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THE ZUCCHINI CLUBHOUSE NEWSLETTER
...the official newsletter from The Zucchini Brothers!
www.zucchinibrothers.com

SUMMER '04


Greetings from ZucchiniLand! And welcome to the latest edition of our Zucchini Clubhouse Newsletter, a quarterly publication filled with interesting facts, news from ZucchiniLand, stories, educational tidbits, projects, and much more! Please feel free to print this out and share with as many people as you want!

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NEW & EXCITING ZUCCHINI PROJECTS

Our radio show, "the Zucchini Brothers...Live! at the Clubhouse", is now online at our site! You can hear it any time, free, by clicking here. Listen to or download the current show and archived episodes! Meet all the ZucchiniLand characters mentioned in our newsletter!

The show is now also on XM SATELLITE RADIO! It airs Sunday mornings at 10am EST (7am PST). And Monday and Wednesday evenings at 8:30pm PST (11:30pm EST).

Check it out! It's a half-hour of the zany Zucchinis...full of educational tidbits, great music for the big and small, and just plain fun!

THE CHILDREN'S MUSIC WEB AWARDS 2003 www.childrensmusic.org
the only children's entertainment awards decided by kids,
proudly named THE ZUCCHINI BROTHERS....WINNER
Best Recording For Younger Children for their CD "SAFE AND SOUND"

We're still working on our new CD. (As we told you in the last newsletter, things were going swell until our tape machine popped a spring and sent the tape flying all over the clubhouse studio!) And now there's another problem: we're working on another CD, too!

We're planning to present "a Zucchini Holiday" in time for the holidays!

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STEVE'S CORNER

Hello everybody! Since the weather is warm here in ZucchiniLand, it's time to get going on my three hundred, twenty-nine point five mile long list of things I need to do around the clubhouse. There's  fixing, patching, straightening, squaring, changing, arranging and squeeching that needs to be done. And that's just the beginning of the list! We decided that the first task to tackle was to make more space in the clubhouse library, so we had a "Used-Book-Cookie-and-Lemonade Sale" in our front yard. It was a great way to make a little money and see some of our ZucchiniLand friends. Susan (and her Mom) helped us with the baking. Mrs. Sweettooth from the Sweetshop bought 5 chocolate chip cookies, our old copy of "the tale of Morton Schiff", and gave us a big tip! We gave Miss. Honeypepper, free lemonade with her cookies (because she's our teacher). She bought a book called "Your Alligator and You" (a pet guide). Mr. Weir, our mailman, chose 6 cookies and "the Encyclopedia of Little-Known Facts About Noses". We gave him a discount on his cookies (because he took the time to stop by our sale during his busy  summer delivery schedule). Robert Zimmerman came by and bought "Bab Goffmere's Memoirs From a Man Who Loves Mustard" and 3 glasses of lemonade and wrote a song right on the spot! He said his throat was "parched". Well since Mr. Zimmerman is the local 'word man', I guess it's time for...

STEVE'S SUMMER WORD OF THE DAY:

Parched
Definition: (adjective) Exposed to great heat so as to be dried or roasted.
Synonyms or words that mean the same are: scorched, seared or bone-dry.


Well, we were excited about our new CD. But after the tape broke on the first one, and after starting a second CD (for the holidays), it's been a true test of patience. As one of our modern rock and roll philosophers says...

STEVE'S 1ST SUMMER QUOTE OF THE DAY:

"You take it on faith, you take it to the heart, the waiting is the hardest part." 
- Thomas H. Petty


And, of course, waiting can be frustrating and tiring as another prominent English rock star philosopher expressed...

STEVE'S 2ND SUMMER QUOTE OF THE DAY:

"Do what you like, but please don't keep me waiting, because I'm so tired of waiting."
-Raymond Douglas Davies


So in the meantime, come to one of our live concerts! And while you're waiting (for whatever it is you're waiting for) you can occupy yourself with this wacky thingy that I learned from our Dad... 

STEVE'S SUMMER TONGUE TWISTER OF THE DAY:

"Willy's real rear wheel "(see if you can say it 5 times fast!)


I'll have to ask Dad where he got that one!

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JACK'S CORNER

Yee-haw! Summertime! I love it so much that I wrote a song about:

"I love startin' the day with a sunny blue sky / all I wanna do is be outside / Walkin' barefoot through the cool green grass / The way that it feels makes me laugh/ In the summertime, that's when I'm feelin' fine."

Yes, this has got to be my favorite time of year here in ZucchiniLand. Actually, I prefer to call this season "summer vacation"...and t-shirts, shorts, and sandals (unless it's safe to go barefoot!) are my clothing of choice. I've been doing plenty of fishing down at Fireman's Creek with our dog, Polly. She always knows where the big fish are, although sometimes she scares them away when she wades into the water to cool off. Phew! Speaking of cooling off, I think I'll see if Steve and Sam want to go over to Susan's house. She invited us over for a swim in her pool. Now that's the perfect way to spend a beautiful, hot and humid summer afternoon in ZucchiniLand--which brings me to...

JACK'S SUMMER WORD OF THE DAY:

Humid
Definition: (Adjective) Containing or characterized by perceptible moisture, especially to the point of being oppressive.


Some people like to complain about the weather, but not me. I love it all! Sure, I prefer a sunny day over a rainy day, but we need rain, too. ZucchiniLand's weather forecaster, Zane Finch, says it helps things grow. Sure, if I had a choice between a cold winter's day or a hot summer's day, I'd most likely choose a hot summer's day. But a little of this and a little of that is what makes the world go 'round--which reminds me of a phrase I've often heard our teacher, Miss Honeypepper, say...

JACK'S SUMMER  QUOTE OF THE DAY:

"Variety is the spice of life."


Well, time to go swimming. Steve and Sam are all set to go, and Susan's parents invited us over for a barbecue afterwards. But first, let me leave you with...

JACK'S SUMMER  TONGUE TWISTER OF THE DAY:

"Summer shiny sunshine."(very hard to say quickly, over and over)

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SAM'S CORNER

Usually in the summer there are two things that matter the most to me: our clubhouse garden and the ZucchiniLand Zebras baseball team.

First the garden...
Things were a little bit rough from the getgo. We planted the seeds and seedlings, they grew a bit, and then a family of rabbits started eating them. Now, I like rabbits, but I also like our garden, and rabbits in a garden can mean the end of the garden. I tried talking to the rabbits. I confronted one at the western edge of the plot and told it that we'd worked very hard on growing these plants and to please leave them alone. Which leads me to....

SAM'S SUMMER WORD OF THE DAY:

Confront
Definition: (Verb) To come face to face with, stand in front of.


Guess the rabbit couldn't hear me. I saw the same rabbit in the same part of the garden the next day. So I put a plastic mesh fence around the garden. Thinking I had solved the problem and that the rabbits would have to settle for eating grass outside of the garden, I went inside the clubhouse for a glass of iced tea. As I was looking out the window, I saw another rabbit hop up to the fence and sit by it for a while. Seemed that the fence was working, keeping the animal out of the garden. But I figured I better go make sure. Well, what do you know? The rabbit wasn't impressed at all with my plastic fence. It had very calmly chewed a hole in the mesh just big enough for it to squeeze through in to the garden. Now, I know that these rabbits aren't out to get me. They just want to eat and can't help but be attracted to a nice garden. Which brings me to...

SAM'S SUMMER QUOTE OF THE DAY:

"I'm not bad, I'm just drawn that way."
Kathleen Turner, US actress
(as the voice of Jessica Rabbit in film "Who Framed Roger Rabbit," 1988.)


So I had to take stronger measures to save our plants: a metal fence! I walked down to ZucchiniLand Hardware and picked up a roll of metal chicken wire, hauled it home, and put it around the edge of the garden. So far I see lots of rabbits hopping around our clubhouse yard, but none inside the garden. I just hope they don't try to hop their way in!

Now, for the ZucchiniLand Zebras baseball team...
Last year was a very bad year for them (as has been every year). Their star pitcher Sadge Blake got tired and retired. He was replaced by Bab Goffmere (who is also famous for his memoirs 'From a Man Who Loves Mustard'). It is hoped that Bab will lead them to their first winning season ever, but so far, not so good. He hasn't won a game yet for the team, and in a bit of desperation, he went overboard on his pregame ritual. You see, Bab loves mustard and he always eats a teaspoon of mustard before he takes to the mound for a game. Since the Zebras couldn't seem to win a game, he decided that he needed to eat more mustard; that a larger dose might give him the confidence he was missing to win a game. So he upped his mustard intake to 4 tablespoons and went out to the mound but didn't make it past 4 pitches, and had to be carried back to the Zebra clubhouse with a very upset stomach. We all appreciate Bab's enthusiasm and wish him a speedy recovery. And, in the meantime, we look forward to the Zebras' first win.

While Bab was dozing in the clubhouse, exhausted from his upset stomach he talked a great deal in his sleep. In the off season Bab had taken a trip to Ireland and bought a watch there. Seems he was having a dream about this. But there was one sentence that Bab had trouble uttering in his sleep.....

SAM'S SUMMER TONGUE TWISTER OF THE DAY:

"I wish to wash my Irish wristwatch." (say that ten times fast!)

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This newsletter is written by the Zucchini Brothers with Susan Meyer. Thanks so much for subscribing to this newsletter and supporting The Zucchini Brothers! We hope to see you at an upcoming performance! And please consider calling or writing your local radio station to let them know you like our show!

Your Friends,
Steve, Jack & Sam Zucchini
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