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Well, if Jack Golding had a good mother, he would have certainly had a good father as well. Today, the hot discussion topic was the ruling by the Boy Scouts of America that they no longer could play with water pistols.  For that matter, they also have "outlawed" water filled balloons, excepting those no larger that a ping pong ball. Can you imagine playing with water balloons no larger than ping pong balls? It seems as if the kids are being supermanaged these days, not being allowed to do what kids have done for many years, all in the name of (I guess) a kinder, more civilized society. The big question is:  How will these young boys grow into men who can handle tough situations? None of this was the case at our grade school in the 1940-1950 period.  We didn't have water pistols then, but we did have rubber band guns--guns that our dads (and maybe even some mothers) helped us to build so we could take them to school for recess fights.   Well, these did get banned, at l

Today was another interesting day.  We ran into Caddo, and we struck up conversation about old times around this area.  He said he was born and raised in Hillsboro, TX and sought a way to escape cotton farming, following in the footsteps of his dad, a cotton farmer.   He interviewed Southwest Texas for a scholarship in football (this was in 1952).  The interviewer on the phone said, yes, he would like to talk to him about a scholarship, and advised him to drive on down to San Marcos for the interview.  Well, Caddo had no car, so he hitchhiked the way to San Marcos, interviewed and asked how he was to get the scholarship and the interviewer said "sign right here and you have it".  He did and he got the chance to play football for SWT.  He then played football, graduated with a degree in agriculture only to find out that there were no job openings in agriculture for those who did not graduated from Texas A & M.  Being an Aggie was important then as now. So, he got a job c

I read an about an idea lately that is proving to be pretty good. The idea went like this:  The basis for all freedom is that one should never do harm to anyone else and should never take their "stuff". Thinking about freedom and the every lengthening list of laws, it seems to prove the point about how freedom is related to harm and theft. And certainly freedom is related to the absence of laws. Hmmm

Another eleven bluebird houses were built yesterday.  That makes 270 built since the project was started ten years ago.  These bluebird houses are patterned after the now classic bluebird story in the National Geographic Magazine article of June 1977  (vol 151, No. 6). Some of these bluebird houses have been used at places lived, but most have been given away to garden clubs, individuals, etc. The outlook is to make another 20 before next spring for two garden clubs. Here's a shot of the 11 just made, all stacked ready for delivery to Medina, Texas

Never experienced this before.  All the garden hoses stored on the ground on the northwest side of the house are badly chewed, and apparently eaten, as the chips are no where around.  Some of the hoses are vinyl, others are rubber.  It apparently makes no difference to the culprit as both have been chewed equally. I set the game camera out for a couple nights, but no photos were taken. The tooth marks are quite large, somewhat eliminating field mice---but what could it be? Here is the evidence: