Vintage Car Show

   Yesterday, the old folks home had a "vintage car show" which was a hit.  A couple of local car clubs came with thier prize possessions and showed them off for a couple of hours.  There were thirteen beautiful exhibits including one of our residents' own 1971 Mustang and a 1970 hand crafted Berliner, made from a kit to reproduce a 1935 Mercedes.  The oldest car was a seventy year old Hudson sedan, highly modified into a four door street "rod".

The Merced Chief of Police came and joined us old folks and the car club members in a steak and hot dog cook out.

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        Part of the line up of cars at the Vintage Car Show

   Of the Model A Ford in the foreground, resident Ted was heard to say, "My brother and I were driving a car just like this home from a dance and we hit a bridge abutment, and broke the axle.  Dad wasn't angry, but made us pay for the repairs.  Took all of my 'Prize Cow Money'.  Later we drove the family from Arkansas to California with that car, towing a horse trailer with all our family and belongings in it. Got all the way to Nevada before it broke down.  Threw a piston from dragging all that load."

Dad

   My own father died accidentally when I was less than a year old, and Grandfather came to be known by me as "Dad". 

   He was very patient, having already raised my own father and my uncle, and I don't remember any swats by him, nor any serious rebukes. Yet he was a good example.

   He worked hard, five and half day per week at the office as an attorney for a title insurance company.  I used to walk with him when he walked the dogs.  By sitting on his lap while he read the Saturday Evening Post and pointed out words in advertisements I learned to read.  The first word I learned to read was not "run", or "spot" or "Dick" or "Jane" but GOODYEAR. The kids in the Campbell's Soup ads were my Dick and Jane.

   He rode the "Big Red" street car to work with such regularity that he became a favorite of the crew, and they would drop him off at our driveway, not a scheduled stop, on rainy days. 

   When he retired from the title company, he opened an Escrow service of his own.  I was hired to prepare the office and I went on my bicycle before school each morning and swept the office and emptied the waste baskets. 

   He ordered my first movie camera and started me on a hobby that I have loved all my life.  When I got a Jiffy Kodak for my first still camera, one of the first pictures I took was of Dad

My father, whom I never got to know, and my Mother, 1923

                                  

                            My Great Grandfather

Sorry, no pictures of "Dad" whom I wrote about above.

 

Whose Dog was Dreyfus

   I have searched my brain (short search) and searched Google (Long Search, but speedier), and I cannot find whose dog Dreyfus was.  He was a Saint Bernard, I am sort of sure, but what movie or TV show he appeared in I cannot recall.

   Martin Crane's (Frazier) dog was Eddie, and Timmy's dog was Lassie, but whose dog was Dreyfus?

   Dennis' dog was Ruff, and Uncle Elby's dog was Napoleon, but whose dog was Dreyfus?

   Nelson's dog was Bethoven, and Dagwood's dog was Daisy, but whose dog was Dreyfus?

   Nick and Nora Charles' dog (the Thin Man) was Asta, and a famous ventriloquist's dog was Farfel, but whose dog was Dreyfus?

POSTSCRIPT:  Thanks to Silk, see comments below, we know Dreyfus was the Saint Bernard-Golden Retreiver mix who belonged to the Westons in Empty Nest.  Weston, played by Richard Mulligan, used to have long heart-to-heart conversations with Dreyfus, who responded by looking wise, or, al least, interested.

It Ain't Just Me -- It's All o' Us

I was feeling bad for having so few recent journal entries.  So I took a tour of journals on my "list", and found that we all are slacking off.

Most had their most recent entries last month, and even the few who had a recent entry, had a gap preceding it.

So I guess we all have sping fever.  Well, Spring is over next week, and summer begins.  Unless we hit the Summer doldrums, we should all get back in harness and up-date our Blogs.

That's my Summer resolution.

Found Another Online Scam -- Ho Hum

   I recently emptied Windows Trash with some un-backed up files in it.  A year's worth of letters down the toilet.

  So I went to search for "lost files".  I got a link to a program called File Recovery.  Download here.  So I downloaded.  ho hum  wait wait.  restart.  ho hum.

   Search for all lost files.  click and away she went, bit in teeth, wow, those lost files flashing by faster than a speeding bullet.  After three thousand found files I thought I'd better stop and see what it is doing.

   Holy cow, here is a list...I read.  I dont see the ones I am looking for but I try to recover one just to see how it works. and LO. 

   TO RECOVER LOST FILES, NEED TO PURCHASE FULL VERSION OF FILE RECOVERY.  $29.95.

   Scam scam.  This is first mention of "purchase".  Well, I may purchase, or I may go to Staples and buy a file recovery program off the shelf.  They are honest.... they tell you that you have to pay before you take it home.

Help !

It has happened often, and this time to ME, alas.  I put a YEAR'S worth of letters in the trash, by mistake. (I thought they were duplicates)  Then I EMPTIED the trash.

Are they gone forever?  Aren't they lurking there on the hard drive, with addresses erased?  A hacker could get them... how can I? 

Help me, you computer literati, Help.

chasferris@aol.com

Self-Checkout

I made my first visit to a market with self-checkout today.  There was one conventional checkout line and five self-checkout lines.  The self checkout lines had NO clerks.  You put your purchased goods on a scanner, one item at a time, then into a bag.  Your total is announced and you put your money in a machine, and away you go.

It was awesome, and intimidating.  My first experience and I was hesitant.  One of my two items did not scan and I did not know what to do, so I went to conventional check out... but had mixed feelings about no clerk checking out.

How impersonal service has become.  And yet, I used to hate it when the check out clerks banged my dinner through the scanner and a box boy (box-person) bagged it, and shoved it at me.  I have become used to buying gasoline without an attendant, why not groceries?

But, my, the store itself: Huge, wide wide aisles lined with sparkling products. Lots of room for my scooter. Rack upon rack of goods of all types and descriptions.  The sea-food alone was impressive: great trays of shrimp, all looking exactly alike...looking almost factory made...amid other trays of edibles.   

I hear that this chain ofr stores is closing many of its outlets.  I wonder why.  Practically no clerks to dispense all these goods.  It is automation carried to the next level...and not doing well,   Curious, and poignant.