My great-uncle

I had a great-uncle who was born on this day. He was quite the character. When I would go to visit him and my great-aunt, he would sing to me every morning at the breakfast table. Some of his songs were quite lovely and some of them, well..., um..., lets just say that they not very politically correct!

He believed that everyone in his house should be out of bed by 10am sharp. If not, then you were subjected to "The Right Guard Treatment". That meant he came into your bedroom and would spray your bare skin with the aerosol can version of Right Guard. Man, that stuff was cold! If that didn't work then he would come back with a tray of ice cubes and throw the ice cubes in the bed.

He also liked to go through the contents of the vacuum cleaner bag after my great-aunt had done the vacuuming. He said it was to make sure that nothing had accidentally been vacuumed up by mistake. He would then sort the dirt into piles and told me that each pile belonged to a person who was staying there at that time. For some reason he liked to make my pile bigger than all the other piles. *grins*

When Mama Hairball learning to cook, she had trouble making gravy and would always get it too thick. My great-uncle told her not to worry, they'd just slice it up and make sandwiches out of it for lunch!

Rest in peace, great-uncle. Thanks for all the laughter you brought to our lives over the years. Thanks for playing cards with us, letting us kids "build stuff" out in your workroom, and for keeping us calm and entertained when we had to get in the storm cellar during tornado season. We still miss you and talk about all the crazy stunts you pulled on us over the years.