It Was An Ugly Win, But A Win None The Less

Penn State 10 Illinois 7, Joe Paterno wins # 409.

Snow and more snow. My son called this morning early and said he did not want to drive to the game, through 200 miles of snowstorm. My 3 year old granddaughter kept him up past 2 AM with an earache. My brother in law begged off the trip and I was not up to drive it myself. My wife was out of the picture as she was committed to baby sitting my 5 year old granddaughter, who is now sound asleep in the next room. My daughter was a no because she and my son-in-law were committed to a Halloween party. My nephew whose tickets they were was a no because last night he worked the local high school football game and his daughter is in the band. Tommorow is the local Halloween parade at which he is working, his daughter is marching and his wife is marching also with the junior high school band she directs. Just too much in one short weekend. My nephew calls before lunch and says he is cooking a roast and to come out and watch the game. My wife bakes a cake. On the way to his house we stop at my wife's church (she's President) as they are having a meeting about cancelling services and such. First matter was to cancel the Saturday night service which had been moved up from 7 to 5 because the youth group was doing the second night of a Haunted House. Second matter was to cancel the Haunted House because of weather. Had they held it, the cleanup would have run to midnight to clear things up for Sunday services. We help the kids get started on cleanup until the Pastor shows up. Discussion turns to Sunday services and decision is to cancel 9:30 traditional service (mostly older folks) and Sunday School but to hold the 11:30 contemporary service (usually a live band, but scheduled for music videos because the band director and a guitarist are in a Halloween parade). We arive a few blocks away a few minutes before the 3:30 kickoff and are offered a tradition glass of vitamins, err screwdiver. My wife says yes to that, wow, the teatotaler has had a rough day so far. We had a few tree branches down due to the wet snow sticking to the still green leaves. We past quite a few trees down on the road. At our nephew's his back yard tree is in pieces on the hot tub and pool deck. My nephew's mother and step father are a no show so they are called. They were on their way when a tree fell down right in front of them, so they turned around. They get home to find downed trees have taken our their power. Call them though whenever there is a score. During the game another large part of the tree comes down.

Oh yes, the game, Penn State misses a field goal, Illinois has a touchdown called back on a penalty, then bobbles the snap on the field goal try, 0-0 at the half, time for more vitamins. We finished the last of the smoked sausage and the chunks of kielbasa in spicy sauce. So far the game is two of the top ten NCAA defenses and soso or worse offenses. Illinois finally puts a drive together at the end of the third quarter to lead 7-0. Penn State struggles to finally get a field goal, 7-3. Penn State gets the ball with about 4 minutes to go and on to the field runs their top receiver who has been out 3 3/4 games with a broken foot. It is do or die and the offense does and comes alive. He makes a few great catches, drops some, but the result is a Penn State touchdown with a bit over a minute to play, 7-10. Illinois comes alive again and marches to within field goal range with 5 seconds left. The kick to tie the game and send it into overtime hits the right goal post upright and bounces back on to the field. Unbelievable, as was dinner; scrumptous roast beef, onions, carrots, mushrooms, mashed taters, spicy gravy and thin crust rolls. We leave without desert because out daughter's plans changed twice during the game and grandaughter talked her way into spending the night at our house anyway. We pick her up on the way home and this chatty 5 year old proceeds to fill us in that during the cleanup at church they broke the light in her Sunday school room but she volunteers that she knows how to fix it because she saw it done at the mall. We get to our house and she say she wants to stay outside and throw snow balls, but first she has to clean the snow off my wife's car. Half way through she starts with the snowballs. My wife responds with a good one and Chloe, just laughs and says, "Bring it on!" Now even grandparents cannot ignore such a challenge, 5 years old or not. We will finish cleaning the car tomorrow after a lot of wet clothes dry. We check our messages and one is from the youth director. The church lost power and they finished moving furniture under the emergency lights. If there is still no power in the morning singing will be the plain old fashioned way.

It is just October, the leaves are still green and there is 10" of snow on the ground. What a wonderful day, anyway. My wife just said the snow stopped. Goodnight to all!

Paul in PA