Captain Catastrophe film now on You Tube!

Check out the Captain Catastrophe film on You Tube:



Or go to link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05q3vlN2RQ0

Captain Halloween

So this is Halloween. I love Halloween. Well, mostly. Kinda. Y'know.

There are two things to do at Halloween. The first is my favorite: scare children. I love Halloween because you can scare children and it's perfectly okay. No one minds. Mostly. Kinda. Y'know.

So Halloween will come. I have the kids all programmed. I play spooky music on the porch. Sometimes, I run the fog machine, but that thing is mostly lame, so that isn't always the case. Then I put out one of those bowls that has a hand sticking out and when someone reaches inside, it grabs you. It's scary and fun. I love it.

Sometimes I like to dress scary, too. Or pretend to be a corpse and when the kid comes near I pop up and scream "Boo!" or "Join us in our unholy resting place." Something creepy like that. Or I just stare at the kids while pulling the cord to start my chainsaw. Good times. Anything to help children learn a valuable lesson: the guy down the street hates children...I mean...don't take candy from strangers. With chainsaws.

The other part of Halloween, the part I don't like particularly, is the whole fighting the forces of evil angle. That gets mighty tiresome. You'd think coming up against a formidable opponent like the Captain here, they'd have had their fill. But, noooooo. They keep coming back for more. Suffering fools.

Now, I don't want to say I'm attacked by monsters frequently. I don't want to, but I think it is accurate. I mean, I've been attacked four times already. Four seems fairly frequent to me. If someone has been attacked five times, I'll happily set aside my whole frequently attacked by monsters mantelpiece to ya, pal. You can have the plaque, the trophy, the whole durn thing.

Each time I've been attacked by a monster it's been right in the heart of my birthday season. (My birthday is October 25th. Make checks payable to "Tim Kretschmann Monster Fighting Fund," please.) Some people actually don't know the idea of birthday seasons. These people are morons. Let me explain.

Your birthday season encompasses the time from your immediate family member's nearest birthday until your birthday. During this "season" all other immediate family members must follow your every command. This is part of being the "birthday boy." Obviously, some of us get screwed. My dad is the birthday before me but it is on September 23. My brother is after me in May sometime (he always tells me when it is coming up--why should I remember it? Kidding-May 26th. I think.) So clearly, you can see I am screwed. I only get one month. However, there is an odd ruling on this. Since my brother has nearly half a frigging year, it is not FAIR! Luckily the ruling states that since I'm the first born and my birthday lands on a 25th (this is key), my rule is absolute during its duration. Basically, this means I can declare his entire birthday season as null and void.

Hah!

Of course, this upsets the ancient ones and they send merchants of death to dispatch me which leads us to the whole monster attack thing. And you thought I forgot!

The first time I was attacked, I was in a gym exercising. So, you know, I was traumatized. And thus, I don't do this anymore.

The second time I was eating some vegetables. Sad how these monsters attack my very lifestyle.

I'd like to say the next time I was attacked I was about to make love, but I want the story to sound plausible. Come to think of it, maybe this is why I keep getting attacked. They always come after the virgin. Somebody--please--save me.

Well, had to try.

This leads me to another thing...lousy law enforcement here. A number of law enforcement types read these columns and they need to know--I've yet to be saved from a Soul-Sucking Thaddeus Gorilla Monster from a member of law enforcement. C'mon, guys. You got to get on this. I don't think you are taking the whole Gorilla Monster threat as seriously as you could. I would like to suggest a task force to fight this. And school uniforms. Get on it.

So this last time, this beast comes at me with its massive, blood drenched claws. Now, these were CLAWS not PAWS. Paws come on pets. It's part of the alliteration from initial consonant sounds. Which means claws generally come from canaries. (Actually, for a true alliteration, the "cl-" sound should be repeated, but I couldn't think of anything PG-13, so you are stuck with a canary clawed gorilla monster.)

It inched toward me reading the poetry of e.e.cummings, an obvious sadist. I, luckily, had an ancient amulet of Escorial and spoke the magic words, "Knowing is half the battle" (Yes, it's a really obscure pop culture reference--we'll see who gets it) which caused a cataclysmic bolt of energy as usually happens in this kind of situation.

The clean up was horrendous. Thank goodness from the trunk monkey.

Now some of ya's are thinking, "No fair. Tim didn't get injured. And this story isn't even true. There is no such thing as monsters."

Well, pish-posh. It was a real monster. And blonde, too. I'll show you right where she pulled my heart out and stepped on it, if ya want.

And trust me, there were other "c" words to go with the claws, but I'm a gentleman.

Wishing you all a Happy Halloween and successful battles against monsters of all kinds,

Captain Catastrophe

The Captain Cooks

So there I am in my car. I used to call it the Red Rocket, but since I saw Cartman on South Park pleasure a dog to raise his "Red Rocket" I've taken to calling her Erika. Come to think of it, it's sort of weird I have to name my cars...but there you are.

I kind of wish everything were as easy as being in my car. The past week has been really odd. I've felt a little lost, as of late, and had decided to "get back to the basics." I've been eating out, pretty much exclusively, for the past two to three months and have always enjoyed eating at home. It was time to get back in the kitchen where things made sense. Like when I would make the Ramen Noodles when I first moved out because I was scared to death of my own budget to pay the mortgage.

Ahh...the good old days.

So I'm in the car, and I set the GPS (that's "Gretchen" by the way) to the nearest Pick 'n' Save. Time to do a little grocery shopping. In my head, I'm trying to recall my favorite recipe as Gretchen calls out my next move.

My GPS is a life-saver. It sits on my dash, patiently, and calls out what I should do next. Turn right. Turn left. Make a U-turn. Best of all, if I miss my turn--it doesn't get mad. It simply states:

Recalculating...

...and it figures out a new route. A new way to meet my goals. I would love to have a life GPS. Go to school. Graduate. Get a job. Get a better job. Buy a house. Get a girlfriend.

Oops. I missed my turn again.

Recalculating...

Some routes just are too difficult for me to follow. So I get to the store.

The way men shop is very different from women. I think it comes back to a matter of goals. Men shop only as a means to purchasing an object. Women shop as entertainment. Thus, men go into a store, find their object and if the price is tolerable, they are out of there. Women seemingly have no purpose to entering a store other than "browsing." This is the opposite approach the sexes have to the Internet by the way. Women jump on, read their e-mail and they are off like a shot. I need to browse. Mainly for porn. It's free, so why not?

Okay, maybe it doesn't really translate. Well, I guess my point is I had a list in mind. It was clear. It was simple. But this was not my home Pick 'n' Save.

I found most of my items quickly because I'm all gifted and such, but for the life of me, I couldn't find the last item: Nutmeg. Excuse me, but what the heck is nutmeg anyway? If it is nuts, just say you are nuts--no need for this Frenchified hassle and high minded wiggle words. What if turkey wanted to get all sophisticated--would it become turkeymeg? I think not.

So I'm pulling my hair out--which is not a good strategy by the way--and also not a good idea. If you saw my father, you would know I don't need to pull my hair out. It will come out soon enough. I see this young lady in whatever it is they call that modified apron they make the Pick 'n' Slave (which is what my buddy Bob, who used to work there called it) employees wear.

"Excuse me, Miss. Could you help me?" I could tell by the way she turned, human relations was not a skill she particularly excelled in.

"So? What do you want?"

I wouldn't mind a night with Angeline Jolie if she would kick that annoying Pitt fellow out of bed, but that wasn't what I was there for. "I'm looking for nutmeg."

--Had she said, "Good luck with that," at this very moment I would not have been shocked. No, she put herself way out by vaguely pointing toward a sign half a mile off. I followed her pointer finger over to the intended target and by the time I turned back to see what the heck it was she was pointing at, she had vanished.

Now that's talent. She has a future in upper management. I was still without my nutmeg.

Recalculating...

So, I found a matronly type and asked her. "Nutmeg? What are you going to use nutmeg for?"

"I thought I would use it as an alternate fuel in my automobile."

"Yeah. Okay. I can see that." She looked like the brunette from the B-52s. Or Boy George. Definitely from the 80s. I figured there was a screw loose there somewhere or some serious drug usage. That must affect the circulation to extremities, because this one chose NOT to point. "In aisle 10. By the spices."

Spices? Why not by the nuts? What the heck? That little "meg" business made a big difference.

Turn left.

So I went to the aisle and I'm faced with two hundred little tiny little containers that look exactly the same except for a label in a type font the size of the fine print on a cigarette print ad--if such things were still allowed. Spices and soup. And cereal. I think I have spent at least three of my thirty-five years staring at these in grocery stores. Cereal was always the coupon for some kind of cereal that the grocery store didn't have. At the soup, it was always trying to find that darn "Cream of Cheese" soup. --and making sure it was the good condensed stuff.

And spice. Well, this was my first trip here. What is this junk anyway? And where's just some normal salt, for crying out loud?

Finally, I find the nutmeg after standing in place longer than one of those guards at Buckingham Guard that tourists with too much time on their hands always try to make laugh. I always want to tell those people, just do something really UNFUNNY. They don't expect that. And they are British. They have that weird sense of humor. They'll be putty in your hands.

Next time you are there, just whisper in their ear, "I believe I need to buy an egg." See what happens. That's big comedy to those British types. Then, offer to brush their teeth.

So I get back in the car, program the GPS to find my house (because I have this darn tendency to get lost) and take off for home.

I get out the mixing bowl, the wooden spoon, a pot for boiling water, the spaetzle maker, and a measuring cup. And I have at it.

4 eggs. Check.
3 cups of flour. Check.
1 tablespoon of that Frenchified nutmeg stuff. Check.
1 cup of water. Check.
Lots of Maggi. Trust me on that.

All in the mixing bowl. Boy, that looks pretty full. Maybe I should find a bigger mixing bowl.

Nah.

Once swish of the wooden spoon was all it took. Flour apparently has no relationship to gravity because once it became airborne, it was everywhere. Particularly on my clothes, which apparently fulfilled the role gravity would generally have. It looked like I just got hit by Milton Berle with that "MAKEUP" pad.

Recalculating...

So, I pull out the Dustbuster and clean up what was readily accessible telling myself that it is only flour and if I miss some, the maid will find it next week.

I should have bought a cordless model.

Right turn in 500 feet.

I reached for a far flung little bit of flour and out popped the electric cord. The plug landed right in the kitchen sink. In a bowl I had filled with water to soak milk out of it. I pulled the plug out and watched the viscous water with a white tint drip off of the thing.

Turn right now.

So I dried it off by blowing on it. To make it really dry, I stuck the plug in my armpit, lowered my arm to get my shirt wrapped around the plug and pulled it out. There. Perfectly dry.

The water in the pot was beginning to boil. Time to finish off the mixing. And this clean up!

So I plugged in the dustbuster again.

The sparks were pretty.

Recalculating...

The Captain at the State Fair

Captain Catastrophe here.

It's been a while, but something kind of happened today that I had to share.

Many of you that know me personally know that this year I went to State Fair quite a bit. Now, I'm really NOT a big State Fair fan. I mean, agriculture is not a big thing for me and frankly looking eyeball to eyeball what will later be a delicious main course isn't my idea of a good time.

But I live in West Allis these days and see it almost as a point of civic pride to go. And our State Fair IS ranked one of the top fifty state fairs in the entire United States. Pretty much.

Think about it. What would State Fair in New Jersey be like? Well, folks, step right up and see the toxic waste disposal exhibit. Pet the oozing barrels of chemical substrate. I bet we're at least ahead of New Jersey. At least.

Anyway, been eating too many items on a stick--never thought I'd express that sentiment--and my tummy ache is clearly going to take another nice evening of trips to the bathroom to clear up.

Oh, goody.

Apparently beer is something a lot of people drink at the Fair. Me? I find the Maple Syrup Root Beer. Why? First, it's $1.50 and everything else down there is $3.00. And I mean everything. Cream puff? $3.00. Pretzel? $3.00. Chicken wings? $3.00. Corn dog? $3.00. Opportunity to perform surgery on a horsey? $3.00. Everything. Corn on the cob, oddly, is $2.50. They must have missed the memo.

The other reason is that Root Beer has more sugar than any other drink I've ever tried. Unbelievable amounts. I've had some German company here for German Fest and some relations this past months. On two separate occasions, these funny little foreigners have tried root beer and both said it tasted like the same thing: Bubble Gum. Obviously, these people eat too much pork to know what is tastes good. It's sad, really. I cry for them.

On the first Saturday of the Fair, I went with some friends (I won't mention who to protect Chrissy) and we saw this cow. It was a psychopathic cow.

The cow kept sticking its tongue out and it looked really funny. So comedian that I am, I decide to try to take a picture of the cow with the tongue hanging out. Only problem: I have a digital camera.

It's a great camera. Lots of bells and whistles but it suffers from the same malady as all digital cameras and most senior citizens: when you finally give it the go-ahead it takes it's sweet time and often misses the important event completely. Thus you push the button and a second later the picture is taken. But when a tongue is going in and out and seemingly random intervals; it's hard to catch the funny cow. For digital cameras, you miss the shot. With senior citizens, mainly they miss the toilet bowl.

Well, one of those 4H type kids was watching with some amusement my problem as I took shot after shot of the cow and not catching the tongue hanging out. She comes up to me and says, "Are you trying to get a picture of the cow with its tongue out?"

"No," I wanted to respond. "I want to have sexy photos of this cow to louse up its chances for a congressional seat run this fall." Instead I lamely nodded my head.

So she jumps into the hay there and starts grabbing inside the cow's mouth. "Watch out," I say, "it's going to bite you."

"Aw, no. It ain't gonna. Cows only have teeth on the bottom of their mouth."

Thought I'd throw in an educational moment in there for you. Proves I learned something at State Fair.

The resulting photo is right there. She pulled the tongue out for me to take a picture of it. Gross as all get out. Now it can give you nightmares, too.


To wash the incident from our minds, we went to get a cream puff. Now, when I went with my friends, no incident. The line moved briskly, everyone got the correct order and no worries.

That's because my superpowers had not yet kicked into high gear.

Friday, I went back to the Fair and decided to grab a cream puff. The line was rather lengthy but I couldn't think of anything else to do and it moved pretty quick anyway. (Not like that darn "Superman" ride at Six Flags on Monday!) I got my Puff and actually ate that without incident either. However, the puff in my hands was not the one I should have had my eye on.


A very evil cream puff was lying in wait for me on the blacktop. And I, with the skill of a panther, stepped right in it. I'm still shocked I didn't fall completely over, but it was slick and it just must have been the fact that there were a lot of people nearby with good karma around that weren't destined to have me fall on them.


I was pretty po'ed, but I found a nice puddle that I'm sure already had decaying fecal matter from livestock already dissolving in it and rinsed the sole of my shoe.

Well, today I was at the Fair again and walking out of the park when I spied another cream puff lying in my path. I deftly navigated around it and found a park security person and told him about the puff. I said, "You better have someone clean that up. Someone could step in it and possibly injure themselves."

He looked me in the eye, laughing and said, "What type of idiot would step in a cream puff? Let alone fall over?"

I nodded at him knowingly and said, "You'd be surprised how many idiots would do something just like that."

Hope you had a great State Fair.

Sincerely,

Captain Catastrophe

Don't Worry. I'm injured.

I can't believe this. I only send that e-mail out to 20 or so people and two people replied yesterday that they were disappointed that I wasn't injured!

You folks are sick. I won't even tell you one of them was my mother. Sick, I tell you.

I mean, I do have plantar fasciitis, so I am limping around today. Six blocks was just this side of crazy for an old cripple like me. If, someday, I could extract that plastic insert in my shoe and melt it in the backyard like my old Star Wars action figures, I'd be the happiest man on Earth.

But, I want to make you all happy, so I'm bringing you a tale of woe.

Well, I've told this story once before, but it never got captured on the website (http://timkretschmann.blogspot.com)so I thought I would get after it. And German Fest is right around the corner, and that's usually a good opportunity for me to be completely injured.

A couple of years at German Fest, I cooked Spanferkel. For the three of you that read this outside Milwaukee or without a German background, spanferkel is roast pig. Generally done on a spit. Not spit on. On a spit. C'mon, people, work with me.

Anyway, one year, the brain trust at German Fest decides to make a new menu selection: the Spanferkel Sandwich. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a roast HAM SANDWICH! That people were willing to shell out $6 for a bun with roast ham on it continues to mystify me. But people do what they do.

I was given an actual grill rig. A carousel with 6 trays rotated within it. Four removable drawers were along the bottom. You could fill these drawers with charcoal and a grate kept the coal from being from top to bottom. This kept air flow and maximum heat. We would get a BLUE FLAME on that coal fairly often. And blue flame is no joke.

A similar grating system was on each tray so the oil and grease would collect in the bottom of each tray and keep that really exciting ham out of that lard. Oh, yummy.

They still sell this by the way. I suggest the Rollbraten. I suggest the Schnitzel. I suggest if you want a Spanferkel Sandwich to buy $6 of ham, grill it and you'll have 20 sandwiches for what this thing is. It tastes fine, mind you, but I just don't get it when we have such good food.

Don't believe there's good food? Check out the previous post and my bouts with weight.

I digress.

So I'm shoveling this nasty charcoal into the drawers. And it's heavy and filthy. It's that charcoal that looks like wood--not the nice chemically treated briquettes. I get that into the drawer, start the fire and let it begin to cook. I then wash up (I would wash up like thirty times as I went between meat prep and shoveling coal. Necessary evil, I suppose.) and I would start to cut the slabs of meat. Everyone told me to cut "with the grain of the meat."

I went with the "perpendicular is good enough" approach. Grain of the meat, my hind end. You go look for a butcher you want that crap. I cut the meat in half. There you go. Don't like it? Hire a butcher.

I was so tough when I did this because I had a really big, sharp knife. By the end of the day, it would be as dull as a rerun of "Night Court" without John Larroquette and my hands would have grooves from where I applied pressure to chop the meat.

I'd place the meat on the trays and it would cook for approximately one hour. Halfway through, I would turn the meat over, so a nice grating pattern would grace both sides. Didn't really need to, I suppose, since the meat would be sliced deli style afterwards, but I thought it cooked more thoroughly that way.


When a load was done, I'd take the meat off the grate and the grease would bubble away in the bottom of each tray. I'd take the meat in, shovel new coal into the drawers, and start the process over. After stoking the fire, I went inside to wash up and I came back to this.

The grease had caught fire.

I've never encountered a grease fire before and this baby was hot!

I was going to wait a while to see what happens, but it takes a long time to get a hot fire going and I needed at least one more load for the day.


So I commence to thinking. This is where things always go REALLY, REALLY wrong.

I really need to get going, so I decide to go over and take a look at things. Only a little flame spilling out the side. What I really ought to do is open the cover and take a good look.

At first, it was sort of surreal. A little flame danced on each rotating tray in the grease. I thought, well, that ain't so bad. I'll just take these out, restock and let that fire cook it. Maybe we'll get a load in forty-five minutes this time. I'd have to put the little tray fires out, I suppose.

So I grabbed a pail and went inside.

Filled the pail with water.

Went outside.

Poured the water.

Stepped back and watched flames rise up with a mighty whoosh!

Slammed cover back down.

Opened cover up to take another look:


Okay. Not good.

I can tell. I can tell it is not good because a crowd is forming. Someone said, "You did not put water on a grease fire, did you?"

Was that wrong? How the heck was I supposed to know? Not a lot of fires over in my cube at work. Grease, electrical, paper--never had many fires over there. Now I'm a fireman? Not bloody likely.

My mother was so concerned when she saw this, her natural instincts went into action. She grabbed the camera and took these pictures here.

I wasn't terribly injured but I did eat some smoke. The fireman on the German Fest grounds came in and blanketed the grill with so much foam that a fire would never start in the grill again. Well, until it had a through washing. I remember people being critical of the firemen foaming the heck out of it, because it was, afterall, a little fire. I always supported their choice since I knew had the grill been even slightly recoverable, we would have thrown another load in and cooked away. This way, we had to pressure wash the whole thing.

I should mention that German Fest volunteers on the whole are better at cooking than me. Afterall, not everyone is . . .

Captain
Catastrophe

The Captain Catastrophe Diet Plan

It’s been a while. So I’ll keep it short. Captain Catastrophe has been busy. My radio show keeps getting interviews with really exciting guests, German Fest is celebrating 25 years, and I spend hours every night working on the radio show website. (Not the Captain Catastrophe one, which you can visit for past stories at : http://timkretschmann.blogspot.com/ --Hey, I’m adding new people all the time, so this is the best way to catch up.)

Anyway, as you know, I’m still not riding my bicycle because of the hideous implications—and by that I mean the very near death experiences the last times I went out. So tonight, with that wonderful 80 degree weather, I decided to take a walk.

Most people engage in exercise to keep their weight in check. Well, I checked my weight and I’m plenty heavy. I’m not trying to lose weight anymore; that hasn’t been working. My new goal is to grow seven inches. I figure that would proportion the weight a little better. Maybe eight.

So, I leave the house—and computer—behind and go out the back door. I go out the back door because the front door is perpetually locked in position this time of year. The wood swells and it tightens to the point that should you ever manage to open the thing with anything short of a blast of dynamite, you sure wouldn’t get the darn thing closed again.

Who needs deadbolts?

I decided to go on an errand my maid had sent me on. Apparently, I was out of Soft Scrub. I can hardly imagine why. That bottle lasted me darn near seven years with nary a complaint, and now I have to get ANOTHER one? What is she doing with the stuff anyway?

So I start walking and I go past the house with the gigantic dog. Could be a doberman. Might be a dragon. Can’t tell, but it makes a heck of a noise behind the eight foot tall tight picket fence around their yard. And it scares me half to death. See, dogs love to eat German boys. Want to know why?

Taste like pork. At least, that’s what someone told some of the earliest dogs. And dogs are real gullible. Everyone knows that Germans really taste like a spinach/cauliflower dip with a dollop of sour cream, but like I say, dogs are real gullible.

I have a theory that the 1970’s Energy Crisis was simply the panicked conversations of Collies and Golden Retrievers. Y2K bug smells of the Dachshunds and Irish Setters. That has a lot to do with how much time Setters set in front of the computer. They still love to play Pac Man, even though we all know Asteroids is the better game.

I digress.

I get to the grocery store and there’s Jerry from work. Eight o’clock at night and he’s wearing a three piece suit. He just came out of a meeting at an office building nearby. He commenced to tell me about Bruno (that’s another guy at work) and his new diet.

Understand now: Bruno always has a new diet. I’ve known him like three years and he has to have been on two dozen diets by now. He’s a dieting machine. He gets on the diet. Loses 10-12 pounds. Decides to celebrate his success at DiMarini’s or Mama Mia’s or Buca’s or something like that. Return to the start. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.

I really think I may be on the right track. Much better to grown the seven inches. Or eight.

Captain Catastrophe and the infinite hole

Some have suspected that the Captain took off for Memorial Day weekend. I mean, you can't injure yourself all the time--you have to stay healthy some times.

But I'm driven. Driven to accomplish new levels of exciting pain at the most inopportune time.

This Memorial Day Weekend, my parents came over to help me construct a new fence in my backyard. My old white picket fence was a scary sight. The wood was rotting out even before I bought the place. I couldn't see painting the thing because it was already coming apart--so I never did. That just accelerated the demise of the thing. I looked like twisted debris after a bombing run.

As you can tell, I was emotionally attached.

My dad, who is reveling in his new status as a retiree, decided a couple weeks ago to yank the fence out from its very moorings. As he tells the story, he did it with his bare hands. A garage full of tools I know aren't mine, pointed to another version of the tale. You decide.

So on Memorial Day I got a call early on that my parents had just picked up a two-man post hole digger (that scary drill looking rig) and we're doing the fence today.

This sounded like a lot of work to me. I was hoping I wouldn't have to be here. Not a very good attitude, but I specialize in bad attitudes as most of you know.

To add to the fun, my back yard is riddled with prehistoric petrified roots coming out of my trees--not the easiest stuff in the world to drill through. Half the holes we drilled were also in clay soil--that was really fun. It was so fun, in fact, we decided to drill an extra hole. Or that had something to do with a bad measurement. It was either for fun or a bad measurement. Something like that there.

Anyway, soon my backyard looked like the gopher from Caddyshack had taken up residence--which would explain partially the evil plots the squirrels have for me. I think this is all coming together at last.

Well, we were picking up a post to place into one of the holes and I was walking backwards and didn't really see where I was stepping. Even though most of the yard was still in tact, my right foot--the one with the plantar fascitis issues--found a hole and went down pretty well the full three feet. My foot folded up to accommodate the smallness of the hole--thoughtful of that foot. I began howling out in pain, like a complete coward.

My dad, of course, suspects I'm faking. Now, don't think poorly of Dad for that--he usually would have been right. I was kind of thinking to doing exactly that so I could supervise the rest of the afternoon. That's more my speed.

But in this rare instance, I really was in pain. That isn't to say I didn't drama queen it a little. I mean, the opportunity was there. Would have been a shame not to.

I shook it off after a little bit and we continued to work and I have to admit. It's a great fence! Looks really good. Once we get all these extra holes filled in, it would be a great place for a cookout.

Maybe before I fill in the holes, I can lure a squirrel or two into one.

Nah. Too much work.

Yours in anguish,
Captain Catastrophe