That long awaited time is here! School is out, and the kids can enjoy the carefree days of summer.
GRADUATION. The end of the school year brings graduation and Mac Swann is celebrating his graduation from Davidson Academy this weekend. Way to go, Mac!
In our family, Nate is graduating from Mother's Day Out. His graduating class was recognized at church a week ago Sunday along with the high school and college graduates. Their commencement was Wednesday night. It is hard to believe Nate will be starting kindergarten in August. Of course, it is just as hard to believe Jenna has completed the fourth grade and Ben the first grade too.
BOYS AND JACKETS. As I remarked last time, it just seems like we are having a cooler spring this year. I am not complaining. One morning it was pretty chilly as the kids and I were leaving for school and work and Vicki told the kids to wear jackets. Ben griped about this but put his on to appease his mother.
Ben was ahead of me as we were walking out to the truck. I heard the van door open so I told Ben we were taking the truck. He said, "I know." As I came around the corner of the Red House where our vehicles are parked I saw the reason. Ben had opened the van. He was stashing his jacket in there! When I told Vicki about it later she just shook her head and said, "That boy, that boy."
73RD BOMB WING REUNION. Once again I have gone to the reunion of my dad's old unit from WWII. This year the reunion was in Colorado Springs. I flew out there on Wednesday and came back yesterday. This was the first time I had flown anywhere commercially since returning home for Korea in 1992.
I had a great view of Pike's Peak (about 14,110 feet) and the surrounding mountains from my hotel window. These mountains don't look much taller than the Smokey Mountains do from Pigeon Forge. Of course, even at the base of these mountains I am already over 6000 feet above sea level, almost as high as the top of Clingmans Dome, the highest peak in Tennessee at 6643 feet.
I had a great time reconnecting with people I had met before. A few people I was looking forward to seeing again, such as Bill Lind (Dad's pilot) and William Agee, were unable to make it this year. Mr. and Mrs. Krantz were also unable to come but their daughter Cathy was there to represent their family.
Bob Stangland (Dad's left gunner) returned this year and it was great to see him again. Bill Copeland was also at the reunion this year (he works with the Commemorative Air Force).
I mentioned last fall that we located Achilles Stathas, the tail gunner from Dad's crew. He and his wife Janet drove to the reunion from Scottsdale, Arizona (a 12 hour drive). I thoroughly enjoyed getting to know them. They are truly great people.
I spent a lot of time in the Memorabilia Room again this year. The 73rd Bomb Wing Association has a large assortment of books, documents, and pictures that just aren't available in one place anywhere else. These materials and the conversations I have enjoyed have shed a lot of light on what Dad did in the war.
On Friday I went on a tour of the Weisbrod Aircraft Museum in Pueblo, Colorado. They have a respectable collection of airplanes there, including a B-29. We got to go inside the forward section of the Superfortress. I even sat in the pilot's seat and the bombardier's seat. Unfortunately the tail section where my dad sat was not on tour, but I could raise my camera up and get some good pictures of the gunner's compartment. Most of the equipment had been removed from this area anyway. They also had a gun sight like my dad used out where you could touch it and see how it worked. I really didn't see the rest of the museum as I was so fascinated just standing around listening to all the veterans walk around the B-29 and reminisce.
The Welcome Banquet was Friday evening. David Oreck was the featured speaker. You will probably associate this man with his vacuum cleaners and air purifiers, however, he was also a navigator for the 73rd.
All the Saturday activities were at the hotel and I had a great time simply visiting with people. I got up Sunday for the farewell breakfast and then headed home.
MEMORIAL DAY. I had planned to mow the yards today but the weather had different ideas. I wound up wrestling and playing Game Cube with the boys. We had pizza for supper at Pauline’s this evening (no one wanted to cook on the grill in the rain).
Joe
Monday, May 26, 2008
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Mothers and Daughters
It feels like our weather just can’t make up its mind. We are experiencing all the springtime cold snaps we Southerners are fond of naming Dogwood Winter, Locust Winter, and Blackberry Winter--it just seems like they are coming a bit later than usual this year. This has poor Nate all confused as evidenced by his question to Vicki the other morning, “Mommy, do I wear long sleeve pants or short sleeve pants today?”
MOTHER’S DAY. Sunday was a busy day for Vicki. It has been a real treat to watch her step into her new job at church. She had interviewed several kids on video tape about their mothers and had me edit the footage for an opening video to Sunday’s service. She asked the kids several questions (What drives your mom crazy? How do you show your mom you love her? How do you know your mom loves you? etc.). I think the funniest ones were the kid who thought his mom made the best Hamburger Helper in the whole world. Then there was the the boy who responded to the question about what drives his mom crazy by saying, “Oh man, where do I start!”
Vicki also had all the kids come down to the front of the sanctuary where she delivered a short lesson/devotional for them before having them pass flowers out to all the women present. She also lined up Mary Alice Yates to take mother/children portraits for anyone who wanted one. Have I said I am proud of my wife before?
Speaking of being proud, Jenna played Amazing Grace in both services on Sunday. She did such a good job. (She’s practicing putting the left hand and right hand parts of the Pink Panther Theme together as I type and doing it really well.) I went home feeling really good about both of the women at my house.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM. Mom celebrated a milestone birthday Monday. The church staff had a surprise lunch for her that day. We all went out to eat at the Catfish House last night. I think Mom is finding it hard to believe that she’s been around for eight decades now, although the waitress guessing her age at 65-67 made that pill a bit easier to swallow.
PASSWORD REPERCUSSIONS. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, we have new email at work. I had a hand in setting up our new email addresses in that I helped to generate the file containing all the address names and passwords to be imported into the server. Wanting to keep the passwords pretty secure I created random passwords for everyone based off one of the Seven Dwarfs followed by a number (e.g. happy123, doc345, or sleepy947).
You know, I never dreamed we would have so many people who would be truly grumpy about the password they got. At least their sense of humor came back when the naming scheme was explained and that it was completely random and not a personal attack. Of course, one teacher voiced this complaint in a faculty meeting which opened the door for a colleague to quip, “We’ve all been wondering why you were grumpy for years now.”
If this job ever comes my way again I am going to use the fruits of the spirit (Galatians 5:22) or something.
Joe
MOTHER’S DAY. Sunday was a busy day for Vicki. It has been a real treat to watch her step into her new job at church. She had interviewed several kids on video tape about their mothers and had me edit the footage for an opening video to Sunday’s service. She asked the kids several questions (What drives your mom crazy? How do you show your mom you love her? How do you know your mom loves you? etc.). I think the funniest ones were the kid who thought his mom made the best Hamburger Helper in the whole world. Then there was the the boy who responded to the question about what drives his mom crazy by saying, “Oh man, where do I start!”
Vicki also had all the kids come down to the front of the sanctuary where she delivered a short lesson/devotional for them before having them pass flowers out to all the women present. She also lined up Mary Alice Yates to take mother/children portraits for anyone who wanted one. Have I said I am proud of my wife before?
Speaking of being proud, Jenna played Amazing Grace in both services on Sunday. She did such a good job. (She’s practicing putting the left hand and right hand parts of the Pink Panther Theme together as I type and doing it really well.) I went home feeling really good about both of the women at my house.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM. Mom celebrated a milestone birthday Monday. The church staff had a surprise lunch for her that day. We all went out to eat at the Catfish House last night. I think Mom is finding it hard to believe that she’s been around for eight decades now, although the waitress guessing her age at 65-67 made that pill a bit easier to swallow.
PASSWORD REPERCUSSIONS. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, we have new email at work. I had a hand in setting up our new email addresses in that I helped to generate the file containing all the address names and passwords to be imported into the server. Wanting to keep the passwords pretty secure I created random passwords for everyone based off one of the Seven Dwarfs followed by a number (e.g. happy123, doc345, or sleepy947).
You know, I never dreamed we would have so many people who would be truly grumpy about the password they got. At least their sense of humor came back when the naming scheme was explained and that it was completely random and not a personal attack. Of course, one teacher voiced this complaint in a faculty meeting which opened the door for a colleague to quip, “We’ve all been wondering why you were grumpy for years now.”
If this job ever comes my way again I am going to use the fruits of the spirit (Galatians 5:22) or something.
Joe
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Cuatro de Mayo
Spring is here…at least it keeps trying to be here. We seemed to have developed shade in our yard overnight. Bill Chatman has been busy planting corn and getting his tobacco ground ready. I’ve been mowing and mowing and mowing.
BUSINESS TRIP. I have always counted it a blessing that my job does not require me to travel. I know some enjoy doing that, but its not for me. Now that Vicki has her new job she got the opportunity to go to a children’s ministry conference at Willow Creek Church near Chicago last week. It worked out where she could ride with a group of people from a church in Goodlettsville so I dropped her off a week ago last Tuesday (the 25th) and got her back a week ago Friday night. She had a great time and made several new friends. I know they did a lot of fun things when they weren’t at their conference, like taking in a White Sox game.
The kids and I survived a week without Vicki pretty well, though I am not as patient of a homework coach as Vicki is. It’s a good thing Jenna is self-motivated. I thought Ben and I were going to kill each other over his spelling words.
We all missed Vicki a whole lot, but I think Nate missed him the most. We tried to talk several times but Vicki was so busy it was hard for her to take a call on her cell phone most of the time. Nate got to the point where he would answer the phone with “Mommy?” in stead of “Hello.” And when Vicki got home he hugged her for all he was worth.
HE GOT ME. Ben has this odd habit of hiding whenever he hears someone coming to the room where he is. He even carries this to the extreme of hiding when he sees me pull up at Aunt Mar’s after I get off work (they ride the bus to Aunt Mar’s and stay there until I pick them up). It’s really funny because sometimes I see him diving for a hiding place through the window as I come up the drive.
The other night I was coming into the living room so we could have our family devotion. Seeing this big lump covered by a blanket on the couch I assumed it was him and tapped the lump with the book in my hand. That end of the lump was pretty soft so I tapped the other end which made Vicki and Jenna break out into a fit of giggles. Yes, Ben had put several pillows under a blanket on the couch and fooled his old man. I don’t think I could have done anything else to have made him happier that my falling for that.
A BUGLESS LIFE. The boys now have an insect habitat in their room. Basically it is a bunch of tubing that connects several spherical pods so you can watch the bugs crawl around inside, very similar to those hamster habitats you may have seen with all the tubing that connects different parts the hamster can live and play in.
The irony is that we’re having a hard time finding insects to put in it right now. Ladybugs are the ideal candidate. We used to be overrun with ladybugs here. We didn’t know where they came from or why they picked us but we had them and the only affordable treatment was the run the vacuum cleaner--frequently. Here recently we’ve hardly seen any. Not that we are complaining, but the boys sure are frustrated that they can’t find any ladybugs for their new toy. (They have gone outside to look, but I think they got distracted and moved on to something else pretty quickly.)
DTV. Let me start this out by saying that we are behind the times. We still get our TV over a conventional antenna. Cable TV is not available for us and we’ve never sprung for satellite TV. I am simply not a TV watcher (the only show I watch regularly is Lost) and while Vicki would probably enjoy several of the cable only channels she has never pushed to get anything more. We still wonder what happens to that $50 we supposedly save each month.
Of course, with the big digital TV transition coming up we will be left with static on February 17 if we don’t take some action. Last weekend I got some digital TV converter boxes. I can’t say picture quality is any better, the convert box I got (from Wal-Mart) puts out a standard definition image. What amazed me was that this tripled the number of channels we can now receive. This is because the new technology allows a TV station to broadcast as many as five video streams (at various levels of quality). For example, Channel 2, our ABC affiliate, is now 2.1 for us (a simulcast of their analog signal). Channel 2 has opted to air a second channel, Nashville’s Weather channel (a local spin on The Weather Channel), which you find on 2.2. Most channels have two sub-channels, a couple have four or five.
I mention this to tell you that there are $40 coupons available from the Federal Government to help defray the cost of purchasing a converter box. Each household is eligible for two coupons. You can apply for them at www.dtv2009.gov. It will take about 5-6 weeks for the coupons to arrive. You may be wondering why you should bother if you have cable or satellite. First, the coupon makes a basic converter box cost less than $10 so it isn’t expensive (it’s cheaper than buying a new TV with an ATSC tuner built in). Second, if you have a TV that you don’t plan to add to cable/satellite you will need one of these to keep it running. And third, it makes a good backup to have local TV if your cable/satellite is down.
Joe
BUSINESS TRIP. I have always counted it a blessing that my job does not require me to travel. I know some enjoy doing that, but its not for me. Now that Vicki has her new job she got the opportunity to go to a children’s ministry conference at Willow Creek Church near Chicago last week. It worked out where she could ride with a group of people from a church in Goodlettsville so I dropped her off a week ago last Tuesday (the 25th) and got her back a week ago Friday night. She had a great time and made several new friends. I know they did a lot of fun things when they weren’t at their conference, like taking in a White Sox game.
The kids and I survived a week without Vicki pretty well, though I am not as patient of a homework coach as Vicki is. It’s a good thing Jenna is self-motivated. I thought Ben and I were going to kill each other over his spelling words.
We all missed Vicki a whole lot, but I think Nate missed him the most. We tried to talk several times but Vicki was so busy it was hard for her to take a call on her cell phone most of the time. Nate got to the point where he would answer the phone with “Mommy?” in stead of “Hello.” And when Vicki got home he hugged her for all he was worth.
HE GOT ME. Ben has this odd habit of hiding whenever he hears someone coming to the room where he is. He even carries this to the extreme of hiding when he sees me pull up at Aunt Mar’s after I get off work (they ride the bus to Aunt Mar’s and stay there until I pick them up). It’s really funny because sometimes I see him diving for a hiding place through the window as I come up the drive.
The other night I was coming into the living room so we could have our family devotion. Seeing this big lump covered by a blanket on the couch I assumed it was him and tapped the lump with the book in my hand. That end of the lump was pretty soft so I tapped the other end which made Vicki and Jenna break out into a fit of giggles. Yes, Ben had put several pillows under a blanket on the couch and fooled his old man. I don’t think I could have done anything else to have made him happier that my falling for that.
A BUGLESS LIFE. The boys now have an insect habitat in their room. Basically it is a bunch of tubing that connects several spherical pods so you can watch the bugs crawl around inside, very similar to those hamster habitats you may have seen with all the tubing that connects different parts the hamster can live and play in.
The irony is that we’re having a hard time finding insects to put in it right now. Ladybugs are the ideal candidate. We used to be overrun with ladybugs here. We didn’t know where they came from or why they picked us but we had them and the only affordable treatment was the run the vacuum cleaner--frequently. Here recently we’ve hardly seen any. Not that we are complaining, but the boys sure are frustrated that they can’t find any ladybugs for their new toy. (They have gone outside to look, but I think they got distracted and moved on to something else pretty quickly.)
DTV. Let me start this out by saying that we are behind the times. We still get our TV over a conventional antenna. Cable TV is not available for us and we’ve never sprung for satellite TV. I am simply not a TV watcher (the only show I watch regularly is Lost) and while Vicki would probably enjoy several of the cable only channels she has never pushed to get anything more. We still wonder what happens to that $50 we supposedly save each month.
Of course, with the big digital TV transition coming up we will be left with static on February 17 if we don’t take some action. Last weekend I got some digital TV converter boxes. I can’t say picture quality is any better, the convert box I got (from Wal-Mart) puts out a standard definition image. What amazed me was that this tripled the number of channels we can now receive. This is because the new technology allows a TV station to broadcast as many as five video streams (at various levels of quality). For example, Channel 2, our ABC affiliate, is now 2.1 for us (a simulcast of their analog signal). Channel 2 has opted to air a second channel, Nashville’s Weather channel (a local spin on The Weather Channel), which you find on 2.2. Most channels have two sub-channels, a couple have four or five.
I mention this to tell you that there are $40 coupons available from the Federal Government to help defray the cost of purchasing a converter box. Each household is eligible for two coupons. You can apply for them at www.dtv2009.gov. It will take about 5-6 weeks for the coupons to arrive. You may be wondering why you should bother if you have cable or satellite. First, the coupon makes a basic converter box cost less than $10 so it isn’t expensive (it’s cheaper than buying a new TV with an ATSC tuner built in). Second, if you have a TV that you don’t plan to add to cable/satellite you will need one of these to keep it running. And third, it makes a good backup to have local TV if your cable/satellite is down.
Joe
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