King Ron Turns 50

Today my father (King Ron, as he prefers to be called) turned 50. I wanted to post a nice tribute to him, but he's gone and ruined it all. You see, a few Father's Days ago, I gave him a book that contained really great pictures of him and me in it. I had wanted to copy those pictures and post them on this blog, but he's lost the book. I see how important it was to him. So instead, I'll jot down a few memorable stories about my dad.

With the fall season comes one of Ronnie's best performance pieces. Every Thanksgiving morning for as long as I can remember he graces our family with a musical performance of "There's a Great Big Turkey Down on Grandpa's Farm." Now, my father is quite a musical fella - in fact, he sings all the time. However, this song is only sung once a year. It doesn't matter how much we beg and plead, he will only sing it on Thanksgiving morning. We look forward to it every year.

Another great thing about Ronnie is his use of funny sayings (some of which he's made up). Two come to mind. First, "Cutting the shine." Yes, this is a made up one. Translation = Four-wheeling. Now, we have no idea where it comes from, but instead of asking if we would like to take the four-wheelers out, he would ask, "So, who wants to go cut the shine?" Yea, I know, it's crazy. The second phrase comes from my childhood. I never quite understood it until I got older. Whenever I would do something clumsy, he'd say to me, "Yeah Grace, how's charm school." I did a lot of clumsy things in my childhood so I heard it a lot. Come to think of it, it's not very nice. Well, what do you expect from someone who loses a Father's Day gift with adorable pictures of his daughter.

Finally, a hilarious story. As many of you know, Ronnie is an avid Boy Scouter. He has the uniform and all. Well, he had just changed into his boy scout uniform, when the doorbell rang. It happened to be my friend, Jana. He answered the door, said hello to Jana, and followed it with, "Now Jana, try to control yourself. I know how you women find men in uniforms irresistible." Jana really didn't know what to think. Can you blame her?

Happy Birthday, Dad!!