Freddogg Off The Chain

First picture is college Coach Tom Marshall the classiest of people whose eulogy was delivered at lunch following mass--just because--I don't know.

Grandson Mikey "You Fredman! Where you at? I'm supposed to catch this ride!"

I dropped my grandson Mikey off at Vacation Bible School in Rehoboth Beach this morning because my lovely daughter-in-law was caught between the devil and deep blue sea running kids around so I was the manatee to the deep blue sea express.
‘You’re picking me up, right Fredman,”Mikey asked. “No, your mom is picking you up,”I said and he does protest “No you are” and I did bold face lie “Sure I’ll pick you up.”
I told the lady at the registration table “I picked this kid up hitchhiking and he had a sign “Vacation Bible School” so I brought him here and at first the lady looked concerned then said “I know who you are, are you ever on vacation” and I said “Only from the lord.”
I brought Mikey inside and whispered to myself “this looks cultish” because growing up Catholic in the sixties I have a real distrust of smiling protestants with that “it’s all goodness” smile.
Later I was at a funeral mass at the catholic church for a classy man, author and football coach. I sat next to a younger friend whose brother is a priest. In a packed church my otherwise normal friend also a football coach was the first to stand, sit and kneel and I whispered to him “what the hell is wrong with you.”
The offer each other the "sign of peace handshakes all around" is so New Christie Minstrels hootenanny bullshit what happened to the surly catholics of my youth?
It was a predictably non-rousing and relevant ceremony then the priest skipped the two personalized eulogies at the end and went right to the recessional song Battle Hymn of the Republic which I always confuse with we just gotta Sink the Bismarck because the world depends on us.
I asked a eulogizer outside of church “what happened to seizing the moment? I was ready to reflect back, to hear warm stories of the coach and to contemplate my own mortality.”
“The priest said “we had to shut it down” that he had another mass”the nephew said in good humor but I went into attack mode inside my head.
What in the freaky freak is freaking wrong with these tax exempt clergy critters?
By the way two church appearances on a Tuesday before noon what is up? Like my grandmother told us at Poppy’s funeral. “If you ever see me born again please do the family a favor and shoot us both.”