Out to Hug the Trees

Some people go out to lunch. Yesterday, I hung up a sign on the door at the office and went out to hugs some trees at the Morris Arboretum yesterday. The weather was a lot nicer than it has been so I took the opportunity to "smell" the roses.

The statues in the video are of John and Lydia Morris. The Arboretum was once their garden and summer home. To ensure that future generations would have access to the site and its botanical treasures, they willed 166 acres to establish a public Arboretum for all to enjoy.

Thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Morris.


The big butterflies, Tiger Swallowtails, were swarming all over the butterfly bushes.

If you would like to see and hear the fountains, click (here)

Addendum:

Thanks to Horticulturist Far Side of Fifty for identifying the "bush" that the butterflies were going "nutty" over as "Joe Pye Weed"!

Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines

One of my Grandfather's favorite movies is Mutiny on the Bounty, a 1962 film starring Marlon Brando, Trevor Howard and Richard Harris.

Another of his absolute favorites is Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines, Or How I Flew from London to Paris in 25 Hours 11 Minutes is a 1965 British comedy film set in 1910, when Lord Rawnsley, an English press magnate, offers £10,000 to the winner of the Daily Post air race from London to Paris, to prove Britain is "number one in the air".


For many years, my Grandfather would hum, sing, or whistle the zany song from this movie while he worked. It goes like this:


Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines.
They Go Up, Tiddly, Up, Up.
They Go Down, Tiddly, Down, Down.
They Enchant All The Ladies And Steal All The Scenes
With their Up, Tiddly, Up, Up
And They're Down, Tiddly, Down, Down.

Up! Down! Flying Around.
Looping The Loop And Defying The Ground.
They're All, Frightfully Keen
Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines.


They Can Fly Upside Down With Their Feet In The Air.
They Don't Think Of Danger.
They Really Don't Care.
Newton Would Think He Had Made A Mistake.
To See Those Young Men And The Chances They Take.
Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines.


They Go Up, Tiddly, Up, Up.
They Go Down, Tiddly, Down, Down.
They Enchant All The Ladies And Steal All The Scenes
With their Up, Tiddly, Up, Up
And Their Down, Tiddly, Down, Down.

Up! Down! Flying Around.
Looping The Loop And Defying The Ground.
They're All, Frightfully Keen
Those Magnificent Men, Those magnificent men!
Those magnificent men and their fly--ing ma--chines!

---------------------------------------------------
Last Saturday, braving the heat and humidty, my dad and I went to the Golden Age Air Museum in Bethel, PA.

The "Golden Age of Aviation" is the two decades between the great world wars, the roaring 1920s and the fabulous 1930s. The museum's concentration is this glorious time that included the birth of the barnstormer, airmail, and flying circuses.


The Curtiss JN4D was designed during World War I as a primary pilot trainer. The majority of American pilots going off to war learned to fly in a Curtiss JN4D. The name "Jenny" was adapted by pilots from the Curtiss "JN" model number.

The museum's Curtiss JN4D had not been flown since the 1920s. The paint scheme represents famous barnstormer and Hollywood pilot Earl S. Daugherty of Long Beach, California.

My dad and I watched in awe and excitement as they pulled a fully restored 1918 Curtis JN4D from its hanger, prepared it for flight, and then gracefully took to the air.


We saw acrobatics, flying circuses, old cars and trucks driven recklessly, and had a great time, not wanting to leave until darkness had fallen and a hush grew over the airfield. I hope you will play the movies and hear how those old planes sounded.


On the way home, my dad and I sang the rousing chorus from one of my grandfather's favorite songs.

They Go Up, Tiddly, Up, Up.
They Go Down, Tiddly, Down, Down.
They Enchant All The Ladies And Steal All The Scenes
With their Up, Tiddly, Up, Up
And Their Down, Tiddly, Down, Down.
If you want to listen, go ---> (here)

Thank You Martha Menagerie!

Hi everyone,

I'm in a bit of a bloggy low, seems like Austin Powers, I've lost my mojo (or the creative moose has wandered northwards due to the summer humidity and heat).

I do want to thank Martha Menagerie for having a CSN gift card giveaway that I won! Martha is a very wonderful person who has a very colorful personal blog as well as several team blogs covering cooking, photography and getting motivated. My favorite is this one (here!)

With the awesome giveaway gift card, I got this:


Every time I turn it on and see its soft glow, I think about Martha Menagerie, her doggy friend Koda the Corgi, and Koda's wonderful mom, Betty.

Thank you Martha M!

A quiet Saturday at Massey Aerodrome

Last weekend, my dad and I visited the Massey Air Museum to see what might be happening on a hot, humid Saturday afternoon in the middle of nowhere on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Being dopey from the heat, I forgot my camera, but took this shot with my cellphone.


"Flying is hours and hours of boredom sprinkled with a few seconds of sheer terror." - Maj. Gregory (Pappy) Boyington

The Chance Vought F4U Corsair is widely considered the most capable of all carrier-based fighter aircraft of World War Two. It's distinctive "bent" wings were designed to keep the landing gear short and robust for carrier landings and give clearance for the enormous 13' 4" diameter propeller required to pull her to over 400 MPH - the first American fighter to do so.

It’s performance was considered equal to many other fighters like the Mustang but its short range kept it either carrier-based or land-based in the South Pacific war close to the action. The Corsair continued to be operated by the USN and the Marines after the war and saw considerable action during the Korean War.

Maj. Gregory (Pappy) Boyington (1912-88) Marine Corps aviator was born in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. In World War II, Boyington was a fighter pilot with the American Volunteer Group (AVG) (the famous ”Flying Tigers”) in air combat over Burma and China (1942), and with Marine Fighter Squadron 214, (the legendary ”Black Sheep” 1943-44).

Boyington got the nickname "Pappy" because, being just over 30 years old, he was ten years older than many of his pilots.

For three months in 1943-44 he led Marine Fighting Squadron #214, the so-called "Black Sheep Squadron," in the Solomon Islands. During that time the squadron was credited with 97 confirmed kills of enemy aircraft. In January 1944 Boyington was shot down and captured by the Japanese and spent the rest of the war as a prisoner.

He was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor and the Navy Cross.

Boyington's autobiography, titled Baa Baa Black Sheep, was a bestseller in 1958. In the 1970s a television series by the same name ran for two seasons on the NBC network, with actor Robert Conrad playing Boyington.

The plane in the picture is actually a full-scale fiberglass model built to be a prop at an eatery in Newark, Delaware named the "94th Aero Squadron Restaurant" which has gone out of business.

Corsair #29 belonged to Top Navy Corsair Ace Ira Kepford (16 confirmed victories), but this plane is painted to represent a later F4U-1D that served onboard the USS Intrepid (now a floating museum in New York City) during the invasion of Okinawa, April 1945. The white vertical tail stripe being the identifier for the planes operating off the USS Intrepid.

Ladies Room Job is Keeping Me Busy

I am being kept busy at the Ladies Room job - and recently, while I was doing some multitasking "quality time" (i.e., reading a professional trade magazine in the bathroom) I encountered this ad in Life Science Leader Magazine.


It reads, "Patient Data - No One Gets You Closer" and "For all your ePro solutions visit CRFHealth.com" so I took a visit. Imagine my shock when I saw that their website has this ad boldy placed near the top of the page along with several others in a rotating banner!

Just so you know, ePro stands for "electronic Patient Reported Outcomes", usually things like "how much pain do you feel this morning" or "how depressed are you today" that a clinical trial patient would record in a diary with preprinted forms.

CRF_Toilet from langland on Vimeo.

I don't even want to think about what "outcome" this patient might want to report.

My favorite childhood memory...

Yellow Dog Granny asked me what my favorite childhood memory was... and this turned out to be a very difficult question to answer.

There were so many memories - with so many people - in so many places...


My Great-Uncle Jim, who was a career quartermaster in the Army - was an Irish man that always had a sunny smile and booming laugh after he told a joke - He took us on car rides to see the biggest and best outdoor displays of Christmas lights after we spent hours playing with his huge toy train layout... He also loved to join us fishing "down the shore."

He always enjoyed belittling the Navy (and Navy guys) at every turn - especially when we were out in a boat. He would shout, "Man the scuppers ye scurvy dogs!" and then turn to me and say, "What the heck are scuppers anyway?"

I remember him taking us to an open house at Fort Dix, New Jersey where he worked and personally seeing to it that my brothers and I got priority on tank rides where we got to steer the tank, shooting at the rifle range, and jumping from the parachute jump training tower.


My honorary Uncle Henry - who took my brothers and I to Atlantic City to walk the boardwalk, eat peanuts, ride the amusements rides, climb into Lucy the Elephant and see Dorothy Hamill with the Ice Capades was much the same - Henry was honest hard working man who delighted in telling the most awful jokes (my brothers and I called them "Henryisms") An example? When is it time to see the dentist? Why Tooth-hurty of course!


My Grandmother - would come down the shore and cook fried eggplant and flounder dinners, that filled us hungry and growing boys after a full day of fishing, swimming, and bike riding. She always made sure Santa brought the things we didn't need but greatly wanted as well as the annual underwear and unwanted handkerchiefs (some of which the packages were never opened).

My Grandfather - who would watch favorite TV shows with us, shows like Batman and Robin, Petticoat Junction, Get Smart, Gomer Pyle, The Carol Burnett Show, and McHale's Navy, when we spent many weekends at their house.

I remember being "down the shore" when I got my first "real" bike and when Apollo 11 landed on the moon and Neil Armstrong stepping out onto the surface on TV.

I also remember playing miniature golf - both with the family and in 'just for kids' tournaments and winning a little plastic trophy (Finally! After months of trying, I finally beat my little brother who won a dozen or more of them as well as my older brother who won at least a half dozen of them himself). I remember the thrill of a "hole in one" - and getting one on the last hole of the golf course, which meant you won a "free game!"

I remember playing in the tidal flats, looking for clams, seaweed and driftwood - and when the weather turned cooler, wearing my sweatshirt to ward off the cool night air that I always enjoy along with call of the seagulls over the crash of the surf. I remember the old wooden boats that the deep sea charter captains took people "from the city" out to catch Blue Fish, Sea Trout, Sea Bass, and most prized of all, Tuna.


I remember the pine barrens - the white sandy tracks into the woods... and canoeing with the Boy Scouts on the Wading, Mullica, Basto, and Oswego rivers down to the ocean. And hiking in the heat and finding luscious wild blueberries to eat.

I remember winning a rabbit (to my mother's horror) for a prize in Cub Scouts when I collected the most newspapers to be recycled out of 30 guys in the cub pack... I remember 4-H camps and shows and winning ribbons for Marigolds (of all things)... and Scout Camps and snipe hunts... and camping in the snow "caveman" style.

I remember going to Disney World, Universal Studios, Knotts Berry Farm, Disney Land, the San Diego Zoo ... and Cypress Gardens to see the water skiing show...and several Sea Worlds, and Miami's Sea Aquarium and being delighted with the Penguins, Killer Whales and Dolphin shows. I will always remember the tour in a then new-fangled people-mover of the Hershey's chocolate factory and getting insatiable craving for anything chocolate to eat!

And annual Thanskgiving weekend trips to the Outer Banks of North Carolina and seeing the place where the Wright Brothers first flew, the grand lighthouses there, as well as the wild horses in Corolla, and seeing "Misty of Chincoteague" on the way home. And of course we did a bunch of fishing there, too.

And the annual spring trips to Boston, New Hampshire, and down Maine... where we walked along the Marginal Way in Ogunquit and saw the lobster boats unload their catch - and climbed Mount Desert Island and peered into Thunder Hole in Arcadia.

I remember attempting to roller skate and ripping the seat of my pants on one of my earliest dates and never trying skating again...and the small creek down the hill that ran near my house where I spent hours throwing rocks to make splashes. Many an hour was spent sledding down that same hill when it snowed enough... Oh, and saving enough S&H green stamps to get a free radio and faithfully listening to the Phillies play baseball for years afterward on it...

And the YMCA day camp at Fisher's Pool, where I learned how to row a boat, and the end of day camp family picnic with a huge spread of yummy bbq chicken and corn on the cob. Day trips to West Point Park for picnics and rides... and trips to the Schwenksville Firehouse for smorgasbord dinners with the world's finest hush puppies and cole slaw. Sitting in the warm sunshine in Milton Mills, New Hampshire in the big field my mom's parents had, enjoying the rich scent of strawberries while watching the chipmunks play hide and seek in the big rocks that formed a boundry wall.

And I remember a trip to Hong Kong where I "accidentally" walked into China and was escorted out of the country at machine gun point. The poverty and the floating palaces and restaurants and the open air markets of the Orient... riding on the high speed Bullet Train in Japan and seeing Hiroshima, the site of the first atomic bomb exploded in anger... And seeing the bridge over the River Kwai in person and walking across it...

I recall a hot, sticky night when we stopped in a place called Ong's Hat...and had some homemade vanilla ice cream... it's something like forty years later and I can still taste that cold, creamy, goodness...

I think my favorite memory might take me a while to find... I hope Yellow Dog Granny doesn't regret asking... My life won't "flash before my eyes" very quickly, it has been a very full one.

Search Stories

Recently I've seen folks creating their Google Search Story. Sugarlens and then Dorkys Ramos over at Dry as Toast have created or featured them. So I decided to give it a whirl - not having much to say lately. To quote Dorkys, "[t]he YouTube feature lets you create a mini movie via Google searches and then select a soundtrack to tell your story."

So here it is...


Orange Cones pictures, bachelor dining issues, my failed dating life, home hygiene, Rodney Dangerfield quotes, Lucy the Elephant, and having writer's block seem to loom large these days...

Try it your self at Youtube.com/searchstories.

Happy 101st Birthday Granddad!

For a great many years, my grandfather determined the price for which the castings produced at the family foundry would be sold at using a pencil and a piece of tablet paper. After forty of fifty years of doing this job, he started to make mistakes and my father and I needed to figure out what to do about it.

It was at that time, back in 1975-ish, I wrote my first computer program, it was designed to determine the casting sale price after the large number of input parameters were entered. It produced a paper tape showing all the inputs and all the interim calculations as well as the final price that was sometimes marked up depending on the customer's credit history and shipping location.

The desktop computer from Hewlett Packard, one of the very first ever made, was affectionately called Hewey. Hewey allowed my grandfather to continue working productively in the front office for at least another fifteen years. Hewey was repaired and rebuilt many times, "he" got a new ribbon printer, keyboard, tape drive mechanism, power supply, and worked hard for about twenty years when he retired from the front office about the same time as my grandfather. My grandfather continued to work in the small wood shop behind the office preparing the tooling for production runs for another ten years.

I have Hewey in the back of one of my closets, saved away in his brown padded travel bag. "He" earned his way into hie retirement and will be a family keepsake for as long as anyone in my family wants "him".

I often find myself wondering if that first computer program might have added fifteen good years to my grandfather's life.


Some sunflowers to brighten the house - the shades were drawn to keep the heat down...


Lighting up 3 candles, one for each digit of 101 years...


Making a wish...


Blowing out the candles now...


I wonder what he wished for... I will probably never know.

Flashback to 1979...

The summer of 1979 found me working as a "special projects assistant" for my dad at the family foundry. With my freshman year of engineering college behind me, I was ready to attempt some unusual things that my dad hoped would keep the brass, bronze, zinc, and aluminum foundry competitive in face of ever increasing expenses and governmental regulation.

Every area of the foundry was open to improvement, improvements in safety, air quality, water quality, material handling, and reduction in hazardous materials and waste. Given a free hand, I explored things like exposure to lead dust, noise (think air hammers and the roar of a blast furnace), and other things and one of the first things I recall doing was installing overhead halogen lights that enabled everyone to actually see the floor for the first time since the building was converted into a foundry in 1918.

Foundry sand is jet black. It starts out white but after being mixed with used sand, black binders (to make it hold its shape when molded) and burned, it turns very black. A fine layer of it coated just about everything (and everyone) - there wasn't much to be done for that.

Another project I remember doing was designing and building an aluminum pre-heater oven, used to heat up a finned-steel tube about a foot in diameter and ten feet long and filled with smaller steel tubes welded inside it, up to 1,220 degrees F. This was done so that the large tube could be filled with molten aluminum and slowly cooled. The smaller tubes inside were then filled with electric heater coils - much like the things that glow fiery red in your oven at home.

The whole apparatus was then used to heat the oil in those big oil refinery tanks in the winter so that the wax that naturally occurs in crude oil wouldn't form and clog up the plumbing. Later they used the same gizmo to stir the oil in such away they could separate out the wax and paraffin so it could be used in a million different ways - such as candle wax, cosmetics, paper coating, inks, fabrics, and even on our foods.

But my most difficult special project assignment happened one day when I thought I'd be able to just take it easy and enjoy the countryside. I was to deliver a small, two pound, hush-hush casting to a customer near Sumneytown, PA. The brass alloy it was made from was a very expensive one - I recall it costing about 100 times what a "regular" bit of brass would have cost since it had a lot of silver, tin and other pricey metals in it.

To add to the expense, the customer insisted that a complete chemical and physical analysis be made of the heat (the batch of metal poured from the furnace pot) that made the part. The set up of the tooling cost around $500 and the laboratory analysis work cost about $500 (in 1979) so the chunk of formed metal I had in my hand when I walked out to the truck was going to be billed at well over $750 a pound.

The paperwork I was given said, "Ward Ch., 29xx Geryville Pike" for the address and the special instructions said, "Ring bell on far left door 3 times, turn around and wait until someone rang the door bell before turning around to collect signed paperwork".

Most odd I thought. Well, I knew from my Boy Scouting experience that Geryville Pike was only about four miles long from end to end and near the middle of it was Camp Delmont, where I spend many a day camping as a scout.

So off I went, and soon found myself zigging zagging on one of Pennsylvania's twisty back country roads, looking for a sign and a building with a street address that might be "Ward Ch., 29xx Geryville Pike". It was a hot summer day, and the delivery truck had no air conditioning, nor did the windows roll down. I drove up Geryville Pike at the speed limit (maybe 35 mph) and saw nothing that suggested "Ward Ch.". I turned around and headed back down the road... and again, saw nothing. Getting a little exasperated, I decided I would ask the guys at a truck repair place at the other end of the Pike if I missed it the third time. And I missed it the third time.

Pulling in at the truck repair place, drenched in sweat, and a little ... "unhappy" with things, I stormed into the office and asked, "Does anyone here know where Ward Chhhh" is? The guy at the desk said, "Huh?"

So I showed him my paperwork and he said, "29xx? is that like 2900-something? or 29 unit XX?"

I shrugged my shouldered to express "H*ll if I know."

The guys says, "Hang on, I'll call (someone), he lives on this road." So he did and the very odd look growing on his face as his conversation grew lengthy made me wonder more and more what I had gotten in to. Finally he says, "He thinks this place is the white building next to the Rheinland Inn, but the Inn doesn't even have a street address. Go back down the pike, it's about a tenth of a mile from the other end on your left."

So off I went, and off course, drove past it once more - but this time noticing where the Rheinland Inn was, so when I turned around, I pulled in to... this building...


Relieved that I had at long last found the place, I went to the 'far left third' door, put the $1,500+ casting on the paperwork on the ground and rang the bell and turned around and waited. And waited and waited. Finally, I decided that perhaps this wasn't the right place after all - but before leaving (please remember this was long before cellphones) I decided to try the other 'far left door'. This time I heard the door open almost immediately, the paper rustling, the door slam shut and a bell ring. I picked up the paperwork to be sure the part had been signed for, and noticed it had been stamped, "Ward Chocolate, Makers of Fine Chocolate Making Machines".

To this day, I have no idea what went on in that building, or even if anything still does, because even after hours of google searches, I can find nothing...nothing at all on the Internet regarding this building. The Rheinland Inn, located next door, on the other hand, while still without a street address, has gone out of business and is currently for sale, shows up in hundreds of web pages in one form or another.

*cue Twilight Zone theme*

There is a fifth dimension, beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man's fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area which we call The Twilight Zone.

- Submitted for your enjoyment, Iggy 'Serling' -

The Real Toonerville Trolley

(This article is taken from the February 1938 Edition of the "Railroad Magazine" and abridged by me)

The Real Toonerville Trolley - By Frank Donovan, Jr.

In Betzwood, Pennsylvania, (the home of the big rusty balls) lies the rotting remains of the most famous trolley in America - the Toonerville Trolley. Its wheels, pole, and controller handle have long since been removed, leaving only the empty, worm-eaten car body. Moreover, the abandoned field wherein the trolley rests was formerly a large and prosperous motion picture studio.

The origin of this trolley was accidental. A young newspaper cartoonist, Fontaine Fox, lived on a street car line in Louisville, Kentucky. For years this route had been getting old cast-off equipment and had become the joke of the town. Finally, the managing editor of the local paper asked Fox to draw some sketches caricaturing the antiquated vehicles. This he did, and in so doing, gave birth to the Toonerville Trolley.

It was not, however, until some ten years later that the famous electric trolley car appeared as a cartoon. The cartoonist made a trolley trip in Westchester County, New York. On this route plied a small, single-truck, one-man car. But what pleased Fox the most was the motorman and the solicitude he showed for his patrons. That evening when Fontaine Fox arrived at his destination, he pondered over his ride and drew the first Toonerville Trolley with its obliging Skipper.

By 1920 the Toonerville Trolley became such a phenomenal success as a cartoon it was put in the movies. The historic Betzwood Film Company was chosen to do the job. This firm was formerly the Lubin Film Company, one of the pioneers in the motion picture industry. Its head, Sigmund Lubin, owned a string of penny arcades, nickelodeons, and theaters in eastern Pennsylvania.


At the outset Mr. Fox and his coworkers realized the success or failure of the Toonerville films would depend upon who played the part of the skipper. It was fortunate they selected a gentleman named Daniel Mason for this role, for he looked and acted his part perfectly. Of course, the other characters were there, including the Powerful Katrinka (Wilma Hervey), Aunt Eppie Hogg, The Terrible Tempered Mr. Bang, Cynthia Snoop, and Mickey (Himself) McGuire, yet none could compare with Dan the Skipper. He out-acted them all.

In the first movies the Toonerville Trolley ran on a narrow-gage quarry railroad operated by the Valley Forge Silica, Sand & Ore Company in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. This did not prove satisfactory and henceforth a local trolley line -- the Phoenixville, Valley Forge & Strafford Electric Railway Company -- was used.

This picturesque electric line was chartered in 1905 and completed from Valley Forge to Phoenixville several years later. It never did reach reach Strafford. Because the route abounded in hills and curves and plenty of rural goodness, it proved ideal for the Toonerville films.

Most of the filming took place between Valley Forge and Corners Store, especially near a town called Williams Corner. The car barn was located at this spot, and nearby stood a weather-beaten covered bridge spanning the Pickering Creek. Since the "trolley" had no motor it was pulled by a truck on flanged wheels or pushed by a regular electric trolley car. With the aid of a pole is was relatively easy to film the car as if it were running under its own power.


To give the vehicle the maximum vertical and lateral motion the car body was centered on a pivot with springs on either side. If, for example, Aunt Eppie boarded the trolley it would sag at the rear and list to one side, often touching the rails. It usually took the combined efforts of the Skipper and passengers to pile up on the front platform and try to balance the car.

In making one picture, a spectacular derailment was carefully planned, and the actors were coached in the act of falling with padded clothes. But it happened that in going to the location for the spill, the car accidentally jumped the track. The passengers were thrown into a briar patch far below the right-of-way. Unfortunately, the cameraman was up the line waiting for the fake derailment, and thus missed the real thing!

Another time in coming down Mount Misery on the narrow-gage road the trolley got out of control. Despite the frantic efforts of Skipper Dan to check the flight, it would not be stopped. At this point, Fontaine Fox, the only passenger, realized the perils of the situation and started to rock the car vigorously until it jumped the rails and skid to a halt. To this day Fox asserts he saved the life of the Skipper.

Toonerville films were distributed by the First National Pictures and later by the Educational Films Corporation. Among the titles were Toonerville Blues, Toonerville Trials, The Skipper's Narrow Escape, The Skipper's Treasure Garden and many others.

The original films were not talkies and only seven of the original seventeen two-reel comedies survive today. Some of the surviving films are stored in the Betzwood Film Archive, established in the Library of Montgomery County Community College in 1987.

The Toonerville Trolley is an American institution. I know I would love to see these movies and dream of riding the trolley!

Friday's Fragments

The US State Department recognizes 194 independent countries around the world, but that list of countries reflects the political agenda of the United States of America. As an example, it includes Kosovo, but does not include Taiwan, as China claims that Taiwan (the ROC) is simply a province of China. Poop on them, ROC is a country to me!

Some years ago, my mom gave me a large map of Europe and some pushpins and we spent a weekend going through all the pleasure trip brochures and business expense reports I had accumulated, and pushed a pin in each place I had spent at least one night. I listed the places not shown on the map somewhere safe (and yes, that means I have no idea where the list is...)


The wall of my home study (the room with my home computer) is covered by a wallpaper made from a beach scene photograph. I need only to turn and look over my shoulder to see places I've been and a place I'd like to return.


Click on the picture to get a clearer view. The reason this came to mind was this:

My grandfather celebrated his 101st birthday on July 6th. Things were a bit busy - with the aftermath of the graduation trip to Rochester, New York - so we didn't celebrate it on that day and we will be celebrating it this Sunday (pictures to come). My grandfather has been in so many countries we decided to make a list going by memory of all of his family members because he often took us with him.

In some cases we had to drag out a map to see where some of the places he went are currently named (i.e., Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia and some USSR countries have broken into smaller countries and/or renamed themselves.)


The best we can tell, he has been in fifty-one (51!) of countries of the world, or more than 25% of them ...and he still wants to go see the Mayan and Incan ruins in Central and South America.

I think I got his travel bug. I can travel light and don't mind sleeping on sofas. But first I want to see the Show Me State...

SpongeCates

Ever wonder what Spongebob Squarepant's babies would look like?



...imagine him and Phoebe Cates?


Oh my.... I umm.. I... oh.. what was I saying? Oh yeah, imagine Spongebob getting *this* lucky...

Well, if you go to Make Me Babies (it's free!) you can select their celebrity headshots (Johnny Depp and Britney Spears for starters) and/or upload your own photo(s) and find out what their baby might look like!


Please say "Hello" to SpongeCates... I must tell you I was rather shocked they had a redhead...

How about Bob Vila...



...and Martha Stewart?



Ewwwwwwwwwwww... I even tried...


Michael Jackson...


...and Marilyn Manson.


Baffling huh?

Oklahoma Giveaway Winner!

Recently, I've been winning the bloggery! That's the blogger equivalent of the blogosphere lottery!

Recently a package arrived at my door from Parsley of Seasons of My Mind who had a postcard giveaway and has been badly biten by the Orange Conehead Alien bug. I sent her a postcard (or two) from the states near me and won! She sent a big envelope stuffed with Oklahoma-themed items in it!

While I've only been in Oklahoma twice in a quick drive-through on the Interstate, I do have some ties to Oklahoma - My mother's father side of the family moved there from Kentucky during the Civil War because their farm was a part of one of the battlefields during the "Confederate Invasion of Kentucky" in 1862. My maternal great-grandfather was a traveling minister, often riding miles on horseback to to give sermons - a life-calling that he passed on to many of his off-spring.

As I said, they moved west to escape the horrors of the Civil War and at precisely twelve noon on September 16, 1893 a cannon's boom unleashed the largest land rush America ever saw. Carried by all kinds of transportation - horses, wagons, trains, bicycles or on foot - an estimated 100,000 raced to claim plots of land in an area of land in northern Oklahoma Territory known as the Cherokee Strip. There had been a number of previous land rushes in the Territory - but this was the big one.

Family legend has it, some of my relatives "jumped the gun" and were Sooners.

The only real link I have of that side of the family is this picture (here) plus some family legends and tales of my great-granny beheading chickens and plucking them for frying, making soap in a cast iron pot outside the rustic cabin she lived in, and a number of interesting stories of her calmly killing any number of rattlesnakes of totally unbelievable length.

I know a branch of the family moved into the Durant and Caddo areas of Oklahoma along the Native Americans Trail of Tears and the hardiest of this hardy lot went onwards north to the Vinita, Oklahoma area, perhaps a little too soon.

So it was with great interest I opened and looked at the items Parsley included in her marvelous giveaway...


An Oklahoma fun fact sheet,
a Deck of playing cards with an Indian Chief riding a war horse,
an Oklahoma state t-shirt (just the right size too!),
a Phascinating photobook about the Sooner State,
five Oklahoma Postcards!
a Genuine Oklahoma State Quarter,
a Key Ring with the state seal and explanation on the reverse,
a blue Dreamcatcher, ready to catch some Nyquil-induced nightmares,
a Pet Tornado (this is really cool!)
and finally, an Ada, Oklahoma shotglass explaining dreamcatchers
...all displayed on a way to cool for words, handstitched OCHA dishtowel along with a handmade OCHA greeting card!



A short video of the Pet Tornado, a 'snow globe'-like, tornado imitating device.

Thank you, Parsley!

:)

The Fourth of July Weekend

For the Fourth of July weekend, my mom and dad decided to get out of town and head down to the houseboat. My mom told my dad, "You are not to do anything! Anything at all!" After some, umm.. lets call it discussion, my dad grudgingly agreed and called me and asked if I would come and help them out with the boat.

Twist my arm will ya?! :)

And so they spent a couple days sitting in beach chairs, reading, and taking cooling dips in the swimming pool.

My dad was much better this weekend. He had about five doctor's appointments last week and his medication regime was completely revised (for the better it seems). Apparently he was taking a blood thinner/anticoagulant as well as a couple nasty pain killers - the pain killers caused intestinal bleeding and the anticoagulant meant, once started, the bleeding was very hard to stop. Once they got that straightened out - my dad bounced back pretty quickly and was hard to hold down/back.

So with the "no work" edict on him, I was chief cook and bottle washer - until they left the wharf aruond mid-day on Sunday since their doggy-sitter wasn't available later in the day. I then had the evening and Monday to myself.

My mom was really tired - its been a stressful few weeks (months actually) and was taking a nap when three baby swallows landed on a mooring line just outside her stateroom (boat-speak for bedroom) window. I was outside putting the canvas boat top up for some shade when I saw them swinging back and forth as their mom and dad flew around catching them little buggy morsels to snack on.

I gently woke my mother up and pull the shade up a little so she could peek at the birdies just outside the window.


She watched intently for a moment and then her face lit in a big smile and she turned to me and said, "You know, they remind me of the Three K's down at the seashore."

My two brothers and I, since our first names all begin with "K" were often called the Three K's, and often did played and swam on the beach together.


Baby Sparrows Learn the Ropes
The swallow on the far right nearly falls off near the end f the video and tells his brother to "quit that!"

About 50 yards off the stern (back end) of the houseboat, a pair of Osprey had built a nest on top of a wooden pole and were busy raising and feeding a couple of chicks. I was startled nearly to the point of falling overboard when one of them dove past my head and into the water next to the houseboat unexpectedly and snagged a ten inch fish!

I put my camera in my pocket and watched them out the corner of my eye for the remainder of the day, hoping to catch them catching a fish without luck. I almost felt as if I had gone back to the days of my unsuccessfully taking squirrel pictures.


Ospreys are big, majestic birds - I'm glad they are making a comeback after nearly being made extinct by poisonous bug-sprays like DDT.


On Sunday night, there was a nice firework display at the edge of the river - my point and shoot camera is no good for firework pictures - so I just sat alone and enjoyed the show from the upper deck of the houseboat.

There are some other pictures of these and other birds in the Flickr side bar.

Schwenksville, Then and Now

I forgot I had this entry nearly written a couple weeks ago - Someone asked to see the before and after pictures of Schwenksville, so I am happy to oblige them.


- William Bromer House - July 12, 1907


- William Bromer House - June 13, 2010


- J. Edwin Miller Garage - c. 1960s


- Miller Garage Building (current owner not known) - June 13, 2010


- Woodside Inn - c. 1930s


- Woodside Inn (Unoccupied and currently for sale) - June 13, 2010


- Farmer's then Bean's Hotel - c. 1900s


- Bean's Hotel (now apartments) - June 13, 2010

As you can see, with the exception of the ornate porch on Bean's Hotel, likely removed in 1930s, some bushes in the front of the Bromer Home, and some of the brickwork in the upper fascade of J. Edwin Miller's garage, nothing seems to have changed all that much.

Fridge Magnet Affirmations

On my refrigerator... Two train locomotives on a mini-railroad spike from Alice Kay and a magnet tag from Rebecca at This Mom's Many Hats.

"Friends are the bacon bits in the salad bowl of life." - Author Unknown

"The best mirror is an old friend." - George Herbert

"A friend is one of the nicest things you can have, and one of the best things you can be." - Douglas Pagels

"The best kind of friend is the one you could sit on a porch with, never saying a word, and walk away feeling like that was the best conversation you've had." - Author Unknown

"It takes a long time to grow an old friend." - John Leonard

"Since there is nothing so well worth having as friends, never lose a chance to make them." - Francesco Guicciardini

"I cannot even imagine where I would be today were it not for that handful of friends who have given me a heart full of joy. Let's face it, friends make life a lot more fun." - Charles R. Swindoll