I'm Just Me (Simple As That): #186

#186 is my favorite brother :) He is three years younger than me.

He has three girls and I have three boys. He loves to hunt and fish and I love to play tennis and jog. We both love to read and spend time with our family. We are both very, very competitive. I am older, so I am better than him at everything and he always loses when we are in competition. Over the years I have beaten him at tennis (right Jeff?), trivial pursuit (right Dad?), bourre' (right Jeff?), and pretty much everything else he thinks he can beat me at. He does not have a blog and he has not set up his laptop that he got for Christmas so he cannot dispute this.

He does not like the Internet and will not appreciate me posting pictures of him here, but...again no blog and no laptop so...

I do not remember a time that he was not around. I remember getting up early on Saturday mornings to watch cartoons. Our favorites were Superfriends (wonder twin powers ACTIVATE! He would always be the shape of a Boa Constrictor and I would be the shape of ICE!!!), Speed Racer, Johnny Quest, and he probably won't admit to it but...Smurfs! We would lie on the big floor pillows that mom made in our Trapp T-shirts and watch TV all morning.

Fast forward a few years. I remember he and his buddies "borrowing" my rabbit coat so that they could make videos of themselves "rapping." They would put on the clothes, set up the video recorder, and tape for hours. Their favorites were the Beastie Boys, Whodini, Run D.M.C. and LL Cool J. Who remembers the song, "Mama Says Knock You Out?"

It was in this same era that my mom and dad bought us our own TV. I say "our" because we shared it. My dad (our resident electrical engineer and carpenter) drilled a hole from D's room to my room, dropped some cable down from the attic, and every month the TV would switch rooms. One month in my room, and one month in D's room. Eventually we added ATARI to the mix and we both got high scores on Pitfall. I remember taking a picture with the TV and the score in the background and mailing it in to someone for some reason???? (Of course I got a higher score than D - see above)

Once he was super cool and in high school, I had the honor of sharing a car with #186. I'm not sure if he shared the green monster with me, but he definitely shared the Monte Carlo. It was a beautiful shade of red on the outside with a faded purplish/pink interior. A two door model with the seats that fold up. I did love that car until he and his buddies got involved. It became infested with bugs after they took it mud-riding and hunting a few times and put the dead ducks they killed on the back floorboards. They use to say that when they took the girls out on dates in the MC, they had to open the doors up and let the interior lights come on before the girls got to the car so the bugs would scatter. Good times...Good times!

This was our dog, Grover!

Yes, we had a dog...don't tell my boys!!!!

He has always been a boys' boy. Baseball, hunting, fishing, bow and arrows, guns, knives, basketball. He managed to take his love for the great outdoors and turn it into a career. He runs a successful charter fishing business and is booked solid on all the good fishing days. His personality and his knack for knowing all the hot spots keeps his customers coming back year after year. They also invite him to visit them in the off season to "help them" guide hunts. What a great life! I can honestly say that I cannot picture him doing anything else. You would think that such a boys' boy would have trouble in a house full of girls, but the opposite is true. He has a wonderful wife who he was smart enough to snag in high school, and three beautiful girls who think the sun rises and sets around their daddy. The girls can switch from cheering to hunting and dancing to fishing faster than it takes some girls to finish fixing their hair.

She helped him with school...

and he got her in touch with the great outdoors!

A perfect match!

Several years ago, my brother was involved in a horrible accident. Without going into too much detail, let me just say that it was a very sobering experience for my entire family. We can thank God that he pulled through okay, but when things like that happen, it really makes you realize that we should not wait to tell the ones that we love, that we love them. I love my brother. I know that in the past, sometimes he has made me mad and we have gotten into some good arguments, but that's the way it is supposed to be with brothers and sisters who love each other. When I think about D, the arguments are not what I remember. What I do remember is that he can make me laugh harder than anyone else in this world. I usually end up crying I am laughing so hard. It is usually over something that most other people don't even think is funny (right Jeff?) Some examples are when he comes to the dinner table with an electric knife to protest mom's tough roast or when he changes the words in mass to make me laugh. ("Only say the word and the potatoes will be peeled").

Anyway, if he reads this post he may get mad because he doesn't like blogging, but I hope he reads it to the end because this is the part when I tell him again how much I love him and I am glad that we were close as kids and remained close as adults. It makes me happy to see our kids growing up together and I look forward to many years of making good memories!

Mushy stuff aside, I just had to add the pictures. Enjoy!

As soon as he could hold a pole, he would fish whenever he could!