BuffettNews.com

Over the past few weeks I’ve been thinking about how Buffett News is much more than a web site where people also chat, but more of a on line community. A couple definitions for, “community,” is, “a unified body of individuals,” and, “a group of people with a common interest living together within a larger society.” While the members of BN do not share the same physical address, it’s true that there’s a lot of living going on in this digital world at BN. Not a day has gone by that I haven’t read something on this thread that simply made me feel better about life, put a smile on my face or choked me up big time, remember guys don’t cry.

The other day Ringling posted the story about his Grandparents of the, ”How Long Have You Been Married,” thread that was very touching. Flying down to LA last week I was thinking that it sure would be cool if we could keep all the good stuff like that in one location. Sort of a “Barometer Soup for The Parrot Head Soul,” thread where the entire reason for the existence of the thread is to post things that make others feel good about life, just the pure goodness of living life on the Big Round Ball as a Parrott Head. There are some very good writers on the board, (Tikitatas) some professional writers, aspiring writers and a lot of really good stories, like the recent stories of the lady who saw Jimmy in Anguilla on her 40th and started to cry and Jimmy gave her a hug, Buffettbrides, Mallory’s, heroic actions to save her kids backpacks from car wash. Those are great stories that make Parrott Heads feel good and inspire us to keep living our lives like a song.

Also, there’s the real sense of community where people figure out a way in a world full of pushin’ and shovin’ to take the “Fins Up” approach and time to care about others. I’m reminded of the Rum Swizzle's thread when Maria was going through her bone marrow transplant and all the great messages of love, support and encouragement others shared for her, Albert and their children. Remember Buffettphest 2006? Have you had a chance to stop and think about the impact on those service men and women who actually had a day off in Margaritaville? And the list goes on and on. Cookbooks for loved ones that passed away, the BNer thread for Random Acts of Kindness and all the charitable causes that are supported right here. I never knew MRS A existed, let alone what a b*tch she can be until the Phin power messages came pouring in for Connie. Did she change her name again?

Maybe you have a story, a picture, a memory or a comment that you’d like to share. Please jump in!

From Ringling


Something I have been thinking about since this thread went up, and asks that you bear with me.

My great-grandmother and her first husband married in 1917, she was a telephone operator and he was a carpenter and bookkeeper who had come west to find a better future than life in a coal mine. They met, married and had 5 kids together. When he died in 1964, my grandmother continued her life, a little quieter (for a redhead, it is possible), still baking for a couple restaurants in town, living in her basement house, and earning a living. That was how I remember her.

Six years later, friends of hers told her about a widower who lived a few towns over (70 miles in ND is "a few towns over"). He had taken care of his first wife for years during an illness, and when she passed, he had also carried on, a little quieter, but not quite willing to say that he had seen or done it all.

The mutual friends introduced them, and over that winter, they got to know each other. They were married on Lincoln's Birthday, and she joked that she was keeping her house in Rugby and her car, "just in case it didn't work out". The house was sold within the year, and she was happy with him the next 4 years. In 1975, her health took a turn for the worse. Cancer, a stroke, heart disease.. pretty much just the product of a hard life, cigarettes, and all.

For the next year, Francis never left her side. They made trips from the house to the doctor to the hospital (and he would sleep in a chair in her room). As the year went by, she got smaller and smaller, and the trips home became less frequent until she made her last trip to the hospital in Nov. He was there when she passed, holding her hand.

Three months later, he was gone. Cancer that had been slowly eating away at him, something he hadn't really told Grandma about, took him in June. In the end, he had stayed for her and when she was gone, decided he had nothing left to see.

They set the bar pretty high in just six years.

From Buffettbride


It was hubby's birthday so I volunteered to pick up the kids so he could go home early and play his drums. I was dilly-dallyin' trying to think up ways to give him a few extra minutes that wouldn't involve a long-drawn out process of getting in and out of the car. Car seats are a real pain.

So my stroke of genius was the car wash. Every little kid loves the drive-thru car wash. The one by our house even has colored stripes of soap to make it extra exciting. For $5, you can't beat that kind of entertainment.

I input my car-wash code and proceed to enter. The kids squeal as the presoak bubbles pass both sides of the car. I glance to the passenger seat--empty save my purse sitting on the seat. I peek back to see the kids smiling. It looks awfully empty back there. Then I see the distinguished shape of backpack handle peeking up from the bed of the truck through the rear window.

The backpacks and volleyball bag are enjoying a colorful presoak as well. So, without hesitation and before a full-on rainbow of bubbles erupts all over my white truck, I leap out of the car and make a dash for the bags. The backpacks first. Schoolwork is important. Then I make a second dash for the volleyball bag.

Then I feel the cold. "I'm hit. I'm hit," I think. Not bad enough though as I see some of the front-pocket contents of the volleyball bag have spilled onto the carwash floor (it also doubles as an overnight bag sometimes). I reach for the flashlight laying hopeless on the wet concrete. Before the second wave of rainbow soap can pass by, I'm safely back in the truck, seatbelt fastened.

The kids cheer with glee and commend mom for her bravery in the face of rainbow bubbles.

From bufitonmybmw

My 40th birthday party was AWESOME! I thought I was gonna faint too!! Thanks SO much to Coleman for the "tip" about being on that beach- it was the memory of a lifetime! And to meet all you guys...frozenbird, parrotprof...just further proof that Parrotheads are real good folk. After the acoustic set, which lasted almost 2 hours, Jimmy walked over to us. I had my sign that read "Welcome to my 40th B-Day Party!" He autographed it and I told him that I'm a Mom from Chicago and it's my 40th birthday and my 5 kids and I are HUGE fans...(I'm sure I was babbling!)...when he just kinda cocked his head and looked at me, smiled and signed my poster. Then he put his arm around me (!) and took this photo. As I started then to cry, he said "don't cry- you're on the beach!) and gave me a hug! Wow. I'm good now. I can die happy! It was so much fun to drink/eat/party with you all- thanks again for all the good wishes.

Dan, you are a treasure.........
What a great thread!

Totally awesome, Tequila Revenge. This ROCKS.

Wish I could remember the details....ETP will be able to retell it phirst hand about her encounter w/ Mr. and Mrs. Andrewsjerrypat. It's wonderphul.

This was the most heartfelt post I ever put up here....I'm glad I found it again and Dan prompted me to find it again......it reminded me of a different time in my life and how quickly things can and do change in our lives....and yet, the one constant that has remained for me is the music....thankfully, the changes in the last few years have been happy and good one for me......I love my parrothead friends....here, there and everywhere!!

From Paige (10-20-2004)

Just spent an hour in the hottub with a bottle of wine.....cool rain falling lightly, steam from the hot tub.....watching the stars, enjoying the quiet.....I was filled with that delicious anticipation of kid on Christmas Eve, thinking about seeing Buffett in just a couple of days.
I was thinking back to my early PH days and finding it hard to believe that it was over twenty years ago.....thinking about how most of the significant events in my life I can tie to a song....meeting my husband...one of our first dates was a Buffett concert.....my Dad died a few years later and I always think about him whenever I hear "Incommunicado"..."on the day that John Wayne died, I found myself on the continental divide...tell me where I do I go from here think I'll go in to Leadville and have a few beers...think of Red River or Libery Valance can't believe the Old Man's gone...."
Less that a year later my 'keet was born, she is and always will be my "Little Miss Magic".....thinking about singing that song to her and remembering with great delight the first time she spontaneoously went "FINS UP" during that song.
Building my career and having those days that s*** and wondering what the hell I'm doing.....and remembering "It's my job to be cleaning up this mess and that's the thing people expect from me." I really do feel like we're cleaning up messes most days, but that's our job......and if street sweepers can smile that I've got no right to feel upset.....
Of course, most recently through my Mom's illness and death.....Buffett lyrics were calming, soothing and a reason to smile on days there didn't seem to be many reasons.....Pacing the Cage....."Sometimes the best map will not guide you. You can't see what's round the bend
Sometimes the road leads through dark places, Sometimes the darkness is your friend. "
Right after my Mom passed I started listening to "License to Chill" with a different ear, although it's still not my favorite album....I can't get through "Coast of Carolina" without at least the hint of a tear..."And the walls that won't come down we can decorate or climb or find some way to get around".....there have been so many days that the walls just seem too big, that the sadness won't lift....but we can decorate or climb or find some way to get around.....
And that brings me to this time, this place.....where a spontaneous trip with my lifelong best friend is the beginning of getting around that wall....sorry this is such a long rant, but it needed to go somewhere.....to the Far Side of the World where there's probably more that one parrothead that will nod and say, "Yeah....me, too"

From Flowerfield Girl


I have always said, there is a Jimmy Buffett lyric for every situation in life.

Here's the first of a couple of posts about the Dallas Show last year ....

******************************************************************


Here is a copy of a series of emails guaranteed to make you just pheel good all over. It's good to share blessings. Am sending them a CD of my photos and a poster from HOOT ISLAND.

It's times like these I am PROUD to be a parrothead. It pheels good to do good.

******************************************************************

Dear East Texas Parrothead,

Is it possible for you to send me a high resolution email photo of the one you posted of the Dallas Concert?

Here is why it is important to me.

My wife had had lower abdominal pains for two months and had every kind of test run, but all came back negative. Then the early part of Feb. 2006, she started having a fluid build-up in her right lung. The doctors determined that the fluid was cancerous, but weren't sure of it's origin. After 15 days in the hospital, they determined it was inoperable, uncurable, Stage IV Endometrial Cancer.

Our whole world has turned upside down since then. She started getting chemo while in the hospital and to make things worse, she contracted an ecoli infection from somewhere in the hospital. We are now on our 5th of 8th chemo treatments and surgery may be in the future also.

We hadn't been anywhere since she was diagnosed. Her immune system is compromised during part of the chemo cycle and we do not leave the house during those 7-10 days of each 21 day chemo cycle.

I never thought she would be able to make it to the Dallas concert when the tickets went on sale, so we didn't buy any at that time. One week before the concert, we had our local Parrothead Club meeting and we were overwhelmed and in tears when one of our members had purchased lawn tickets for us. Not only had they done this enormously generous favor, but they have also provided us meals for over two months.

We don't go to traditional church, so you might say we really are members of the Church of Buffett. My wife couldn't have made it without their prayers, support and kindness.

We headed off to Dallas and the soncert saying how great that it was that our club had bought us tickets.

They even had got my wife an electric wheelchair to stroll the grounds since her energy level is so depleted.

When it started raining, I thought to myself, "my wife could come down with a cold or even something worse if she sat on the lawn and it started raining during the concert since her immune system is compromised."

That is when I got the idea or you might call it a calling from above to go check out the box office to see if there might be some returned tickets. That way my wife wouldn't be exposed to the elements. Low and behold to my surprise when the guy told me that he had two tickets, front row, center section. I couldn't believe it.

You can't believe what is like to be that close to the stage. We didn't want the concert to end. Things were made much better when Jimmy threw out a guitar pick and my wife Rhonda retrieved it.

To make things even better, I was talking to Jimmy's bodyguard, Charleston, before the concert and told him that this was really a miracle that Rhonda was even there.

After the two of Jimmy's guys got through "shooting out " the concert shirts, he came over to Rhonda and gave her one.

It was a perfect evening that we will never forget.

Some other stuff....the two tickets to the lawn didn't go wasted as two of our club members were searching for tickets and I sold then at face value and gave the money back to our club member who had bought the lawn tickets for us in the first place.

I also gave Charleston my address in the hopes that Jimmy might send an autographed "get well" picture back to Rhonda.

This may be my wife's last concert, but I pray to the Lord above that it will not be. But if it is, it was a night made in heaven.

P.S. Your life is never very stable for very long when you have cancer. My wife went to her oncologist/gyn. yesterday for a check-up and she told him about a rash on her chest. Bad news is that it is shingles (caused by the low immune system). Good news is that we think we caught it early enough. You have to start medication within 48-72 hours for the antibiotic to be effective.

Thanks
Jerry Andrews
Sec./Treasuer
Central Oklahoma Parrothead Associaition

******************************************************************
Tell you what.

I'll send you a CD of *ALL* the photos I took. How's that? I had a camera pass and was able to be right there next to Charleston for the first three songs. Would be happy to share the blessings as long as you promise not to pass the photos around. Took me a long time to get that photo pass.

So glad you and your wife had such a beautiful evening....I got a pick at the Maui show. Landed on my arm, so I know just how your wife felt.

Much phin power to you and your wife.

Terry Mathews
East Texas Parrothead
******************************************************************
Terry,

That would be FANTASTIC!!!

I PROMISE that we would never share them with anyone else.

We were on the left side of the center section on the isle. Charleston was standing just to our our left.

I noticed a couple of photographers next to us with long lenses that had some sort of press passes on.

I will reimburse you for postage and the cd cost.

Thanks so much. We are eternally grateful.

My wife goes in for chemo # 5 tomorrow.

Jerry & Rhonda Andrews
**********************************************
Jerry:

I was one of those photographers. The kid with me was from the Dallas Morning News. I am the older lady with the white hair. Charleston hugged me when he first came down the steps.

I don't have many crowd shots....but, maybe you can find yourselves in one. I thought you might have been right in front of us . . .

The CD is on its way to you. Consider it my gift to your wife. I’m also sticking a little somethin’, somethin’ in the mail under separate cover for you both to enjoy!

We had a kick a$$ party in the parking lot. 18 states and British Columbia were represented on HOOT ISLAND - Party at the End of the Parking Lot.

As the Official "First Lady" of the island, let me be the first to invite you and Rhonda to be our guests at HOOT ISLAND - 2007.

Enjoy!

Terry

***********************************************************************************

Thanks so much for everything. The CD photos & the "little extra" from Hoot Island.

We are looking forward to receiving them.

You have my permission the share the our story on your Hoot Island Thread.

As a matter of fact, we have two of our club members at Hoot Island, Christina Coleman (CRC Parrothead) and Jane Zielny (JaneLovesJimmy).

Hopefully and with God's help, we will be back in Dallas and will gladly accept your invitation to Hoot Island 2007.

Jerry & Rhonda Andrews

Here's my column the week after I got Jerry's emails ... one more post and you'll be up to date!


********************************************************************

Here's my column for next week.....

******************************************************************

We need to remember we are part of a much bigger picture.
There’s something good here . . .
I asked for and received a photo pass to the Jimmy Buffett show at the Smirnoff Center in Dallas. I was able to take the newspaper’s camera into the venue and stand right next to the stage for the first three songs and snap away to my parrothead heart’s content..
There’s something good here . . .
Even before I received approval, I had this feeling that I was supposed to have the camera with me this year. I couldn’t explain why, but it was a strong feeling.
There’s something good here . . .
After processing my press credentials, the Smirnoff people gave me a choice of standing on the right side of the stage (where Jimmy was) or the left side. Didn’t know why at the time, but I chose the left side.
There’s something good here . . .
I took 140 shots during the first three songs and posted a couple on a Buffett-related website.
There’s something good here . . .
I got an email last Thursday from an Oklahoma City man who saw the photos on the website. He told me his wife has inoperable, uncurable, Stage IV Endometrial Cancer. They didn’t buy tickets to the show because they didn’t think she would be able to make the trip.
There’s something good here . . .
However, her strength held and their local Parrothead Club gave them two lawn seats, so they came down for the show. As the day progressed, he began to have second thoughts about the wet lawn (it rained all day before the show) and his wife’s compromised immune system.
There’s something good here . . .
So, right before the show, he took a chance, checked at the box office and scored FRONT ROW, CENTER SECTION SEATS. To top it off, his wife caught one of the guitar picks Jimmy tossed out to the audience.
The two of them were sitting just to the right of where I was standing. My camera captured what they saw all night.
There’s something good here . . .
Now I know why I was supposed to be there with a photo pass.
A CD with all the pictures, along with a specially designed poster from the evening left Quitman for Oklahoma City on Friday. This lovely man and his sweet wife will have the photos of their special night to share, hopefully for many years to come.
It FEELS good to do good.

I got this email from Jerry today ... am *so* looking forward to meeting (not meating) him and Rhonda at the Dallas show. Gotta love BuffettNews.... for so many reasons.

*********************************************************************

Terry,
Thanks to to the BN'ers for helping me track down your new email address. The one I had bounced back.
My wife Rhonda, has Stage IV Endometrial Cancer and you wrote a very touching and poignant article about her attendance at the concert last year..
Well, after 10 chemos and two surgeries, she is in remission!!!!
However, the doctor said that the cancer will come back, but he doesn't know when.
We are going to Frisco for the concert. Are you going to be with the Feeding Frenzy group?
If you are, we would love to come over and visit with you awhile.
We have about 70 OK PH's that will also be set up someplace.
Jerry & Rhonda Andrews
OK Parrotheads

East Texas Parrothead wrote:I got this email from Jerry today ... am *so* looking forward to meeting (not meating) him and Rhonda at the Dallas show. Gotta love BuffettNews.... for so many reasons.

*********************************************************************

Terry,
Thanks to to the BN'ers for helping me track down your new email address. The one I had bounced back.
My wife Rhonda, has Stage IV Endometrial Cancer and you wrote a very touching and poignant article about her attendance at the concert last year..
Well, after 10 chemos and two surgeries, she is in remission!!!!
However, the doctor said that the cancer will come back, but he doesn't know when.
We are going to Frisco for the concert. Are you going to be with the Feeding Frenzy group?
If you are, we would love to come over and visit with you awhile.
We have about 70 OK PH's that will also be set up someplace.
Jerry & Rhonda Andrews
OK Parrotheads

That's awesome!!!

East Texas Parrothead wrote:I got this email from Jerry today ... am *so* looking forward to meeting (not meating) him and Rhonda at the Dallas show. Gotta love BuffettNews.... for so many reasons.

*********************************************************************

Terry,
Thanks to to the BN'ers for helping me track down your new email address. The one I had bounced back.
My wife Rhonda, has Stage IV Endometrial Cancer and you wrote a very touching and poignant article about her attendance at the concert last year..
Well, after 10 chemos and two surgeries, she is in remission!!!!
However, the doctor said that the cancer will come back, but he doesn't know when.
We are going to Frisco for the concert. Are you going to be with the Feeding Frenzy group?
If you are, we would love to come over and visit with you awhile.
We have about 70 OK PH's that will also be set up someplace.
Jerry & Rhonda Andrews
OK Parrotheads

::very teary here::
Again.....I love my parrothead friends.....

I also have this one. For you old-timers, just skip right on through. I know you've heard it before, but TR asked us to post our BN-related stories. Here's one of mine.

My father was killed in Korea. He was a Sabre Jet fighter pilot. I was 18 months old. He is buried at the Punchbowl (National Cemetery of the Pacific) in Honolulu.

My mother remarried and built a new life for us. My stepfather was a great man, but I had a lot of unfinished business with my mother and the way she refused to talk about my father.

One Veterans' Day, I got a phone call. I believe it was 2003, but I can't be sure. I just know it was Veterans' Day. I picked up the phone and heard sobbing on the other end. It took a while, but I finally figured out our own SchoolGirlHeart was on the other end. When she recovered a little bit, she said,

"Guess where I am?"

I said, "I don't have a clue."

She said, "I'm standing at your father's grave."

She was on duty in Waikiki and had taken time from her day off to go to the cemetery and find my father's burial site.

Needless to say, it was a random act of kindness that I'll never forget or will *ever* be able to repay.

There's more.

When she got home, SGH sent me several links to websites for Korean War vets ... and one of them had a photo of my father that I had never seen ...



I even found the flight surgeon who worked the crash that killed my father and 172 other men. We talked and corresponded. He lives in Arizona.

Through one of the websites, I obtained the flight surgeon's report on my father. It might sound gruesome, but reading the form really gave me a lot of closure.

I also found men who had served with my father. They called and emailed and told me that I came from "good stock."

I *made* my mother go to Hawaii at the end of January (after Veterans' Day in November of 2003) ... we had business to finish ... and guess who picked us up at the Waikiki airport? You got it. Our own SGH. We drove up to the cemetery, cracked open some Scotch, vodka and tequila and toasted the old man right there under a rainbow.

Oh, yeah. And we saw Jimmy at the Waikiki Shell that night and then at the Maui Arts and Cultural Center two nights later.

There's been a lot of healing in my heart since that phone call.

Gotta love BuffettNews for so many reasons.

God Bless our SGH...she's one in a million and I'm happy to be part of her world.

all I can say is that you never know how one small (and it seemed so small at the time) thing is going to have an impact on someone else's life....



(And not that I expected it, but I have been paid back, many times over.... )

Or maybe, in reality, I was actually paying another kindess forward.... Here's my Barometer Soup for the PH Soul story:

I joined BN four months after 9/11, three months after I was recalled to active duty, while I was sitting alone in a hotel in Maryland. One of the first things I did here was sell tickets because I was being deployed to the Middle East and would miss the shows.

I was teased pretty mercilessly by my team in the Middle East about being a Buffett fan. All in good fun, but merciless.....

Until the day The Box arrived.... From Thornton, Colorado.... Now, at this point, I hadn't met a single BNer.... I knew most only by screen names.... Because we received our mail at the office, I opened the box in front of my teammates. It was a big box.... And it was FULL of all kinds of great Buffett (and other) stuff: picture frames, bootleg CD's of shows, books, bumper stickers, parrots.... and there was a letter.... with the screen names and the real names of all the BNers who sent all this great stuff to PHAW, who boxed it up and sent it to me....

"You've never met any of these people?" they asked.

"Nope. Only online."

"Wow..." was about all they could say.

BNers helped me get through deployment.... BNers are some of the most giving people on the planet...... Really......

From chippewa

Margaritaville, 1977-2007,

passed quietly, making noise after a long run in the Buffett News March Madness Tournament. Conceived in the Florida Keys, Rita, as she was known by friends, stayed there all season with her life partner, Jimmy Buffett. Some people claimed there was a woman to blame, but the Monroe County Coroner has listed the official cause of death as "nobody's fault".

Together, Rita and Mr. Buffett traveled extensively, visiting such places as Great Woods, Riverbend Music Center and, most recently, Anguilla. Sadly, her dream of seeing Boise in her lifetime will go unfulfilled. She delighted in strumming her six-string on her front porch swing, while watching old men in tank tops cruise the gift shops. Rita also had a tattoo, a Mexican cutie, many years before their recent surge in popularity.

Rita had several loves in her life: She enjoyed sailing on Boats, walking on Beaches, drinking in Bars and singing Ballads. Tequila played an important part in her life, some say even 50 to 60 percent. Once, after breaking a flip-flop on a late-night walk home, she cut her heel on a discarded pop top. The laceration might have become infected, but tequila was applied to the wound and quickly healed. Rita's close friend Mr. Utley joked that, "about one ounce was poured on the cut. The rest of the bottle was applied internally." The event left such an impression that she later bottled and sold tequila under her own label. Rita also broke her leg twice, but she always insisted that these were not tequila-related incidents.

Food played a big part in Rita's life, as she and Jimmy became partners in a restaurant chain bearing her name. Some of her menu favorites included boiled shrimp and sponge cake. In her final days, Rita developed an affection for various frozen concoctions which helped her hang on, hang on, hang on. Her love of great food caused some problems, however, as she always dreamed about weight loss. Close friends also worried about her high blood pressure, and they took great pains in hiding her shaker of salt.

Margaritaville is survived by one Son of a Son of a Sailor, and a Pirate, 40. Memorial services will Come Monday at that One Particular Harbour.

. .I LOVE this thread. . .! !

. .good job, TR. . ! !

Thanks so much for this thread TR! I have so much to be thankful for in my life that i can post on this thread but can't do it right now because i can't see through the tears! i will post later!

I love this thread too. Great idea, and thanks for getting it started. I have to admit to being a little "misty" right now too.