Vote for Merle!

The Evansville Courier Press is having its annual “Pet Idol” calendar contest to benefit the Tri-State Newspaper in Education Foundation. I’m not sure what this is or what they do, but…a couple of weeks ago, Haley was down and she took a picture, at my request, of Merle. I had tried, because he is so handsome and those eyes are so incredible. But it wasn’t a one person job. Every time I’d get ready to snap the pic, he’d walk toward me or walk away. I thought with Haley handling the camera, I could herd Merle. The result is photographic history.

So, I entered the picture of Merle into this contest. The top 13 vote getters will have their pic in a calendar (sold for donations to this foundation) for 2011. The official pictures came out for the first time in Sunday’s paper – in black and white. WHAT!? How can his adoring fans get the true feel of those eyes in BLACK AND WHITE!?

As I’ve written before, Merle has got to the point in a young male (mostly) cat’s life when he roams. Probably since spring, he’s spent more time away then he’s spent at home. But since his picture was in the paper, he’s been there every morning when I open the door. Frankly, I think he’s keeping it close to home to avoid his groupies. Not that he could do much with said groupies… or could he? Do the parts still work? Hmm… In retrospect, it’s too bad we “fixed” him, he could have passed those eyes on to another generation (or six.)

I got to work Monday and promptly emailed Merle’s picture (in color) to everyone in my email address book… whether I’ve spoken to them in the past 10 years or not!... and asked them to vote for Merle. I’ve received a variety of emails back from people, it’s been fun. My cousin Sara asked me if he was named after Merle Hazel (a little old man who is somehow related to us, or at least he always comes to the Barger Family Reunions in July). I wrote her back with the following story of how Merle got his name:

He was one of three boy kittens and I drove out to Wadesville early one morning before work to help corral them because Mom and Dad had an appointment for them with the vet to be fixed. They still had not decided on names for the kittens, so I tried one last time and pointed out that the vet was going to want names. So Dad say, “Ok, Willie Nelson”. And I was like, “Uh for all three of them??” And then he said “Willie, Waylon, and the boys.” I said, “You’re going to name this one, ‘The Boys’?” (Especially since ‘the boys’ were the reason for the visit to the vet!) So finally, we ended up with Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, and Merle Haggard. Of course, none of us are country music fans, but that was beside the point. (Willie just disappeared as male cats of a certain age tend to do in the country. Waylon was run over in the road -although I think it would have been more fitting for Willie to be run over so I could say he was playing “on the road
again.”)

Merle is entry #17 in the contest, and as of Thursday (the last time they updated the stats on the website) he’s in 2^nd place!! I think it’s a wasted opportunity that you can’t vote online (and wrote the paper and told them so), so I set up “Vote 4 Merle” Headquarters at my desk at work.

I’m collecting fundage and will take care of turning the money in for Merle. Greg even donated the contents of the “Curse Jar” into the fund for Merle. (Since most of the money in said jar was FROM Greg, this was nice.)

Voting runs until Friday, October 1^st. And the winners will be announced on Sunday, October 3^rd. For all of my many fabulous readers everywhere, IF you are interested in voting for Merle, he would appreciate your vote. You can call in your vote to 1-866-683-1724 and pay by credit card – votes are $.25 per vote. Either way, you KNOW I’ll let you know the election results after October 3^rd.