and Madeline Kahn that's an hilarious tip o' the hat to the Paul Heinreid / Bette Davis "two cigarette" scene in "Now Voyager".

Watch this movie...it's brilliant...

Next up...Shadow of the Vampire...

...another spectacular film, this one a fictionalized version of the making of that silent movie classic, Nosferatu.

The premise of Shadow is fascinating: suppose the actor who plays Nosferatu in the original film (Max Schreck) isn't really an actor...suppose he's an actual vampire.  What might happen then?

Chaos, confusion, terror for starters.

Very well done movie and both Willem Dafoe as Nosferatu and John Malkovich as Murnau are outstanding.

But as for the original silent movie classic...the eccentric to a fault / bona fide nuts German filmmaker, F.W. Murnau, wanted to make a movie out of Bram Stoker's horror classic, Dracula...but the author had died and his widow refused him permission.

Undeterred, Murnau simply changed a few names and made a thinly disguised version he called Nosferatu:

Yes, this is an early silent movie, but it's really creepy and probably the truest adaptaion of Stoker's novel.

Outraged, Stoker's widow sued and won, and all "known" copies of the film were mandated to be destroyed...thankfully not all of them were, and so it survives even today.

This is another one you should see, just to round out your cinematic education.

You do want to be educated, right?  You don't want to be an ignoramus, do you?

It was a busy Saturday afternoon, but I did take a few minutes to get my college football fix...

...and of course had to kick it old school.  Don't watch the NFL anymore, so if I watch football on TV at all it's college...but I still think small town high school ball in person is the best.

And while I was watching a little bit of the Corn Shuckers vs the Wildcats I heard a thump against the windows by the patio...looked outside and saw this pretty little feller...

...sitting there dazed and confused.  It was obvious the unexpected meeting with our windows had scattered his chickens and he needed a couple of minutes to compose himself.  Eventually I gave him a gentle nudge and he managed to right the ship and fly off into the wild blue again.

The big yank this weekend - besides enjoying the spectacular, crisp fall sunshine and colors - was having a gas line installed so we could put a gas log set in the mid century modern fireplace in our bedroom...

Our room is the coldest in the house in the winter...furthest from the furnace and all that ductwork is in the crawl space under the house...so now we'll have in room heat...insert excited "woo hoo" here.

Starting to get crowded around Mr. Tree Creature now...

As Rodney King once inquired, why can't we all just get along?

...as the squirrels have stepped up their food gathering activities.

And that should just about do it for this edition of the Atomic Monster Cafe.  Thank you for stopping by, taking your shoes off and setting a spell (with apologies to the Beverly Hillbillies).

later, mcm fans...

Much Ado...

...about not so much (with apologies to the Bard).

As it turns out, there was much preparation for very little...Mother Nature got pissed about something and blew up a storm on All Hallows' E'en, complete with gale force winds, the season's first snowflakes, and wind chills in the 20's.  Consequently our usual 100+ trick or treaters dwindled to some paltry sum less than 50.   Hardy souls they were, each and every one that braved the storm.

As Charlie Brown might say, rats!  Today I feel like Linus bemoaning the absence of the Great Pumpkin...all that time and effort preparing for the big night and in the end it was only Snoopy.

Lots of clean up today...besides putting all the decorations away for another year, we also have a major mess in the backyard from all the falling branches, courtesy of the wind storm.

Oh well...some pics from the not so big event:

My official work portrait...I stopped in at 9:30 for the costume contest...not sure if I won anything other than the undying respect of my terrified co-workers.

Our front entrance, scarified for the festivities...forgot to put out The Creature From The Black Lagoon, but he's light and probably would have blown away:

He was going to sit on top of the bushes, next to the Scare-wolf.

Should have taken a picture of the tree creature and his buddies...I set up the swinging bat and the raven in a cage on either side of him, hanging from the tree limbs

Yeah, it's a repeat of an earlier tree creature pic.

I think maybe the photographer had a little too much to drink, or else the house was tipping over when this pic was taken.

...or maybe it's just the miracle of perspective?  Still looks a little tipsy, but this time I was the photographer.  Was that one whiskey I had or two??

Mr. Bolts and his lovely bride...kinda looks like Cher, doesn't she?

...and their beautiful daughter, Sarah the Huntress.

Ah well...there's always next Halloween.

A couple of my phones arrived last week, so I rearranged some of my collection to set up my Talk Through The Decades display:

That's a panoramic shot of them...looking from right to left is the 19-teens candlestick phone; next to that is the 1920's Western Electric 102B1 phone; the blank spot is where the Danish KTAS D30 phone from the 1930's will go...a brief interlude to enjoy a fine, Wild_Hare 5 cent cigar from the humidor, then we rejoin the tour with a Western Electric model 302 "I Love Lucy" phone from the 1940's; then a Western Electric Spacesaver phone from the 1950's - that one is actually hooked up to our land line; and finally a 1960's Swedish Ericofon in lovely Barbie pink...keep your comments to yourself.

I went right to left instead of the more traditional left to right b/c I wanted the spacesaver to be hooked up and working and the phone jack is on the left...could run a longer line, and if I get one I may move things around, but for now that's the setup.  The 1930's Danish phone should be here next week.

Today will disappear in a flurry of exciting tasks, either work or nature related, so it's into the fray we go.

Later, mcm fans...

Labor Day...

If you look closely at the end of the log on the left you can see the remains of my early morning cigar...

...weekend.  Started this Friday morning at 5:30 with a problem from work...appropriate I suppose since we are after all celebrating labor...so I got my butt out of bed and fixed yet another problem caused by a recent operations upgrade from hell.

Since I was up anyway, I showered, padded downstairs, and spent some time outside in the pre-dawn darkness...eventually decided to enjoy an early morning fire, and shortly after sunrise, a good morning cigar.  No whiskey...yet...

So this week we and a couple of neighbors paid to have several trees removed from the property behind us that were blocking the horizon and crowding out the sun...here's the new view:

kinda reminds me of Sinatra's Twin Palms...ok, I'm reaching...

That view used to be dominated by a wall of walnut trees...now we can see blue sky and sunshine...unfortunately we can also see the outline of an ugly apartment building, but that's life in the big city I guess.

While we're on the subject of trees, here's another addition to my upcoming Halloween display:

The Tree Creature during the day...

...and at night.

If you're not a fan of Halloween, we should talk...but either way, you have to admit this is cool...I'll put a spot light on him to add to the creep factor that night.  As always our goal will be to give the little trick or treaters an old timey spooky thrill, some great candy, and the gospel of Jesus Christ.  A good time will be had by all...

Earlier this week I got a surprise in the mail from Bob Adams of www.RonsonRepair.com and this time he was in cahoots with Karen...sent a package to her attention, and this was the surprise:

I think Bob knows this may be the closest I'll ever get to having my own bowling lane...what a great lighter...thank you Bob!  Oh, the ashtray it's sitting on was also a gift from Bob.  Truly, he is all about his passion for collecting, fixing, and promoting Ronson lighters and related items.  Very cool!

So the rest of today will be about getting down to the Douglas / Saugatuck area, browsing the antique mall there, then bowling a couple of games at the LakeView Lanes.

Oh yeah, that's what I'm talking about...(please ignore the fact that was a brooklyn strike...even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while...)

Later, mcm fans...