Winter Sets In, College Football Bowl Season is here, and Happy Birthday "Endora"

Looking out some 2 weeks into the future, I can see no days above 35 degrees for highs, with most days slated to be in the 20s, with lows in the teens...pretty rare to be this cold for an extended period this early in the season...after all we are still technically in "Fall".  So much for Global Warming...one thing I've noticed of late, folks have tired of the lies of the left wing Marxists and media about Global Warming...most thinking folks know what many of us have known all along....there is no such thing as man made Global Climate Change...it is indeed a hoax!

Return of the Marsh Hawk____

I walked out back this morning to give the ration of seed and feed to the Sparrows, Cardinals, and Gray Squirrels...the pair of red birds along with the hoards of small pesky Sparrows came swooping in fast, and began their feast....I came back in, read some material on the Internet and began preparing for my morning writings.  Some 15 minutes later, I popped out of my chair for another, my third, cup of coffee....and lo and behold, the birds were gone.  It didn't take long to figure out why.  I looked above the feeders in the backyard and saw the looming form of our resident Marsh Hawk...killer of birds, and other small rodents and mammals, lurking above the vines and feeders by the back fence.

Now of course I cannot be sure it this is the same one that has been hanging around for the past 4 winters....they look pretty similar, and it wasn't around as much last year(a mild winter), as the brutal winter of 08 and 09, and the previous 07/08 winter.  But given the early signs of a long, cold, season, my guess is he(or she) will make more visits this season, as it progresses.

Bowl Season has Arrived_____

Ohio State's Buckeyes are once again in a BCS Bowl....Coach Jim "The Vest" Tressel has a 5-3 record in BCS games in his previous years...this season OSU takes on the Arkansas Razorbacks on January 4, 2011, in the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans.  Wisconsin the tri-champion(along with Ohio State and Mich State) of the Big Ten, will take on TCU in the Rose Bowl on 1/1/11...while the Spartans are left with the "Booby Prize" of the Capitol One Bowl against Alabama, also on New Years Day...despite the fact MSU defeated Wisconsin early in the season.  The tie breaker was not kind to Michigan State.  In the National Title Game, undefeated Auburn takes on the Oregon Ducks.  For the rest of the BCS and other bowl action, click on the link:

http://www.bcsfootball.org/ 

Happy 110th Birthday Agnes Moorehead___


To most folks my age or younger, Agnes Moorehead, will be always remembered as "Endora", the conniving mother witch of Elizabeth Montgomery, "Samantha", in the 1960s TV show "Bewitched".  Born in Massachusetts on this day in 1900, Moorehead was actually so much more as an actress.

Moorehead passed away on April 30, 1974, and is buried just down the road in Dayton, Ohio.  She was a college alumni of Muskingum College in Ohio, and owned a large tract of land near Rix Mills, in the hilly area of southeastern Ohio.  She was a devote Christian and conservative in her political leanings...she left her "Emmy" and papers to the College, and her land to Bob Jones University.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnes_Moorehead

Outside of "Bewitched" I fist saw Moorehead in the Bogart and Bacall offering "Dark Passage".  After I got XM Radio a few years back and became a fan of "Old Time Radio Channel", I learned that Moorehead was one of the great Radio Actresses of that time, working between 1937 and 1954...then coming back for the first installment of the CBS Radio Mystery Theater.  She performed in two episodes before her death at the age of 73.  Moorehead's death of cancer, is one of the many that happened to actors and crew of the John Wayne/Howard Hughes bomb(no pun intended), "The Conqueror" from 1956.  To date, 90 of the 220 or so cast members, including Wayne, Moorehead, Susan Hayward, Director Dick Powell, and dozens of others have died from cancer.  The shooting site of the film was downwind from a Nuclear test site:

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/374/did-john-wayne-die-of-cancer-caused-by-a-radioactive-movie-set

Agnes Moorehead began in Radio with her friend Orson Wells on the series "The Shadow", in 1937, where she was the voice of "the lovely Margo Lane"...she played in hundreds(if not thousands) of radio broadcasts and was a long time supporting actress in dozens of feature films long before she played "Endora".  She received four Oscar Nominations and 7 Emmy awards, but won only once, that for an episode of Robert Conrad's "Wild Wild West" in the late 1960s.

Roundball, Dartball, etc.....

Saturday I officiated three basketball games, giving me a total of 10 for the week.  I certainly used the time off yesterday to rest the back, legs, and knees.  9 more games scheduled for this week...including a boys Junior High double header tonight here in Celina.  Following that I will make the 20 minute drive to Rockford to toss darts, probably arriving near the end of the first of 3 games.

The week will be busy, and the weather will remain cold....winter is here early.

Back Later>>>>

Photos-The PRH backyard has that "Winter" look, and it's likely to stay that way for the foreseeable future.  The Marsh Hawk is back, and perched, looking for a meal.  Ohio State faces Arkansas in the Sugar Bowl.  Agnes Moorehead as "Endora", and years before as "Margo Lane" in the "Shadow" Radio program which started in 1937.