How time flies. Sisters’ Day is here again and so is cooler weather. I am really enjoying it. It is my turn to play hostess. It seems the older I get the harder it gets to get everything ready. Pam came in early to carry four chairs over from the community room so I’d have a seat for everyone. The rest of the girls arrived shortly after that. Those present were Lucy Branson, Mary Jo Crider, Linda Crider (me), Pam Hale and Susie Kleffner.
I forgot to turn the coffee pot on, so everyone else had to wait for that. I had my tea though; I made that the day before. I got six cinnamon rolls from Perkins for our breakfast and had some applesauce and butter for topping. They were mostly finished eating before they got their coffee. My bad. Sorry girls.
Some of us were still confused about the new schedule for having our turn being hostess for the day. Apparently, Pam and Susie were the only two of us who had the sense to write it down. After some more discussion, Pam finally texted a copy of her list to all of us after someone said “just call me when it’s my turn.” I think now we are all straightened out on that topic.
We talked about how the younger generation travels all over the world at the drop of a hat. One of the girls was talking to her granddaughter and commented that she intended to call them the week before. “That wouldn’t work,” she said, “I was in Prough.” A big trip for the rest of them is coming to Jefferson City and for me it’s going to Vienna.
Do you listen to audio books? Lucy does when she is quilting, and Pam listens to them when she is driving her route on Thursday. Lucy is listening to one about the Korean War. She said it is terrible what those people went through. Lucy said it was amazing how much Trump and McCarthy are alike. Our brother Norman was over there when Lois and I were toddlers. We were about three when he came home. We were six months old when he was drafted. I know this because that was when Mom and Daddy had a family picture taken. If you ever get to see it, I am sitting on Mom’s lap and Lois is on Daddy’s. The story is that Daddy had me, but I wet my diaper, so he made Mom take me. Do any of you have a childhood story that has haunted you all your life? I have two but they don’t mortify me the way they did when I was a kid. I am probably the only one who remembers them now.
We talked about the paper and how a lot of people in the Vienna area would like to see more Vienna happenings in the paper. It’s nice for Belle to have the sports from their school put in the paper but Vienna has some good sports teams too and those folks would like to see that in the paper. Maybe they can have Belle one week and Vienna the next. I’m just saying.
I decided to go out for lunch. I said “Where do you want to go for dinner?” They all looked surprised and said “You’re the hostess you pick.” I suggested four or five places but no one accepted or rejected any of them. Shirley said to write some names down, put them in a bowl and draw one out. I wrote several down, studied them for a bit and decided we’re going to IHOP and we did. It wasn’t very busy and we got seated at the back at a big table. We checked over the menu and made our selections. The waitress came and took our orders and said she was the only server. There were four or five tables besides us. The waitress came back a while later and said they were out of turkey for the turkey sandwiches that a couple of the girls ordered. They settled for chicken and before long we got our orders. Mine was delicious. I had shrimp and onion rings. The others didn’t say anything about their sandwiches, so I took that to mean they were okay.
Lucy was trying to clean out her pantry. She took a can of carrots, one of green beans and apricots, put them in her blender, made a smoothie out of them and said it was delicious. She’s looking forward to trying some other concoctions.
Shirley and Bob bought a pair of metal cups with metal straws. Shirley said they work well. Bob was having a problem with his. He said it was so hard to suck the drink out. Shirley asked him if he pulled the straw up off the bottom once he did that his worked great too. That’s our Bob. We’ve had him so long I guess we’ll keep him. Love you, bro.
We talked about new coffee pots. It takes them one minute for every cup you make. Brinktown just got a new 50-cup pot. That means that it will take 50 minutes to brew a pot of coffee. We agreed that was going to be a problem at the church suppers.
What do you think of the self-checkouts showing up in a lot of stores? We agree that if you check yourself out you should get a discount. How about five or 10 percent off your total bill? I would be more inclined to use them.
We all do a lot of reading, so we got to talking about books. Some of them wouldn’t be half as thick if they took all the bad words out. We were taught to keep those words out of the language we speak. It seems some writers don’t think that it applies to the written word. We can’t tell you if the stories are good because we don’t get to enjoy them because of the language they use. Some books turn out to be completely different from the descriptions on the back. We don’t like that either!
Fall is the season for mums. They come in so many beautiful colors. When they sell them at churches or organizations. Wanting to contribute to the cause makes it hard to decide what color to buy. Sometimes we wind up buying at least one of each color or at times even more. They are so hard to resist.
Sometimes when you see a certain thing or place it reminds you of someone who is gone now. It brings them back so clear it is like they are sitting beside you. Since we lost our brother Harold, I have seen so many men with mustachios just like Harold’s was. I find myself looking around to see if it is really him. Of course, it’s not, but I find myself wishing I could see him again. Talking about places we’ve been brings back memories of them. Bus trips remind me of how many I’ve taken with Katie and Lucy. I recently lost a friend I have known for over 40 years. So many memories are popping up that bring her back in my mind. Maybe this seems so prevalent, because there are so many more who have crossed over than there used to be. One day we will all be the ones coming to the minds of the ones we leave behind.
On that note I will be closing this article. Hope you enjoyed it or at least it made you think. Hope you have a good October. We will see you then after the next Sisters’ Day.
Thought: With so many things back in style I can’t wait until morals and intelligence become a trend again.
Fun fact: There are 58,267 names on the Vietnam Wall. 39,996 were just 22 years old or younger (8,283 were 19; 3,103 were 18; 12 were 17; 5 were 16). Three sets of fathers and sons; 31 sets of parents lost 2 sons; 997 were killed their first day; 1,448 were killed their last day; eight women nurses; 224 soldiers were awarded the Medal of Honor during the war and 153 of them are on the wall.
