the green green grass of home...
to
Cricket Hill
Nestled in the hills are memories
of our friends who have passed....
This page is a tribute to their memory
with the hopes they'll not be forgotten.

These pictures are about half-size...
I added the captions just because I was 'inspired'...
Placing your mouse on any picture will bring up more details
LEFT click on a picture to see the full sized version
- use your back arrow to get back
RIGHT click and select 'save target as' to save the image

This is Susan...Don't mess with her tail!...
Susan and Sam 'tolerated' one another...She just plain didn't let him affect her life much...We were chattin' the other nite about past times... The conversation got around to Susan and the balloon..The one time we were just kinda sittin' around (snowed in no doubt) and somebody posed the question, Just one of those things that ya do in the seventies when you are always on a quest to see something unique...What WOULD happen if ya gave the cat a balloon? Well accounts vary as to the length of time lapsed before we saw that cat again, but it varys between 3 days and a week...We never tried that again... sure did give us a laff at the time tho... You always knew you were in for a good time when you heard Pete say, 'Susan, it's time to pay the rent...'

This is Hildegard...'Hilde' for short...
Hilde and Sam were a pair... I think it upset her when Sam would take off for Days at a time...He wouldn't go far... just needed his 'alone time' I guess...They worked as a team frequently... whether it was to dig down thru a woodchuck hole to get that bugger or just to parole the perimeter, one was always there...backup ya know?... I guess they had it worked out between them...I think the X-Files was inspired by Sam and Hilde... Sam knew the truth was out there... being a Lady, Hilde was much more reserved...

If you want to hear one of Sam and Hilde's typical banters, click here.

and here is one of Sam's 'stunts'...
This is a story in itself...See the whole thing below the pic...

Ya gotta understand a little about Sam before you even hear this story...
Sam was best described by his owner as being 'The Broderick Crawford of the Dog Set.'
He was a free spirit for sure. He liked to hang with us but seemingly would get bored after awhile.
It was then that he would request egress and head for town... After 2 days, Nancy would
call around town to see if anyone had seen Sam... Usually after 3 or 4 calls she'd connect
with someone who had seen him that morning when they went for their paper
or invited him in for breakfast. Sam being the street-wise Dude he was, would never
overstay his welcome and usually leave his benefactor within a respectable amount of time.
Actually, he just made it appear that way... no doubt he had 'bigger fish to fry... .'
Once he told me the reason he wanted to go out was that down the hill aways, he heard of
this new French bitch that just moved into town... 'Fifi' I think was her name...
By his calculations, she oughta be just about goin into heat...
and nothin' much was happenin' on Cricket Hill that day anyway...

Gettin' back to the story, this one one of those fine summer days where
a walk in the woods seemed like a fine thing to do.
We packed some stuff and took off.. The dogs went along with us (who could stop them?)
The pic was taken at a pond up the hill a little further than you would have liked...
We reached the pond and the near side seemed to be a good place to cop a squat for awhile.
We had a seat on the bank overlooking the water.
No sooner had we burned one when there was a rustle in the brush. Sam was onto something!
The brush and grass around the pond was pretty high and we couldn't see much,
but, before you could say 'Lay Down Sally',
this rabbit dives off the bank into the pond about 5 feet to our right... with Sam diving in after!
Sam swam his ass off across the pond after that rabbit! Hell, we were amazed...
neither one of us knew rabbits could swim... Hilde ran around the other side of
the pond; she knew she didn't have to run too fast to be on time...
The rabbit staggered right up onto shore and right into Hilde's open mouth...
She stood there with this waterlogged rabbit dangling from her mouth
and looked at Sam as if to say 'Okay, so now what?'
We had a hell of a time convincing her to drop the rabbit...I think she was awaiting Sam's permission.
Sam took the necessary time to shake himself off, then apparently realized how tired he was.
Finally Hilde let it go... she seemed to lose interest after becoming
aware of how much effort was expended on a cotton tail.
The rabbit took the first available exit stage right. He appeared to be none the worse for wear.
Sam just took it all in stride... after all, he did mastermind the whole thing...
and it worked...just the way he figured.

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