Give Me A Break

I went to more summer training yesterday. My training yesterday started at the WISD Playhouse on I-35 by Baylor. The purpose of the training this time was to acquaint the elementary teachers with the new math textbook adoption. The morning training focused on the textbook itself and the various components.

The publisher of our adoption is Macmillan/McGraw-Hill. The presenter started by going into detail about the company and the name. As she was telling some fact about McGraw-Hill the following exchange took place:

Me, "Is Quickdraw still with the company?"

I get a blank stare.

Then she asks,"Who?"

Me, "Quickdraw!"

She, "Quickdraw?"

Me, "Yes! Quickdraw! Quickdraw McGraw.

"Someone in the audience, "He teaches Kindergarten!"

She, "Oh! I fell right into that one. They normally ask if Tim or Faith are there.

Fast forward to the afternoon session.

I arrive at Brook (That's the school I teach at, Brook Avenue Elementary) and am met with several police cars in the staff parking lot. Something has obviously happened and I had my suspicions.

I headed into the building and sure enough I learned that several vehicle windows were broken.

During the school year our parking lot is locked up during the day to keep folks out. However, during summer training with so many people coming and going the lot has been left unlocked.

Enter the folks that have nothing better to do during the day. Then add to that seemingly intelligent people leaving their valuables in their vehicle in plain sight.

Now I know that many of these people are not accustomed to this neighborhood, but gee whiz! Take your valuables with you; or at least hide them so that folks are not tempted.

Give me a break! And Charlie too. He had to clean up all the mess and it was terribly hot today.

© 2008 Barry T Horst


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Something New

Julie and I went to the Waco-McLennan County Library on Saturday. We both checked out some books to supplement our summertime reading. Julie wanted to watch a movie over the weekend. You know, something light and entertaining. The movie she got was "War & Peace". Oh well, it doesn't really matter.

After we left the library we were driving along Austin Avenue going towards the "Square". As we passed The Waco Hippodrome Theatre Julie saw an advertising poster for "Tuna Does Vegas". Julie was excited and said she wanted to see it because she thinks Greater Tuna is funny.

Yesterday in the mail we received a brochure in the mail from the Hippodrome for their upcoming productions/presentations. As we were looking at it Julie noted the various Donor Levels for membership in the Waco Performing Arts Center. The Donor Levels are Directors ($2000+); Benefactor ($1000-$1999); Producer ($500-$999); Premiere Patron ($250-$499); Patron ($150-$249); and Friend ($50-$149).

I would like to suggest these additional levels: Casual Acquaintance ($25-$49); Just A Nodding Acquaintance ($5-$24.99); and Excuse Me! Do I Know You? ($4.99 or less).
© 2008 Barry T Horst


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Picture Monday, July 14, 2008

Ahhh, to be a kid again. The pictures below are pictures of Chris's dad. Yes, that's right, my father-in-law. These pictures were taken at a much simpler time when it was certainly fun to be a kid at least. I'm sure that these pictures were taken at the local park in Nevada, Missouri which was his hometown.

Look how the kiddos are dressed. Was it a Sunday afternoon some years ago? Maybe the boys just dressed a lot better in 1930's when they went to play in the park. It looks as if it must have been a shirt and tie affair.

Looks like the girls dressed up to play in the park also. One of them even donned a hat for the occasion.

© 2008 Barry T Horst

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Forgetful or Just Plain Sidetracked-I Just Don't Know

Oh my goodness! I forgot to get to the blog today. I don't know what to write about but here goes anyway.The other day we were out driving around and went to a couple of stores. One of the stores we went to was a half price book store. We stopped and looked around for a while. I bought a couple of paper back books. The books were some vintage MAD Magazine Spy vs Spy and Dave Berg books. Brought 'em home and read them yesterday and last night.

Meanwhile, Chris started rummaging around here at the house. After a short time she comes into the bedroom with about 100 different cartoon paper back books. Among the books she found were Hagar, the Horrible; Tumbleweeds; Peanuts; MAD Magazine; Beetle Bailey and a host of others.

I started looking at some of the paper backs earlier today and decided I would try to put some on eBay. I got started on that and then time got away from me and all of a sudden I realized I spent time doing eBay and not the blog.

Oh well, maybe I'll get some money from them instead of a bunch of dust.

By the way, why do things collect dust when it just sits?

© 2008 Barry T Horst


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Imagine That!

I had to run some errands today. Julie went with me because she wanted to go to the library. After spending some considerable time at the library we made our way to Sam's Club. I decided to take what I call the "scenic route", which simply means I don't want to go the normal straight shot way. i wanted to go the long way. Today it took me through downtown Waco, across the Brazos River, and along Elm Street in East Waco. I've always liked this route because I get to drive past areas and places that remind me of my younger days. For instance, today we drove past DeMaria's Bar-B-Que and Jasper's Barbecue on Clifton Street. I am reminded of when I was very young and my dad would take us to a barbecue place on Elm where they served you on butcher paper. I think it was DeMaria's when they were at their old location closer to Clifton Street.

I also commiserated upon the loss of Paul Quin College for the Elm Street area and how I thought the entire area would be much better had the college not moved away.

As we were approaching Sam's Club I mentioned to Julie that Collin Street Bakery would be building a restaurant on I-35 behind the Sam's Club. I understand that the restaurant will look similar to their other restaurant on I-45 in Corsicana, TX.Upon mentioning this to Julie, she reminded me of a visit we made to the bakery when she was maybe 12 years old. The family was in the bakery looking at all the cookies, cakes, pies, breads, and other delicious baked goods. Everyone in our group was making their selections and getting them bagged up. When it was Julie's turn we asked what she wanted. She thought for a moment and puzzled over what to get.

Finally she asked, "Can I have a hard roll?"

We chuckled and told her yes. Here we thought she was building up to something spectacular and yet she simply asked for a hard roll. It seems that she thought they just looked good.

Imagine that!

© 2008 Barry T Horst


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Are You Ready For This?

I spent Wednesday night cruising the Internet for old time radio shows. I found a lot and listened to a few while I worked on the blog. Thursday night was different. This time I spent my time looking for old time TV shows.

Wow! If only the day was 48 hours long I would be happy.

As I search for things on the Internet I sometimes think I need GPS. I mean I sit down and know exactly what I'm going to look for and what I'm going to do; and I start. It always seems to go downhill from there. Take for instance last night; I planned on researching classic or old time TV shows. (Really, I just wanted to try to find some episodes to watch. I mean gee, sometimes TV with 100+ channels gets a little boring.) Anyway, I start out on YouTube and find the pilot episode for Fibber McGee and Molly on NBC in the 50's. So I watch.

Then I do a search for classic TV. This, of course, yields a gold mine. So I proceed to visit a few. The first is Like Television. There you can download many classic series and watch to your hearts content and it's easy too. The shows are divided into various categories which makes it relatively easy to find what you want. They also have films, commercials, and cartoons. Then I headed to TV Land. They have a few episodes to watch but I didn't stay long. After that I mostly find links to web-sites that are databases and the like; good to read but not much if anything to watch.

I head back to YouTube.

BONANZA!! And I don't mean the show, although it can be found there.

See, I told you it could be found there. Anyway, I look for Fibber McGee again and watch a few of the videos and then somehow jumped to Jack Benny. One of the Jack Benny videos had Mel Blanc on it. So then I started watching videos with Mel Blanc. You know Jack Benny once said, "There are only five real people in Hollywood. Everybody else is Mel Blanc." After Mel Blanc for some reason I started watching Spike Jones; John Denver; Peter, Paul, and Mary; and Patty Duke. That's quite a variety of music videos, and in the middle of all of those I watched some episodes of The Life of Riley and The Patty Duke Show. And all the while I open more screens and look up information about the shows and read about them. Of course when I do that I can't watch the shows, I can only listen. Then I try to write my blog while I am reading and watching and listening and talking to Chris and Julie and tending to the cats and walking the dog and taking out the trash and, and, and.....No wonder I'm tired!

Good night or good morning or good day or good grief!

© 2008 Barry T Horst


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