Acrochallenge!

Hello, lovers of letters, and welcome to another round of acromania.

I had no pictures for a Picture Sunday last night. That was only part of my "Saturday Problem."

Now, I had a nice time at the first Oktoberfest of the year up on the mountain. However....

Let's see, it all started when I fretted about Milo, and finally decided to give him a Big Boy Test and leave him to roam free in a blocked-off kitchen. Then I headed out, got to the mountain, and realized that there's no way I can eat German food for the next six weeks. Normally the fear and dread at the German buffet kicks in about week three, but I was sick of it the first night. I'm going to have to bring my own food to get through it.

I was also told by Ed, our Fearless Leader, that he wanted some help on the SKB website, and he'd love it if I'd take as many pictures as possible during the night. I got my camera at the ready - and there it was, out of memory.

The Sauerkraut Band had a nice Jager-toast and began. It was a small crowd, but they were very nice and loved dancing, and all was going as planned until the "Trumpet Echo." At the end of the "Trumpet Echo" the clarinets pop up to the front of the stage and do a little dance where we take our horns apart at the middle joint and twirl the bottom part around. I did that. I hit my bell against the mouthpiece of my horn.

I thought I'd just broken my reed until I started changing reeds, then I realized I had actually chipped the mouthpiece. It was a sinking feeling, knowing that my much-loved and very expensive Luis Rossi mouthpiece was broken, and an even sinkier feeling realizing that, well, I couldn't play. It was about 1:40 into the three-hour performance, and my clarinet-mate Mary suggested calling her husband or Mr M to bring another one up the mountain. I called Mr M.

He headed up the mountain with a new mouthpiece for me, but until then I was left dancing, swaying, clapping along, and marching around with the audience. But Mr M arrived very quickly, during our break, no less, and I was ready to end out the night.

Headed home, ankles swollen from the standing and my shoe choice, and arrived home. Where - where I went to the door and heard little Milo, well, at the other side of the door. I mean, right at the other side of the door. I opened the door and yes, there he was, and I had to practically stand on him to keep him from running outside, and as I was opening the door and bending down to push him back inside, the key to my door broke off.

I got inside and did a small assessment. Milo hadn't knocked down the gate to the dennette, he'd jumped it. Which, considering he was only two days out of a neutering and still had new stitches, was a pretty mean feat. And I have to tell you, I don't know how long he'd been in the dennette, he might have jumped the gate five minutes after I left or when he heard the car pull up in the driveway, but he was a ptretty good boy. One clothespin found and chewed, one red felt-tip pen plucked off my desk (and believe me, folks, the things he could have plucked from there) and chewed, and not even chewed to where it dyed my carpet. Oh, and he also pulled Mr Peabody's straw hat off the table, but didn't destroy it.

So, night one of Oktoberfest. In for a new mouthpiece for the clarinet and a new lock for the dennette door. Where will it go from here?

And so tonight's acrotopic. Ever have one of those days? Tell me about it. "It Was One of Those Days." Did you fall off a ledge? Someone steal your television? Have to work over time? Tell it all.

The rules are the same, everyone gets three entries to come up with the best acronym they can, one that matches not only the topic above, but also the letters below. The letters are randomly drawn from the acrobasket. The acrobasket remained safe during Milo's night of freedom. Thank God. Imagine my cleaning up letter tiles from now till the end of time. Then tomorrow night at 10:00 est I shall be reading the entries and naming the winners.

The topic - "It Was One of Those Days." The letters:

A D A B O I S

Oh, shit, I just dropped an A tile and Milo ran off with it in his mouth.

Got it back. So yes, you can use the second A. I gave you seven letters so you can tell me more stuff that went wrong! Now, acro!

Betland's Olympic Update:
* I saw this Bill Geist report on CBS Sunday Morning yesterday. Imagine my shock. You must go here and see it for yourself.