Back to Back

Back to back. B2B.This weeks topic comes to us from Maris.



Now what - you may ask -  does this song have to do with the topic? It's Blake  Shelton's 14th consecutive number one  record. That's back to back to back to back to back to back to back to back to back to back to back to back to back to back to back. I am not the world's biggest country fan but that is still quite impressive.

Barrack Obama won back to back presidential elections as did Bill Clinton, George W Bush, Ronald Reagan and other two-term presidents.

2 grand slams in back to back at bats in an inning. accomplished by Fernando Tatis, St. Louis Cardinals, April 23, 1999 - now that is impressive


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Also in baseball a double header is back to back games between the same teams on the same day

One pitcher has thrown back to back no hitters in the history og MLB.

Baseball - with its myriad stats - is ripe for such trivia it seems.

I've been known to consume back to back beers on multiple occasions, as hard as that may be to believe. Ahem. I've also offended consecutive people on multiple occasions with back to back smart ass comment - again I am sure y'all find that hard to believe.

So there you have it - a bit of B2B trivia for future use. Time to check out my LBC brethren to see what they have to say. See ya next week - same bat time, same bat channel.

James Thurber's Dogs

Thurber says:

1. Dogs are obsessed with being happy.
2. He had as much fun in the water as any person I have known. You didn't have to throw a stick in the water to get him to go in. Of course, he would bring back a stick to you if you did throw one in. He would even have brought back a piano if you had thrown one in.
3. I am not a cat man, but a dog man, and all felines can tell this at a glance—a sharp, vindictive glance.
4. I myself have known some profoundly thoughtful dogs.
5. If I have any beliefs about immortality, it is that certain dogs I have known will go to heaven, and very, very few persons.
6. If you are a police dog, where's your badge? [Asked of his German shepherd]
7. In his grief over the loss of a dog, a little boy stands for the first time on tiptoe, peering into the rueful morrow of manhood. After this most inconsolable of sorrows there is nothing life can do to him that he will not be able somehow to bear.

Ginger  (see image above) says

1. I am not obsessed - it's just the way I am.
2. Throw a piano in the water and you are on your own big boy!
3. The only good cat is a flat cat - unless it wants to play nice with me.
4. Me too - one sniff of their behind and you can tell.
5. He got that one right.
6. That's a bone spitter!
7. There's nothing worse than losing your best friend - even if he/she only has 2 legs.

And  then there's this one that says it all -

The dog has got more fun out of Man than Man has got out of the dog, for the clearly demonstrable reason that Man is the more laughable of the two animals.

Thurber packed a ton of human observation ihat he shared in his dog tales. I for one am about to read more - and to see what the other LBC bloggers have to say on this topic - brought to us by Lin.

I'd rather be.......

I'd rather be sipping a glass of Glenlivet neat
I'd rather be eating a rare steak than a well done steak
I'd rather be riding a motorcycle and will soon make that happen
I'd rather be drinking a cold beer than a room temperature beer
I'd rather be watching a gorgeous sunset than a gorgeous sunrise

I'd rather be me than you - regardless who you are - I know how much effort it took to get me here and although I am far from perfect I am not badly broken. I'm comfortable being me - extra X's and all.  There's never a dull moment in the insanity that is my family. What more could one ask for than a bit of uncertainty every day??? Life would be extremely dull without it.

You've heard this one from me before but it fits...

Road hogs

This weeks LBC post comes from Dame Quixote - aka Padmum.

I  haven't enjoyed recreational driving much since  my time in Hawaii when my only means of transport - rain or shine - was my Suzuki 550.




In spite of enormous volumes of traffic riding the highways and back roads on Oahu was a pleasure. The bike made avoiding road hogs relatively easy, I recall hitting the north shore on the day the big waves hit - parking in the lot above Waimea Bay with a shave ice from Matsumotos and just watching in awe as the waves crashed. Then there wqs the sail plane beach - where glider pilots buzed the beach while learning to fly.

Since those halcyon days driving has been merely perfunctory - simply getting from point A to point B. Since I grew up in the SF Bay Area heavy traffic was  the norm and so it never bothered me much.  When I rode my bike I road under the assumption I had a massive target on my back and everyone was out to get me - I was the ultimate defensive driver. The net result of that was in all my years of motorcycle riding I have never laid one down or been hit.

I was recently  thinking of investing the money on a newer, bigger model to get around in my retirement -



It's approximately 3 times the engine size of my 550 and would make me  - on size alone - a road hog.  Then again, perhaps karmic entanglements over the years have used up my riding luck.  Decisions, decisions.

Regrdless, road hogs are not something I worry about. There are far too many important things with which to occupy my mind. Now I think I'll ee what the other LBC folk have to say on this subject.