Am I getting to be the old grouchy guy ?

For awhile I have found golf balls in the back yard.

I figured they came from the teenagers that live on Maplewood behind my house and they had hit a errant practice shot from their backyard to mine.

In the last two weeks the golf balls have been numbered, I thought, oh well no big deal.

Today I went out to dip the leaves, clean the filter and feed the fish in the Coy pond.

I heard a, not loud, bang, and a golf ball came sailing by through the Oak tree branches and about 8' from me.

I said,"Damn good shot."

And things got quite from whence the golf ball came.

Occasionally there are a couple of hawks that enjoy our bird bath, last summer I found a hawk dead in the backyard and a couple of weeks later, two dead doves.

At that time, again taking care of the fish, I heard a air rifle going off, I bitched at the kiddos that time and have not found anymore dead birds.


Back to the present, it is obvious that the new thrill is some kind of air cannon thing that shoots golf balls.

That seems like a expensive habit to me, after all the pictured golf balls are Titelest, Pinacle and other brand names that look brand new, they aren't range balls.

So I hope if they run out, or their dad figures out he is missing all his golf balls, this will end too. Although the balls numbered from 11 to 77 so far tells me they have a almost unlimited supply.

Anyone want to buy some golf balls? They are not getting them back!

Mom doesn't want a new TV!

My Moms 10 year old 27" Zenith console TV was showing its age.

On some channels, no matter what you tried, the color just wasn't right, and the sound was funky on every channel.

Her oldest grandson offered to buy her a new TV for Christmas, he has been complaining about it for over a year, she shot that down by saying " I don't want one of those TVs that hang on the wall or set on a table, I like my console TV."

So I broke out the measuring tape, then went to Tiger Direct.

Now Mom has a new 28" flat screen TV... and the best thing for her, she still has her console! A win all the way around.

The Damn trim out to longer than installing the TV in the console. LOL

Finished product shown above.

Part Of My Life, It Was Fun

This is just a little tale of a part of my life.

About 1978, after going to school at what was then TSTI in Waco, I returned home, to work for my dads company.

While I was at school, he had hired a manager for the diner we owned. The managers daughter came to visit her dad, her mom and dad where divorced, and one thing lead to another and I ended up in Baton Rouge LA.

After I had went through about $300 of my $700 of cash on hand, I applied for, and was hired by Automatic Music Company in Baton Rouge, for all of $5.25 a hour.

In the 9 months I worked there, my pay was raised to $7.50, which was considered outrageous by my co-workers.

They had us “street mechanics” on a shift work schedule, week one, 8 am until 5 pm in the shop, second week, 8am until 5pm on the street, third week, 2pm until 10pm on the street, fourth week, 5pm until all calls where finished, sometimes as late as 4 am.

Some interesting things happened on the street work.

I went to the Al Green lounge on East Blvd.,(yeah, the singer owned it), where a employee waited to meet me outside and the sign on the door said , “No guns or Knifes allowed.”

There was also all the LSU college bars, the Tigers Lair, the Brass Rail, where a butt naked guy was getting hazed by his fraternity brothers and soccer was being played with a empty beer keg as the ball.

There was also the version of a Louisiana redneck bar, where a drunk lady told me, “if you don’t fix this jukebox, I’m going to squash you behind it.” I did fix it.

Then there was the gay bars, more than one believe it or not, one only a block away from the LA capitol building, where the Village people songs played over and over, at least while I was fixing their machines.

There was also the little truck stop on Airline Hwy, they also had motel rooms, while I was fixing the pinball machine, the owner, I guess, answered the phone, talked, then said… “That damn Cherry, every time she fucks a guy she wants fresh sheets, what makes her so special?” Yeah it was a “cat house”, like the one across the river in Port Allen, that had one one jukebox and 43 walboxes s , one in every room, $2 a hour for the room don’t ya know.

And of course, the little Italian restaurant, I fixed the jukebox and the owner say “Come, set with me, you want something to drink?”

He says to me… “I know you work for the New Orleans family (true, that was who owned AMC), I come from New York, and I am friends with the family there, can I get a newer box?” I passed his request up the chain of command.

When I decided to come back to Texas, my boss in Baton Rouge offered me his job because he was getting promoted to New Orleans.

That was one of those crossroads moments in life. I have wondered more than once, how my life would have been different if I had chosen the other path.

Don’t get me wrong, working for that company, no one did anything illegal, other than do a favor for a Baton Rouge city councilman for a favorable zoning ruling ;).

It was a great time to be a 20 year old, lots of fun, and if I would have taken it, a complete change of my life.

A Early Gift..

The people that brought us the other little kitty decided it was time we adopted another. This time they went to Adopt A Pet here in Victoria and gave us this character yesterday for Christmas.

The shelter called her Addison, since we haven't thought of a better name, I guess that's it.

She is a lovey dovey young cat so far, with some of the most golden eyes I've ever seen on a cat.

When we talked about the last kitten, the person who brought us both of them said, " The last one wouldn't have lived another day by itself on the side of I-45, she had a good, but short life, but her accident has made room for another young cat searching for a home."

I don't think anyone could have said anything more fitting and that meant as much.

South Texas Roadrunner travels

Over the last three months I have been privileged to observe the travels of, I guess I'll call him, the Weesatche roadrunner or Head East, like the 80's band, it fits.

Once a week I travel to the Weesatche Cafe and Hall in my business travels.

About three months ago, I drove up and there was a Roadrunner hanging out in the parking lot, it didn't seem afraid of people or the tomcat that was 20 yards away resting, and not worried about the bird.

Since this was the summertime, and I have been to cheap to fix the AC in my truck, I left my windows down.
I went in the Hall, did my business and commented to the owner Scott about the roadrunner in the parking lot and how the tomcat ignored it.

He told me that the roadrunner had been hanging out for a few weeks, that at first the cat tried it's best to catch it, but failed every time and had given up. I guess the cat was smarter than Wiley Coyote!

I went out to leave, and the roadrunner was in my truck! Unfortunately so was my cell phone with the camera.

I opened my drivers door and the roadrunner jumped in the back seat, extended cab truck, he/she was looking all proud standing there I have to admit.

I walked around to the passenger side, open the front door and the little back door, the roadrunner went to the driver side, so I walked back around to the drivers side and the roadrunner exited my truck.

The next week the roadrunner was in the parking lot, I rolled my windows up. the week after that, no roadrunner in the parking lot.

For the next five weeks, no roadrunner and Scott said he hadn't seen it either.

Three weeks ago when I went to Weesatche, no roadrunner either, but on my way back I saw the roadrunner, about a mile away on FM 884.

The next week I didn't see him, but last Wednesday, there he/she was again, four miles further down the road, almost at the Hwy 183 intersection, heading east.

What a bird, not only did he/she check out my trucks interior, it follows the roads I travel.

On the map is where I have seen the fowl, it's about 6 miles from Weesatche to the Google locater thing.

Could this be the difference of the two new HS.?

A thought occurred to me, I don’t know if I am right or not, but events tend to lean toward the I am right side.

Before the debacle of consolidation of Stroman and VHS was corrected, stories and tales where told about a preference shown to some students over others, be it Football, Baseball, Band or virtually any group at Memorial High.

Now that we have two brand spanking new high schools, a few other schools, a state of the art auditorium and Natatorium coming soon, it seems to me that just maybe all the talk about about a preference being shown just might have been true.

Let’s be honest, most of the preferred students would be the ones from the higher end of Victoria s population. And it seems that a majority of those students ended up at West HS.

West HS received a brand new football coach, and lots of people thought it was the best thing since sliced bread. West also had the honor of having the National Award winning Drill Team instructor as a part of the faculty.

Well, we all know, so far how those selections have turned out.

At East HS, the bad old Memorial football coach was placed and the Drill Team started with a brand new instructor.

All the drama with the West Drill Team, and the better than any one thought results of the East football team point to one conclusion, IMO.

All the Memorial students that had to take a “back seat” to the preferred students are now showing how talented they really where all the time.

Once the “privileged” students moved to a campus where they can continue to be “privileged”, the true talent of the truly talented un privileged students is now reveled.

How my mom and Dad met

I know this won't mean much, except to me, but it is a tale of the way things changed because of WW2.

Before today, all my mom had told me about how her and my dad met had to do with when Patti Welder High School played Bloomington High School in a football game in 1943.

Being a Bloomington girl, she was mad that a Patti Welder player had broken a Bloomington players leg during the game. Understand that Bloomington had all of twelve players on their team, now down to eleven.

She got in my dads face and said, "How could you?", He said , "Hey that's the game."

Anyway, my dad graduated from Patti Welder at the end of the 43 year, and enrolled at Baylor.

He stayed at Baylor for about six months and, much to his moms disapproval, joined the Marines.

He ended up being stationed at Pearl Harbor as a Sargent when the Pacific war ended.

Ok, back to how my mom and dad really got together....

My dad came back to Victoria and drove to Bloomington one day, to look for a girl he use to know. He couldn't find her.

He saw my mom and stopped his car and asked her if she knew Annabelle, ( yeah I asked my mom if her name was Annabelle Lee, the Edgar Allen Poe one.)

Anyway, my mom tells him yeah, she is married and has a baby. Then he asks my mom if she wants to go get a coke.

51 years of marriage, four sons,eight grandchildren and four great grandchildren, here we are.

What a strange twist of fate, if I say so myself.