June 28: Picnic at Brenda's

One of our cruiser members, Brenda, has allowed the cruiser group to meet at her house for 5 years for an annual picnic. She has a great back yard full of paths, flowers and lots of shade trees. The club provides the hamburgers and bratwurst and we all bring side dishes. The temperature was hovering around 100 deg but several people brought fans so we were at least comfortable. As the day wore on, a front moved thru and the temperature dropped to the 80's. A great time was had by all and the variety of food was great - not to mention it was all just plain good cookin'.






















We also held a brief monthly club meeting after dinner and tried not to doze off.



Today, Rebecca, Nathen, Larry and I all went to Cheney Lake just for a picnic and swim. Willie and Austin were in Missouri helping his parents move to Lebannon, MO. Willie came home tonight and Austin is staying there for another couple of weeks.

The only news I have on job hunting is the City of Park City has accepted my resume and now wants me to go thru their battery of tests. I'll do that Tuesday afternoon but won't hear anything on that until after the 17th. The job is for Data Entry/Police Clerk.

June 22: Job & Car Show

Sorry to be running so late with my blog but I was hoping to have some good news on my search for a job. None so far. However, Larry now had his "dream" job. This is the one he talked about all winter--delivering parts for Automotive Supply. He can now wear shorts which as the Canadians will all remember, was his favorite thing to do. Unlike Guy, Larry almost always wore a shirt.

He talked about how he's come full circle. He used to delivery newspapers and telegrams. Now 48 years later, he's still delivering stuff.

I'm still searching. Sent out 5 resume just this week alone. Still working at the mircrofilm place and they're cross training me now for paper scanning. Talk about a soul crushing job - WOW - I can barely stay awake. I'm glad now when I get back to the microfilm department.


Saturday we went to the Mopar show at the Sedgwick Co. Park. It rained when we got there, cleared up and poured down with another rain storm at closing time. A great time was had by all.



The Coke PT owned by Larry & Delma Nulf. One of these days I'm gonna sneak in a Pepsi into his display.




















First black convertible is The Darthcruzer owned by Henry & Anna Monton; the second one is the Coke PT; the third one has cool ghost flames and is owned by Steve and Sharon Mundy. The last one is the K-State PT owned by Dave B. out of Topeka. At the very end you can just see the trailer that belongs to another PT from Oklahoma.











The ghost flames:







Darthcruzer:










Larry's new hairdo and the gang under the canopies that we always seem to need.












And just for those of you who can't tell yet that we were at a Mopar show, here's some photos for you.




This is a 67 or 69 Fury (can't remember - go figure). It in now way is anywhere near stock condition. This is a complete re-do. How about that cool engine.






The oldest Dodge on display that day and it was sitting on a trailer.














The big fins and spoilers of the Chrysler/Plymouth era.










I tool a look at my blog one day - the way you all see it - and discovered that my wording doesn't always match up to my pictures. I hope all of you have been able to adjust my thinking and figure out which picture I'm talking about.

Also, I'm on the verge of giving up the blog. Our lives aren't that exciting anymore and I don't want to bore anyone. I will probably do Facebook as soon as I figure out how it works. I set up an account and I've already had several people ask me to join theirs. I've accepted but I don't know where to go from there. Someday one of the kids will be here and can help me. In the meantime, I'll publish a blog or two just to keep the relatives, at least, current on what we're doing.

June 7: Garden of Eden and Mac

As promised, here is the second installment of the Mystery Cruise from last Saturday.







The Garden of Eden, located in Lucas, KS, was built by Samuel Perry Dinsmoore, a retired schoolteacher, Civil War Veteran, Farmer and Populist politician. You can see some of his political view points in his sculptures.

He began building the garden and his home in 1907 at the age of 64. Over 22 years he fashioned 113 tons of cement and many tons of limestone into this unique cabin (it's made of limestone but shaped to look like logs) with its surrounding sculptures. In 1924, at the age of 81, he married a 20 years old and they had two children - both now living outside of Kansas. His son, John, is the youngest surviving child of a Civil War veteran.


Dinsmore built this 40 foot tall limestone "log" mausoleum for himself and his first wife. He is laid rest in his hand-made, concrete coffin that has a side window for viewing his mouldering body.






From Lucas, we headed east out into the country roads. We stopped at the Vonada Stone Co. Farm. Here they make limestone signs and markers of all types. Also, benches and sun dials. We got a demonstration on engraving limestone and one on actually making the limestone fence posts. Our tour guide, Brenda, drilled a hole for the stake and wedge that help split the rock. We then went on a very scenic trailer ride out into the pasture to look at a small quarry and some Oak trees planted on a hill that were part of an original homestead act that required planting of trees on your land.






The day ended up in Lincoln, KS where we enjoyed dinner at the Hungry Hunter. A great time was had by all.










On the way home, I took this picture from Ron's car as it traveled down the highway. The thunderheads were over Newton and were gone by the time we got there.


And special thanks to Ron for taking all these great shots for me.






On a sadder note, my mother's companion and dancing partner for the last 9 years passed away on Sunday the 5th. Gene and I drove down to be with her for several days. The memorial won't be until around the 20th and we won't be able to be with her then. She seems to be doing well but misses Mac very much.

June 1: The New Job and a Mystery Cruise

My new job does work with microfiche but I'm working on microfilm. The microfilm is both 16mm and 35mm. The local county government has decided it needs to replace some old microfilm so I'm now helping this company with that project. There are suppose to be a total of 2500 rolls of film. We make two copies: 1) A diazo copy for the county to use daily; and 2) a silver copy that will go to the salt mines for storage. This will last about 3 months (unless I find work elsewhere) and the cost to us tax payers is a mere $100,000. The reason for film as oppose to CD's is that the life span of the information and the CD itself have not yet been determined. The life span of diazo film is over 100 years and the silver is suppose to be good for 500 years. Not sure how they can determine that and not the life span of a CD but I guess that's not my problem. I am still putting in applications at other places still hoping to get full time employment somewhere.

Larry is still working at the hotel - delivering tooth brushes, unclogging toilets, helping young co-eds move to another room because their a/c was broken, trying to fix a broken elevator, policing the parking lot looking for non-paying parkers, etc. Not a bad job description for the title "Shuttle Driver".

Today and tomorrow are his days off this week and he went swimming today. Met an interesting guy in the pool - Larry Grimes. The two of them had quite a visit about the apartment complex. They're about the same age too but Larry says Larry has more hair than he does. Wonder if Darrell is around somewhere.

Saturday (while Larry was working), I went on a mystery cruise with the P.T. Cruiser group. I rode with Ron & Janet. We left north Wichita at 7:00 AM (my eyes were almost open) and headed north. First stop (potty break) was just north of I-70 on the highway going to Wilson Lake. Stopped at a store called "Kansas Originals". A really neat place. I bought a new T-Shirt and pin. I think everyone bought something.



This was on the scenic Post Rock By-Way heading north to Wilson Lake. More on the post rocks later.







Next stop was Lucas, KS originally known as the Garden of Eden. First stop, however, was at the Grassroots Arts Center. To take the description of the artists from their brochure, "Grassroots art is made by self-taught artists working outside the academic structure of fine art and beyond the cultural traditions of folk art......" Generally, someone turns 65, has lots of time on their hands and says "Wow, look at all this junk in my closet, yard, garage, etc. Maybe I can do something with that." It was an interesting place but a little mind boggling.



Left is a a car made from the old style pull tabs - the ones that always got thrown down or you put in the can and hoped you didn't swallow it.

This lovely sculpture on the right was all the trash taken from a drained lake. Kinda like those I Spy books. Can you find the marble, jack, toy cow, etc.?




Limestone is a big deal in this country. This antique car and school yard scene was carved from a chunk of limestone by a lady that filled up a whole room in this museum.







More limestone but these were done by master masons. The stained glass window is actually pieces of glass and the bottoms of broken bottles.







We then walked over to the Deeble house where there are thousands of Barbie Dolls and other dolls made into so many different things that my mind kinda went numb. Notice the aluminum foil walls - ceilings were the same way. The lady that made these lived here until she ran out of room and moved out. In the backyard are scenes from postcards that she collected. This one is from Mt. Rushmore.




I have no idea!!!






From here we went to the Garden of Eden. I asked another photographer to take over for my royal assistant, Henry, and I don't have those photos yet. They are well worth waiting on. They'll be in the next edition.

Thank you, Henry, for taking all these lovely photos for me. I still can't believe I walked out of the house without my camera.

The Garden Of Eden and the Vonada Stone Co. family farm will be posted as soon as I get the CD with the pictures.