Rocket Team Vatsaas

From left to right:
Rick Vatsaas, Brad Vatsaas, non-member Pierre "Blacky" LaFontaine, Mark Vatsaas

Shown here in our secret safehouse shortly after our breakout from the Stillwater State Penitentiary in 1952. Note that none of us had yet changed out of our prison uniforms. Still exuberant over our first tastes of freedom outside the cell doors, the escape was choreographed by Blacky LaFontaine - albino midget, criminal mastermind, and gifted florist.

Here is a family portrait with (clockwise from left) Rick, Brad, our sister Janet, and Mark before our medical plan paid for his electrolysis.

Well, that's not exactly true. That's really a poodle. We just told him the electrolysis story to make him feel better about not being in the picture.

The really sad part is that we never had a dog. Our parents were so distraught when Mark dropped out of college they had him airbrushed out of all the family pictures. Usually they replaced him with a fern or a giant floor lamp. His wedding pictures look really goofy. In those he was replaced with a black-and-white cutout of a smiling Richard Nixon waving the Victory sign with both hands.

BEFORE

AFTER

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