{"id":913,"date":"2010-12-24T11:10:40","date_gmt":"2010-12-24T17:10:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.keloland.com\/lund\/?p=913"},"modified":"2023-07-20T21:00:10","modified_gmt":"2023-07-20T21:00:10","slug":"a-holly-jolly-christmas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/a-holly-jolly-christmas\/","title":{"rendered":"A Holly Jolly Christmas"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I hope you can handle one more story about Eureka, South Dakota\u2019s Holly Hoffman, who survived the popular CBS reality show, \u201cSurvivor\u201d finishing fourth out of all the contestants vying for a million dollar top prize.\u00a0 Holly has since been pretty busy giving interviews and making personal appearances..including one at the Pizza Ranch in Hartford on Thursday which is where our paths crossed.\u00a0<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_918\" style=\"width: 559px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-918\" class=\"size-full wp-image-918\" title=\"Holly Hoffman 001\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.keloland.com\/lund\/files\/2010\/12\/Holly-Hoffman-0011.jpg\" alt=\"Survivor star, Holly Hoffman, greets fans at Hartford Pizza Ranch \" width=\"549\" height=\"292\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-918\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Survivor star, Holly Hoffman, greets fans at Hartford Pizza Ranch <\/p><\/div>\n<p>She was there with her husband, State Representative, Charles Hoffman, along with Governor-elect, Dennis Daugaard signing autographs and picture-posing to raise money for the West Central D.A.R.E. program.\u00a0 Thanks to the efforts my of old pal, Joe Prostrollo, the event also helped raise a few dollars for West Central Senior, Tucker Smith..our grandson.<\/p>\n<p>On December 13<sup>th<\/sup>, Tucker was admitted to Avera with severe pain. A body scan revealed numerous dangerous blood clots that required immediate attention. Tucker spent several days in ICU and underwent three surgical procedures to remove the clots and have stents inserted in his vulnerable veins.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_922\" style=\"width: 463px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-922\" class=\"size-full wp-image-922\" title=\"tucker in hospital\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.keloland.com\/lund\/files\/2010\/12\/tucker-in-hospital.jpg\" alt=\"Tucker Smith manages a smile with his sister Tara in ICU\" width=\"453\" height=\"604\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-922\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Tucker Smith manages a smile with his sister Tara in ICU<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Everything went well but doctors had some bad news; Tucker, who has been an outstanding member of the West Central Trojans football team and a candidate for college scholarships, learned that he won\u2019t be able to play football ever again; devastating news for a young man with such talent and passion for the game. But, as is so typical of Tucker, he has handled this disappointment with class and an optimistic attitude that other doors will open.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-919\" title=\"tucker tuesday\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.keloland.com\/lund\/files\/2010\/12\/tucker-tuesday1.jpg\" alt=\"tucker tuesday\" width=\"386\" height=\"500\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Just before he was released from the hospital, his friends and classmates at West Central held a benefit called Tucker Tuesday in which a sizeable sum was raised to ease the sting of a big hospital bill. Good kids!<\/p>\n<p>Tucker WAS able to be at the Pizza Ranch for Holly\u2019s appearance and was presented a Charley Brown-type Christmas tree bearing branches filled with cash. Thanks, Joe.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_920\" style=\"width: 606px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-920\" class=\"size-full wp-image-920\" title=\"holly and tucker and me\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.keloland.com\/lund\/files\/2010\/12\/holly-and-tucker-and-me.jpg\" alt=\"Holly and Tucker and me..oh my.\" width=\"596\" height=\"344\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-920\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Holly and Tucker and me..oh my.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>As for seeing and visiting with Holly in person; well, not only is she drop-dead gorgeous (A fact Linda wishes I\u2019d stop repeating every five minutes) \u00a0but possesses that wonderful quality of \u201cSouth Dakota niceness\u201d genuinely delighted to visit with folks and share her amazing Nicaraguan survival story.<\/p>\n<p>Now it\u2019s time to dwell for a spell on another story that\u2019s as old as Christmas itself, about the arrival of a child who was born to die so we might live. We can never repay a gift like that only rejoice and be glad in it.<\/p>\n<p>Merry Christmas to you all!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I hope you can handle one more story about Eureka, South Dakota\u2019s Holly Hoffman, who survived the popular CBS reality show, \u201cSurvivor\u201d finishing fourth out of all the contestants vying for a million dollar top prize.\u00a0 Holly has since been pretty busy giving interviews and making personal appearances..including one at the Pizza Ranch in Hartford&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lund-at-large","category-60","description-off"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=913"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11829,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913\/revisions\/11829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jodystaples.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}