I've been very busy this week.  Let's see...we started out last Saturday, having lunch downtown at Brit's pub with a bunch of old friends from Havre, Montana.

26 Havrites hopped aboard the EmpireBuilder and came to town for the first round of the men's Div I NCAA basketball tournament.  A whole lot of them were friends of ours from a long time ago in a state far, far away.  We lived in Havre for five years back in the last half of the eighties.  We left Montana just after the fall of the Berlin wall, but before the Soviet Union bit the dust.  It was literally a different world back then.

Eight or ten of us gathered at Brits on Saturday.  We had a fun time, talking over old days, catching up on everybody and hearing the news from the big sky.

It was a spectacular day for mid March.  Blue sky, no wind, warm sun.  I met Jay at school and we walked over to the pub on the Nicolette Mall.  Lunch was delicious and the company was grand.  Not all the news of our friends was good, but that's the way it is in the world, isn't it?

Last week was lovely and warm.  Much nicer than we usual get in March.  This week, March has remembered how rotten it's supposed to be so we're back to cloudy, windy, cold and the threat of snow.

I don't care.  It's officially spring and it's going to get nice.

On Tuesday there was  a small celebration at MCTC for the basketball team.  I pulled Josie out of school and we went on down town.  There was cake and ice cream and big, laminated photos of the team taken during the state tournament.  They were really good action shots.

There were some large posters with this year's honors on them; Southern Division Champions, Conference Champions, Regional Champions and National Runners up.  The trophies were there, too.  The players were all there and they were dressed to the nines.  They clean up really well.  Al lot of faculty and administrators who support the team were there. 

My Mom and Dad joined us for the celebration.  My Mom wanted to thank the players for the most entertaining basketball season ever.  They had no idea who she was but I think they liked her.  I did have to tell her to stop flirting with them at one point.

"I wasn't flirting!"  she protested.

"You asked to see their tattoos!"

"I did not!" she drew herself up to her full five foot three inches (she thinks she's 5"3 and a half, but she's not) and all her dignity. "I just asked them why so many ball players have tattoos."

"Oh.  What did they say?"

"Not much." she grumped.  "And they wouldn't show them to me."

It was a very nice ceremony and it was good for the players to get an 'Atta boy!' from their school.


Wednesday, Josie and I got her signed up for her high school classes next year.  She was very nervous before hand, but after the forty minute presentation in the auditorium in which we were lead through the registration process she seemed very relaxed.  On the way home, she said "I think that'll work out very well."

"Yes," I said "You should have no trouble with that class schedule."

"I was talking about the boys."

Apparently while I was boring on and on about the merits of taking French or American Sign Language classes and checking little boxes, she was checking out the other kids in the auditorium.  Well really, what did I expect?


Today after school her basketball team had their banquet in a pizza place around the corner from school.  The girls just walked over and the coaches and parents met them there.  There was lots of pizza and pitchers of pink lemonade.  Their third place trophy was on the table and the coach handed out team pictures with their scoring stats and each girl got an award.  Josie got "Most Improved Player".  It's true.  She didn't even play last year but she earned a starting position.


I've also been very busy, work-wise, thank Heavens.  As of today there are still a few rich people left in Minnesota.  We'll see how long that lasts.  I keep hearing "experts" say that we should be coming out of this recession by the end of the year but I'm not sure that's the plan.  When the President of the United States gives a press conference in which he says there's to be no more getting rich in America, we've got a Big Ass Problem.

As of today, I'm still making money.

Don't tell anyone.

 

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