We Met Red Green

Every Thursday night, at 8:30, our entire household stops moving and for a few moments there is complete silence....until the laughter begins. All my boys...all five of them...line up on the couch and watch with anticipation for Red Green to come on PBS.The boys have watched and watched this show. If ever one of them is grounded from tv, they usually get ungrounded just so they get that Daddy time to see Red Green, that's how popular he is in our house.

I often think that Hubby and S1 watch it as a tutorial show, since we seem to fix a lot of things with duct tape.

We had heard that he was going to be at Rylee's Ace Hardware Store in Grand Rapids on a particular Sunday. We had heard if we brought our own roll of duct tape we would get in faster. So we left with enough time to get us there half an hour before he was to arrive so we could indeed, meet THE Red Green.

Rylee's Ace Hardware was a store I did not knew existed. Now that I do know, it is probably not a good thing. As soon we walked in, there Fiesta dishes everywhere and aprons and kitchen tools. Husband reminded me we were here to conquer Red Green, not conquer browsing so we got in line with a man who had a Red Fox in a carrier (I kid you not) and stared at all the duct tape in front of us. It was the good stuff, not the dollar store stuff we buy. 3M duct tape, NAME BRAND stuff.

It was with mixed emotions that we learned in order to get a signature of Red Green, we had to buy that fancy duct tape for five dollars a roll.

Husband painfully parted with 20 dollars, but it seemed a waste to just get a signature on such nice duct tape so he ran the good stuff out to the suburban (which was across the street because the place was filling up so quickly) while the boys and I learned we had to wait to be called in the next group...twenty minutes or so from then. We were all of five people away from being in the first group to meet THE Red Green.

But we were in a hardware store so the boys wandered off to look at boring fishing poles and hardware stuffs while I wandered here..........

And then drank the beauty of all the colors in.

I just so wanted to bake in the test kitchen!

And the aprons, the hand towels.....

Do you see these colors? How can they not make you happy?

Fiesta ware, people. FIESTA dishes! I have never in my life seen so many Fiesta dishes. I was sure I was dreaming, afraid to touch them less the vanish...or my boys bumped me and I broke it and then had to pay for a dish I have always wanted and purchased just to never have.

Yes, people looked at me oddly as I snapped all these kitchen pictures. But I HAD to share them with all you girls who are reading this not caring (or even knowing) who Red Green is. These photos are for you so you can mention them to your husbands who will, no doubt, want to read this just to see what we thought of the read Red Green. You don't think he knows who Red Green is, but dear, he does. He does. It's a man thing.

It didn't take long for husband to see that if we didn't get in line, we would be far far far back in line. Knowing how close we were to be in the first group, knowing Red Green was THERE, we had just seen him!, knowing his garden was calling his name, he left me in line and began to scout out ways to get in the line he knew we should be in.

He couldn't find a way.

So we stood in line about fifty people back.

And then the waiting began.

Since they had us all snaking along the back of the store that no one really cares to shop in, we had long isles empty of people. It didn't take long for the boys to start realizing that the duct tape would make good racing toys. And the isles would be good racing ground.

Red Green would have been proud had he seen this.

Now, a little know tid bit about my husband. He meets the most eccentric people in the world, I swear it is true. (I don't believe I fall into this category) We stood next to, and I do mean RIGHT NEXT TO, this man.

This man, we came to find out, was conceived in a chicken coop. Really. He says it's why he is sort of a bird brain. His words, not mine.

His parents had bought a farm and while they were building a house they lived in the only building there, the chicken coop.

He was full of all sorts of information on past movie stars, past Red Green shows (he knew them all), every show ever on PBS.....he knew broadway shows and books and literature and every story he began began with "I have a story about that".

Seriously.

Anything we mentioned in passing, he "had story about that".

We would have been annoyed had we not been so bored. And when we found out he had been a life time Marine (sort of came as a surprise in one of his "I have a story about that" bits) we had to have some awed respect for him as well.

I am not exaggerating one little bit. This man talked the whole entire long hour or longer we were in line.

The WHOLE time.

As we got closer to Red Green, there was a woman with a little table selling shirts, hats and the movie Duct Tape Forever. The boys nearly burst they were so excited they could own a movie with Red Green in and not just have to wait for him to be on Thursday nights. We purchased one movie....I mean, you sort of feel you should standing there in front of her like that.

Besides, how could you not when you seen the look of sheer elation on the boys faces?

And then, as we rounded the stacks of ladders and rows of paint cans, there he was, Red Green.

S3 and S4 could hardly believe he was real and wasn't sure what to think. They just kept staring and looking at him.

S1 and S2 were so excited they could hardly speak.

S1 did have the kind heart to ask Red Green to please sign his roll of duct tape three times because he had two friends at school that he always always always talked Red Green things over with. And he was so nice, he did.

He also signed the new movie we just had bought. The movie the boys now have memorized.

I love this picture. S4 has to check it all out.

S3 wanted to know if Red Green was watching us on tv. I knew what he meant, he wanted to know if Red Green seen us on Fox 17 in the morning. I held my breath as he asked this but the good hearted man answered patiently, "I sure do. Every time. I'm in that tv looking back at you!"

S3 was in awe.

This dear Red Green took longer than he needed to to sign every roll of dollar store duct tape, answer the boys questions, pose for pictures (I took nearly ten or more). He was patient and kind and good natured.

The boys were shocked he didn't speak in Red Green dialect, but as his normal Steve Smith self. But that didn't stop them from calling out as we left "Keep yer stick on the ice!"

And all in all, it was a forever memorable, happy, well worth the time in line sort of day.

Even husband agreed.