Hundreds trot out for Thanksgiving Day benefit walk

What a great turnout for Sandpoint’s Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving morning. More than 200 walked, jogged and chatted on an overcast, but nice morning.

People were asked to bring food or money for the Bonner Community Food Center and two vans were filled with food. Nice job to Missi Balison and the Sandpoint West crew for organizing this.

I found out that one of the nicest guys I know, Mike DePrez, is no longer swinging clubs at the Idaho Club as the pro. He is now heading up marketing at Laughing Dog Brewery with Team Colby.

Shawn Morrenzia is more anxious than most for the snow to fly. He is the proud winner of a snowblower after his one ticket was picked in the DayBreak Center’s raffle.

The fundraiser was spearheaded by John Elsa, who not only organized the prizes but camped out in front of the Safeway in Sandpoint for weeks selling tickets.

Yes, Shawn bought only one ticket.

Other winners included:

• Bob McCabe, snow rake.

• Rob Neilson, Kevin Hatcher, Gretchen Heller, Beata Golua, some guy named Everett and Roberta Weilmaker, each won shovels and Sandra Cunningham and Irene Henderson each won a bag of salt.

Bob Hamilton e-mailed me after he read my last column to tell me he is grateful for his newspaper carrier who is ultra dependable.

“It is not always easy to get to our place in the country, but day after day, week after week, month after month, the paper is almost always in its roadside box before 7 a.m. regardless of road conditions,” wrote the dean of Sandpoint High School journalism.

  “We have been appreciative for lo, these many years.”

Thanksgiving e-mail: Every word out of the bird’s  mouth was rude, obnoxious and laced with profanity.  John tried and tried to change the bird’s attitude  by consistently saying only polite words, playing soft music and  anything else he could think of to ‘clean up’ the bird’s vocabulary.

 Finally, John was fed up and he yelled at the parrot. The  parrot  yelled back. John shook the parrot and the parrot got angrier and even more rude. John, in desperation, threw up his hand, grabbed the  bird and put him in the freezer. For a few minutes the parrot  squawked and kicked and screamed.

  Then suddenly there was total quiet.  Not a peep was heard  for over a minute. Fearing that he’d hurt the parrot, John quickly opened the door to the freezer.  The parrot calmly stepped out onto John’s outstretched arms and said “I believe I may have offended you with my rude language and actions.  I’m sincerely remorseful for my inappropriate  transgressions and I fully intend to do everything I can to correct  my rude and  unforgivable behavior.”

 John was stunned at the change in the bird’s attitude.

 As he was about to ask the parrot what had made such a dramatic  change in his behavior, the bird spoke-up, very softly, “May I ask  what the turkey did?”

David Keyes is publisher of the Daily Bee.