Benjamin Joins the Band!

Benjamin's weapon of choice, the Baritone Horn.

  

Last night was band instrument selection night at Pierce County Middle School. It was like the great sorting from Harry Potter.  The Band Director would, acting as the Sorting Hat, gently steer kids to the choices that would be best for them.

Benjamin for a good long while had been talking about the trumpet.  But after testing it out last week, he found it hurt his braces (at least for him).  Then over the weekend he became interested in the saxophone.  Alison got out her clarinet, and although she could still produce sounds out of it, he could not.  It might happen down the road, but we did not have the training to teach him.

But when we got there, the Band Director and his assistant showed Benjamin another possibility.  The assistant took him to a side room and introduced him to the Baritone Horn.  We heard some beautiful sounds coming from and immediately knew that was the assistant.  Then we heard these tentative, bleating sounds coming form it, and we knew that was Benjamin.  But, hey!  At least it was sound!

So the Baritone Horn was selected, a rent-to-own plan was established (up to five years to pay for this bad boy!).  And the great experiment has begun.  Will he be able to do it, as his big Brother Doug did?  Or his Grandfather Strait?  Or his mother Alison?  Or will he take after his father and be unable to play an instrument to save his life? There is no pre-testing at his school so we just don't know.

But I pray that he does.  Band was a very positive influence on the development of Doug.  It provided a sense of belonging, discipline and exercise.  Alison also remembers it very, very fondly.  The band when I was in school was very popular and successful.  Even though I wasn't in it, it was a huge source of pride at our school.  

So we shall soon see what kind of adventure we are in for.  Hopefully one that will enrich Benjamin in manifold ways.  At this point, the only ones who seem skeptical of the whole enterprise are the dogs.  They have to steel themselves for the house to be filled with some new sounds.

Annie Week Two Starts This Friday!

Some of the great casts members you will see this weekend.

Saturday Afternoon cast in action!

DAC presents our largest show to date! "Annie" will be performed 12 times , by four separate casts of local children and adults. Bring your friends and family to come experience this classic show, right here in the heart of downtown Waycross, Georgia.

SHOW TIMES

Friday, August 17th - 7:00 PM

Saturday, August 18th - 3:00 PM
Saturday, August 18th - 7:00 PM
Sunday, August 19th - 3:00 PM
Friday, August 24th - 7:00 PM
Saturday, August 25th - 3:00 PM
Saturday, August 25th - 7:00 PM
Sunday, August 26th - 3:00 PM

TICKET PRICES
Advance Tickets - Available Through July 31st
Ages 13 & Up - $8.00
Ages 6-12 - $5.00
Ages 5 & Under - Free

Tickets Available From August 1st Through Show Times
Ages 13 & Up - $10.00
Ages 6-12 - $7.00
Ages 5 & Under - Free

Purchased Tickets Will Be Reserved For Specific Shows, To Ensure That Every One Is Able To Have a Guaranteed Seat To Enjoy The Performance Of Their Choice - Each Seat Will Be Guaranteed Until 10 Minutes Before Show Time, At Which Time Any Empty Seats Will Be Available For Last Minute Customers To Claim

Season Tickets Are Available - If You Are A Season Ticket Holder, Please Contact Us To Reserve Your Seat At One Of These Twelve Performances

This is going to be the largest and greatest show ever performed by the children & adults of Flying Dragon Arts Center!

Lewis Grizzard and Me

Hey!  I knew Lewis Grizzard!  Okay, well, not really KNOW him, but there was at least something.  Hopefully enough that this title will catch attention and spin off into the Google engines as a rapidly and highly ranked search choice. Not that I'm trying to manipulate the system or anything.

In the late eighties and nineties, I worked for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.  I was a prominent writer and editorialist - SCRATCH THAT.  Actually I was an accountant, a bean counter, a numbers cruncher.  A very lowly figure well beneath the notice of the great and famous Lewis Grizzard.

I became the General Ledger Supervisor working with a staff of three.  One of our areas of responsibility was the write and initial approval of expense reports.  We had to make sure they added up and all receipts were accounted for, and that all expenses met the general standard of acceptance of the Atlanta Journal-constitution.

Without going into specifics, Mr. Grizzard's expense accounts were very interesting and very....different.  We would often have to question his reports.  When we did, we did not get to talk to Lewis Grizzard directly.  He had his own "corporation"  and it was one of his "corporate" people that we talked to.  After losing objection after objection, we gradually had to accept that the same rules that applied to everybody else simply didn't apply to him.  Not that we didn't stop trying.

The most entertaining one is one where we got this humongously large bill from Houston's Restaurant in Buckhead.  Apparently, one of his buddies, a sportswriter, had just been fired by the paper, and he just came into this restaurant/bar and said, "Hey, ever'body!  Drinks are on the The Atlanta Constitution!"  Yes, the expense report was approved.

I saw him once, at a party for the 1988 Democratic Convention held in Atlanta.  He had a female on each arm, and he may have glanced at me, but in a way where they're really just looking right through you.

Even though many people I know and respect read and love Lewis Grizzard, I have to admit my connection to him as a man above the rules kind of diminished my enthusiasm for him.  What little I've read of him seems okay, but I just can't get him to him at the same level as others do.

Alison's mother, Rose Aldridge, wrote for The Blackshear Times, including a column that was very interesting slice of life stuff.  She won a number of awards for her writing.  I've always felt she should have collected her columns and have them published.  Maybe she wouldn't become as famous as Lewis Grizzard, but maybe, just maybe, it would be enough to cut her a little slack on her expense report.

The Good, the Bad and the Truly Terrifying: Saturday Political Soapbox 33

State Senate Candidate Gene Mitchell astonishes myself and  Lamar Deal with his command of his facts and his common sense solutions.

The most terrifying choice ever made to run for Vice-President.  Seriously.  And after Dick Cheney and Sarah Palin, that is saying a lot!  This devoted follower of Ayn Rand is the most extreme candidate ever presented by either major party in decades.  And within the context of his times, he IS the most extreme ever.

Today's soapbox is a drawing of contrasts.  This is not what I originally planned to write, but sometimes events overtake us.

I had the distinct honor and privilege of attending a campaign rally for State Senate candidate Gene Mitchell, who is running for the open seat in our Georgia senate district.  He is a very competent and accomplished young man,  He served four years in the United States Marine Corp and graduated from Mercer University.  He is a South Georgian who has stayed here to help revitalize this area.

I was very impressed with his ability to speak on the issues.  His opinions, marshaling of the facts, and nuanced solutions were intelligent and well-spoken.  They are common sense and should appeal to both Republicans and Democrats alike.  In my opinion, he believes that government and private business are tools to be used to improve South Georgia as a whole.  He believes in both and wants to see them work together to benefit all of us.  His ideas, I believe, will improve the stability and growth of public education, preserve and target the Hope Scholarship, and accelerate infrastructure and development in this section of the state.

Whether you vote for Gene Mitchell or not, whether you live in his district or not, you need to check out his facebook pages and learn more about him.  I believe this young man represents the very best of the future of American politics.

In sharp contrast, we have another relatively young person (at least in terms of Presidential politics) whom is being announced as Mittbot's selection for Vice President.  Paul Ryan is a worshipper of the atheist writer Ayn Rand, and believes that government's only purpose is to serve the interests of the wealthy and the powerful.  The budget plans that he has proposed in the past, have dramatically increased tax cuts for the wealthy while increasing taxes on those least able to afford it.  His budgets increase spending on programs that benefit the wealthy while slashing or eliminating programs that benefit the middle class and working poor.  And the worst thing, even in his proposed budgets that call for so much slash and burn, so much sacrifice by those least able to afford it, even in his budgets, they don't come into balance for DECADES.  

For a long time now, it has become a Democratic Party tactic to claim the other side wanted to get rid of Social Security and Medicare.  But now, the cover is off the ball.  Now the claim is absolutely, undeniably, reliably TRUE!  

For my Republican friends who think this is a great choice, be careful what you wish for you.  If this happens, it's going to effect you and those you love in ways that you have not yet comprehended.  For my Democratic friends who think this makes this election a slam dunk, be careful of complacency.  The American voting population can be fickle and unpredictable, and voter suppression and negative ads will be widespread this election.  It doesn't matter what the polls say.  You have to keep fighting as if you were ten points behind.

So in Gene Mitchell we have a candidate who wants to see us as citizens work together with all elements of society, with all the tools at our disposal, to make a better place to live and work and enjoy the freedoms of a democratic society.  And in Paul Ryan we have someone who would pit us against each other, would help the strong devour the weak, would take government and unions and small business out of the toolbox, and let the wealthy and large corporations run roughshod over us all.

So do we move ahead to a better future, or do we charge backwards in time - not to the Reagan era, not even to Coolidge and Hoover, but into a Dickensian nightmare?

Your call, America!

Tomorrow is Today: Annie's Here!

Amara Greace Jeffords as Annie surrounded by her orphan pals.  Catch her this Saturday afternoon.

Michelle Chancey as Grace and Sami Jo Kuhbander as Annie.  Catch them tonight, tomorrow night and Sunday afternoon!

DAC presents our largest show to date! "Annie" will be performed 12 times , by four separate casts of local children and adults. Bring your friends and family to come experience this classic show, right here in the heart of downtown Waycross, Georgia.

SHOW TIMES
Friday, August 10th - 7:00 PM
Saturday, August 11th - 3:00 PM
Saturday, August 11th - 7:00 PM
Sunday, August 12th - 3:00 PM
Friday, August 17th - 7:00 PM
Saturday, August 18th - 3:00 PM
Saturday, August 18th - 7:00 PM
Sunday, August 19th - 3:00 PM
Friday, August 24th - 7:00 PM
Saturday, August 25th - 3:00 PM
Saturday, August 25th - 7:00 PM
Sunday, August 26th - 3:00 PM

TICKET PRICES
Advance Tickets - Available Through July 31st
Ages 13 & Up - $8.00
Ages 6-12 - $5.00
Ages 5 & Under - Free

Tickets Available From August 1st Through Show Times
Ages 13 & Up - $10.00
Ages 6-12 - $7.00
Ages 5 & Under - Free

Purchased Tickets Will Be Reserved For Specific Shows, To Ensure That Every One Is Able To Have a Guaranteed Seat To Enjoy The Performance Of Their Choice - Each Seat Will Be Guaranteed Until 10 Minutes Before Show Time, At Which Time Any Empty Seats Will Be Available For Last Minute Customers To Claim

Season Tickets Are Available - If You Are A Season Ticket Holder, Please Contact Us To Reserve Your Seat At One Of These Twelve Performances

This is going to be the largest and greatest show ever performed by the children & adults of Flying Dragon Arts Center!

Escaping Through the Glen

A wintry cloak of fresh white snow
Covered the forest floor
A crisp clean lovely blanket of snow
Untouched by the  boggy moor

Through the forest lay the glen
In summer a wavy range of grass
In spring a buzzing nature's zen
In fall a hint of a decaying pass

But in winter it was just a solid white
A sheaf of purity ringing empty
Only the rabbit trails to sight
Leading to something beyond she could hardly see

She followed a fat gray rabbit to the other side of the glen
Her green cloak and garment covered to her knees
As she plunged down into the snow with each step
Then the rabbit disappeared into a small grove of trees

On she went, out the glen and through the grove
And there it was, an entry way carved into the side of a hill
A huge stone doorway that seemed closed to her forever
Until she reached out and touched the face of a carving on it

A carving of a bearded old man
With a long hooked nose
Protruding like a giant spoke of a fan
And this she caressed; why?  Who knows?

It slid open and she saw inside
A huge library she could see
All the books; nothing left to hide
She stepped through; there was no fee

The door closed behind her
She could hear the click of it's handle
A man decked in golden fur
Stood smiling by a warming candle

Ripping Good Yarns: Hall of Fame Winner!

The votes are finally in! We have our first entrant into the shiny new Ripping Good Yarns TV Hall of Fame.

Receiving 0% of the votes were the following -

Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman 
Cagney & Lacy
Medium


Receiving 5% each of the vote were the following -

Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Star Trek
Seinfeld

Receiving 17% each of the vote were the following -

Lost
All In The Family
The Twilight Zone

And the winner, our first Hall of Famer, with 34% of the vote is -


M*A*S*H


A great program of the late seventies and early eighties, it depicted war and it's horrible effcts in a manner both darkly humourous and emotionally impactful.  The characters were funny, sarcastic and prankish, but they were also very human, and the whole watching public cared about them.  Even they more cartoonish characters like Hot Lips Hoolihan and Frank developed an emotional complexity that you rarely saw on television.

It was really the first program to be identified as a dramedy, a combination of drama and comedy that could have you rolling on the floor laughing one minute, and teary-eyed the next.  It was the one show while I was in college that students topped their schedule, went into the dorm commons room and watched together.

It's ending has been criticized as being over bloated (it was two and half hours long, an unprecedented send off for what had been a half hour comedy).  I actually missed the ending because I had a class that night, but caught it much later.  I remember everyone who attended that class was deeply resentful that the Professor had not cancelled the class.

So congratulations, M*A*S*H!  You now occupy the premier spot on our imaginary Hall of Fame mantle piece.  Huzzah!