I Can't Believe....

...they went to the Evansville Indiana Zoo and did not make a single picture of a monkey!














































Wait was this? That's not porn is it? Ok all is forgiven, good work girls!

A Little Late but Happy Birthday...

Margaret's birthday yesterday, Here's photo of Pop, Margaret, daughter Grayson, husband Kevin taking a walk at their Christmas time visit.







A more recent picture, Mary and Grayson sit in the area to view underwater otter activity at the Evansville zoo while Margaret looks on.

Quick After Work Trip...

Got off work Saturday and headed out for an after work fishing trip with co-worker Myron. Cathy had to work, Myron kept asking "where's the Catfish Queen?"

Nice spring day but not much fish cooperation, we each caught one. Here's Myron with his catch, a small looked to be a hybrid striper, not remarkable for it's size, but for the fact the he is not much of a lure fisherman and that's what he caught it on.
Small boat, large boat. Just ships passing in night or some type of rendezvous?


Is this an example of fine or gross motor skills?

Cathy and Mary's Evansville Trip...

Margaret and Cathy do the sister thing on a recent spring break visit to Evansville.
Mary and Grayson do the cousin thing. Guess Kevin was doing the man thing at work while these gals all played at the zoo. I was also doing the man thing back in Lufkin.










Look at those faces. What does the expression tell us? Fun? No fun? Pain? Surprise?

It's This Kind of Guitar...

...it brings out my best. Mary plays the student prince at last weekend's jam session.
















"A humahumaknookieknookiewauoowau is the state fish of Hawaii, I swear. I usually have it blackened when I'm there."

Pop Jams on a Uke he did purchase on a visit to Hawaii.











Thanks to Mary and Caitlyn. Every good party has to have hazmat clean up or you just haven't had a party.

More From the Weekend...

Rose (to be refered to as the "bearer of the grandchild" from here on) and Juan at the fest this past weekend. They are now now 24 weeks pregnant which means the baby is good to go. Of course much better at full term since yesterdays ultrasound showed she is almost 2lbs (not quite as large as some catfish I have caught) and tall.



Where is this gang of Cooneys headed? Did some one holler "Dinner?"

Popfest...

This past weekend was the 2nd annual Cooney Family Reunion or Popfest as some call it held against the green pine and blooming red bud back drop of Bill and Geneva's home we call the Land.

Here you see folks crowding the buffet table to chow down. Cold weather kept us shut in the garage with the propane heaters. I don't think anyone minded except for a few folks who chose to rush spring by wearing shorts.





Here you see the clan gathering for a group photo that David Jr. set up with a tripod camera. He gets the results I'll publish here but for now you will have to be content with my gonzo journalism coverage of an incomplete line up as every one moved to get in place.




Left to right, White Rabbit, Geneva, Pop. Saturday was Geneva's Birthday, she was very modest not wanting to steal any Cooney fire and thunder on their day, here we wish you a happy birthday and many more.












Of course there was a big jam session. Pictured here are Patrick, Pop, Michael and Cathy. As I was playing myself I did not get many music pictures. Other musicians missing from this picture are John on guitar, Mary on drums, David on washboard, Kelly (Matt's girlfriend new to these kind of proceedings, brought her own instrument, a very good sign) on tambourine and me. Maybe others made a picture with all, please send.

The music went very well, get selection of songs. No sweet harmony singing though. Cooneys all sing lead.

Thinking About Old Spring Break Camping Trips...

Here's a photo of Pop, Cathy and travel trailer, made from the water during last fall's camp catfish on Lake Sam Rayburn. This week being spring break and hearing of families taking spring break trips brought to mind a spring camping trip our family took one time when the kids were little.

Detailed plans were made to camp at Caney Creek Park on Rayburn. We had never camped there before. A new place it required a pre-camp scouting trip to check out the facilities. This was a job that fell to me and my daughter Mary who must have been 4 years old at the time. We took an afternoon and drove down. A nice woodsy park, lots of trees, privacy looked good. May not be the same now as this park was hard hit by Hurricane Rita reportedly losing 60% of it's tree cover. At this time it was in fine shape. As we drove around the park, I scouted the water, reading sign of good fishing spots. I noticed a point here, a tree line there, a draw, a creek and a place where an old road bed entered the lake. All prime fish holding structure which with good bait, sharp hooks, scientific methods and copious use of fossil fuels it would be the perfect setting to perform the most favorite of human activities, the collapsing of unsuspecting ecosystems.

I stood on the lake bank, planning to set trot lines, and surveying the unsuspecting native species. Mary was by my side.

I gestured to a line of willow bushes, "I think I'll put my lines out over there."

Mary at my side, looked up with a serious child face and said, "Oh daddy, don't put out lions, they scare me."

St. Pat's Gig...

Well pre St. Pat's, it was actually the day before. Miguel debuted his C melody sax and it sounded great after a recent fix up.

The C melody is an interesting instrument with most of it's history dating from the early 20th century. In the key of c, no transposition necessary it can play charts written for violin, flute and so on. It was designed as a parlor instrument with a more subdued sound than alto or tenor that could be taken up quickly by beginners in a living room family band. As used here with modern amplification (around here that late 70s Bassman amp in the back ground counts as modern) and a tenor mouth piece the sound is rocked up a bit.

The popularity of the C melody crashed with the stock market in 1929. Instrument makers were forced by economic times to scale back production to a narrower variety of instruments and many of these niche instruments such as this were eliminated from the cultural land scape of America. Kind of the way eating out has gone these days, Chedder's, Olive Garden, Logan's, alto, tenor, bari, and on down the road it's the same thing all over again. Actually even though there were very few to none of these horns produced 1929 onward there is actually a New Zealand company with some in production today

Is this the best horn in town? Probably not. It could well date to the 1920s. It does score major cool points.

Here's Larry, Miguel and Runt with a pre gig run down of the changes. I think it might have actually done some good.

Quick After Work Fishing Trip...

Cathy and Mary took off for Evansville this week and me and the boys from work thought we might mount an after work Therapy Services trip today complete with snorkeling and four leaf clover hunting but ended up later at work than was fun so we canceled taking the boat out. I nevertheless took off down behind the Rayburn Dam to try a little bank fishing action, thinking might hook up with a striper in the swift waters there. Caught one nice sized Kentucky Spotted Bass. Did see a 3-4lb Striper floating dead in the water so there was evidence some are there.

Looking down on the tail race from above.


A water level shot. These are cell phone photos, they took the good camera on the trip. I guess this is the first time I have been down here since sometime around 9/11 when access to close parking was closed as a security precaution. Parking is open again and I saw no characters of suspicion.

Mudbelly's Listening Pleasure This Week...

New cd from a New Orleans based group shakes up a bunch of different crescent city elements into a right nice mix. It's good. "Yeah he'll be ok, give him these pills, put this in his pocket, take him away."

New Ray Wylie Hubbard is out. Ray Wylie seems to just be hitting his stride with his last few releases. Good greasy gut bucket stuff makes choices, kind of a something vs. nothing theme, "A. Enlightenment, B. Endarkment (hint, there is no C.)"

New Hendrix out this past week. Pretty much the same as old Hendrix, good stuff. Reportedly they have enough stuff in the can for two new releases a year for the decade. Jimi, we miss you but I'll probably be gone before they finish with you.

Sometimes You Got to be a Big Boy...

And I don't care how stylishly low you have been wearing those trousers you are going to have to be a big boy and pull them up. This is not some middle age old white guy get off my lawn rant about the state of the pants, I am talking metaphysically, metaphorically, universally get a hold of the loops, the belt what ever and hang on.

You did not think things were really going to stay the same did you? Say what, you did not know it was going to be in public? You have a lot to learn.

Farewell Father Bill...

Had a farewell party at church today for Father Bill. He's a member of the LaSallette Order, missionary priests who have been in Lufkin since 1928. Our St. Patrick's Parish will be taken over by dioscene priest assigned by the Bishop in Tyler.









Father Bill and Brenda. We will miss him, he has done a fine job at this church. He goes to a church in Orlando next.











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Father Paul with Doris. Also a LaSallette he demonstrates a near perfect donut bite. Father Paul will be with us till June.

This Sunny Weather...

Got me feeling all frisky. Feel like I could make like the little boy in the photo, get on down with some alligator wrestling. Just take that old big lizard and choke him good.