Jim was my friend and neighbor ever since he, Renee, Marissa and Gracie moved to Granbury back in 2000. I'll never forget my wife telling me how she first met them when they moved into the house up the hill from us. She was outside with our 2 daughters (ages 6 and 8 at the time) when Jim came walking by with Marissa and Gracie in her stroller. My daughters saw "a new friend to play with" so they all went over to meet Jim and his girls. After a little while, Jim agreed to let Marissa stay and play with my girls while he took Gracie home. A few minutes after he left, my wife realized that his wife would be upset with him for leaving their daughter with a "stranger", so she went over to the driveway to wait for Renee. Sure enough, just like clockwork, here comes Renee down the hill about 2 minutes later. I'm sure at the time there was a little panic but we laugh about it now. I think Jim was a pretty good judge of character. From my experiences, I've always been a little leery of people at first but I was really happy to find out that my new neighbor had a sense of humor. It all started about a month after Christmas (I can't remember if it was 2001 or 2002) and I was a little slow getting my Christmas lights down. I had disconnected the extension cords and timers but hadn't taken the lights down. Well it's already late January and all of a sudden for about a week straight, someone kept plugging my lights in. I would come walking out of the garage in the evening and kept finding the lights on. I even made the mistake of blaming my wife for it (boy did I get in trouble for that!). So one day when I finally had some time off, I got out there and started taking them down. About that time, Jim came driving around the corner and stopped and said "Oh man, you're taking my fun away!". And thats when the practical jokes started between us. I remember I retaliated by putting a "Gay Pride" sticker on the bumper of his car (he was driving a Caprice Classic Cop car at the time). He drove around like this for 2 weeks before his neighbor Boom Boom pointed it out to him. After that it was just back and forth between us for the next few years, trying to outdo each other with practical. I have to say he did get the last one. A few years ago, me and my family went to Chicago for Christmas. While we were gone, I asked Jim and Renee to watch the house for us. Everything was fine until about a week after we got back, a friend who lives down the street from me asked me when I became a Steelers fan. For those of you who don't know me, I am and always have been a huge Dallas Cowboys fan. So this kind of struck me as odd until my friend told me that for a week straight while we were in Chicago, there was a Pittsburgh Steelers flag flying on my mailbox with a spotlight on it every night. It was then that I knew that Jim had struck again. I have been trying ever since then but just haven't been able to top that. About 6 years ago, Jim came up with the the great idea of decorating my yard on Halloween and scaring the kids who came by trick-or-treating. That first year went pretty well (I think we scared more Moms than kids). The next year we recruited another friend that we both worked with to help us out. He came over with his Texas Chainsaw Massacre outfit complete with chainsaw and it was that night that we realized that the 14 to 15 year old girls were the best to scare. The next morning we were picking up candy all over the front yard from kids who were too scared to come back and get it. One year, about 3 years ago, we didn't do anything for Halloween except hand out candy. I was surprised to find out so many people were disappointed that we weren't scaring kids that year. I think the parents got a bigger kick out of it than anything. Once again, all this was the brain child of Jim Pore. Brian, you were right. Jim never did anything half way. It was all or nothing with him. Like Brian said, I'm just glad he let come along for the ride. There are just so many great things to say about this guy. He was always my "go to guy" if I ever had a question about cars. And boy did he know about cars. You could fill the Smithsonian with the amout of knowledge he had about cars. And the great thing about him is he never gave me a hard time no matter how trivial the question may have seemed to him. Everyone who knows me can tell you I'm not much of a gear head. I guess I'll have to become one now. No one really takes account of their friends until times like this. I don't know how Jim felt about our friendship and I suppose I'll never really know, but over these last few weeks, as I continue to look back on all those good times, I've come to realize that he was one of the best friends I have ever had. He would do anything for you day or night, no questions asked. People like that are few and far between. We all lost something when Jim left us and went on. But we can find comfort in the fact that we will see him again someday. And he'll be holding a Steelers flag or waving the Terrible Towel when we see him. But I'll still be glad to see him. I guess there is only one more thing to say. Being a Cowboys fan, I hope I don't explode into flame for saying this, so here goes. GO STEELERS! (That ones for you, Beep!)
The Invention of the Bolognia Pizza