The Tail of the Dogs (as told by Jack Roy in ~1990)

The Tail of the Dogs

Well the dogs they had a meetin'
And they came from near and far.

Some came by automobile
and I'll be damned if some didn't come by car.

Before they could go in, or even take a look.
They had to take their assholes off and hang them on a hook.

After they were seated, each mother son and sire.
Some dirty hell of a son of a bitch came in and hollered fire.

They all ran out in bunches and didn't think to look,
they just grabbed any old asshole, hangin' off any ole hook.

As can be expected, these dogs were kind of sore,
because they were wear'in an asshole they'd never worn before.

So when you see two dogs on the street alone,
they'll smell each others assholes and hope to find his own.

This famous poem was oft recited by Jack Roy and other Camp / Program directors at Camp Cedar Valley / Pine Trail Reservation.   There are numerous variations that emerged over the years as the poem wasn't written down.  One of these was, "Some dirty hell of a doberman pinscher came in..."    another was "mighty sore".

I served as the program director in the late 80's and Jack came to visit and we talked for a while in the cook shack.  Upon request the above is the version he shared.

Minnesota Comes to Lincoln!!!!

Minnesota football has a nice rig!  Hopefully the 2021 season will be a little more normal.  And here's to a new team winning it all!

Beans! They are what’s for dinner!

The kids were quite amused to discover Grandpa eating a can of bans for lunch!

Shopping in Downtown Muskegon!

We had one trip into Muskegon to visit Uncle Duck and also did some shopping downtown.

Hurricane Elsa!

Elsa caused mostly water related damage with less wind than expected.

Leaving work - was happy to have the Subaru with 8.7" of clearance!

Country Dairy in New Era Michigan!

Didn't have time for the tour but scored some great ice cream and some great cheese curds!

Lake Michigan Sunset!

Lake Michigan on the evening of July 21, 2021.  Elle and I walked down and were rewarded with some pretty skies.  The moon as rising on the opposite side!

Italian Bracca

We ran into an Italian Bracca in Asheville. A friendly pointer styled hunting dog.  This was at 12 Bones....

Hangin’ with Uncle Dave!

We had a fun day with Uncle Dave at the Grand Rapids Museum and Planetarium.  Elle scored this good selfie and we saw some super cool things at the planetarium.

North Carolina - 12 Bones BBQ

Quite good with quite a following.  Long lines even in mid-afternoon.  Widely acclaimed by Obama so the lines probably trended Democratic!

Rick and Barb at the Stony Lake Inn

We ended up eating here three times! Great perch and walleye! Jack had a lot of steak…

North Carolina Update - Connor Adopted!

 

Coffee from a Glass Pot!

The VRBO we stayed at near Shelby, Michigan featured an almost all glass coffee pot.  Cooler than it is functional it still functioned reasonably well and made good coffee.  It was hard to pull out the hot metal coffee innards the held the ground coffee before pouring.

Rick’s Childhood Home!

Anytime we happen to be in North Muskegon swinging by Oak Avenue is a must!

2221 Oak Avenue in Muskegon

North Carolina Dance Practice

Clogging fun!

North Carolina - Day 7

Friday was our last day in Asheville so after a little more tennis we packed up and checked out.

The lobby was cool including a large connect 4 game, Conner - the dog up for adoption, a pool table and a bar.

We scored a bit more BBQ before skipping town.  Bear's was decent but not as good as 12 Bones.

Poor Conner still hadn't been adopted but I'm sure he will be soon.

Back on the road with North Carolina staples.

After dropping Bill off in Charlotte I headed to Waynesville which is close to Jack's Camp Daniel Boone.  You can also note another W city, Weaverville just North of Asheville.  Asheville has gotten to be a pretty expensive city from a real estate perspective with lots of Charlotte and Atlanta people, in particular, choosing to retire in it.  If the prices seem too high in Asheville the local realtors encourage prospective buyers to "Think Weaverville"

Shanghai Dumplings - You Don't Know Nuthin' About Shanghai Dumplings!

Shanghai Dumplings is located just up Biltmore Avenue from Aloft so we walked by it a lot.  On one particular occasion, two gentleman were just in front of us seemingly looking for a place for dinner.  One stepped back to look at and read the sign and his friend returned, "Shanghai Dumplings - you don't know nuthin' about Shanghai dumplings.  You don't know nuthin' about Shanghai."

We kept walking and so did they.

North Carolina Trip - Day 6

After all the hiking we stayed local on Saturday beginning the day with a quick duck into Izzy's

After lunch at the Atlanta based Mellow Mushroom we went to the Moogseum.  A museum dedicated to one of the father's of synthesized music, Bob Moog.  It was small but well-done.

We then went to Asheville's Pinball Museum which was a fun place to spend a few hours.  Below is one of Atari's only pinball offerings.   For $15 you could play all you wanted.

  

 

The views of the Blue Ridge Mountains are quite good from the sixth floor of our hotel, Aloft.

The city had recently removed its final large structure commemorating a Civil War veteran.  Will be interesting to see what they replace it with as this statue is in the heart of the city.  When we arrived in town we thought there was a big protest going on as there was a lot of activity right in front of this area.  Turns out it was just a 3-4 flag wavers excited about Jesus.

North Carolina Trip - Asheville Tourists Game

We scored buy one get one tickets to see the Asheville Tourists play the Winston Salem team.  The Tourists are the High A minor league team for the Houston Astros.

All seats were good in the smallish stadium so we chose to social distance a bit since it wasn't full.

Lots of scoring and a W for the home team!

North Carolina Trip - Day 5.5

Chimney Rock hiking continued. 

The highest elevation is ~2,640 feet above sea level though it certainly seemed higher.

The Skyline Trail was a bit anticlimactic because you couldn't see really actually see the Hickory Nut Falls so we also did the Hickory Nut Falls Trail that went to the bottom of the falls.  It had rained that morning so the falls were flowing pretty well.

Then, having not eaten much breakfast or lunch had our nicest meal of the trip at Chestnuts.  Filet and salmon were the rewards for our 100+ flights of climbing and ~6 miles of hiking.