The Treasure Hunt

Tuesday morning at Ivy Tech I have another proctored exam in Psychology and then I am completely done until spring classes begin in January. With only two classes this semester hasn't been very difficult... although I am still looking forward to the break. I also like the fact that beginning Tuesday, and over the course of the next 15 days at work I am off a total of nine of them: I could get used to that (:

There is no particular reason for writing on my blog this evening other than I had some things on the computer I needed to tend to and then I was going to turn in early tonight. However, after I was done I felt restless and decided to write instead of laying down.

Recently I have been watching (on Netflix) old episodes of My Name Is Earl. (Later into the series some of the humor got out of hand, but many of the earlier shows were hysterical.) I had actually forgotten how funny some of them were. There is a lot of the older sitcoms I enjoyed watching: Frasier, Seinfeld, Friends, Cheers, Everybody Loves Raymond, etc. However, at least for me not that many of their pilot episodes were all that funny. In fact, I didn't even like the Seinfeld series until much later into its run. The reason I am writing this is if you have never seen the pilot episode for My Name Is Earl, or if you have seen it but do nor remember it, you ought to try and see it again... it was hysterical, and especially for a pilot episode. Whoever cast Jaimie Pressly as Joy on that show picked a perfect girl for the part. I suppose quintessence is not a word that for most people would immediately come to mind when imagining the “white trailer park trash” Joy Turner, but that is what I thought of when I was just thinking about some of her antics.

The entire cast is very good, but I think she plays her part the best. There is almost always one star I like better than the rest on each of those old shows. On Friends I liked Joey. For Raymond I thought Robert was the funniest person on the show. Of course, on Seinfeld it was Kramer... and there wasn't even a close second. I guess thinking about some of the old comedies I have a question for you. If you could only pick one sitcom as your favorite... which one would you pick? And, for that show... who would be your favorite personality? And it is okay to go way back in television history to make your selection. Anymore a lot of stations are running many of the old old reruns. Sometimes when I can't sleep I have been watching old I Love Lucy shows. It's funny, but I didn't really appreciate her comedy until I got older. She is another person that had great comedic timing.

A couple of nights ago I was reading through some of my older favorite poems and I suppose because it is nearing Christmas I reread Moore's, Twas the night before Christmas. It sort of made me sad because instead of just wanting to read it and enjoy the story, I remembered why I had first committed it to memory.

Tammy and Missy were not much more than babies, really just big enough to climb up on my lap when I first memorized the poem so I could recite it to them. I suppose it would have been easier to just read it from a book, but I thought I wanted to be able to tell them the story instead. So, every Christmas Eve (at least until 1983-84) I would gather them upon my knees (Steph was a baby by then) and I would tell them that story which had been written so well, and so very long ago.

Memories are a funny thing. I believe it has been more than thirty years since I have tried to recite that poem... and I wasn't even sure I still could? But, as the pages were open before me I closed my eyes and recited every single line. I guess there are some things and certain people who are involved when memories are being created that makes forgetting impossible? There are a few people in my life, that for me all of the memories I have of them are truly unforgettable (:

I hope that for all who reads this that you have many happy memories involving events and people you love far more than life itself... that makes unforgettable memories for you as well (: