CrossRoads Farm

A Great Game and the Red Neck Nation

2003-11-24 - 9:20 a.m.

Week 11 - The pats are still first in the division. But it wasn’t pretty. It was a fight every step of the way. I thought we were off to a great start when we had Houston on the 2 Yard line and held them to a field goal at the end of their first drive. But when The Kid got sacked on his very first play of the game I knew his might be a fight. And wow, was this a fight. The score went back and forth. We made some bad mistakes and Houston capitalized nicely. At the half it should have been a 17 to 3 lead by the Pats. But instead it was 10-3. The second half wasn’t any better and a few times I was sure we were going to lose. We are due.

We are on a nice long winning streak. We haven’t lost a game since September. We were due and I was mentally preparing myself. Then, at the very end of regulation. Adam “Money in the Bank” Vinitieri comes out to kick us to the win. Time to sit back and enjoy, we got 5this one all sewn up. Then it happened. The commentator said, “The Houston Texans have never blocked a filed goal attempt in franchise history.”
“Oh, shit!” I said.
D looked at me quizzically, What?”
“He just said ‘never’. You never say “never!”
”So??”
“Watch, they are going to block it.” I said it with The Certainty I sometimes get. It’s rarely very strong and it usually isn’t about things that I can change, but it is there occasionally. When I am really in the Zone I can almost call the football plays before they happen and this time I was right again. Houston blocked the kick, no flag, we are going into overtime.
And what an overtime!! Houston won the toss but we didn’t call it quits. As a matter of fact there were 3 changes of possession. We finally got Vinitieri in close enough to kick, and this time it sailed true. With only 41 seconds left on the OT clock. A-mazing. Aerobic exercise I’ll tell ya, being a Patriots fan.

Red Neck Nation – You shoulda seen us out here on Saturday afternoon. Gumby was here to celebrate H’s birthday. We had lunch and opened presents then went outside to enjoy the 50 degree weather while it lasted. We started by building a campfire in the fire pit over near the playhouse. We were standing there talking and dinking a couple beers when Gumby decided he wanted to try out D’s pellet gun on some cans. Next thing you know all three of us are taking turns hitting bottles off a target we constructed with a pipe and a piece of wood. It was off in the tall grass so there wouldn’t be glass all over the yard. So bring your picture into focus. We got the fire, dog running around with the kids, old country music playing in the background, and a rapidly emptying 12 pack. Then Gumby looks at me as I got ready to take my shot and starts laughing. “You should see you,” he said. I had on a pair of jeans with mud splatters on them and brown hiking boots, an olive drab jacket that almost looks like fatigues and a gray stocking hat and I’m aiming the gun at the target. I laughed then squeezed the trigger – took out the target too, the half of a green Beck’s bottles that was still sitting between the two brown bottles. “And as if that isn’t bad enough,” he said, “your aim is improving with every bottle of beer you drink - you must have great grandpa’s genes in the there after all.”
My great grandpa was a Vermonter. Lived up in Barton. Gramma B says that her father had at least one gun in every room of the house. And that he was never farther than arms length from a gun whenever he was home. And apparently he was one hell of a shot. I suppose you would be if you owned that many guns.

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