Yesterday's Trip: A saga

  Tonight, we are staying in a hotel in Kansas City that we were supposed to stay in last night, until our alternator quit - intermittently, apparently. The hotel kindly adjusted our reservation in spite of the 'nonrefundable', 'nonchangeable' nature of the reservation. But that was not the first little kindness that we had been shown yesterday. 

 We left Chattanooga (after a kind friend made us an early breakfast!) intent on making it 10+ hours to KC yesterday. A few miles outside the little-known town of Monteagle, TN - one hour from our starting point, 9 from our destination - the red battery light came on. We stopped and were helped with an urgent and quick battery change and alternator test by the professionals at Monteagle Tire and Auto Service. Auto shops appear to have an extra gear when helping stranded travelers. We were on our way again.

 Two-plus hours later, having escaped a strange cluster of traffic in Nashville, as we approached Pleasant View, TN, the crimson light reappeared. Once again, we made an urgent pitstop at an autoshop, Auto Service of Pleasant View. Here the mechanic again checked things out and recommended that we go on to the dealership where they could better identify our exact problem and should have the parts to fix it. He was not only quick and thorough, but he was also willing to get soaked in a cloudburst, and he would not accept payment for his time. More kindness.

 The dealership was about 20 miles away, and the mechanic believed we would make it but gave some instructions in case we couldn't. These gave me a sense of what to expect 'in case of emergency.' Unfortunately, that 'sense' was needed. About 5 miles farther along, the Pilot started choking to death. Thankfully an exit appeared right ahead, and so I headed for it slowly. The exit appeared to exist solely for the sake of an empty road, an abandoned gas station, and an extant gas station. We choked our way to the extant gas station, parked, and shut off the vehicle. Then it was time to ponder. As I normally do with any vehicle problems, I called my dad. He advised that getting a new battery might be cheaper than getting a tow. But the gas station lacked new batteries.

 However, as I came out of the door, I saw a tow truck idling by the road in the gas station parking lot. Lest it escape, I jogged over and started asking questions to the driver. (Typically, I refrain from random jogging in public and from talking to strangers, even when in distress; however, this seemed like a perfect time for exceptions.) 

  Since he was already there, the driver arranged with dispatch to get us to the dealership for about a quarter of what I expected to be charged for a tow ($60!), saving us not only money but also time. He loaded up the Pilot, and we all piled into the passenger side of his cab, and we were off. 

  At the Honda dealership, the outlook was bleak... "It'll be a while till they can do the 1-2 hour check of the battery, alternator, and starter." "We'll call you eventually." "We may not even have that part in stock; and if we don't, it could be a day or two." Oh, and it's still rainy.

 However, since they were also trying to sell new vehicles in this location, there were amenities. A playground for children... a coffee and cocoa dispenser... clean restrooms... comfy chairs... and a kids movie playing in a nearly-soundproof glass room. So, while the diagnosis took several hours to be given, our physical distress was quite minimal - basically involving trying not to get wet on the playground. 

 Anyways, the diagnosis was rather pricey; the alternator failed; the BRAND NEW battery failed (!?!?!); some gasket-y thing should be replaced since it probably leaked onto the alternator and caused the failure. On the up side, the next new battery would include a ten-year warranty... but I'm selling the vehicle to a friend in 2 weeks. So we compromised. The gasket-y thing would have to wait till Denver. They were authorized to change the other two, but that wouldn't start till today. However, they start work at 7AM, so before 8AM, I'd gotten a call that all was now well. 

 When I went to pick it up, I found out that they had also tried recharging the battery. It was okay after all. So, no ten-year warranty, and the price was better. Saga/adventure over.

 We let the kids swim a bit longer in the hotel pool, and we headed out, arriving in KC a day late but thankful to be here.

Points of thanks to the Lord:

- We didn't break down on the highway itself!

- A tow truck was waiting for us at the gas station we made it to. (The driver said we were lucky some lady needed to be pulled out of a ditch near there.)

- The parts were available. 

- The supposedly dead battery came back to life.

- The hotel rescheduling our reservation so easily.

BONUS: The Honda dealership shuttled us to and from the hotel we stayed at last night. When I got into the car this morning, it started acting up. The driver told me that it had worked perfectly until I got in and that I might consider myself a 'black cat'. We barely made it back to the dealership with the shuttle car's engine light on and it coughing and spluttering along at less than 15 mph.

Random observation: Upon learning of our situation, three different people mentioned 'hotel with a pool'. Apparently, there is a well-recognized truth that 'when traveling with children, a pool can rectify nearly any situation.'

What does this image mean?

 Even some rather basic images can communicate in some surprisingly intricate ways. You may remember this picture puzzle from childhood:

 Last night while with friends, I saw the this image on one of their hats. The friend had gotten the hat from lost and found and hadn't interpreted it yet. Together we mumbled through key words and stumbled upon the hidden meaning in a brilliant flash of illumination. I'll put our key words in light text below so you can work through it for yourself. Select the text if you want to see them though.

(source of above image)

  The interesting takeaway is that an apparently random picture can cause a group of people with shared knowledge to suddenly yell the same thing. Images are powerful.

"Is that a Bengal goat? 😀" 

"My friend had a golf hat."

"It's striped. Isn't it a tiger?"

"Oh!"

Tiger is the GOAT!!!

fun with alarms and their verbs

 

 Yesterday evening in class, a dear elderly gentleman, one of the most diligent students I've had, had a new question for me. The text in the book was having the students use 'phrasal verbs', those amusing two-word, one-meaning verbs like 'get up' or 'go ahead'. The text was specifically using them in the context of alarms, like smoke alarms. He wanted an explanation for the phrasal verb used when an alarm sounds. 

Why do we use 'goes off' to say that an alarm 'turns on'?

 After asking his question, he carefully stared off into the middle distance so as not to put me on the spot as I publicly and verbally pondered the ridiculousness of this linguistic oddity for the first time. "Your alarm is going OFF; please turn it OFF, or it won't go OFF... er, ahh, I mean it won't stop going OFF."

 After a bit, I readily admitted to the class that this certainly had the potential to throw off (!) a night's sleep, at least until my alarm...

A Recommendation, a Waxwing, and a... well, one more surprise

  The smallest graces and beauties in life often arrive quite unexpectedly. I truly love birds and seeing a variety of them. One result of this is that my current favorite game is Wingspan, a beautifully drawn and well-designed board game which a friend gifted us a few months ago. Somehow competition is combined with beauty and a pinch of education to make a thoroughly enjoyable game experience, although it's too complex for the kids still. But I digress...

  Last week on a walk along a bike trail I saw a flock of Bohemian waxwings. I wouldn't have known their name if I hadn't happened to see this article about it in the Denver Post a few days before, "A rare and beautiful bird is turning up all over Denver this winter." Apparently these waxwings haven't been to Denver since I was a toddler. They were far more beautiful than the rather distant picture below suggests. The two colorings, presumably male and female, were both lovely; and the dozens of waxwings were in no rush to go anywhere else. But this morning...!

Bohemian waxwing

 Driving down Holly Street to drop kids off for school, I saw a bald eagle! I have loved eagles since I was very young, and they always make me think of my granddad because he had a house full of bald eagles (pictures, sculptures, and whatnot). Again, the picture quality below is lacking, but the gift of seeing beautiful birds wherever I'm at was not lacking in any way. Thankfully, we had a couple minutes to get out and take pictures of the bird before I dropped the kids off. Then I went back to look at it again in quietness.

A bald eagle, in Park Hill, Denver

 I said 'quietness', but actually you may notice in the video below that the crows and magpies were thoroughly disturbed that the eagle had entered their normal space. That's what the racket is, but the eagle seems unconcerned with it. And well he should!

 Actually this is the second time in the last several months that we've seen eagles. In November, driving back from Thanksgiving, we saw some bald eagles in Kansas, but they were away across a field. So even though we trespassed into a corn field, we still couldn't get particularly close.

 

Firsts in 2022: The Atlanta Braves

  One of my hobbies - 'pastimes' might be a better word - is following baseball, although I usually can't 'watch' much since time zones don't align well. Last night, Tyler Matzek got his first save in his 5th MLB seaso, 3rd as a reliever. Earlier this year, Jackson Stephens had also gotten his first 2 career saves. Below, I collected the other firsts that I could find from this year's Braves, not including debuting (or barely debuted) rookies. (Source: MLB)

 For most of these firsts, the pattern is clearly that they are young players, but one or two players in the list have waited a long time to do these firsts.

Saves:

- Tyler Matzek (5th season)

- Jackson Stephens (3rd season) - first 2 career saves

Balks:

- Jesse Chavez "The Most Traded Player in MLB History" (15 seasons) - 14 seasons with no balks!!!

Stolen Bases:

- Austin Riley (4th season) - first 2 stolen bases; previously, he had been caught stealing 3 times

- William Contrares (3rd season; 2nd with much time)

Walk-off hits:

- William Contrares (3rd)

 - Austin Riley (4th) - first 2 walk-off hits

Reached on an error:

- William Contrares (3rd)

Outfield assists:

- Travis Demeritte (3rd season)- first 2 outfield assists

Caught Stealing (Pitcher):

- Kyle Wright (5th season, 1st with more than 38 IP) - caught 2 stealing

 - Ian Anderson (3rd season) - caught 3 stealing

Pick-offs:

- Kyle Wright (5th season, 1st with more than 38 IP)

Double Play (fielding as a pitcher):

- Kyle Wright (5th)

ROOKIES:

  As for rookies, it appears that Michael Harris II is the Braves only hitting rookie who has made his debut this year. He's having an excellent year and not really leaving himself many firsts for the future; a walk-off hit, an intentional walk, and a sac bunt & fly seem to be about what's left to look forward to.

*The only 'second' that I could find so far this year was Guillermo Heredia's second career triple, excluding categories that also had a first this year.  

**As for rookies who are pitchers, William Woods & Bryce Elder debuted briefly. Dylan Lee and Spencer Strider with only 2 and 2.1 IP last year respectively have checked many new boxes, as have Jesus Cruz, and Tucker Davidson who had about 20 IP before this season. Also, Mike Form (1B) recorded his first pitching appearance allowing 2 runs on a walk and a home run.

Anticipation, summarized by Wodehouse

"Few things are so pleasant as the anticipation of them."

~ P. G. Wodehouse, The Adventures of Sally

a Disastrophe with Hanitizer

   My sister recently shared with me the word malaphor, which apparently is the blending of idioms or cliches; her sharing included the example, "it's not rocket surgery." It's always nice to have another word for something you already know how to do. I mean this summer I had realized that you should 

Never count your chickens before they come home to roost!

  

  Having said that, I have for years been collecting words along the same line - serendipitous combinations of words that, merged together, picturesquely convey far more than the sum of their parts. Language Nerds (the main reason I've considered getting Instagram) had one this week: 

cupidity: the dumb stuff we do when we are in love 

   Here are some additional samples that I present for your use.  

hanitizer: the stuff we wash COVID off our hands with (credit: small human in Texas) 

himpered: when you feel both hampered and hindered in and from doing something

disastrophe: when a catastrophe gets disastrously worse

crimpled: the feeling of not being able to walk because you've been sitting all crumpled up

anticdote: 1. a story about one's own antics; 2. a humorous anecdote told in order to offer warning for others as an antidote to their foolishness (credit: unsuspecting theologian in a lecture)

clowsy: cloudiness that makes one feel drowsy (credit: brother-in-law)

waservoir: a place with a large accumulation of water held in reserve (credit: small human)

wuzzled: the state of a paper that has been crushed and wadded and was not supposed to be in that state Ex: Why is this all wuzzled up?!? (credit: father) 

the Scariest Sign in America (when driving at dusk)

  About ten miles outside of Denver, there is a sign. For an Elk Crossing. 

  I wanted to take an actual picture of it when we passed it on our trip, but we missed our chance... because we were frantically scanning the underbrush for elks. (I know, that's not the plural of elk.) Anyways, I used to drive a smallish Nissan Altima, or other similarly sized cars.  Imagine how one of these monstrous deer would shatter such my poor dear car if we were to smack one while they were 'crossing' the highway at 70mph. No bueno! 
 Thankfully, a friend loaned us an SUV this time, hoping it would help us surviving an elking, I think. Presumably it would have, but it didn't lower the residual stress any.

 Needless to say, I always have, and presumably always will, consider the Elk Crossing sign to be the scariest road sign in America... except for possibly, the Moose Crossing sign, which I have yet to see, thankfully.

The Case for Freddie Freeman as the Greatest First Baseman for the Atlanta Braves

  With his career WAR at 26.6 (per Baseball Reference), a strong case can be made that Freddie Freeman is the greatest first baseman in Atlanta Braves’ history. In the Atlanta era, no one can really rival him as a primary first baseman. The greatest player to play first base for Atlanta was undoubtedly Hammerin’ Hank Aaron, who manned the position for two years (1971-1972) totalling 11.2 WAR in that short space. Those two years by Aaron included the highest single-season 1B WAR in franchise history (7.25) in 1971. Even that year, however, Aaron played nearly as many games in right (60) as he did at first (71). Regardless, that was not Aaron’s primary position as a Brave. It is Freddie's.

Freddie Freeman   
(Wiki Commons)

 Freddie Freeman has played 7 years as the Braves' primary first baseman; that is already tied for third in first base longevity for the franchise. Add to this, that only Fred Tenney (1897-1909, 1911) with 39.1 WAR in 12 years primarily at first and Joe Adcock (1953-1962) with 26.6 WAR over 10 years in that role have as great a WAR as Freeman as Braves’ first basemen, and Freeman’s significance at the franchise level begins to become clearer. Other than Tenney and Adcock, only Earl Torgeson (1947-1952) with 18.6 WAR in six years can even really be part of the first base "greatest" conversation for the Braves’ franchise.

  These other three contenders for the title of ‘greatest Braves’ first baseman’ all played prior to the move to Atlanta in 1966. Since then, no one has put together a sustained run of production at first for the Braves. Historically, this has not been a position of particularly prolific production for the Braves. So, let's look at Freeman's numbers in his first eight years. Per Baseball Reference, no other primary first baseman beats Freddie in these categories during the Atlanta era: 

- Freeman is 16th in Braves' career WAR (in 8 years!) 

- He is 5th in Win Probability Added.

- He is between 10th and 22nd in 

  + HRs (12th)

  + RBIs (18th)

  + OBP (15th)

  + SLG (14th), 

  + OPS (11th)

  + walks (tied for 13th)

  + doubles (11th)

  + extra base hits (10th)

  + total bases (17th)

  + runs (21st)

  + hits (22nd)

  Freeman is prominent in numerous other less well-known offensive production categories as well. 

  At the single season level, other than Aaron's 7.25 WAR in 1971, Freeman's 6.45 WAR in 2016 is the highest WAR in franchise history at first base. Plus, his 5.67 WAR (2013) would be the sixth highest after Alou 6.29 WAR (1966), Brouthers 6.23 WAR (1889), and Torgeson 5.96 WAR (1950). 

  During the Atlanta era, other than Freeman, only Fred McGriff and Hank Aaron* have as much of 11 WAR while primarily playing first base. Freddie has over 26 WAR. On the basis of all this, I believe Freddie Freeman is easily the greatest Atlanta Braves' first baseman. 

  Joe Adcock and Fred Tenney deserve a bit of additional attention here. Having both played before the move to Atlanta, they are the significant competition that Freeman faces in terms of becoming the greatest Braves' franchise first baseman. In the categories listed above, one or both of them were often listed before Freeman. With multiple years of his normal production as he enters his age-28 season, Freeman can be expected to reach and surpass these two in most of those areas in the natural course of events. This, of course, presumes that he continues with the franchise, but why would fans anticipate anything else?

Freeman (2014)   
(WikiCommons)

Maybe most significantly for the franchise, Freeman is signed for 4 more years! He should get a meaningful chance to become the greatest Braves' first baseman in franchise history, in addition to already being the greatest Atlanta Braves' first baseman.

Notes and Tidbits:

* Hank Aaron played a total of 210 games at first.

- Freeman is 6th in franchise striketouts.

- Freeman has three years with over 4 WAR (same as Tenney), four years with over 3 WAR (same as Torgeson; Adcock had 5 years like that; Tenney had 7 years like that). (Source)

- Joe Adcock has a fascinating career filled with colorful stories. He broke up baseball's longest perfect game. He apparently holds the NL record for most consecutive games with a HR against an opponent (9 straight in 1956) (source). He also had a 4-homer, 18-base 9-inning game. He won the World Series in 1957, and he could have became a professional basketball player. (a very interesting bio with anecdotes) Besides his seven years as the Milwaukee Braves' primary first baseman, Adcock also had 3 years with between 56 and 78 games in which he played the second most games at first, due either to injury or platooning. (detailed history) 

- Sixty-one different players have led the Braves’ franchise in 1B WAR during their 142-year history. 

what is 'a progress'? or, 'a royal progress'?

  As I read a chapter in a book this evening in preparation for a class I am to teach tomorrow, I came across the idea that Queen Elizabeth I would make a 'progress' from time to time.  The first time I read this, I glanced at the explanation in parentheses which commented '(entry).' But as I kept reading it became clear that 'a progress' was something more than that - it was, in fact, some sort of official trip apparently.  Indeed, once I started looking, Merriam-Webster provided the clarity I needed.  It says that a progress can be both a royal and a non-royal journey.

  With a nudge from the book, I made the connection to Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress and thus made sense of a title that has never made a ton of sense to me. (When I checked to see if my wife knew this tidbit, she promptly guessed it; maybe that's why I am sharing it here.) :) 

re: the dark before dawn

  Saying 'It's always darkest before the dawn' makes nearly as much sense as saying, 'You always find something the last place you look for it.' Of course you do... you don't keep looking after you find it, and if it got even darker, then it wouldn't be getting lighter, aka dawning!

  Alternately, despair.com has a different approach to this...

  However, this brings to mind one of my most recent favorites, Andrew Peterson's "The Burning Edge of Dawn."

I've been waiting for the sun

To come blazing up out of the night like a bullet from a gun

Till every shadow is scattered, every dragon's on the run

Oh, I believe, I believe that the light is gonna come

And this is the dark, this is the dark before the dawn...

This is the storm, this is the storm

The storm before the calm

This is the pain, the pain before the balm

This is the cold, the cold

It's the cold before the warm

These are the tears, the tears before the song

This is the dark

Sometimes all I see is this darkness

Well, can't you feel the darkness

This is the dark before the dawn.

humor from the young

'If math were food, I would never eat.' - a student

"There's not many things to forget about you." - a daughter, speaking to someone in an imaginary world [Is this an insult or a compliment?]

The evil silent ones, like 'sword'

 As I have taught English, and as I have watched my daughter try to learn to read English, I have become aware again of the ridiculousness of evil - and nearly omnipresent - silent letters lurking surreptitiously in the undergrowth of English orthography. I say 'again' because I am quite sure that I was very aware of these entrapping oddities years ago as I tried to aquire the art form called reading.

 I do not say that these letters have no purpose for certainly with sufficient instruction the English spelling system can be learned. Indeed, in the case of vowels often the silent letters can give clear meaning. For instance, plumber could become plumer, but then it would be pronounced differently - so, it would need to be plummer. So, some silent letters can make sense, but there are the other, too...

  So, in solidarity with those seeking to decipher the sinister silent-letter riddles, I submit these repeat offenders and request the improvement of the English language through the abandoning of this ridiculousness.

half

know

clothes

gnat

built

sword

answer

castle

comb

hour

subtle

debt

bee

plumber

island

four

caught

vineyard

could

psychology

Often more usefully, these may also be silent:

any vowel 

doubled letters 

Pessimist: one who sees the medicine in every spoonful of sugar

Pessimist: One who sees the medicine in every spoonful of sugar

Notes:
1.  These people often consider themselves realists.
2.  This definition arouse from accusations against this blogger.

Classical - My Little Ones are loving it more than I do

I don't know if anyone would suggest that either of the two composers below (Camille Saint-Saens or Dmitri Shostakovich) are 'classical' musicians, but they are introducing my daughters to listening to instrumental, classical-style music with enjoyment and imagination. They beg to watch these two animated compositions over and over again. Hopefully soon we will add 'Peter and the Wold' to this repertoire for them! Please, enjoy...

Camille Saint-Saëns - The Carnival of the Animals

Dmitri Shostakovich - Piano concerto No.2 

  In January, an essay that I read by Kevin Bauder pointed me toward thinking about this topic and particularly some of these musical pieces. I especially enjoyed finding 'The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra' through that essay, "Start Them Young." My daughters are a bit young to 'get' the music without the animation, but because of the way it's presented even they can benefit from this rendition as they begin learning about the various musical instruments and their sounds.

  

Hiccups

Hiccups

Hici hici cups.

Hiccups after tea cups.

Hici hici ups.

Diaphragm jump ups.

Lung and chest bounce up.

Hici hici ups.

Giggle after sup.

Everyone cracks up.

Hici hici ups

Backwards gulping cup

Waters flowing down

Hici hici- stops!

by Julide, 2015

(poetry assignment on topic of personal interest)

Numerical beauty (palindromic)

Yesterday while counting something, I realized that adding 9 to 5 five times, resulted in a numeric palindrome 05 14 23 32 41 50.  A palindrome is a word that can be read the same way forwards or backwards.  Today, when I glanced at the numbers I'd written down again, I wondered if it would work with another number.  Sure enough, it does. Just add 9...

00

01 10

02 11 20

03 12 21 30

04 13 22 31 40

05 14 23 32 41 50

06 15 24 33 42 51 60

07 16 25 34 43 52 51 70

08 17 26 35 44 53 62 71 80

09 18 27 36 45 54 63 72 81 90

Beyond that, there's multiple additional pattern layers within the set, and the pattern renews after the first series; thus, after 01 10, you have a second numeric palindrome:

19 28 37 46 55 64 73 82 91 

Again, this continues after the other sets.  Aren't numbers beautiful?  I am especially curious about what is special about the number 9 in these sorts of sequences.  

  I've played mental games with numbers since at least fifth grade when I learned to 'cast out nines' as a method of checking multiplication, division or addition problems.  (Another pattern that I realized years ago is that the square of any number is +1 of the product of the number before and after it.  Thus, 8x8=64, which is one more than 7x9.) Anyways, I have no idea whether there is any significance in this sort of thing or whether whoever else has found it has given it a name, but I haven't found it if there is a significance or if it does have a name! 

The Most Memorable Food

  Likely my first memory of the most memorable food is from when I was about 8: four of us cousins were visiting Opa and Oma (our grandparents), and after lunch we had watermelon for desert.  This led to an extended discussion of the possibilities of growing watermelons out your ears if you swallowed the seeds. With Opa leading the imagining and Oma carefully staying out of the discussion, we enjoyed our desert for quite a while.  Unfortunately, I can't provide you with a picture of those imaginings, but they were quite in depth. (That was in Suriname.)

  A couple years later, there was a general family food fight in North Carolina; it got so intense that both the baby and Oma got involved this time, not to mention Aunt Debbie and the rest of us children, as well as maybe some other adults.  If you know Oma, this may be difficult for you to imagine, so I am including (non-photoshopped) proof.

Oma and some of us grandkids

Serious wars, obviously.

  As we continued to grow up, our background was the site of much more watermelon eating and seed spitting, except by the member of the family who wasn't up to trying to spit most of the time.  

a backyard picnic, without watermelon unfortunately

  Today, I began to try to pass on the tradition to our littlest generation.  Watermelon fun in the backyard with baths following, another memory, another place, more family.  First, we had to make sure that watermelon was a good snack, and then we began the process of trying to spit seeds... I got chunked a time or two... There's still half of a watermelon left, so maybe next time I will be able to get some pictures of the fun.

Apologetics for Lucy Pevensie of Narnia

  I recently started reading C. S. Lewis' Aslan, Cadı ve Dolap (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, obviously in Turkish).

  When I came to the part where Lucy's older siblings go the Professor to find out what they should do about her Narnian imaginings.  I noticed that the Professor used the same argument that Lewis popularized regarding the deity of Jesus in order to convince Peter and Susan of Lucy's truthfulness.  In other words, Lucy was describing something true because they had never known her to be a liar and she had not seemed to be trying to lie convincingly.  Furthermore, she wasn't crazy.  So, therefore, the Professor concluded that she must be speaking the truth (which he obviously could have guessed much more easily with his extra information from Büyücünun Yeğeni.)

 As I confirmed on Google, this is not a new observation, but it was still a fun discovery.

Paul Bunyan: a new Tall Tale (by a young student)

 Paul Bunyan was America's greatest lumberjack. He was the biggest man in the whole world at that time. He was much more than 25 feet tall.

 When he was a baby, he would eat trees like broccoli. His crying used to make tornados that would make the rocks and trees fly into the air.

 At thirty years old, he was stronger an bigger than ever. But his shoes smelled like all the American garbage gathered in one place, but only when he took them off.  He could only make a bath in the sea. So Paul sometimes got lice as big as a blue whale.

 If he dropped his ax he would split apart America. Then Paul and Babe the Blue Ox would have to push on America's two sides and rejoin them. Twice he dropped the ax, and it made the Continental Divide and the Mississippi River.

 When he was 90 years old, he died. They buried him in Denver, with Pike's Peak as his headstone.

[This new tall tale was imagined with a bit of direction and a few place names by a young student; she'd never heard of Paul Bunyan till today.]