Tag Archives: Fancy Farm Kentucky

First Saturday

Posted on August 6, 2011 | Leave a comment

I may be in Manhattan today, but my thoughts are back home.

Best of luck to everyone working hard (and playing hard) at today’s Fancy Farm Picnic!  No one does barbecue better — I can almost taste it — and there might be loss of life during the political speeches this year.

I hate to miss that.

At the very least, could someone play a few cards of tab bingo for me?  And if that doesn’t work out…

…just make sure I win the car, okay?

Thanks.

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Posted in Commentary, Entertainment, Family, Food, Friends, Games, Home, Humor, Life, Politics, Summer, Travel

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Law & winners

Posted on April 4, 2011 | Leave a comment

Before the original Law & Order television series closed up shop here in New York City, locals used to have a saying:

“If you live here, chances are pretty good you’ve been an extra on Law & Order.”

Take me, for instance.  During my first year in Manhattan alone, I skulked about in the background of no less than nine different episodes.  I even met Billie Jean King when she guest-starred as a judge.

If you owned a police officer’s uniform, you could work on the show pretty much every day. And we’re talking long days — 14 hours was fairly typical — at piss-poor pay.

Television is so glamorous.

Well, now everyone has a shot at being immortalized on Law & Order…without ever stepping foot on the set!

Just visit the contest page on AOL Television and post your favorite episode or moment from Law & Order in the comments section.  A winner chosen at random will have his/her name written into a future episode of Law & Order: Los Angeles. As if that wasn’t cool enough, the winner will also receive a $100 American Express gift card.

For once, you don’t have to live in New York or Los Angeles to ‘appear’ on a TV show.  You can live in Sacramento or Tallahassee or Albany or…

Fancy Farm, Kentucky.

Just be sure to post your comment by noon ET on April 7th!  That’s the deadline for entry.

Of course I’ve already commented about my favorite Law & Order.  And it wasn’t even one that I appeared in.

I’m so humble…

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Posted in Advertising, Celebrities, Commentary, Entertainment, Humor, Internet, Life, Television, TV

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Step right up

Posted on October 31, 2010 | Leave a comment

You can take the girl out of the small town, but you can never take all of the small town out of the girl.

Maybe that’s why I love the story of Anoka, Minnesota — the “Halloween Capital of the World.”

It’s a northern suburb of the Twin Cities, numbering a little over 18,000.  In 1920, it hosted the very first Halloween parade.  Seventeen years later, the town persuaded the United States Congress to make the title an official proclamation and continues to celebrate the holiday each year with several parades.

I love a parade.

And take it from me — small towns know how to do ‘em up right.  Fancy floats.  Queens and their court.  Livestock and tractors joining in the fun.  And food, too.

It’s enough to make any ghoul proud.

So, as you celebrate Halloween this year in towns large and small… in New York City or Boston… Kansas City or Fancy Farm, Kentucky… bob an apple for the folks in Anoka, Minnesota who got the party started for us all.

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Posted in Humor, Home, Holiday, Family, Life

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Life’s a picnic

Posted on August 7, 2010 | Leave a comment

When your hometown is called “Fancy Farm,” people tend to remember the name.

Admittedly, it’s unusual….although it does sound a bit like a now defunct amusement park near Middletown, Ohio called “Fantasy Farm.”  (When I attended the University of Kentucky, I got that joke a lot.)

But on the first Saturday in August, there’s no confusing Fancy Farm, Kentucky.   Ask any local, state or national media outlet, and if they aren’t already there, they can certainly direct you.

The annual Fancy Farm Picnic is big news, and has been for 130 years.  Politics, pork barbecue and great people, all gathered at the party of the year.  Heck, it even made the Guinness Book of Records in 1978 as the Largest One-Day Barbecue in the World.

I was there.

Of course, I’ve been to a lot of picnics since I was five years old.   Playing games and eating barbecue when I was little.  Working in the ice cream booth that was my family’s responsibility.  We’ve had class reunions around picnic time, and lots of family from out-of-town — the ‘city folk’ — coming to Fancy Farm in August for this one-of-a-kind experience.

It’s small town America at its best.  Neighbors coming together, all as volunteers, working to raise money for the community church, proud of the tradition that generations of families have built.

And for the barbecue.  And the politics.

That’s the heart of it all.

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Posted in Humor, Foods, Home, Travel, Politics, Entertainment, Summer, Family, Life, News, Food, Friends

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Cluck cluck

Posted on July 6, 2010 | 2 Comments

Growing up in a town of 400 people (Fancy Farm, Kentucky), we didn’t have a lot of restaurant choices.  So, on special occasions like birthdays, my mother would let us choose our favorite meal, and she would cook…because she was a fabulous cook.

My favorite?

Fried chicken. Mashed potatoes. Lima beans.  Sometimes biscuits, too.  A little slice of heaven on earth…and no one made it better than my mom.

I mention this because it’s National Fried Chicken Day.  I never knew July 6th had this designation, or I would have made sure mom cooked my favorite meal that day as well.  I would have had the excuse to indulge every year on this day, too, because I don’t eat fried chicken that much anymore.

I’m not sure why.  It’s high in protein, and the breading really doesn’t add that many carbs to the mix.  Where I probably sin the most is in the amount of mashed potatoes I can put away — if they’re smooth and creamy the way I like ‘em, I can eat an entire family-size serving.

Man, I’m hungry.

Hope I can find some fried chicken here in NYC…’cause it’s National Fried Chicken Day, damn it, and a Southern gal’s gotta celebrate.

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Posted in Foods, Holiday, Home, Humor, Travel

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Southern comforts

Posted on May 7, 2010 | 1 Comment

I’ve said it before — I’m no foodie.

Many of my friends bemoan the fact.  Here I am, living in New York City, a bazillion wonderful restaurants literally steps from my apartment, and I go out to eat rather infrequently.

I’m an embarrassment to my ‘hood, no doubt.

But send me back to the South for no more than 24 hours, and every Facebook post I make…is about food.  Not the delicacies you would find at the five-star restaurants lining the streets of Manhattan.

Oh, no.

I wax poetic about the Southern-style veggies served for lunch at Cracker Barrel. (Sweet potato casserole — I mean, come on!)

Shed a tear at how much bacon they put on a breakfast platter at the airport diner.  (Nine strips.  That’s just wrong, but oh, so right.)

Smile nostalgically when asked if I’d like “sweet or un-sweet tea.”  (I always choose un-sweet and add my own Sweet ‘n’ Low, but you know you’re in the South when you hear those words.)

I guess you can take the girl out of Fancy Farm, and tempt her with ‘fancy foods,’ but I’ll always have more simple tastes.

Or, as my friend Denny Keller would say…

“You’re so simple.”

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Posted in Foods, Humor, Travel

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Right again

Posted on March 19, 2010 | 1 Comment

Once again, President Obama and I agree.

We both picked Murray State to upset Vanderbilt in the first round of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament yesterday.

Great minds…

And since there is a very good chance that I will devote a portion of this blog to my alma mater and East Region #1 seed University of Kentucky Wildcats — who also won their first-round game yesterday — I wanted to give Murray State a little love today.

I grew up, as many of you know, in Fancy Farm, Kentucky, which is a mere 45-minute drive from the Murray State campus.  During high school, I spent a lot of time there, attending regional meetings for academic clubs and visiting my sister Lou Ann, who is a proud Murray State alum.  (My brother Kent also received his degree from Murray a few years later.)

The Murray State Racers were no slackers coming into the tourney; they boast a 31-4 record this year.  Many credit Racer Isacc Miles, who formerly played for Creighton, as the reason behind Murray’s appearance on the national stage.

Whatever the impetus, Butler had better be ready on Saturday ’cause the Murray State Racers are coming!

And they’ll have the entire state of Kentucky behind them.

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Posted in Humor, Sports

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For Seve

Posted on October 15, 2009 | Leave a comment

I love golf.  Have since I was a kid.

Do I play?  No.  But I’m a huge fan.

I discovered golf via television.  We didn’t have cable back in the day, and on the weekends, coverage of major tourneys took over the networks…so I watched.  And I became enamored with the complexities and competition of the sport.

And, of course, the personalities.

Long before Tiger Woods dominated the world of golf, I was obsessed with a Spaniard by the name of Seve Ballesteros.  He burst onto the scene in the late 70′s, becoming the youngest player to win the Masters in 1980 at age 23.  (Tiger, of course, went on to break that record in 1997.)

Seve was everything my hometown of Fancy Farm, Kentucky (population: 400) was not.  He was exotic, good-looking, and world-traveled, and perhaps I assigned those same qualities to the sport of golf.

Seve went on to win five major championships over his career and was a great team player for the Internationals at the Ryder Cup.  He struggled in later years with back problems and retired in 2007.

In 2008, Seve was diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor.  Following surgery and chemotherapy, he is now partially blind in his left eye.  During his recuperation, he founded the Seve Ballesteros Foundation to help others with cancer fight the disease.

His story has inspired so many people on and off the golf course.   And, as recently as Wednesday, he pledged to return to the 2010 British Open and play a round.

And people wonder why I love the game of golf.

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Posted in Sports

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