Scottie D. and I are in constant search of the planet’s best tenderloin. As Iowa is home to the best tenderloins on the planet, we haven’t had to stray too far from our front door.

Recent events have forced us out of those front doors as the BK’s in Ogden was home to what we both considered the best tenderloin on the planet. But now BK’s has closed and become The Lucky Pig. If anybody tries to tell you that The Lucky Pig has a comparable or even better tenderloin than BK’s, that person clearly knows nothing about tenderloins. NOTHING!!!

However, this isn’t a journal entry about what is wrong with The Lucky Pig’s tenderloin. This is an entry about the greatness of the tenderloin served at The Country House in Colo. The New Reigning Tenderloin King!*

Here are a few pictures from our trip to Colo and our tasting of greatness.

Bow before your King!


Scottie D. Showing off the Tenderloin


His First Bite


Me Enjoying the Reigning King!


Our Tenderloin Posse Squaring Up with the House


The Sassiest Waitress Ever!


The 2nd Sassiest Waitress Ever!

If you are interested in trying tenderloin greatness, The Country House is in Colo, right off US30. Next to the Twin Anchors Campground. Be warned, they don’t serve the tenderloin on Sundays, but they are definitely worth eating at on Sundays as well. They serve a giant spread family style on Sundays with flat out the best cole slaw I’ve ever had in my life. It is cheap too. $10.95 for a ton of food.

*The King until we find something better, but the bar has been set high!

Right before I went on vacation a month or so ago I did the 3 month photography for Scottie D. and Melissa’s new family member. I was still struggling from the equipment problems, but I think we did some good work.

Here are a few of my favorites:

Next week’s random Wednesday photo collection will cover my vacation, well the biggest part of my vacation.

These are the pictures I entered in the Pufferbilly Days Photo Contest and the person that selected the picture:

Derrick Gorshe


Jen Gorshe


Russell Kennerly


Dawn Krause


Scottie D.


Rebecca Peterson

Thanks to everybody who took their time and energy to select pictures for me this year!

The picture that Dawn chose got 2nd Place in Black & White. My original intent for next year’s selectors was to bring back all of the people that had chose an award winning photo in the past few years, but my fire for photo contests has kind of been extinguished. Not that I might not reconsider, but I think that this might have been my last photo contest. Or at the very least the last time I enter the Pufferbilly Days Photo Contest.

The pictures are from:

Backup/Old My Pictures/Real to Life/Color

Apparently at one time I thought these were some of the most important color pictures I had taken. In retrospect, I have no clue why.

Willy on our last day as roomies.








Peterson Pits




I’m pretty sure Scottie D. gave me that bird feeder.






At one time, I’m pretty sure I thought this was the best picture I was ever going to take. Thank God I was wrong!






This sweet orange couch’s demise is still a sore subject to this day.


Jay needs to go back to his days of sweet facial hair.




The hallway to Eric and Suzie’s first apartment.













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Next week’s folder will be:

Old My Pictures/Real to Life/Special Effects

I’d like to give a big thanks to my fence crew that over the course of 4 intense work days over the last couple of months built a fence for me.

Thanks to:

Jason Stensland
Jay Janson
Andree Jauhari
Joshua Kraushaar
Derrick Gorshe
Scottie D.

Here are a few pictures from the project:

Me and my friends put a lot of sweat equity in this project. The heat index was well over 110 on at least 1 of the days we worked on this project. But I’m sure it will be worth it when I finally complete Operation Puppy!

These pictures come from backup/Old My Pictures/Deg-Porter Wedding

These pictures were taken at Scott and Melissa’s wedding. The last wedding I was in until Jen & Derrick’s wedding.

Mr. Porter


Scottie D. all tuxed up!


Scottie D. in black and white.


Scottie D in glorious color.


Setting up chairs.


Posing for George


Future Mrs. Porter


Nate

Next week’s folder will be: backup/Old My Pictures/Egg Toss

Because I had such an incredibly packed weekend, I didn’t get a chance to post this until it was two days late.

Happy Birthday Scottie D.:

Sorry about the tardiness!

“DOWN GOES NATURE! DOWN GOES NATURE! DOWN GOES NATURE!”
-The voice of Howard Cosell inside my head

At exactly 10 PM on July 29. 2010, I popped the top on two bottles of Virgil’s Micro-brewed Root Beer and Dawn and I celebrated the end of Hedgegeddon. We had just dumped the final body of my fallen enemies into the burn pile at Scottie D.’s Mom’s place. It was over. Mankind was victorious!

It wasn’t easy though. Nature put up a good fight. I have complete and utter respect for nature, but on this front, I was the victor.

It took quite the effort though:

• 3 spades were broken
• 1 shovel met its demise
• 2 pairs of gloves were destroyed
• I was forced to bring a hat out of retirement
• 3 different trucks were used
• 2 sets of chains
• 7 different people helped in the process
• 2 different neighbors stopped by to say that it looked like “hard work”

Thanks to the following people for helping me win my ultimate battle with nature:

• Scottie D.
• Jason
• Derrick
• Dawn
• Willy
• Becky
• Jesse

We took a few pictures of the ceremonial removing of the final hedge. Scottie D. was there at the beginning and there at the end, so he gets a very special thanks. Plus he even cut down a bonus bush after we removed the final hedge.

The Last Hedge


The Path of Destruction


Dead Hedge Waiting to be Removed


The Last Hedge


Scottie D. and I with the Last Hedge


The Same


The Beginning of the End


The Battle is Almost Won


A Matter of Time…


Down Goes Nature! Down Goes Nature!


Mission Accomplished


Present Arms


Scott claimed that he would be able to cut down this bush in under 1 minute. I pulled out the old Gra Lab Enlarger Timer and timed him.


I haven’t seen a wife prouder of her husband since Jen and Derrick when he took down the Gunderburger.


He didn’t quite make his 1 minute goal, but Scott definitely took this bush down in under 3 minutes.


Doing a little cleanup.

Now that the destruction part of my backyard plan has been completed (for now… I’m looking at you currant bushes) I will be diving head first into my fence building plan.

I smell a fence building party on the horizon!

This past Sunday was Hedgegeddon (pronounced Yardegeddon in the Jansonian dialect) and it was a complete and utter disaster. It rained all weekend (or so it seemed) and the rain didn’t stop for Hedgegeddon.

In the end Hedgegeddon Round 1 – You Win this Time Mother Nature! was a complete failure. There were 2 No-Call-No-Shows. 1 person backed out at the last minute. The ground was one cohesive piece of mud and wouldn’t give anything up. The chains and straps became wet and mud covered and slipped off the hedges regardless of technique. In the end, the ultimate battle between Man and Nature wasn’t even close.

The crew of Jason, Scottie D., Derrick and I were completely and utterly demolished. Even though Nature laughingly ran up the score on us at the end (like Tom Osborne teams of the past) by having my spade break in half in Derrick’s hands, our spirits are not crushed.

There is a reason that the most common signature at the bottom of my emails reads:

Man can be destroyed, but not defeated.

Hedgegeddon 2 – Suck It Mother Nature! (that is a working title) has already been scheduled. Barring rain, this time Mother Nature will feel the bitter taste of defeat. After all, the words before “A man can be destroyed…” are “But man is not made for defeat.”

Despite the Georgia Tech vs. Cumberland U. size of this last setback, the day was not without some small modicum of success:

There was actually a good thing that came out of Hedgegeddon. I stopped mowing certain sections of my yard in preparation for this unblessed event. When I stopped mowing a certain patch of the yard I found out that I have hollyhocks. Sweet!

I’m particularly proud of these hollyhocks because apparently these are a difficult flower to grow in this part of the Cyclone State. However, I can grow them without even trying. I truly am becoming a master gardener!

Here are a few other flower pictures from the Bennett Flower Gardens:

I’m hoping that there will be some moonflower and lily action in my backyard in the next couple of weeks. It also seems like the cherries will be ready for picking in the next couple of weeks as well!

I had my, what could theoretically become, annual Birthday Barbecue on Saturday.  I would like to thank all of the people that attended and made the evening special:

• Bardole, Shannon
• Bennett, Charlotte
• Cousin, Amy
• Daniel, Jeffrey
• Degeneffe, Austin
• Degeneffe, Melissa
• Degeneffe, Scott
• Dill, Colby
• Dill, Dan
• Dill, DJ
• Gorshe, Derrick
• Gorshe, Jen
• Henning, Monica
• Howard, Jesse
• Howard, Kalista
• Howard, Kelly
• Howard, Saydie
• Howard, Taylan
• Hugen, Todd
• Janson, Jay
• Jauhari, Andree
• Jenson, Terra
• Johnstone, Jack
• Johnstone, Jason
• Junck, Sara
• Kahler, Logan
• Kahler, Russ
• Kewer, Jeff
• Krause, Dawn
• McAlpine, Willy
• Nitchals, Peggy
• Parsaei, Nader
• Perkovich, Becky
• Roberts, Lori
• Roberts, Steve
• Runestad, Anders
• Stensland, Carla
• Stensland, Johnathan
• Wever, Ada
• Wever, Amanda
• Wever, Greg
• Yin, Amy

Next year, I will move the barbecue back to its traditional spot of the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend.  Feel free to circle the date May 28 on your 2011 calendar that you have yet to purchase. It will perhaps be an even smaller and more intimate gathering.  I might start instituting a survivor type invitation policy similar to the fashion of invites that Jay uses for Symposium.

Special thanks need to be extended to the following people:

Sara for taking the pictures for the invitations.

Sara for providing the s’mores goodies.

Jay for making three desserts: chocolate raspberry cookies, key lime bars and apple crisp.

Steve for providing homemade salsa and chips.

Becky for making a pasta salad.

Scott and Melissa for bringing a banana creme pie.

Shannon for baking a fresh rhubarb pie with rhubarb picked from my personal rhubarb patch.

Johnathan for bringing over cornhole.

Logan and Russ for running the grill.

Mom for baking a cake and creating a watermelon fruit thing.

Derrick for being the fire-starter.

Andree for being the best dressed person at the party.

Shannon for opening the party.

Willy for closing the party.

There isn’t any photographic evidence to support that this party existed. I was too busy to touch a camera and Sara didn’t take any pictures this year. Maybe next year I will add “Party Photographer” to the list of Staff positions for this shindig.

If you wish to be hired for this position (no pay, no benefits, possibly a STAFF t-shirt*) simply send the answer to the following question to bennett@photography139.com:

Why would I make an awesome Party Photographer?

I suppose I should start planning Friendsmas now. It can wait a couple of months.

*That is not a joke. There will be staff t-shirts next year.