Thanks to all you cousins and elders who attended Saturday's Coveted Burnt Wienie extravaganza in Lake City, Minn. The lively gathering of more than 40 cousins was a success, featuring all of the traditional trappings of any social gathering given by a Miller -- enough delicious food for 150 people (including 16 large desserts), a slapstick program featuring not-100-percent-true stories and multiple catcalls, a hot game of croquet/Poison, a terrifying thunderstorm and at least one toilet overflow. Some snapshots:
The younger cousins provided glamour and brilliance. Above, H.B., Izzbee and K.
Rugby star M. and track star Mo discovered common ground in friendly games of croquet/Poison.
Looking much more serious than you usually see them, Anna, Lavone Broberg, Elmer, Katie and Patty-Lou plotted something or other before the gala program.
Out on the patio, cousins sat in the sun or shade and sipped cool amber drinks from genuine plastic glasses. Above, cousins Sarah, Tuck and Joe. Sarah clutched her purse tightly, just in case the Kirkwood boys took it in mind to steal her precious collection of pop can tops, don't even think about it, pals.
Uncle John, Aunt Kate and cousin Sheila relaxed on the patio at Pam's party pad, Aunt Alverna's former townhome. We're sure Alverna would have enjoyed the festivities.
Then the program began! Oh boy! Now we get serious! Note how grave and thoughtful Mavis, Katie Jo and A-Bro looked as they listened to the dispositions and examined the evidence for family members' best, biggest goofs in the past year. Cousin Davy Sprick was master of ceremonies and in charge of crowd control, a role he was very qualified for as UW-Eau Claire's chief of police and
potential running mate for Barack Obama. Above, Aunt Florence read her nomination for daughter Patty-Lou Pepin, whose failure to get her son Nathan well-fitting shoes Florence blamed for his dramatic dead faint at his recent U.S. Marine graduation in San Diego.
Aunt Kate's nomination was a piece of brilliant epic poetry (we hope she'll send us the hard copy so we can publish it) nominating cousin Jane and her family for royally gumming up their washer and dryer.
Then cousin Mo got up and nominated her dad, cousin Chris Miller, who, frankly, had committed such a rapid-fire series of gaffes in a hour-and-a-half period (making his family late after telling them to hurry up, smashing one of his vans into another of his vans, a Chevy Chase-style fall down his church's steps and trying to carjack a van that he got mixed up with his own) that he should have won the Coveted B.W. for the next
decade. We'll print her nomination soon as we can find it, it's around here somewhere, let me see, now, where did I put it, why do I keep
losing and forgetting things??
The nominations went on and on ... stellar ones for Tanya Cook, Patty Pepin, Steve Pepin, Chris Miller, the Hagbergs. A disturbing number of nominations were for the scrapblog editor. The scurrilous claims mounted -- she had lost her boarding pass as a plane arrived, walked her nieces several miles to the Empire State Building and then realized she'd forgotten the tickets, lost something or other else, forgotten something or other else, and worst of all, she had misidentified an opium poppy growing in her Old Frontenac yard as a hollyhock, even though Uncle Elmer had told her what it really was.
The scrapblog editor was relieved, then, when venerable Aunt Anna wheeled her walker over to the nomination spot, above. Surely Aunt Anna would change the subject! And indeed Anna did, gravely describing how Noah failed to move his car when a blizzard covered it up and as a result got towed and got a $180 ticket. But then Anna did a shocking thing -- instead of nominating Noah,
she nominated his mother, your scrapblog editor, for failing to tell Noah to move his car! A sinister pattern was beginning to emerge ...
The crowd listened raptly, cousins young and old turned into jurors and judges. Who would win the Coveted B.W.? The suspense mounted!
Oh -- my --
gosh! After trusted bailiffs and election judges collected paper ballots, M.C. cousin Davy announced the results --
cousin Pam had won! Can you believe it? She was so shocked she had to be briefly propped up by her niece H.B. Miller. Yes, the scrapblog editor was Coveted B.W. champ! She'd won for forgetting things and losing things! Cousin Chris came in a close second for his car-smashing, stair-tripping, grand-theft-auto spree.
The scrapblog editor was so overcome that she forgot to give that speech where you thank your mom, your dad, your annoying siblings, your cousin this, your cousin that, your cat, your other cat, your masseuse, your personal fitness adviser, your neighbors, your co-workers, your boss, the pope, the Dalai Lama, Mr. Ruberto, Sid and/or God. This was a good thing, for it allowed the second meal of the afternoon to be served at 5 instead of 6 p.m.
Later, after everyone had had a third dessert, last time's winner, Uncle Joe, advised Pam about how to keep such an honor from going to your head, and also how to keep the precious family grail's plastic and veneer surface shining proudly. Uncle Joe has won the award many times, and probably could have won it again had Pam told all she knows, but she stood down, because E.W. is also the scrapblog's senior research associate, corrections coordinator and cold-case crime investigator, and she needs to stay in his good graces so he'll ride shotgun on her next field trip to Dumfries, Minn.
The younger cousins provided glamour and brilliance. Above, H.B., Izzbee and K.
Rugby star M. and track star Mo discovered common ground in friendly games of croquet/Poison.
Looking much more serious than you usually see them, Anna, Lavone Broberg, Elmer, Katie and Patty-Lou plotted something or other before the gala program.
Out on the patio, cousins sat in the sun or shade and sipped cool amber drinks from genuine plastic glasses. Above, cousins Sarah, Tuck and Joe. Sarah clutched her purse tightly, just in case the Kirkwood boys took it in mind to steal her precious collection of pop can tops, don't even think about it, pals.
Uncle John, Aunt Kate and cousin Sheila relaxed on the patio at Pam's party pad, Aunt Alverna's former townhome. We're sure Alverna would have enjoyed the festivities.
Then the program began! Oh boy! Now we get serious! Note how grave and thoughtful Mavis, Katie Jo and A-Bro looked as they listened to the dispositions and examined the evidence for family members' best, biggest goofs in the past year. Cousin Davy Sprick was master of ceremonies and in charge of crowd control, a role he was very qualified for as UW-Eau Claire's chief of police and potential running mate for Barack Obama. Above, Aunt Florence read her nomination for daughter Patty-Lou Pepin, whose failure to get her son Nathan well-fitting shoes Florence blamed for his dramatic dead faint at his recent U.S. Marine graduation in San Diego.
Aunt Kate's nomination was a piece of brilliant epic poetry (we hope she'll send us the hard copy so we can publish it) nominating cousin Jane and her family for royally gumming up their washer and dryer.
Then cousin Mo got up and nominated her dad, cousin Chris Miller, who, frankly, had committed such a rapid-fire series of gaffes in a hour-and-a-half period (making his family late after telling them to hurry up, smashing one of his vans into another of his vans, a Chevy Chase-style fall down his church's steps and trying to carjack a van that he got mixed up with his own) that he should have won the Coveted B.W. for the next decade. We'll print her nomination soon as we can find it, it's around here somewhere, let me see, now, where did I put it, why do I keep losing and forgetting things??
The nominations went on and on ... stellar ones for Tanya Cook, Patty Pepin, Steve Pepin, Chris Miller, the Hagbergs. A disturbing number of nominations were for the scrapblog editor. The scurrilous claims mounted -- she had lost her boarding pass as a plane arrived, walked her nieces several miles to the Empire State Building and then realized she'd forgotten the tickets, lost something or other else, forgotten something or other else, and worst of all, she had misidentified an opium poppy growing in her Old Frontenac yard as a hollyhock, even though Uncle Elmer had told her what it really was.
The scrapblog editor was relieved, then, when venerable Aunt Anna wheeled her walker over to the nomination spot, above. Surely Aunt Anna would change the subject! And indeed Anna did, gravely describing how Noah failed to move his car when a blizzard covered it up and as a result got towed and got a $180 ticket. But then Anna did a shocking thing -- instead of nominating Noah, she nominated his mother, your scrapblog editor, for failing to tell Noah to move his car! A sinister pattern was beginning to emerge ...
The crowd listened raptly, cousins young and old turned into jurors and judges. Who would win the Coveted B.W.? The suspense mounted!
Oh -- my -- gosh! After trusted bailiffs and election judges collected paper ballots, M.C. cousin Davy announced the results -- cousin Pam had won! Can you believe it? She was so shocked she had to be briefly propped up by her niece H.B. Miller. Yes, the scrapblog editor was Coveted B.W. champ! She'd won for forgetting things and losing things! Cousin Chris came in a close second for his car-smashing, stair-tripping, grand-theft-auto spree.
The scrapblog editor was so overcome that she forgot to give that speech where you thank your mom, your dad, your annoying siblings, your cousin this, your cousin that, your cat, your other cat, your masseuse, your personal fitness adviser, your neighbors, your co-workers, your boss, the pope, the Dalai Lama, Mr. Ruberto, Sid and/or God. This was a good thing, for it allowed the second meal of the afternoon to be served at 5 instead of 6 p.m.
Later, after everyone had had a third dessert, last time's winner, Uncle Joe, advised Pam about how to keep such an honor from going to your head, and also how to keep the precious family grail's plastic and veneer surface shining proudly. Uncle Joe has won the award many times, and probably could have won it again had Pam told all she knows, but she stood down, because E.W. is also the scrapblog's senior research associate, corrections coordinator and cold-case crime investigator, and she needs to stay in his good graces so he'll ride shotgun on her next field trip to Dumfries, Minn.
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