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Awe, Sadness

Broncos 'Barrel Man' dies

DENVER - Tim McKernan, the man known for years as the "Barrel Man" at Denver Broncos football games, has died.

McKernan, 69, passed away on Saturday morning. The Broncos superfan was diagnosed with an inoperable respiratory disease earlier this year and was told he had between two months and six months to live.

For 30 years, in all types of weather, McKernan donned a barrel and cheered on the Broncos, first at Mile High Stadium and then later at INVESCO Field at Mile High.

He retired from being the Barrel Man after the 2007 Broncos season.

McKernan was a former mechanic for United Airlines and he and his wife were based out of Gunnison.

He sold the barrel he wore for Super Bowl XXXII for $30,000. It was autographed by 49 players and was sold to a Black Hawk casino. McKernan gave part of the proceeds to a battered women's shelter.

Kymberlie's Daily Twitterings

03:27 I just unlocked the "Crunked" badge on @foursquare! bit.ly/82rU5X #
03:27 I just unlocked the "School Night" badge on @foursquare! bit.ly/5Kq8ra #
03:27 Waiting on my chicken to cook, this song comes on, and suddenly I smell like you. (@ Whataburger 324) bit.ly/5RSBB8 #
14:31 So, is everything cancelled tonight because of the snow? (Yes, I'm just getting out of bed.) #
15:11 New photo on Flickr: Snowy Mazzy bit.ly/5auaZs #
15:23 Really starting to come down out here in Spring (uploading video now). Guess I will be staying in tonight. Maybe the endless RB setlist? #
15:30 This is freaking genius! Wear it, @JRCohen! RT:@JenXer I...resisted...as long as I could... #draw365 #JRinabikini yfrog.com/4avyzuj #
15:47 New photo on Flickr: Snowier Mazzy bit.ly/8itHHB #
15:56 Here's my front yard (with Mazzzy!) & backyard showing the snow coming down out in Spring: bit.ly/6dZr8r & bit.ly/7R9Dim and #
16:55 Amazon mp3 Deal of the Day is 'Christmas Songs' by Diana Krall for only $2.99. Her voice is so pretty. bit.ly/5FoKIy #
18:14 RT @ASTROGaming: Retweet this for a chance to win one of the new @upperplayground A40 Audio Systems! bit.ly/6x6c8H #astroupcontest #
18:17 RT @GuitarHero: "I got the Fall of Troy DLC, now I want this prize pack too bit.ly/8EH1Q6!" RT for your chance to win! #
19:12 OMG! JR kept his word! Rock on! RT @JRCohen: tweetphoto.com/5840697 #
20:17 Only good thing abo ut staying in because of the weather is that I'm finally making some progress on Rock Band again. #
22:29 @smurfing74: Hearsay does indeed rock. Please tell Joe that the girl he cut an apple for last night says hi. #
02:00 Made serious progress through all the venues in Rock Band. Only have eleven more unique ones before I've played everywhere. Hand hurts now. #

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Avondale Homeowners Association Dinner

Deborah
14 hours ago
Post a comment

We signed up for this once we got here. Association Holiday dinner (and meeting) was open to the 300 homes or so in this area. We were sure we would be wanting to leave as soon as we got there. We were wrong!

We were greeted warmly and had name tags slipped on - we were able to meet people and read their names. We met our "sheriff" Rick who patrols just our neighborhood in a patrol car provided through our association dues. He even dropped by our HOUSE tonight to drop off his card and info on who to call if we need help. He was a sweetheart.

Then we met a few more of the owners - all sweet - all nice.

We choose a table at the back to put our seating cards on, and before we knew it were were meeting another couple who we clicked with. Eric and Heather immediately moved their cards to our table and we ended up laughing and making friends with EVERYONE at our table! Seems we ended up the evening suggesting the "table" come to our house for dinner soon!

I guess there were 80 or so people at the dinner. Ben was the youngest in the room, but not by much. I was defiantly NOT the oldest. Most people were surprised to realize I had a daughter graduating from college. (course I DID just get a cut and color today ;-)

All in all, BOTH of us had a great time. We love it here and it seems here loves us too.

TweetleeeDee

00:16 @joeymcintyre Can you follow a mid-west girl? It's mighty cold in Denver, below zero tonight, some Joey would warm me up!! #
10:38 Already looking fwd to sleeping in Saturday morning, and working only a half day Monday! Ahhhh I can't waait. Can barely keep my eyes open! #
10:40 RT @TFLN: (818): he took off his pants and apologized in advance if I thought he was too small. --- lmao heard that before! #
10:48 @jakecoco "if I were an artist" that was the first song of yours I ever heard, loved it! #
11:40< /em> @BigGirlBlue happy bday!! #
12:31 @mdcurry booooooo, no pulling out for you. #
13:55 I think I wanna make some shortbread cookies soon... Been craving them like crazy! #
17:14 @mdcurry so, you're saying you dont have experience pulling out... #
17:27 @mdcurry lolol i just like given you shit (= #

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Snowier Mazzy

It's really starting to come down.

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Snowy Mazzy

OMG! Real snow in Houston!

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Madeleines de Prous-T-V

(Oh le vieux jeu de mots du titre, j'ai honte!)

Bon alors, j'ai fait la liste:

V (Visiteurs): La VO, enfant, quand j'étais aux Etats Unis.
Mac Gyver: Sorbonne,deuxième année de droit, avec un bol de céréales au yaourt bio pour diner.
Friends: Agence de pub, première grosse addiction au format série vs. film
X Files: In love with Duchovny, moi qui suit une Scullienne dans l'âme.
Columbo: Première grossesse, sur TV Breitz de mémoire. Heureusement qu'il y a wat-mille épisodes pour tenir les 9 mois d'insomnie.
Derrick: Deuxième grossesse, à des heures indues, et que des millièmes redif. ça rendort direct.
Le Renard: (si si) Troisième grossesse, à des heures indues sur RTL9 de mémoire. Vive les insomnies. (C'était ça ou Chasse Pêche et Nature donc bon, camembert).

Voilà, ça suffira pour l'indigestion, je vous garde la suite pour une autre fois;)

Dang, Dang, Dang. And Some More Dang, Too

lauowolf
Yesterday
23 comments

Very, very bad vet news about the Boe Kitty.
My beautiful tuxie child.

P1010685

1 comment

You might remember the Defective Knee-Cap Saga from last year, in which the final official opinion was that The Boy just had weak bones, probably because of his feral childhood.
Fuzzy bits on xrays being healing of injuries.
Surgeon's first theory having been that he was being raised on tofu by crazed hippie owners - us - and had not enough calcium.
Not.
So over Christmas last year he had one knee problem, then in late spring another.
Well, if one was weak, so was the other, so that sort-of made sense.
So we were to let his little patellas heal by keeping him in to enforce rest and minimize jumps, and he would be pretty much okay.
And he's been going about his kitty business, being okay.

I was skritching him under the chin, and found a lump.
My immediate thought was, of course, abcess, or possibly dental problems.
Well, no.

The lump is misshapen bone on the side of his jaw, causing increasing difficulties in eating, grooming and the like.
He's marginally okay now, but if it keeps growing it will doom him.

Their current working theory on the cause is bone cancer.
HIM IS NOT QUITE TWO YEAR'S OLD.
The vet is saying that maybe he was born with it.
Which is more just badness in the universe than my brain can hold.
If is this, he can get steroids for a while to slow things down, but we're talking months.
It's his jaw, which is a very bad place indeed.

The only alternate theory is a possible systemic infection by one of a couple of fungal thingies.
One of which might make sense - an infection from pigeon or bat droppings - since we have no idea where his young feral mom had her nest.
My rapid reading through googled sources says it is known to go systemic in young cats.
The radiologist doesn't like this concept, and is thinking an early injury lead to a tumor which spread.

I do like the fungal theory, since anti-fungals would mean constant medication, but the possibility of a longer term survival with some reasonable quality of life.
And there is no history of an actual accute injury.
His feral family was observed and mom and litter trapped as soon as possible.
He was already about four months old when trapped because he was the smart boy who evaded the traps.
But no one ever said he was limping - only that he was too damned smart for his own good.

He goes in for a bone biopsy Tuesday morning to sort it out, since the treatments would be completely opposite.
So be thinking good thoughts about funguses for us.

QotD: Reminiscing about the Internet

Do you remember the things you did when you first started using the Web and how it has changed your life?

Well it was mostly just AOL and it's chat rooms

oh and of course looking up stuff online to plagiarize for high school, totally worked too, got 10 A's the last few weeks of Govt class on all my reports & projects (=

Moo, glucosamine, chondroitin, MSM, and Omega 3

Anne
Yesterday
2 comments

Moo is home. YAY!

She is looking rather pitiful and is very glassy-eyed from the pain meds and probably still a bit from the anesthesia. The vet said that when they got in there, her cruciate was "gone". They use a new procedure now - instead of a figure 8 wrapping with fishing line (OK that is an over-simplification of it, but is generally what was done), they now use a sheath that is crimped at the top and bottom basically wrapping the joint to keep it stable (I am envisioning shrink tubing - anyone who has messed with electronics and wiring knows what I am talking about).

The vet also said he's started using surgical staples instead of stitches when closing up the incision - his claim was that his wrists are giving out on him and this is quicker and easier. Poor guy! He is SO great with the dogs, but he gets SO nervous when talking with people. He had finally gotten past most of that with me because I had been in there almost weekly last year with Moo's ear problems...I think maybe having Neil with me this morning made him nervous again. Hehe! Neil is very intimidating looking if you don't know him.

He also told us about new advances in what they know about pain and how it works - what they now know is that anesthesia affects the consciousness, but that the pain pathways were still active for patients under anesthesia, so though you weren't aware of the pain on a conscious level, you were still feeling it. Now, after the anesthesia, they inject a local pain killer into the joint before beginning surgery. They also use a systemic painkiller throughout the process.

This all has gotten me researching glucosamine and chondroitin formulas again. He highly recommends the one they sell there (at $54/120 tablets)...but after some digging, I think for long-term maintenance, my Costco ones for $30/300 tablets is better all around. My two main concerns being that the vet pills have 400mg of flaxseed oil in them. While that is a good source of omega fatty acids, animals (including humans) do not process it as well as omegas derived from fish oils. Also, the vet pills have sucrose in them. While I am sure it is a negligible amount (it is the second to last ingredient), it is still there and is unnecessary. It also has a ton of MSM and no chondroitin. And the research I have found on MSM is very inconclusive as to any benefits and little is known about its long term effects or side-effects. So anyway - I will give her the week's worth that the vet provided to us with her antibiotics and pain meds (Rimadyl) and then we will switch back to her regular ones with added salmon oil (which runs me about $17/month for both dogs).

SADIE is being such a good big sister - Moo went to lay down and made a loud groan/whine (she was laying on her sore leg, silly dog) and Sadie came racing into the room to check on her. The cats have been circling and are very wary of her - I think she smells funny and they know something isn't quite right. Mostly now she is resting under the desk here with me. She's moving slow, but is getting around OK when she needs to. Her poor leg is all shaved and looks funny but, I think she will be just fine. We go back in about 10 days to have the staples removed and to let the vet have a quick peek at the incision to make sure it is looking good.