KUBEKLASSIK 13: ANARCHY BABY!

Sooooo....2013...Lucky 13?  For who?

March 3.  We are in the Month... the ides... and you know what that means?

KUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBEKUBE!

That is right. We are back!

You need to start thinking about your picks.  We are one week before Selektion Sunday and normally I would have entered my annual period of fasting and meditation in preparation.  In the past I have gone to an Ashram where under a vow of silence for a week I contemplate things.  Normally I contemplate the Wailing Oneness of God’s creation.  The beauty and perfection of mathematics as it relates to sports wagering.  It is a cleansing time.  Purification before the storm that inevitably arises from Selektion Sunday through the rest of the tournament. It is a ritual.  Normally I would advise everyone to find your personal safe place and get centered.  Make sure you get a great deal of sleep and please refrain from any alcohol or casual drug use doing this preparation period.

That would be normally.  But this year I have been diagnosed, just recently of various intolerance's.  To Lactose, Fructose and now... even worse... gluten.  The formal diagnosis comes next weekend, just in time for Selektion Sunday.  And this year for preparation for body and soul I have another plan.  I plan on spending a week of binging and decadence eating everything I know my body will reject.  Drinking gluten filled beer.  Eating gluten filled pasta.  Eating soft lactose filled cheeses and consuming all the processed food that I can.  I will record all of this on an APP called food diary and there is at least a reasonable chance that I will not survive but I am doing it for all of you... and for KUBE KLASSIK 2013.  For this years tournament is going to be one of...mayhem and ANARCHY!

I cannot pretend that KUBE Management was not shocked and pleased by last years pool.  409 Kontestants.  I was most pleased that my parents were both still alive to see this tremendous achievement.  Now lets focus on the big goal.  The final goal...500 Kontestants!  This is going to take a great deal of work and focused concentration.  Lets focus on our best performers:

Without Moneta Group, the KUBE is nothing.  Less than nothing.  By investing their client funds in this tremendous “investment” they always provide the bulk... the corpus if you will of the KUBE pool.  

But it is the little people that make KUBE great.  The Kontestants that trail in from Becker’s many, MANY jobs and MANY law firms.  I mean this kid has done his part.  If Becker were to put together in one firm all of hisentanglements the name of the firm would be, Shifrin, Treiman, Barken, Dempsey, Ulrich, Davis, Davis, Kasnetz, Greenberg, Barry, Helfrey,Simon, Jones, Spencer, Fane,Britt, Brown, Wagenefeld, Hepler, Broom, Waltrip AND Schmidt.  I would like to get all of those guys to play but several are dead.

Look at our other Kontributors:
1. The Kowert/Winstroer Clan
2. Servco and Greg Gates and his old girlfriend’s families and his college... :Associates”.
3. Becker the Wrecker and his Konnections
4. Former Camp Arkadia staffers... and their families.
5. Jon Becker’s limited Valpo konnections and out friends at Boomreactive.com and of   course oursister site, Bathtubtuna.com.
6. Kuklas family and high school friends especially his son Dan...the Sortswriter.
7. The Sievers and Associates clan (Saftey First!)
8. The good people of Zerman Mogerman
9. The Epic annual struggle between CBC, Vianey and the poor sister Lutheran South grads.
10. Some random Dierbergs (but we are hoping Ryan gathers some Fllridians as we have been weak in that state.  My nieces have been doing the right thing and marrying people who will be expected to carry their weight and bring in Kontestants.
11. Glendale Lutheran members and their youth and parents I have korrupted over the years.
12. Becker the Wrecker and his “people”.
13. Our friends and Korperate sponsors at Dierbergs, “Official Grocery Store” of KUBE (tm).
14. Kukla firends all over the Kountry.
15. Kukla relatives... from the extended Kukla Klan literally skattered all over the kountry; and
16. Becker friends from Dubai to Palau including the fabulous, globe trotting Todd King!

Today Valparaiso plays for Horizon League Championship after a spectacular buzzer beater last night with Wisconsin Green Bay http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/team/_/id/2674/valparaiso-crusaders.  It is March madness and anything can happen BABY.

ANARCHY!

Details to follow.

The Christmas Letter 2012 (As Edited By Family)

Soooo... for those of you who do not appear on my wife's Christmas Card List (this is normally because we don't get a card for you but otherwise is through my omission) we present the edited Christmas card for 2012.  The unedited version was destroyed by progressives who are turning our country into a socialist state.

Well, it has been a good year to be a Becker.  Let’s do it in reverse order.  Mike and Sandy who are enjoying their time as “empty nesters” took Lily and Lola and entered them in the Westchester Kennel Club show.  The dogs did fabulously, with Lily biting several other dogs and Lola, who never stopped her sobbing whine, was given a Blue Ribbon just for leaving.  It was an awesome experience for the dogs and we have high hopes for next year.

Laura is in the midst of her 2nd year at Valparaiso, in what she hopes to be a 4-7 year plan.  She has majored (in no particular order) in Communications, Room Mate Abnormal Psych, Education, Communications, Bread Company Consumption and Business... and Communications... again.  She is currently Facebook official with a nice young man named Jon.  She worked up at Camp Arcadia this summer and worked in the Kitchen and as a server with remarkably little drama.  We are most proud.

Pat GRADUATED! from Truman with a degree in Psych.  It was approximately 117 in Kirksville on the day of the graduation.  The graduation speaker had expertise in human trafficking.  It was a hoot.  After making us very proud Pat decided to think really hard and upset his parents in ways we had not yet imagined and he has proceeded to Lawrence, Kansas to get his masters In Social Work.  A Jayhawk!  Imagine our family shame. He and Kyle have been together for going on 4 years.  Sadly, they both love Lawrence, Kansas.  Maybe it is the liberal politics of Kansas, who knows? Rock Chalk?  You never think it will happen in your family.

JON AND LYDIA GOT MARRIED!  Jon did the nicest thing he could have done for his parents by marrying the beautiful Lydia Schaftenaar and making her Lydia Becker. The setting (Camp Arcadia’s Chapel on the Beach), ceremony,  day and the weekend were all perfect and it was a storybook wedding that even I cannot be cynical or snarky about.  We  are so grateful for the many family and friends who traveled a long way to celebrate with us. Jon and Lydia purchased a house in Shrewsbury and are raising our grandcat, Henry David Thoreau ,and granddog, Schafly.  Henry is evil. Schafly is adorable. The Schaftenaars have graciously allowed us their daughter’s continued presence here and we are hoping they will be frequent visitors.  We couldn’t feel luckier that God brought our families together.

Sadly the first paragraph was a lie and Sandy and I continue in our jobs.  My life has been really tied up in a call committee for a new Pastor at our church (going on two years and people are starting to think that I am the problem) and Sandy really just works a lot during a big chunk of the year.  But is was a great year for us. Perhaps the best ever and as I said at the beginning, a good year to be a Becker. Tragedies touched several families we love this year humbling us and making us ever more grateful for the friends and family who never fail to be there for us and share our sorrows and our joys, but this year a lot more joys.  We go into 2013 feeling blessed with all of you by our sides.

Wishing you a blessed Christmas and 2013!

The Becker family,
Mike, Sandy, Jon,Lydia, Pat and Laura