Entertainment, Branson Style.

The "show" is the heartbeat of Branson Entertainment. Most revolve around singing, some involve dance, comedy, magic, martial arts, acrobatics, etc. We saw this family today. There are a lot of "family" groups in Branson. They have a certain similarity to them.

They range in numbers anywhere from a handful to a small village. One group we saw a couple years ago was a Mormon family. Five brothers, all singers, all married, all with many children. By the end of the show there was at least 50 people on the stage.

The whole family works the show. They work hard and are extremely talented. Like them or don't like them you can't argue with their talent. They work every aspect of the production. Ticket sales, and ushering and clean up. Some have hotels and diners and clean rooms and serve food. The "stars" aren't pampered or untouchable. There are 100 others shows in town just like them and they can't afford to be unapproachable or to rest on their accomplishments. I'm not sure they work any harder than average folks with 9-5 jobs but I think of the lack of talent and mind numbing "success" in these ladies:


...compared to the talent I've seen in Branson.





































The entire family is worked into the show. They all seem to be able to sing and play 30 instruments, no matter how large the family. I've often wondered as I watch a show what happened if one of the kids doesn't want to pursue the music/entertainment industry. I imagine the conversation would go something like this:

Child: Mom, Dad, there is something I want to discuss with you. I've been thinking about it for a while.

Mom/Dad: Yes, what is it?

Child: I know I come from a family of entertainers. And I know music has provided us with many opportunities, but I've decided it isn't for me. Instead I want to go to school and become a Doctor.

(Awkward silence)

Mom/Dad: (pausing to regain composure, conjure up support) Why? Didn't we raise you to be better than that? We always told you to find your own path, and make your own choices but what we meant was you could choose the french horn over the fiddle. A Doctor? (Dad looks to Mom) But what will we tell our friends?



There is also ALWAYS a tribute to the armed forces. It isn't optional. Every show works a military tribute into the line up. The most awkward one I saw was a show featuring a family of Native Americans. The main singer was full blood Native American and was adopted as an infant and didn't find out until he was an adult (after both parents died) that he was Native American. He reconnected with his birth family now tours with his daughter and several members of his tribe, performing Native American music and dance.
If ANYONE should get a pass from the military tribute it should be a group of Native Americans! With as lousy as our military and government has treated Native Americans I would think their tribute would consist of a defiant fist, with perhaps one raised finger......but they came up with a tribute. It mostly consisted of reporting on military involvement on the part of Native Americans in recent wars. (The Navajo Wind Talkers in WW2)




While waiting in line today to get tickets there was a member of the Brett family's road crew. His back was to me and I could see the cities in the "2011 Brett Family Tour". I scanned the list and saw.....New Castle, Wyoming. I have family in New Castle (hey Kristin!) and while it has been a while since I've been to New Castle, I remember it being quite small. I've never seen it listed in a tour schedule. We asked him about being in New Castle. He right away responded excitedly with, "Oh yeah, New Castle! It was this little place out in the middle of no where. No cell phone reception but man did they have good omelets. Wonderful omelets with steak in them. I want to go back to New Castle just to get another omelet." Well now... Of all the things I thought he'd talk about, omelets would have been way down on the list.

What say you, Kristin? Is there a restaurant in New Castle with really great omelets?

Pay Dirt.

I am on vacation in Branson, Missouri. A place with so much natural beauty is almost hurts to view it. A place where being 40 makes me a youngster. Branson is where old entertainers go to retire. Las Vegas for the over 80 crowd.

The day started in Indy at 4:00 AM. In a stroke of luck that could not be planned my departing flight left IND at 7:05. My BIL, Jake, was leaving for a missions trip and his flight left at 7:00. The entire house was up and bustling by 4:30 AM. There was time for me to see Jake's team checking luggage and taking care of last minute passport information. I then headed off to my gate to begin my journey.

After an uneventful flight I touched down in Kansas City and waited for my parents to meet me (driving down from Omaha). I got to spend some quality time in the Kansas City Airport. When looking out the windows your eyes are not sure what to make of the massive tarmacs, with gigantic airplanes coming and going and nestled just behind the concrete are acres and acres of.....grazing cows and farmland. Only in the Midwest!

While heading south of Kansas City some of our time was passed on the phone with Jami who excitedly relayed the story of mechanical trouble with the plane Jake was on which caused the airport to swap out planes--only it was a smaller plane. Passengers were being bumped and 11 members of his team made it on. The trouble being that there were 12 members, and number 12, Jake, didn't have a seat. He stood in the airport, completely alone, trying to figure out how to meet up with his team. One by one stand by passengers names were called. He realized he had all of the team's cash in his backpack. Finally, his name was called. The very last person to get a seat...

Meanwhile we were having to make our own important decisions. Namely where to eat lunch. We hadn't seen too many options for a while so when the first place popped up we headed towards it, despite the fact that it was an A/W Root Beer and Long John Silver. At the very last second as we were turning in I saw what could have been the letters "BBQ" on a building. We turned the car around, and found this:






Hopefully, the money they saved in repairs and upkeep was spent in food. We walked in and it was a tiny, little room with 10 or 12 tables, dark brown paneling, and a handful of customers. We seated ourselves and a pleasant woman approached the table. No uniform or name tag. She said today's special was chicken and something or other and....(I kind of zoned out).....everything is homemade and the mashed potatoes are peeled and mashed by hand. My attention was back. Ah. Pay dirt. We had hit pay dirt. I knew it. And I was right. A few thing were pre-made(buns and chips), but the rest was made from scratch. There was nothing fancy about the presentation. White plates. Serving sizes that were in line with what the average human should consume and not the mega portions we are used to from most restaurants--and the prices reflected portion size. Dessert was homemade coconut cream pie with homemade crust. It was amazing.





I've heard that if you are in an unfamiliar town and do not know where to eat to observe where the locals go. The locals went here. Really. Aside from our table and one other table EVERYONE knew each other. As one customer entered the waitress simply said, "today is the noodles". He nodded and seated himself. In one corner there was a group of people that could have perhaps been the Dukes of Hazzard, 30 years later after neglecting their dental work, hair care and all attention to fashion. Uncle Jesse was there, as were Bo and Luke. Daisy joined them at one point--the years hadn't been kind to her. They were loud and happy and very much enjoyed their fellowship around the table....and with everyone else that entered. Not being at their table was not seen as a reason not to visit with others.

It was a great find.

Up the road a bit we stopped at Gordon's for some peaches. I think their editors were on vacation this week. There was a sign advertising home "growen" tomatoes. There was also this sign I noticed as we were paying for the peaches:



I was so confused. Are they lucky because if you purchase two you might only pay $.25? If you ask for one do they make you take two? How would pricing work for three? Does this special make sense and I just don't get it?







The view from our table at supper.



This view is why I enjoy Branson. If I have to drive past the Osmond Brothers and Mel Tillis to get there, so be it!

Sometimes you have to know when to break the rules.

Tonight I went outside to water my plants--a job that by this point in the summer has long since lost its glamour. I've got my ipod going, with the ear buds firmly in place, paying no attention to my surroundings. I bend over to turn on the faucet, with my eyes down, happily lost in the book-on-cd I've downloaded and I hear......."Meow?". I swear. If a cat can form the sound meow to come out in the form of a question, this one did.

My first thought is that it is one of my cats and I can hear her through the window. Nope. My second thought is that one of my cats scooted out the door with me. Nope. I look around to see the source and find this:



Only it wasn't resting on the ground. It was stuck on a cat's head. (I've met this cat once before. I was watering my flowers and turned around and there she was. When she saw me she flopped down, exposing her belly, wanting to be petted. I obliged. We exchanged pleasantries and she was off.) The question I heard in the "Meow?" seemed now to say...."Could you help me out? I seem to have gotten myself into a situation here and I'm not sure what to do."

I froze. I had no idea how much distress this kitty was in. I'm a little surprised as I think back over the situation how quickly I took in the bizarre scene, triaged what she needed and acted. My first instinct was to rush towards her but if I knew if I did she might run. I made myself slowly walked towards her. I didn't want to grab the bag until I knew I had a good hold on it, because if she took off who knows if she would have gotten help before suffocating. Without a lot of drama or fuss she let me approach her, grab the bag and tug it off.

She still didn't bolt, so the next thing to check on was if she wanted some comfort. When I petted her she leaned in to my touch. Relaxed. Closed her eyes a little. Safety and comfort taken care of I noticed how thin she was. I know the first rule of stray cats is to never feed them because they'll just come back. I know. I know. I know. I kept seeing the image of this poor kitty with no one to love her, having to scavenge for food, ending up with a bag of cheese stuck on her head trying to feed herself. To heck with the rules.

I rushed in my house, grabbed a Tupperware bowl and a handful of cat food and rushed back out. To say she inhaled it would be an understatement. Poor thing. She was starved. I watched her eating and started mentally going through the steps it would take to get her cleaned up and make her mine. Vet visit, shots, declaw, introducing her to the other cats......but my plans were short lived. I let her finish her meal in peace and when I came back she was gone. I wondered briefly if she is part of a kitty grifter ring and the "head stuck in the cheese bag" was her go-to grift. I could hear her boasting to her kitty friends, "Heh. Heh. I swear it works every time. Walk up to a human with something stuck on your head and you should see how fast the food comes flying out!"

She may be back. She might not be. Either way she was brave enough to ask for help, and I was there to provide it.

Here you go, Sharon! :-)

I've told this story several times and it still hasn't gotten old, so I figure it is worth blogging. My mom and I recently had a conversation that went something like this:

Mom: "I got a response from something I put on Craig's List and let me see if you think this is somehow a scam."

Me: "If you have to ask it probably is."

Mom: "Someone is interested in your Dad's laptop and they want to know if I'll take Paypal. They also say that for my trouble they'll pay me $120 more than my asking price."

Me: "Ah. Total scam. We see this kind of thing at work a lot. Next thing he'll ask you to go out and buy two cameras, keep one for yourself, charge him for the whole thing and send it overnight to Nigeria regardless of the cost of shipping."

Mom: "Why would he offer to pay more than my asking price"

Me: "Because he is paying with a stolen credit card and doesn't care what he pays because--he's not paying for it. Best thing to do is just drop it. Don't write him back, just be done. Did he write in all caps and call himself something that is supposed to sound vaguely American like MR. KEVIN or MRS. SYLVIA?"

Mom: "Well....he signed it Paul McCartney."

There you go. This is where the scammer's sometimes clever plot falls apart. They sort of, but do not quite know how to blend in culturally. A friend at work thought they should have tried Bart Simpson. Princess Diana and Michael Jackson would have been just as effective.

Lordy, lordy look who's.....

You know how the title ends....40. And the answer is, yours truly. Well, almost. In less than 48 hours I will bid farewell to my 30's and enter my 4th decade on this earth. I'm not afraid of this birthday. I'm not depressed or anxious, or resistant....at least that is what I keep telling myself!

I plan to celebrate the heck out of this milestone. For the next 365 days is it my birthday. One big, year-long celebration. A few months ago my sister asked me what I was going to "do" for my 40th. Hmmmmmm.....avoid it. Worry. Pester my self for being 40 and not being married with kids. Look fondly in the rear view mirror and remember the good days. A very tiny voice in my head said....you don't have to do that, and if you did what good would it do?

Ah. And with that I let myself off the hook. Which felt good, because we were not designed for the hook. I'm just going to have fun with this birthday.

And the really good news is,I've got plenty of sick time banked that I can use when I need hip and knee replacement surgery :-) Perhaps I'll learn Braille while recovering from the surgery so I'll still be able to read when my eyesight goes. Maybe a subscription to Prevention magazine. The possibilities are endless.

40, ready or not here I come.

I said goodbye to an old friend today.

This week has been rough, but today was a killer. I've got three cats. They are going on 16, 15, and 14 years old. As far as medical drama goes they've been pretty low maintenance. Other than routine shots and check ups and declawings and such, I've had one visit to the vet for a UTI. (Well, there was the emergency visit when a box full of nail polish fell out of my closet. Several bottles shattered and unfortunately one of the cats was positioned close enough that she collected quite a bit of the nail polish. Her back half was now blue, purple, yellow and white. As the vet looked at the cat he said....well, we've never dealt with this one before. She got a pretty choppy shave job. )

Many times in their little kitty lives I've told them that when the time comes they are going to have to take care of it on their own because I didn't think I could make the decision for them. Yoko didn't get the memo. For a while now I've felt things weren't quite right with her. She just been deteriorating slowly and I've been watching for quality of life, and for the most part I could still see "her" and didn't sense any pain. A few days ago I noticed she hadn't moved from a particular spot for hours. She was dazed, and her eyes were vacant. I won't go on about the specifics, but I just knew where things were headed. I prayed so many times for release from "the decision". I kept hoping to find she wouldn't wake up and would go peacefully in her sleep.

This probably is the part where I should talk about how wonderful she was and all her enjoyable qualities and how much happiness she brought to everyone's life, but I can't. She wasn't that cat. She was shy and antisocial. Most people who have been to my house have never seen her because she won't come out. My nephew thinks he saw her once in 6 years. She was scared of almost everything and freaked out if you wanted to pick her up. But she was mine, and when all the other distractions and things that scared her were gone and when it was just her and me we got each other. Eventually she tolerated being petted by me. She was happy to be on the bed but if I tried to pick her up she was outta there.

Oddly though in the past couple days while she's spent most of her time sleeping, the place she chose to sit was my bed. When I got in bed at night she curled up as close to me as she could. When we were in the vet's office today and she was scared she set herself right against me and let me rest both hands on her to comfort her. I've been thinking...dang it cat. Why'd you wait until now to decide to buddy up with me?

She was nearly 15. She had a good, long life, but having to choose to end it just takes something out of you. Yoko is survived in death by Kiki, whom she loved very much and Kizzy whom she loved not at all. But I can't blame her. Kizzy is a difficult cat to get a long with. In the picture below Kiki is the one who is sitting on her. She loved him. Kizzy is the one who was usually not invited to be part of the in group, hence the positioning on the other edge of the bed.

Goodbye little buddy. Thanks for a good, long run.

Meagan is a momma.

One of the hardest things to do is wait for the news of how the story will end. Not quite a week ago my best friend's daughter checked herself into the hospital and was induced. The bride and groom in the gorgeous picture above (very top of my blog) started their family early into their wedded bliss. Shortly after their return from their honeymoon Meagan and Michael found out they were going to be parents. She was due in October. So we all set our clocks for mid-fall.

Meagan had several complications a long the way and her doctors began to worry for her health, so the plan became to keep Breydon in as long as possible without endangering mom or baby. And so we waited.

On Wednesday, 8 months to the day that we sat at Boat House and enjoyed rehearsal dinner and waited for the events of the next day, we waited for Meagan to have her baby. It was a new experience for me to get labor and delivery updates by watching face book! At about 12:45 a facebook post reported Meagan being at 1 cm. My first thought was....oh my goodness, this kid is really having a baby. I'm not sure what I thought was going to happened once she got to the hospital. Maybe that they'd hand Breydon to her. My second thought was....this is going to be a long night and there won't be news for a while. So I slept. Until the phone rang telling me Breydon was here. Meagan was fine. Despite being 6 or 7 weeks early the little guy was 5 pounds 6 ounces. Other than the normal 34 week preemie issues he was doing very well. I figured it was just about time to get up for work and then I looked at the clock. It wasn't even 2:30. 2 pushes and 11 minutes of hard labor. I think it was the first thing that was "easy" about the pregnancy.

Breydon continues to do well and pass mile stones, and barring anything unexpected we have a better idea of how the story ends.

I'll let the pics tell the rest of the story.


Proud dad!