Yard Sales!

Well this weekend is going to be a great weekend indeed. Ya see, my wife and me are headed to the lake to stay the weekend with Mom and Dad. The Lake House is such a relaxing place. We will fish off the dock and maybe play some cards. Mostly we will just spend quality time catching up. However, the lake house also means saturday morning Yard Sale huntin!!!
Growing up my Mom and Dad didn't have a ton of money. Basically, I guess we were kinda poor. Mom always seemed to get me whatever the heck I wanted so I didn't notice that fact much. Whenever we would get the urge to spend some money we would load up and go to Yard Sales and thrift stores. We would always have a good time. Most everyone in our family collected something or other. This made it even easier to find something cool. You might spot something an Aunt or Uncle collected and get it for them. In return they would do the same when they went. The things we looked for the most were Antiques. We would get all excited about any kind of Antique we could find. Mom and Dad are experts in knowing what something is. They also have eyes like eagles when it comes to yard sales. Guarantee ya they will spot something before you can. Nothing was more fun than finding something, then talking the person down from a dollar to fifty cents. Then you could take your treasure home and look it up in a book to find out it was worth a whole lot more.
Nowadays, because of shows like Antique Road Show and Ebay, you can forget about finding a deal in a thrift store. Even most yard sales price stuff out of the roof. However, if your patient and look real hard you can still find a deal from time to time.
Every old peice of junk that we have collected over the years are almost priceless to me. When I walk by and look at any of them I see not only the history it represents but the memories it made for me!!!

Bow and Arrow Troubles!

My Dad decided to build a back porch on our house. It took him quite some time to finish it too. He put painless ours into it and had just gotten the green fiberglass roof panels up when this all took place.

Well, ya see, I recieved a bow and some arrows from somewhere. Mom told me I could shoot them in the back yard but to be careful cause they were dangerous. I was having a great time shootin the arrows. The only problem was that I only had like four arrows and it was getting old chasing them across the pasture. I decided it would be much easier to shoot em straight up in the air to see how high they went. Plus, you didn't have to chase em as far. After shooting up a couple I had it down pat. That is right up until one of them didn't go quite straight up and when it came down it went right in Dad's new roof. I quickly climbed up on the roof of the house and managed to lean over on the porch roof and pull the arrow out. In a scurry I climbed back down to assess the damage only to find a very little hole about the size of a dime. Sure that Dad wouldn't see it I returned to the bow and arrow. Lesson learned I decided I should move further away from the house before continuing. However, the very next arrow I shot came down directly in the middle of the porch roof. In a panic I realized that I wouldnt be able to reach it from the roof or crawl on the new roof to retreive it. I entered the porch and could barely grab the tip of the arrow hanging from the roof. It wouldn't budge and I realized at this point I was screwed in a big way! When Dad came out on the porch the first thing he noticed was the arrow. He turned to me and gave me a look that made me certain I was probably close to my last breath. Course I told him i was sorry about a bazillion times. When he asked me what was I thinking I replied with my usual answer "I don't know!" For some reason I never seen the bow and arrow again!!

The Bicycle Stories #1 in the series

As I grew older, despite the accident with the rose bush, my love for riding a bike grew. I rode my bike most everyday after school and almost all day every day during summer. Almost every hill I came across turned into a little jump. Performing wheelies was a regular pretty much wherever I went. As I got better on my bike at doing tricks I also got a bit more cocky. Anytime I could show off for someone was the perfect time. Never to be outdone I would go to drastic measures to out ride any of my buddies.
This brings me to the ramp I built on the dirt road in front of our house. Ya see, the little hills just weren't cutting it anymore for me cause I was more advanced than that. So one day I set out to build a ramp. I found a couple of sheets of plywood in the barn. One was about three feet long and the other about five. Three concrete blocks later the ramp was done. With two blocks under the jump ramp and one under the landing ramp it looked perfect. Now I'm no dummy so I started with them close together. This quickly became an easy challenge so I began to move the landing ramp away from the jump ramp. Soon the ramps were about eight feet or so apart. I was airing that sucker out! About that time my Mom and Her boss came out of house. Mom told me to move the ramps so her boss could get his truck out of the drive way. No way was I gonna move it without one last jump. I mean, heck, I finally got an audience!! I sped back down the rode yelling "Hey ya,ll watch this!" Well little did I know that while I had been jumping the ramp over and over that the front board had been moving back a tiny bit at a time. Hitting break neck speed I hit the ramp with mom and her boss paying close attention. As soon as my front wheel hit the ramp the front board fell to the ground. I never had a chance. When the bike hit the bricks I was tossed like a lawn dart over the handle bars. I flew in the air a very long way. As a matter of fact I believe it was probably just shy of eight feet. Hitting the landing ramp in the front without the bike was definitely not the awe inspiring landing I was looking for. I'm pretty sure it was the landing ramp brick that broke my fall and knocked the wind out of me. Once I came to a stop I couldn't catch my breath. Finally right before I was sure I was gonna die I got a breath and realized besides a few scratches and bruise that I was alright. Right about that time mom yelled "That was a great trick. Do it again!"