Unexpected

The boys are at the Dallas Stars' hockey game this afternoon. This is what's going on outside the arena - on this literally freezing, wet and nasty day. These protests are going on all over the county. There are an estimated 30-40,000 people on the mall at the Capitol today, protesting the potential federal takeover of our healthcare choices. (You won't see pictures unless you go to blogs or FoxNews.)

Is there any way we can channel this energy into enacting term limits? Nothing would help stop bad legislation more than limiting the perpetuators. Don't ya' think?

On another note, St. Mary's just whipped Villanova in the NCAA tournament. Watching snippets of the game, I remember both teams from last year's tournament and should have anticipated the result. In my bracket picks, I had picked St. Mary's to win their first round game, but not this one. I'm glad, anyway.

I picked 21 games correctly out of the first 32. How's your bracket holding up?

You're doin' fine, Oklahoma!

Back to one of my favorite topics - reality TV. The newest season of Amazing Race is on. This season, as usual, includes some interesting couples.

Eleven pairs left Los Angeles for Chile. This year's group includes all the usual combinations - black, Asian, old, middle-aged, pretty but clueless, smart but weak, strong but dumb, et.

The "hick" couple is two brothers from Oklahoma. The brothers, cowboys both, always wear their felt hats (with plastic protectors for the rain), custom belt buckles and jeans. They talk with an "Okie twang." (I can say that, I'm from Oklahoma.) There's nary a curse word from their lips. Instead, you hear "good gravy" a lot.

Most of the contestants acted like the cowboys had cooties and were a little "slow." The editing of the first episode, when the cowboys had some rough spots, did leave you wondering how savvy they could be.

But in the second leg of the race - yeeow! Forced to take a later bus, they found one with a different detour, but an earlier arrival time. They sailed through the rest of the course and finished first, so far ahead that no one else knew.

A particularly obnoxious couple, busy being pompous and setting up alliances, assumed they were finishing first and were shocked at their second place. They grilled the cowboys later, purposely using "big" words in the conversation, thinking that was somehow intimidating. The cowboys just nodded and smiled. All the contestants seemed to think it a fluke that the cowboys finished first.

The third episode has just ended, and the cowboys finished first again, making it from Chile to Argentina. Ayipieeay!

What the other contestants and we viewers are finding out is that the cowboys are confident, patient, independent, shrewd and full of common sense. You might even say they're the "real McCoy."

Oklahoma, OK!

Jet and Cord

Brothers/Cowboys

Cord McCoy

Age: 29
Hometown: Tupelo, Okla.
Connection to your teammate: Brother
Current Occupation: Professional Bull Rider
Pet peeve about your teammate: He likes to voice his opinion
Favorite hobbies: Riding horses
Achievements: Rode world champion bucking bull, “Big Bucks”
Lifelong to do list: Get married, have lots of babies and live happily ever after
If I could switch places with someone: I wouldn't trade with anyone.
Role Model/Hero: My parents
What are you passionate about: My beliefs
What would you do if you won the million dollars: Buy a big ranch
People would be surprised to learn: I don't have a television or a radio in my house
Favorite place you have ever visited: I love visiting everywhere, but home sweet home is always the BEST
Biggest challenge you and your teammate will face on the Race together: Choosing one idea and going with it
What did you hope to accomplish by running the Race (other than winning one million bucks): Spending time with my best friend and brother

Jet McCoy

Age: 30
Hometown: Ada, Okla.
Connection to your teammate: Brother
Current Occupation: Cowboy
Pet peeve about your teammate: Punctuality or lack thereof
Favorite hobbies: Reading
Achievements: Making it on THE AMAZING RACE
Lifelong to do list: To remain a cowboy
If I could switch places with someone: Nobody, I am happy being me … I haven't worked out all of my own problems so I wouldn't want to start on anyone else's
Role Model/Hero: Cord would be my hero
What are you passionate about? Horsemanship
What would you do if you won the million dollars? Pay off my house
People would be surprised to learn: How much I read. I read every single day
Favorite place you have ever visited: Texas
Biggest challenge you and your teammate will face on the Race together: Communication
What do you hope to accomplish by running the Race (other than winning one million bucks?) To broaden my horizons and gain a better appreciation for the world in general

Can you dance?

On a Saturday afternoon in April, 1982, I was exuberant. My job's busy season had just ended and in a few weeks I would be moving back to the great State of Texas. Words could not express my jubilance. What to do? I put on my cowboy hat and an "Asleep at the Wheel" album and danced around my apartment to the country swing music. Now I am not a dancer in the modern sense of the word. I stomped and swayed and spun and swung my arms to the music played as loudly as our downstairs neighbors would stand it.

I still dance. In times of joy I step and clap around my home office, moving in time to the music of my mood. In times of sweetness I may sway and two-step with a real or remembered baby in my arms. In the car I may crank up the volume and use the steering wheel as my tambourine.

These displays are almost always private, though. It's not that I have any pride in the matter, I just don't want to cause unnecessary concern that I may have truly lost my mind. I could not explain my compulsion, but I knew I was normal.

I confirmed it last night while watching the opening ceremonies to the Vancouver Winter Olympics. Part of the ceremonies featured aboriginal dancers. A video clip of those dancers is not available, but I found a substitute (without the elaborate costumes and props) that works.

While watching the Olympic dancers, I realized where I get it from, that need to express myself through motion. Our human nature is hard wired that way. Whether clumsy or graceful, we all can dance. Never mind the reality TV shows which would answer "no."

If you think about it, many celebrations and happy events have choreography.

Envision your favorite sports event. The team huddles with linked arms and chants, perhaps raising hands to the sky. There are fist bumps and chest bumps and flips and struts in moments of success. The involved fan may explode from his seat to warpath around the room after a significant victory.

Graduations, christenings and weddings have their promenades and partner exchanges and kneelings and risings and turnings. Each ceremony incorporates movement into its rituals, because our human nature says there are times we simply can not be still.

So don't be still. Dancing isn't just for the young or the talented. It doesn't have to be pretty or make sense. Soon enough you'll only be able to shuffle along anyway, so why not dance as long as you can?

And the next time you see a grown-up, someone who should "know better," skipping or twirling down the sidewalk, don't turn up your nose at the weirdo. Instead, share a smile and a wave and a hop. You can dance.

Reality Check

Do you watch reality television shows?

My parents watch the original reality TV show Jeopardy every night and sometimes Wheel of Fortune.

My husband records and watches several - Amazing Race, Survivor, The Apprentice, Deal or No Deal and others as they come and go. Our family even made a video and applied for a spot on the Amazing Race. We were way too normal to get selected. Ricky and I are waiting until we're old enough to qualify as the "old married couple" in the race. Maybe we'll get lucky a couple of years from now - you'll know it when my blog goes dormant for a few weeks!

My highly educated daughter is addicted to shows like Bridezilla and America's Next Top Model. She could name by sight the eight children of Jon and Kate. My boys watch crazy obstacle course contests. I'm not sure how many original episodes there are, though, since whenever I ask about a particular contestant, they already know whether he wins or not.

I generally stay condescendingly above it all, maybe pausing for a peek as I walk through the room with laundry.

However, if it's "America's Got Talent" night, you had better not get between me and the remote control. I started paying attention to that show a couple of seasons ago when a local area ventriloquist, Terry Fator, won the show. He's gone on to sign a $100 million Las Vegas contract. Last season's winner was an incredible opera singer. My favorite, who didn't win, was a Broadway style singer who had lost his voice in an auto accident and gradually recovered. He has since produced a CD. (Maybe Santa will wrap it up for me this year?)

I watched nearly every episode this summer. The judges picked over one hundred and fifty contestants from auditions around the country. They ranged in age from seven to over seventy. The acts included magicians, dancers, singers, harpists, triplets playing violins, drummers, animal tricks, comediennes, chain saw juggling and anything else you could think of.

During the preliminaries you saw more of the train wrecks - the people whose friends and families did not have the guts to tell them they really weren't very good. The judges had no such scruples and their comments could be brutal. I still recall the young woman who thought it was a talent to open her suitcase on stage and have a friend crawl out. What do you say to that?

After the preliminaries, the judges culled the group down to forty, at one point giving three groups twenty-four hours to rehearse and have a dance-off for the remaining spot. The producer added eight (including one of the losing dance-off groups) and the voting season started with quarter-finals of twelve acts each. For each quarter-final, the fan votes picked the top four advancing and the judges picked the fifth. After taking two weeks to do the quarter-finals, two semi-finals were used to reduce the twenty contestants to ten with fans choosing eight of the ten. Those ten competed on Monday night.

I am proud to say that I voted every time. There were some very good acts that did not advance far enough, but all in all, the American people did well in their choices. And many of those that did not make the finals, like the guys combining trampolines and basketball dunking, carved out solid stepping stones to future opportunities.

As one of the judges mentions regularly, this show is what America is all about. The contestants come from all parts of the country and all social strata, but start on an equal footing. They are judged on their abilities alone. If they advance, it is because of their performance, not their past. If they fail, it is because they are not as talented or appealing as the other guy.

One compelling aspect of the show is the remarkable goodwill shared and expressed between contestants. Nearly every competitor, upon his or her exit from the stage, graciously recognizes the achievements of those moving on, understanding his own performance was lacking. He wasn't robbed, someone else was better. The "losers" learn from the experience and vow to try again. The "winners" appreciate and acknowledge the efforts of those that came up short.

There are some common characteristics of those that move ahead.

First, they have worked very hard and were prepared for the opportunity in the preliminary rounds. Second, they were able to use the judges' criticisms and suggestions to improve subsequent performances. Third, they were able to creatively work under pressure to improve their act or routine for the next round of competition.

Would that we applied these concepts to our own failures and successes of living and working!

It is amazing to see, over the course of a few short weeks, the finalists transform from ugly ducklings into swans using the production resources of AGT. The pretty opera singer, originally wearing a simple sundress, now has the evening gown, hair-do and bling to match her powerful voice. The former chicken catcher has emerged from the poncho and baseball cap in stylish clothes and a visible face that only enhance his ability to hold a crowd breathless with his music.

I watched ten great acts compete for the top prize. I voted forty times for my two favorites. But no matter who wins this season, I won't say "oooh." This time they were all that good.

The Agony and the Ecstasy

I have umpteen tax returns left to complete before the end of the day tomorrow, September 15.

The power has been out earlier this evening, slowing me down. (All the electrical lines in our county have to be water-logged by now!) For a while I had a flexible flashlight wrapped around my neck to see my workpapers  as I worked on laptop battery power.

I have had a "blog" percolating in my head and partially drafted, ready to finish tomorrow afternoon, when the furor has faded. The blog is about the finals of my favorite television show, which I assumed would air on Tuesday night.

The show is TONIGHT, and I can't watch it later, because I want to VOTE.

Watch a little, compute a little, watch a little, compute some more............vote, vote, vote, then back to solid working.

One more day.........

A Woman After My Own Heart

Remember, I said there might be a political comment every now and then, but chocolate has no affiliation, so this is personal, not political.

The following quote was from a Washington Post article about the government spending protest in Washington, D.C. today.

Like countless others at the rally, Joan Wright, 78, of Ocean Pines, Md., sounded angry. "I'm not taking this crap anymore," said Wright, who came by bus to Washington with 150 like-minded residents of Maryland's Eastern Shore. "I don't like the health-care [plan]. I don't like the czars. And I don't like the elitists telling us what we should do or eat."

My point, exactly! Joan is a little more than fifty-something, but she can join my club anytime.

UPDATE: Why, may you ask, is the text of this post larger than the text of my other posts? I don't know. But if I try to fix the text size, the gremlins will screw something else up, so I will let it be. Now that I think about it, that's actually not a bad philosophy when dealing with computers.