Aired July 2nd, 2025
I want again. Welcome here to the 4:05 Coffee Break, guys. Get you a cup of coffee, glass of iced tea, bottle of water, a tall icy glass of lemonade. It is hot out there. Let's see what's going on.
OK Solberg:Spring wheat, $5.82 a bushel. 550 pounds steer calf, $3.96 on the top end. Butcher hog in Omaha, 62ยข a pound, and a 100 pound fat lamb in Billings, $2.19. But guys, there's more, much more. So let me ask you a question.
OK Solberg:Have you looked forward in life to a time when you could get up at 1AM, go and do a little writing, and remind your wife of being a mad scientist. I don't think any true scientist creates or discovers anything that doesn't happen in the wee hours of the morning or late late at night. So yes, I woke up at 1AM and I came down to my office. See, I'll go to KMMR at 06:40 for devotions, then walk, then drink coffee with friends.
OK Solberg:At 09:00, I'm back in my office for visitation and research. Noon comes, lunchtime. 01:00 bible study at the Rivers Bend. And guess what? By that time, I'll have been up for twelve to thirteen hours, and I can take me a cat nap in the heat of the afternoon just gooder than good.
OK Solberg:See, I like to get up early because writing is about a feeling and the feeling comes when you think of it and that feeling usually hits in the early morning hours. So in other words, I'm pretty dumb till late at night. But see, you're the reason for the good feeling. If I had all these thoughts and nowhere to share them, well, you know what? Then Thea would be the only one who could listen to me and I couldn't bear putting my wife through that any more than I have to.
OK Solberg:Oh, sure, it might sound neat for five minutes in the afternoon, imagine if you had to live with it always. Yikes. That sounds yucky. Did you realize yucky is a cousin to icky? Yes.
OK Solberg:They're cousins, and they live just down the lane from each other. But since we're on the subject, I wanna know, do you use the word yucky? Have you found yourself saying the word icky? Do you see what I mean when I say I have a fascination with words? Can you imagine a roughneck on a drilling rig using the word icky?
OK Solberg:I can hear it now. They're in the doghouse, And it's loud and it's noisy and trying to eat his bowl of stew, and all of a sudden he hollers out, oh, yuck. This stuff is icky. His buddy leans over and takes a bite and he says, that tastes like 'Ssssh', here comes the tool pusher. See, words are like the clothes we wear.
OK Solberg:Either your clothes fit the occasion or they don't. Some words work well here, but don't stand a chance over there. Do you realize that words that are the most powerful, we never actually get to say, you know? Well, a roughneck does, but not the rest of us. Like if your child is with you and you stub your toe on the bed frame, oh man, have you done that?
OK Solberg:Your child's with you and you stub your toe on the bed frame, it it just isn't natural to holler out hallelujah. You stammer and stutter and search for a word that doesn't sound so harsh like dadgummit, dadgummit, or fudge, or like grandma used to say, old biscuits. But the word you wanna say, you can't say. But the kid knows it anyway and sometimes he says it for you, not that he learned it from you, but one of his friends is a child of a gravel crusher. Oh, language is fun.
OK Solberg:If you don't use the words icky and yucky, what do you use? Have you caught yourself saying, liar, liar, pants on fire? A college student might not say, liar, liar, pants on fire. He might say fraud. A lawyer will tell you they're providing false testimony.
OK Solberg:The doctor, he'd say they're displaying inconsistencies in reported history. An engineer tells you that data is unreliable. And the poet, oh, the poet tells you truth has fled their tongue. I don't know. I'm sticking with liar liar pants on fire.
OK Solberg:It might sound icky to some, but it still gets the point across. Proverbs twenty one twenty three, whoever keeps his mouth and his tongue keeps himself out of trouble. Good advice. Short, sweet, to the point. So until next time, as you go out there, remember now, don't be bitter.