Morgan Gets Job...

With college graduation scheduled in August Morgan was offered a job today by Carpenter Company. Carpenter, located in Temple Tx is the largest manufacturer of foam comfort cushioning in the world. From their web site:

Carpenter Co. makes furniture more comfortable, pillows more soft, carpets more cushy, and homes more cozy. We are Carpenter Co. We provide the world with comfort.

Sounds like a secure field to me. Comfort is not likely to go out of style. Congratulations son!

Visit to College Station...

Paid a visit to Morgan in College Station, met he and Ali Friday for a minor league baseball game, the Brazos Vally Bombers vs. the McKinney Marshalls. The Bombers won. Good summertime fun with a nice breeze blowing through the covered grandstand.

On Saturday we paid a visit to The George H.W. Bush Presidential Library on the campus of Texas A&M University. I had forgotten my big camera so here is a grainy cell phone photo of me outside. Search the blog, there is also a post about our visit to the Clinton Library.

Hard to tell from this photo, but my wife claimed that everyone could tell I was a Democrat because I had my shirt tail out. I say she was being subversive and tried to disguise herself as a Republican because she had recently shaved her legs. Anyway, I was asked to speak at the library during my visit. It was by two security guards after I had emptied my pockets of phone, keys, wallet and strolled through the metal detector. They said, "you got on a belt.?" I said "Yes sirs." This was not the only security check I endured on this day, but that's another blog post.

Very nice place with many ponds on the grounds. Bush actually has an apartment there where he stays when there is business at the conference center. He likes to fish in the ponds. Morgan says that if you hear he is in town it is also a good time to hit the ponds as you can count on them being freshly stocked. Executive privilege I guess.

Anyway I think Presidential Libraries are neat. I am headed to Austin in September, might try to squeeze in LBJ's while there. I'll also get around to Dubya's at SMU one day.

More from the weekend...

Took a round about way home from Ft Worth the other day. Got this shot. It's kind of ironic, when I try to access this web address from work I see a similar message. It has not always been this way. Any way it just kind of makes you want to hit the woods and tell lies about why and what for later.

While driving around we made a stop at an isolated country store for gas. It was cheaper than gas in Lufkin. Made me say why and what for. I looked around in the warm store for awhile because it had been cold and blustery as I stood and gassed up in my caught by surprise short pants and punk rock teeshirt. I looked at some home manufactured crappie jigs hanging in the tackle section. Been hanging there five years I bet, I kind of inspect stuff like this as one of my more minor hobbys. Would catch fish I bet, with it's rubber skirt like legs. Hard stiff hook, maybe by design. If it hangs up, you break off no straightening the hook and getting it back. got to buy more. Too bad that skirt is old fish catching technology. All kind of quiver plastic out there now.

I kept looking around and Cathy found a ceramic monkey piggy bank and I bought it. Another minor hobby, monkey, not piggy bank. The lady at the check out was Asian. In a shrill voice she said, "You not from around here." And you madam? Maybe next time that way I'll stop in again. she will still be there and will say "You man buy monkey."

Passing through Coldsprings on Saturday on the way to the Panther game we were dodging horse excrement all the way and we found where it was coming from. Here you see a trail ride turning left into the fairgrounds and a biker ride turning into the American Legion Post across the street. Wonder what the bikers left on the road the way they came? Too bad I could not catch more bikes in the picture but hopefully you can get the juxtaposition. I came home a different way that night. Bet things got interesting by midnight in these parts.

Finely a celeb shot. Reggie McNeil at the Panther game. He's the former quarterback who lead Lufkin to a State Championship a few years ago, quarterbacked the Aggies, played for the Bengals and has signed with Toronto of the Canadian League. He appears here to give this blog some street cred.

If he saw his picture here he would say why and what for.

Tubas!

Shot of the OSU tuba section. Pretty impressive,but...

...look out for those A&M tubas. I almost let them get too close.

Count those Aggie tubas. 25 or 30 strong.

This was how half time looked from my seat. I tried flipping this picture but some how it just was not right.

A&M Visit...

The trip to the Aggie game turned out good. Morgan is doing well in school and they put up a big welcome sign for us.












It was cool to walk around campus taking part in all the hullabaloo. Here Parson's Mounted Calverly gets ready to move.











The Corps march in. I had several good pictures of this entrance but I chose this one with the tubas in the back ground.












Oaklahoma State had a good team. Almost won. here is me with the OSU tuba section. Are those tubas making my butt look big?

I have some more tuba stuff to get up later in the week.









The gate for the day was 86,000











There were three ex- Lufkin Panthers on the field for this game. three on the Aggies and one for the Cowboys. Two of the Lufkin Aggies had a direct impact in the victory, Dixon with a fumble recovery and Lane with three touchdowns. Here is Lane, number 11, rumbling for the open hole.

Busy Weekend...

Friday night I helped Morgan load all his earthly belongings in his vehicle and on the trailer attached to it and he left Saturday morning to move into his new apartment in College Station.

Saturday I worked about 9 hours.

Sunday I took what few remaining things there were around there were around the house, a drum set, a couple of guitars, a toilet bowl plunger and I drove to College Station. We unloaded, ate a quick lunch, I hooked up to the trailer to fetch it back and I was home in time to play at church.

I guess he really has moved out if he took the drum set.

Last night I was tired.

Well We Should Give Away a Big Screen...

This blog is two years old today. Every visitor today gets a big screen. Don't worry, I have your shipping address. For those of you whose family will not understand your preoccupation with visiting here I have a nice card I will enclose that explains it all. It includes some pictures of me I have not posted here.

I got started in August 2005. News that month was kind of like this month, go back and check the archives, that first post is still there. Drum camp was going on, Morgan off to school and the changes since then, I'm not in school and no hurricanes on the way. There has been good news and bad news posted here throughout this time.

I am honored that there have been over 5000 visits to my little Internet home. I never thought things would be this busy. Actually there have been more than that, I did not start tracking till late November of 2005. I consider it a blessing that I have been able to keep in contact with so many people and provide them some kind of idea what goes on around here.

Ya'll keep coming around.

purchase photos here...

Check out this link, click on ATA Taekwondo individual shots then search Wallace. You can view some portraits that were made by Rickey McNeal Photos. There were some really great action shots they made just playing around that are not posted here, wish you could see them.
http://www.rickeymcnealphotography.com/

Rickey, the photographer, is a guy that used to work at the mill. His son Reggie was a Lufkin high and Aggie football standout. Last I heard he was with the Bengals.

Sooner or Later...

Everybody is gonna need a ventilator. That was a line in a song. Now I don't need a ventilator but I never dreamed I would have to make one of these things either. Check the labels for the history of these things around here. I had the sump pump in my septic system go out. That happens about every ten years or so, this is my third or forth one I think. First one I ever put in my self, it's all rigged to go. While I am at work today my aggie electrical engineer will do some mods to the electrical delivery to this unit so I hope we make a clean quick hook up.

Busy week, work, the kids both did a TKD mid term testing last night and looked real good.

Nancy and her four kids come from New Orleans today for a visit. Shaping up for A fun weekend.

College Student Kitchen...

Morgan is moving back from Doches, a short time will be spent at home and then he moves to College Station to become a full time Aggie. He signed a lease at an apartment there yesterday.

For now we must absorb his household goods till he is gone again. Let's take this time to do an examination of what is here. Look at this sack on the kitchen cabinet. Looks like the contents of his kitchen.

Let us examine several articles in the sack. What's this? Looks like some kind of sanitary wipes. I cannot remember ever having anything like this the first time I went to college. I do not think they had been invented.

Besides, I can't remember getting my stuff dirty.

How about this, oatmeal. What's a young guy doing eating oatmeal. I never ate any myself till just recently. My wife made me. Said it was good for my cholesterol or sex drive or something. I forget which.

What about this? "Improves the Taste" it boasts on the label. Even the oatmeal? What's in this stuff? Is it legal to have this stuff?

Here is a bunch of the other stuff. Jumbo can of tomato soup, must like this stuff. Store brand chili, that means no brand alliance in that category or a craving for mystery meat.

Chunky Soup? I don't even get that around here, must have been an impulse buy. Pancake batter in a plastic container? What's the world coming to, things are just too modern. Hamburger helper and a bag of cereal for dessert, works for me.

I know what, lets mix all this stuff together and eat it right before bed time. Swimming in my belly if you wish. I bet you would wake up feeling like Mr. Puffy.

We are bleeding maroon around here...

Big news around here yesterday. Morgan was accepted into the Texas A&M engineering program. Begins in the fall. I think he is going to do mechanical engineering and has expressed some interest in renewable resource type technology. Just in time looks like. Hope the oil holds out two more years then we should be OK.

He is furiously looking for a place to live. May go down there this weekend.

I remember the good old days when we were kids and we watched old South West Conference football on the TV with my dad. Teams that struggled mightily against each other with no bowl playoff glory and big money at stake. Only school pride. Teams like A&M, Texas, Rice, Baylor, the Razorbacks and the TCU Horned Frogs and so on.

I remember my dad calling the Aggies by a name that no doubt came about in an earlier time. A&M stands for agricultural and mechanical. My dad would stare at the black and white screen and and those big old farm boys in maroon uniforms that we would have to use specialized brain cells to superimpose color on to make up for the short comings of the small screen in those days (not like today when we have the big screen and give them away freely, the big screen, not the specialized brain cells). and he would say, "Them manure spreaders are going to have to do something this quarter."

Renewable energy, manure spreaders, let's see, that might just go together.