For years, I have heard that death comes in groups of 3.  Maybe this only works for small-town newspapers.  I don’t know.  And I don’t know what to expect around here.  Why?

Well, we lost K9 last week and I’ve been expecting another one to be done.  But not the one that I found dead under the red barn.  B22, the last Harley daughter, was dead this evening.  She had raised some good ones.  Banner hanging wethers at Tulsa and OYE, productive does and buck prospects.  Very profitable doe.  Although, she was not a kind doe.  She beat up other goats and destroyed panels.

The question is….what is the 3rd one?  K9 and B22 classify as great ones.  Does Hugh Hefner count as the third one?  Some would call him an icon.  The playboy brand is definitely iconic.  I even saw a text that  had a pic of Hef with a pile of playmates and it read, “Nobody is saying that Hugh Hefner is now in a better place.”  I laughed, but…..No matter what you think of Playboy and/or Hugh Hefner, you have to appreciate that he had a vision, a goal and then worked towards those goals.  And it worked.

Yes.  Yes, I have looked at a Playboy magazine before.  My dad made me climb up into a multi-story fort of my middle brother’s making back in the 80s.  That fort was filled with cigarettes, playboy magazines and a few empty cans of beers.  I had to crawl back down the snow-chain ladder and report back.  “Dad, I don’t think that you want to go up there.”

Ironically, the only issue of Playboy that I ever actually owned was bought by the Dragon Lady.  I was serving a 3 year sentence teaching at Billings, OK.  (’93 to ’96—great people, great place for me to start a career, school…..??)  Tammy was still in school at OSU.  She asked if I needed anything from Stillwater.  Sure, bring me back a magazine of baseball or good rock music.  She brought me back a Playboy with an iconic Elle Macpherson photo shoot that also just happened to have the previews of the MLB season and an article about the band KISS.  Order delivered!

If my memory serves me right, the Playboy experts picked the Texas Rangers to win the world series that year.  I still remember quotes from Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley.  Yes!  Yes, I read the articles and the comics.  I also saw the very tasteful pics, although topless pics of one smoking hot Elle Macpherson.  I still do not know if Tammy knew what she bought or if she just went to Hastings and said “Give me a magazine with something baseball, music and my husband will like it.”  If that was the case, mission accomplished.

I had that magazine for a couple of years.  It stayed in the middle of my magazine rack that stayed next to the throne.  It was always sandwiched in between Sports Illustrated, Ag Youth and Purple Circle magazines.  I lost that whole rack at Waynoka in the flood of ’98.  I liked to re-read the articles about KISS.  And….and look for new hairstyles.

Here’s to hoping that Joe Dirt is still going and not the third one.  Here’s to betting that the Rangers still won’t win the series.  And I bet KISS could still give a memorable interview or a concert.  And according to the internet, Elle Macpherson is posing again…at almost 50.  Hunh?!  Wait.  I’m almost 50.  Probably not the same.  Some age better than others.