Phones & Phones What's Extravagance
In my present family that consists of Barbara, Jason, and me, we each drive our own vehicle and can’t imagine life otherwise. I work out of town on most days; Barbara needs transportation to her work in Pontotoc, and Jason has to have a reliable means to get to work or to school, all of which adds up to our being a three-vehicle family. At some point in my childhood, our family got a telephone. We were on a "party line" sharing our line with three or four other families, and in time the telephone opened up a new way for us to communicate. Mama could call Daddy at work to tell him what foods she needed him to bring home that evening or call a neighbor to learn my whereabouts. I don’t remember spending much time on the phone as a teenager. I didn’t date until I was in college, so about the only time I needed a phone was to call up Tony Austin to see if there was anything going on at his house or if he wanted to walk over to my house. Something happened in the regulation of the phone industry after Barbara and I married and folks were allowed to buy a telephone, not just rent one from the phone company. And, about the same time, folks were allowed to have more than one phone without paying a service fee for the additional phones. As with anything new in the industry, the first phones for sale were expensive, selling for upwards of fifty dollars. So, when Barbara and I learned that Eldridge Martindale had a truckload of them we decided to see if they were affordable. I had the feeling I was buying "hot" merchandise when I handed the man a twenty-dollar bill for a sleek, red phone that would have gone for at least seventy-five dollars at the telephone office. After we moved to Pontotoc, phones became more and more reasonably priced. At one time, we had nine phones in our nine-room house on Eighth Street. Every room except the living room had at least one phone. This included the bathrooms and the utility room. Our two houses on Dogwood Circle have built-in phone jacks in most rooms except the bathrooms, but the former owner had a wire pulled and a jack installed in the master bathroom, right alongside the toilet. However, we only utilize five phones in the main house and one in the guesthouse. I think I could survive without a phone at home, except for the data line running to my computer, but I’m not sure Barbara could cope without a home phone. I don’t think anyone makes a cell phone battery that holds enough charge for Barbara to talk to Rayanne, Dot, or Cheryl day in and day out without multiple chargings every day. Cell phones have revolutionized our lives. Husbands are better connected than ever to their wives. Women find a greater sense of security in having a cell phone in case the car, van, or SUV has a flat or breaks down. Parents buy youngsters cell phones so they can reach them anywhere at anytime and the youngsters can phone their parents when they need something. Students are using cell phones to "text-message" test answers to their friends, and now cell phones double as cameras and devices to connect to the Internet. Where will it all end? In my current household, everyone has a cell phone. I have two, one for business use and one for personal use. Barbara has a cell phone and now Jason has one, too. I shared in an earlier article that Barbara and I dropped one service provider and by having a family plan with Cingular, we both received new camera-phones, nationwide coverage with double the minutes, and a family rate that saved us ten dollars a month. I also mentioned considering giving my old phone to Jason for emergency usage and letting him buy prepaid minutes. But, after checking into the prepaid option, it seemed to make more sense to spend another ten dollars per month and add him to our family plan. The decision to buy Jason a new phone rather than to give him the old phone proved easier than locating the phone Jason wanted. He didn’t want to shop for a new phone and decided "one like y’all’s is fine." Barbara and I spent the better part of a Saturday afternoon in Tupelo and Pontotoc trying to find a Sony Ericsson, Model Z500a. Either the shops didn’t carry that model or had them on backorder. One salesperson, in Pontotoc, actually berated my choice and insisted the Samsung and Motorola models were superior. I thanked her for the information without comment. Finally, we contacted our niece, Brigitte Rankin, and told her to order us one. Somehow, though we are a three-car, six-phone, three-cell phone family, it really doesn’t seem extravagant. What do you think?
Subject Matters When It Comes To Email I don't like to open an email unless I recognize the sender, as doing so can sometimes allow a computer virus or "worm" to enter my computer. I've had such an experience and the necessary cleanup and repair was no fun. It was just before Christmas when a suspicious looking email arrived in my inbox. The sender's name was unusual, "Hi, its me!" I didn’t know anyone who used the name, "Hi, its me!" but an email’s subject matters, too. I probably would have trashed the message without opening it, had it not been for the subject line, "Leslie Basham! see me!" that grabbed my attention. The use of exclamation marks in the name and the subject conveyed a sense of urgency. A lot of folks overuse punctuation marks in their electronic correspondences, but I was not impressed. "Leslie Basham," I mused silently, "Could this be an email from the Leslie I know." Okay, I don't know Leslie Basham, at least not personally, but I've seen her in enough automobile advertisements over the past dozen or so years, to feel like I know her. I finally decided to put my computer at risk and opened the message. In short, the message was from a guy named Tom who had read an article on my website, dated about eight years ago, in which I described my delight in watching the facial expressions of Leslie Basham during her automobile commercials for a Greenville, MS, car dealership. Tom explained how he saw Leslie in TV commercials almost daily and would (for a fee) videotape some of her commercials for me. Tom may have been completely sincere, but I thought I detected a tone of voyeurism in his comments and wasn't too sure I wanted to pursue his offer. However, I sent a cautious reply stating that I might be interested if he would quote a fair price for his service. I also mentioned, I had recently seen a few Leslie-commercials when Barbara and I were in Hot Springs, AR, last fall. To date, Tom has not responded to my reply. Tom, as well as a host of others, have stumbled across the pages of my website while searching for information about something or someone. If Tom used Google (a search engine) to find information on Leslie Basham, then RRN was 35th among the more than fourteen hundred references listed. However, if Tom used MSN’s search engine, he would have found my article ranked fifth. Google is an excellent search engine, but it wouldn't have helped K. Blackwell of Pensacola, FL uncover my mention of Blackburn syrup in an article dated 8/21/99. But, since Mr. Blackwell likely used Yahoo for the search, my article was fifth in a listing of 48. Mr. Blackwell wrote: "I came across your newsletter after finishing off my last drop of Blackburn syrup tonight. I wanted to find a grocer in Pensacola, FL. that carried this brand. I went on to read the article you wrote about Blackburn syrup. When I came across the part about "coming out even" It took me back 25 years. As a child I would eat my mother's homemade biscuits and Blackburn exactly as you so vividly described." "Except for one thing I always would pour just enough syrup so as to be forced into another biscuit to finish off the syrup. (too valuable to waste) But also not enough syrup to finish the 2nd biscuit and so on. "Coming out even" didn't happen until the third or fourth biscuit. Readers of that article may not have completely understood unless they had experienced the biscuit and Blackburn syrup delicacy. Rest assured that it brought back many wonderful memories for me. Thank you. Maybe you could email info on what chains carry the syrup." I enjoyed Mr. Blackwell’s comments, but I’m afraid I don’t know enough about the grocers in Pensacola to assure him where he could find his favorite syrup. I did suggest he try Food World, and, if that was unsuccessful, he could always shop Piggly Wiggly’s online warehouse at www.pwclub.com and have a case shipped to his house. From a writer’s point of view, that which I found most interesting about the note from Mr. Blackwell was his reference to an article I had written about Blackburn Syrup. While I did mention Blackburn syrup in the article, it was more of a tribute to Golden Eagle syrup than Blackburn syrup. Mr. Blackwell wisely used "Blackburn syrup" in the subject line of his email correspondence, allowing me a sense of relative safety regarding opening an email from someone with an unfamiliar name.
Archers' Plight Good Samaritans Abound Shortly after Jim and Sheila Hess returned to Vicksburg following their trip to Hawaii, I had the privilege of dining with them in downtown Vicksburg. I enjoyed our fellowship and came away assured by Jim that he would submit an article concerning one of their experiences in Hawaii. Jim has yet to write as promised, but he was kind enough to submit the following "letter to the editor" that first appeared about a year ago in a McComb, MS newspaper, and is used here by permission of the original contributor who now attends FBC, Vicksburg. February 16, 2004 Dear Editor, There is a story to be told, but first, let me introduce my husband and myself. We are Bob and Nancy Archer from St. Clairsville, Ohio. In our retirement years, we became RVers. This is the sixth year for us to volunteer for the National Park Service at Mt. Locust (located 15 miles above Natchez) on the Natchez Trace Parkway. It happened on Thursday, February 5, 2004 that Bob and I drove our trailer to Bus Supply in your fair city of McComb to have our leaking ‘black water’ tank repaired. On our way back to Natchez, the left rear trailer tire went flat and blew apart as we traveled west on U.S. Hwy. 98. We were somewhere between McComb and Bude. Our cell phone would not allow us to call for help, but at that time a white sedan pulled into the country road (Allen Road). The driver, seeing our plight, stopped to aid us. Bob could not find the specific tool he needed to remove the locking nut from the spare tire. While he looked for the tool, our good Samaritan propped an umbrella over his left shoulder and proceeded to remove all the lug nuts from the damaged tire. With the tool not found, the ‘good Sam’ drove Bob to a nearby store to telephone for help. Left alone on this unknown country road, I realized that I was in a vulnerable situation—a woman alone on a country road. A young man in a black pickup truck pulled in to see if he could be of any assistance. After explaining our situation briefly, he said that he lived down the road off the highway and would be of any help he could. He left. The rainy downpour continued as it had all day. The time was nearing five o’clock and the daylight was leaving us. I waited and I prayed. Bob and our ‘good Sam’ stranger returned and said that a truck from McComb would come to our aid. It was five-thirty and the light was growing dimmer. As we waited for the truck, effort continued to get the spare tire off the back of our fifth wheel trailer, we three waited in the chilly rainy downpour. To our surprise, the young man in the black pickup truck returned to offer his assistance to us. He said that he had an acetylene torch that he could bring to heat the stubborn locking nut holding the spare tire. He left to get that torch, and by the time he came back, yet another man joined the group of ‘good Sams.’ Offering advice and enjoying each other’s solutions to the problem, those fellows were having a good time back there behind our trailer. Surprisingly, the downpour of rain stopped. Our first ‘good Sam’ with torch in hand, heated that bolt and freed the spare tire quickly and expertly. One of the men put the spare tire on the trailer, another tightened the lug nuts, and the third man returned the flat to the spare tire mount. When all involved were satisfied that we could get on our way to Natchez, the group of roadside helpers began to leave the scene. Bob offered the men money and one explained (as he rode out of sight), ‘It don’t work that way down here!" His comment reminded us of the saying at the end of each Lone Ranger program, "Who was that masked man? I never got his name!" Bob and I did not get one name of those men who stayed with us during our plight that rainy, chilly evening, but we wish to thank them for their assistance to us and for the persistence to get the job done. The sun made a brief appearance during its sunset, as we drove toward Bude.
Bodock Beau Brain Rattlers Larry Young keeps his promises pretty well. He once told me he gets a lot of jokes in the mail and promised to send me only the best ones. Larry contributed the following two jokes: New Instrument My wife and I were browsing in a crafts store when I noticed a display of country-style musical instruments. After looking over the flutes, dulcimers and recorders, I picked up a shiny, one-stringed instrument I took to be a mouth harp. I put it to my lips and, much to the amusement of other shoppers, twanged a few notes on it. After watching from a distance, my wife came up and whispered in my ear, "I hate to tell you this, honey, but you're trying to play a cheese slicer." He Didn't Think Long Enough A husband and wife are getting ready for bed. The wife is standing in front of a full-length mirror taking a hard look at herself. "You know, dear," she says, "I look in the mirror, and I see an old woman. My face is all wrinkled, my hair is grey, my shoulders are hunched over, I've got fat legs, and my arms are all flabby." She turns to her husband and says, "Tell me something positive to make me feel better about myself." He studies hard for a moment thinking about it and then says in a soft, thoughtful voice, "Well, there's nothing wrong with your eyesight." Services for the husband will be held Saturday morning at 10:30 at St. Anselm's Memorial Chapel. Brain Rattlers
English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity
of the human race, which, of course, is not a race at all. That is why, when
the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by fillingit out, and in which, an alarm goes off by going on. Furthermore, there is no egg in eggplant, nor ham in hamburger, neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat.
If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them,
what do you call it? Is it an odd,
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It
hasn’t been that long ago when families with two cars were considered
to have one more automobile than they needed. In the family of my childhood
there was one car, and my dad drove it. Mama never learned how to drive which
may have been a good thing. She used to say she wished she could just run
off, and she might have done so if only she had learned to drive. My siblings
and I didn’t know what it was to drive our own car until we were making
our own way in the world. These days with both husbands and wives working,
it’s hard to imagine a family not having two automobiles. I can’t
cite any statistics, but I believe most such families have one or more SUVs
or trucks.
