A rolled rump...Bethian style

I thought for sure my Colts were dead meat, but after a couple of forced turnovers late in the game, they came back to beat the Houston Texans! Woohoooo! (Sorry to anyone who is a Texans fan. Miss G, if I recall, you don't care for football, so I hope I'm not hurting anyone's feelings.) I really couldn't believe they came back to win that game. They were down 17 in the fourth quarter, and got 3 touchdowns to win it. I was really starting to wonder about them...they just haven't seemed like themselves lately. But that was COOL!

It's starting to smell good in here. The roast is in the oven, with some onion soup mix and red wine. (I suppose we'll HAVE to drink what I didn't use on the roast.) In about 45 minutes, I'll add some carrots, potatoes, and onions, and let it roast for about 45 minutes longer. I decided to use the Dutch oven (It was a gift from Ken's mom, and originally belonged to Ken's grandmother, so it makes everything taste better!), because it's one of our really nice roasts--not a tougher one like a chuck roast--a rolled rump. Feel free to roll your own rump right now. Ha ha! What's wrong with me? I'm in VERY high humor tonight!

Maybe it's because I'm already thinking about the letter I want to write to the editor of our local paper. I finally finished reading the paper a little while ago, and on our editorial page, our Letters to the Editor section is called Voice of the People. Vox Populi! Shane and I have had a lot of fun with it over the years, including the letters from an elderly gentleman from LaPorte who always began his letters with "Methinks." Imagine my surprise when I began working with my friend Jackie in Indianapolis (her and her husband were from LaPorte), and when I somehow mentioned this writer, she started laughing and knew exactly who I was talking about! Anyhoo, someone today wrote, "Many on the left tend to be driven by their own self-absorption and lack of moral guidance, therefore acting upon their own rage and hatred."

Exsqueeze me?! Gregory M. of Mishawaka, Indiana, you have no idea what hell you hath wrought. Don't worry, I'll keep it cool. But seriously, "lack of moral guidance" and "rage and hatred?" Come ON. That is just ridiculous, and I find your self-righteousness quite humorous. I'll let you all know what I decide to write, but this deserves a response. I'm looking forward to it...in fact, I love this kind of stuff! Sorry, Gregory M., but you don't get a pass on this one. I'm calling you on it. Heh heh heh.

On a lighter, more Deutsch note, Cousin Shane sent me an email today. I'm not exactly sure about the timeline on this, but I think it was the summer between my first and second year of college, and the summer before Shane's senior year in high school. It could have been the year before, and Shane will correct me if I'm wrong. The important thing here is that he spent a few weeks that summer in Krefeld, Germany. Shane and I both took a lot of German in high school, I went on to take some in college, and Shane was lucky enough to actually get to spend some time in Deutschland! He recently reconnected via Facebook with some of the people he went on the trip with, and he's been having a great time remembering his trip!

He sent me a picture of one of the castles he visited, Burg Linn. Isn't that gorgeous? He also sent me this email (Shane's text is in brown), and I had to put on my German hat to try to translate. I did okay, although Shane had to help me out with a couple of things.

john finally persuaded me to get out the bags of stuff from germany and i've been having a verklempt day so far. i saved everything, and there is a veritable treasure trove of goodies. i can't wait to look through all of it, but i wanted to quickly mention that i have a letter that you wrote to me when i was there in my hand right now. on the back flap, in true "bethian" style, you wrote "ideale sind wie sterne: man kann sie nicht erreichen, aber man kann sich nach ihnen orientieren." -- carl schurz ...you wrote your letters in german, too.

[I like the "Bethian" style part! I still like quotes! The quote is "Ideals are like stars: one can't reach them, but one can still orient themselves by them." Wow, that is STILL a great quote!]

you wrote about having a lot of fun over the 4th of july that summer. you said "deine mutter ist verrueckter als ich dachte!" LOL "sie hatten ein ding, das heisst bloedesurteil. jede zeit, jemand dumm sagte or machte, diese person hate das bloedesurteil bekommen. (ich habe es nie bekommen! whew!)" do you remember what that thing was?

[The first part is "Your mother is crazier than I thought!" Ha ha! That would be my beloved Aunt Bert, Shane's mom, and when I wrote "crazy," it was definitely in a fun, loving way. Aunt Bert was something special. The rest of it is something like, "She had this thing that was called Bloedesurteil, and each time someone said or did something dumb, they got it, but I never got it." I was stumped by "Bloedesurteil," and Shane looked it up...something like a "silly decision," and we presume that it was some kind of game that I was playing with Aunt Bert while Shane was in Germany. I wish I could remember what it was, but I can't!]

you go on in the letter to give me an update on the news from the latest edition of rolling stone. you mentioned hearing "beyond the valley of 1984" by the plasmatics. you said "es war FREMD, aber nicht immer so schlecht." haha you also mentioned finding an album called "exposed." it had adam and the ants on it, and loverboy, ellen foley and a few others. you said you will buy it when you have enough money. it was only $2.98, but you only had $2. then, in true music fanatic style, you said "ich muss jene platte haben!" jawohl!

[This was a commentary on the new Plasmatics album, which I said was "STRANGE, but not really so bad." (I thought that "fremd" was crazy, but Shane reminded me that it meant strange.) As for the album with Adam Ant, et al, I said, "I must have this album!" Ha ha!]

I was amazed to see how well I used to be able to write German! I certainly couldn't do that now, but I was happy to see that I was able to translate much of it. What a blast from the past, and what fun to share this with Shane.

AND, to top it all off, my friend Bruce from Indy just called, and we had a nice chat and got caught up, and had some good laughs! (Just a little insider info here, without divulging any particulars...if they can sign the main players, Disney will be making the third, fourth, and fifth installments of the Pirates of the Caribbean movie franchise. Sweet!)

Whew, what a day. I'm hungry!