This morning while standing in the kitchen, I found myself pondering the table pictured in this post. When my dad was, literally, on his death bed, he called us in one by one to talk to us. After comparing notes, we discovered the main theme of dad’s wishes was that we not let mom sell and move out of the “party house.” Everyone has great memories of this house, of the crawfish boils, of the game room Christmas Pictionary tournaments, of a million other things.

In my morning pondering, I realized that the underdog of this “party house,” is the table pictured here. This is where the real talk happens. It’s where we would all sit and visit with mom while she cooked. I can still see all the aunts sitting there talking and laughing so loud that you couldn’t imagine anyone knew what anyone else was saying. I can still see Bonnie and Kelly cutting sausage for the red beans and rice. I can still see Grandma Ransonette sitting there drinking her Christmas Eve “high ball” that dad would make for her as soon as she walked into the house. I can still see Terry having a beer with late arrivals to the parties while they eat their first bowl of gumbo.

This table is also the overflow table for people who aren’t quick enough to get a seat at the big dining room table. Nobody feels bad for them though, because people eventually leave the big table and pull up more chairs to this little kitchen table to scrunch up and eat with the losers. Like so many other houses, gaze upon and appreciate the heart of the house: The Kitchen Table.

Roy and Dale Doing it Gangsta

I was flipping channels and saw "The Roy Rogers Show" playing on the RFD channel. I put it on for a few minutes and there were Roy and Dale walking around their house cooking and, generally, doing normal household stuff with six-shooters on their hips. So gangster.

My Christmas Story Theme

As I sat and watched my son and daughter-in-law play Santa this Christmas Eve with "A Christmas Story" playing in the background,  I remembered that the first time I saw "A Christmas Story," my son Cory was four years old which is the same age that his daughter is now.  That was 27 years ago.  How the hell did that happen?

House on Skull Mountain

Back in the '70s growing up in Port Arthur, Texas, there was a movie theater that had about five screens and all movies cost $1 to see.  The screens weren't much bigger than today's home television sets with the largest being about one third the size of a normal movie theater screen.

Right now, I'm sitting on my couch in my very own living room watching the fabulously awful 1974 "House on Skull Mountain."  I'm watching it on a television set not much smaller than the smallest screen at the Golden Tri Cinema.  Weird.  These are exactly the kinds of movies we used to see there:  lots of Burt Reynolds, Bruce Lee and B-horror movies.

They also ran some mainstream movies there about a month after they left the real theaters.  There were always technical problems, bad film stock issues (the copies shown at the Golden Tri had already been viewed hundreds and hundreds of times by the time they made it there) and out of sync or non-existent sound.  Of course, with no cable television or VCRs back then, it was the only way to see a movie, if you didn't want to (or couldn't afford to) pay full price.

Hey, look!  It's Lionel Jefferson!

.

Tip to Stay Young

I like this tip a lot.  I think being in contact with lots of my former classmates and other fabulous people I haven't communicated with in 20 or 30 years through Facebook has turned back my mental clock...in a good way.  One great thing about being 56 is that I can be nostalgic about the '60s, '70s, '80s and  '90s.  I'll never run out of material to use to make myself feel young(er) again. 

From CNN.com - 

"Step back in time"

"Did you love punk rock music in college? Load some Sex Pistols tracks on your iPod. You might think that being so nostalgic would make you feel ancient, but research shows it can have the opposite effect.

In one study at Harvard University, people who were placed in an environment that resembled their youth -- with movies, music, and memorabilia from the past -- experienced marked improvements in their memory, vision, happiness level, and overall health.

'It shows that our mind-set is what limits us,' says lead researcher Ellen Langer, Ph.D., author of 'Counterclockwise.'

So do something that really takes you back (like re-reading your Anne Rice paperbacks!)."

"A La Chasse, Tu Perdre La Place"

"If you go hunting, you lose your place."

Growing up in my large extended family was a continuous game of musical chairs.  There were never enough seats for the number of people in the room.  Someone would always have to drag an uncomfortable chair from the dining room into the living room or pull up a spot on the floor.

The rule in our Cajun family was "a la chasse, tu perdre la place."  If you go hunting, you lose your place.  If you chose to leave the room for any reason, your seat was fair game.  Parents never intervened.  No seat was saved.  If you got up from your nice comfy corner of the couch to go to the bathroom or kitchen, chances were that when you got back to the living room you would find your brother, who ten seconds earlier was laying on the cold floor, comfortably snuggled into your nice warm spot.

Some things never change.  Friday night, I was at my mom's house with nine other adults and five children.  I had successfully scored a primo spot on the corner of the couch near the fireplace with a reasonably good view of the Cotton Bowl game on the television.

I had decided I would leave at halftime, but midway through the second quarter, I got thirsty.  Really thirsty.  Parched, in fact.  I surveyed the room with "a la chasse, tu perdre la place" ringing in my ears.  Every relative became suspect. 

Would my uncle straining his neck on the opposite corner of the couch grab my seat for an un-neck-binding view of the game?

Would my 12 year old cousin who was sitting on the floor take my place forcing me to play the "I'm an  old lady" card when I returned with my drink?

Would some other relative come in from another room and excitedly plop down in the best seat in the room quietly patting themselves on the back for their unlikely score?

So, instead of going to the kitchen for a drink, I sat there.  I didn't dare move.  My throat felt like sandpaper, but by god, I wasn't leaving that couch.

I did leave at halftime and when I got home, I guzzled a big glass of water like I had just crossed the Sahara.  Then, I sat wherever the hell I wanted.



.

Success!

Saturday, we held a benefit for an ill classmate and made almost $8,000 selling raffle tickets, baked goods, barbeque links and smoked boudain links. Pictures below.

Did you know that when the sausage links are being grilled, they sometimes split open? Did you also know that those split sausages go into a separate "junk" pan and cannot be sold as a "link on a bun?" And, did you know that those split sausage links are delicious little gifts from the gods and that tasting one will make you want to slap your momma? I am now obsessed with juicy, split, "junk" sausage links. Just what I need...another food obsession.

Note to all 1974 graduates of Thomas Jefferson High School in Port Arthur, Texas: we're looking for you. Click on the flier below for information on how to contact Karin Shepherd with your information.

That's me in the front in the red coat. I was initially kneeling down and it took about five of those people to help me up. My 54 year old knees, cold weather, twenty extra pounds and three layers of clothes conspired with gravity to hold me down. One of the beautiful things about hanging out with people who are exactly the same age as you is that everyone could relate to my dilemma and they were proud of my courage for attempting to kneel down in the first place.

Me, Duane and Megan laughing at god knows what. We laughed all day.



Favorite stories of the day:

Differences between mothers and fathers
Randy told us that he's always had a hard time convincing his children that he was "hot" in high school. That's what dads do. They try to convince their kids they used to be "hot."

Moms on the other hand work hard trying to convince their kids that they absolutely, positively did not "make out" with anybody under the football stands and certainly didn't speak to the people who smoked dope in the empty field across the street from the school. Moms also never snuck into bars, drank alcohol while under age or made illegal u-turns while cruising "the drag."

Making money while "working the street"
Occasionally while holding their signs (see picture above) and trying to lure people to our tasty goods, drivers would stop and hand money to our sign holders. Margaret was very excited about the $3 someone handed her from a car window. Shortly after Margaret's wonderful $3 moment though, Randy came up to us flashing a five dollar bill.

Margaret still isn't buying it. She maintains that he paid somebody $10 to give him $5. "So, it's a wash," she says. That's her story and she's sticking to it. Nobody works the street like the women of the Class of '74. Especially not the MEN of the Class of '74.

Even we have more sense than that
Shortly after two of our classmates took the signs and headed to the street, they started walking back toward the tents.

"HEY! No way," I said. "Get back out there. It's not that cold, you bunch of old timers."

"Well," one of them said, "We decided it wasn't a good idea to hold our signs up and shout at the funeral procession."

I looked at the street just in time to see the hearse pass by.

Yep, Class of '74. We're a class act.

This and That

Cool New Beaumont Events Website
Click here for a great new website for Beaumont events. It's called CtheDs.com.

Connect the Dots
The name of the above website (CtheDs) stands for "connect the dots," which reminded me of how much I used to love doing "connect the dots" or "dot-to-dot" puzzles when I was a kid.

Can Catchers and Channel Changers
Thinking about "dot-to-dot" puzzles reminded me of a conversation I had with someone a couple of days ago. When we were kids, my brother, sisters and I used to fight for the "privilege" of being the can-catcher or the channel-changer.

What was a can-catcher you ask? A can-catcher was the person who would grab the cans in the grocery store as directed by mom and/or dad. Tough work, but somebody had to do it. I suspect this little job duty was created during one of mom's four pregnancies. Plus, having four children with an age range of only six years, mom had to come up with creative ways to keep us (well, Terry and Stuart) from running amuck in the store.

What was a channel-changer? In the olden days, there were no remote control devices for television sets or for anything else, for that matter. Every night, we took turns being the channel-changer. Mom or dad would tell us to either change the channel or raise or lower the volume or bang the side of the set when the picture got fuzzy. There were also the occasional vertical hold or "turn the big knob" issues to be dealt with.

Our parents also somehow convinced us that folding towels, dusting the furniture, washing the car or gathering coat hangers were fun activities. They constantly used the old Tom Sawyer trick on us and we never knew. Sneaky!

My favorite story about my cousin Alan - Originally Posted 5/1/05

Our cousin Alan passed away Tuesday. This is a blog post I did four years ago which is my favorite Alan story...

Saturday night we celebrated my Aunt Gladys' birthday with a big dinner party at Sanderson's in Nederland. The food was great and, if you're ever in the area, you should give it a try.In honor of Aunt Gladys, I would like to tell you a story about how she and my mom almost drove into the canal in Port Arthur with all of us kids in the car. Just your typical Southeast Texas Saturday afternoon.

Port Arthur, Texas, where we grew up, has a man-made island called Pleasure Island which was formed when the canals were dredged to build a seawall. At one time, the island had a ballroom and swimming pools and a carnival but by the mid-sixties, it was just another place to go crabbing.

Crabbing for my family involved my mom and two of her sisters taking eight kids, ranging in age from 2 to 12, either to the slippery seawall or to a muddy riverbank with string, raw chicken necks, a couple of nets and a couple of ice chests at daybreak. You'll notice that I didn't mention life jackets. Somehow, (no doubt by the grace of some very busy guardian angels) we survived.

By noon, we would be finished crabbing and we would all go to my grandpa's house where we would boil the several dozen crabs we had caught and sit outside and eat them. Good times.

On the day of our adventure, my mom was driving and Aunt Gladys was in the front seat. My cousin Alan was sitting on Aunt Gladys' lap and my little sister Bonnie was probably sitting in the middle in the front. In the backseat were me, my sister Terry, my brother Stuart and my other cousin David. This passel of children ranged in age from around 2 to 12 with me being the oldest. Alan was about 3 years old.

When we got to the intersection on the island where we would ordinarily turn left to go home, my mom noticed other people going right. We had never taken the right turn before and for some reason on this particular day, my mom and my aunt decided it would be a good day to see what was on the other side of the island. Mom took a right and followed the two other cars thinking the road would loop around to the other side of the island and eventually take us back to the bridge which would take us back to the Port Arthur mainland.

As we drove deeper and deeper into the marsh, we kids began to get scared. The usual cacophony of, "he farted" or "he's looking at me" or "you stink" was replaced with the more quiet, "where are we" and "the road is too skinny" and "Mom, where are we going?"Mom and Aunt Gladys tried to keep things upbeat but we could tell things weren't going well as they quietly discussed how the road appeared to be eroding as we drove on it which we kids had already noticed. If we looked out of the window on the passenger side, it seemed we were looking straight down into the canal.

To make matters worse, one of the younger kids made a poopy in his pants and it was a big stinky one. Alan started crying and we all told him to think happy thoughts.When he kept crying, Aunt Gladys told him, "Alan, think of Mickey Mouse."

Alan said, "Okay."

When he kept crying, my aunt said, "Alan, are you still thinking of Mickey Mouse?"

He said, "Yes."

She said, "Then why are you still crying."

Alan said, "Because, I'm thinking of Mickey Mouse being killed."

In my twisted family, this of course caused hysterical laughter. Since we were only driving about 5 miles per hour, my mom stopped the car, got out and ran up to the total strangers in front of us. She told them she wasn't driving one foot more and would he drive the car past the narrow patch of road which he did.

Just another day in paradise.

"I'm going watch my fights."

In the olden days, women would stop whatever they were doing in the middle of the day to watch their "stories." "Stories" was another word for soap opera. In our family, mom watched "As the World Turns."

Just as religiously as mom stopping every day at noon to watch "her stories," every Friday night, my dad would announce, "I'm going watch my fights." He would then go off to the "den," pop the handle on his recliner and watch boxing for hours. The "den" in those days was an eight foot by eight foot room in the middle of the house with a chair, a couch and a twenty year old black and white television set. The "den" also had a door on each wall leading to various rooms in the house. So, people were constantly walking in front of him while he watched his fights.

These days, dad has his own room in a big house that he shares only with my mother. So, nobody's walking in front of the TV anymore. He's also got cable, so he doesn't have to wait until Friday night to watch the fights. However, although his television is color, I still think it's twenty years old. Dad always gets the oldest television in the house. That's just the rule.

Since dad's been sick, he doesn't watch television in his room. He sits in his recliner in the living room and watches the big fancy schmancy television. Of course, being outnumbered by women in this family (4 to 2), the fights were rarely, if ever, watched in the living room.

This past Saturday night, my mom and I decided to bite the bullet and watch the fights with dad on the big TV. Dad was a good sport about it, but I don't think he was prepared for the female play-by-play that occurs when women decide to watch "the fights."

"I hate that guys pants."

"Oh,my God! He's bleeding!"

"Why doesn't somebody stop this thing?"

"Is that his mother? Even his mother can't watch. Oh, that poor woman."

"Oh, isn't that nice. He wants to be a lawyer and help poor people."

"That guy from New York talks too much."

"I hate that guy from New York."

"Why are they booing? How rude."

"Now, I feel sorry for that little guy from New York."

"Why doesn't somebody stop this thing?!"

"Oh, my God! Look at his eye!!"

I think we've given dad a little extra motivation to get his strength back. I'm pretty sure he can't wait to watch "his fights" on that twenty year old television in his quiet little room without the commentary from the ya-ya sisterhood.

Update on dad

Dad's temperature is normal, his incision site appears okay and he doesn't look jaundiced anymore. The bad news is that one of the stents they put in a couple of weeks ago is "cracked," whatever that means. We're waiting to hear from the doctors in Houston to find out our next step.

Now, a funny dad story. As I've mentioned before, dad not only retired from one of the local refineries, he has been a professional clown for over 50 years. Back in the '70s, dad also did some Ronald McDonald work for the southeast United States. He was even in the Orange Bowl parade one year as Ronald McDonald.

Dad would fly out to do Ronald McDonald work on the weekend and be back on Monday to work at the refinery. One weekend, he had a layover flight in Abilene and the stewardess told dad the layover would be about 30 minutes. In those days, there was no security and at the smaller airports, passengers walked right up to the plane, climbed the stairs and boarded on the runway.

Dad left the plane and, as it turned out, the layover was 5 minutes and not 30 minutes and the plane left without him. Dad freaked out because he had to be at work at the plant the next morning. He looked around the runway and saw a private jet boarding a couple of passengers. Dad walked up to the man getting on the private jet and asked him where they were going.

The man, his wife and secretary were flying to a private airfield in Dallas and offered dad a ride to his connecting flight. Dad got on the plane and the private jet guy called ahead and had a taxi waiting for dad at the private airfield which took him to the Dallas-Fort Worth airport. Dad made the flight with five minutes to spare, boarded the plane and sat in his seat.

Shortly after he got to his seat, the stewardess walked by, looked at my dad, dad looked at her and she walked away. He never did tell the stewardess what happened.

Just Because

John Parr - Man In Motion (St. Elmo's Fire)
Uploaded by jpdc11

My Musical Family

My family used to call these ta-duh-ta-duhs.

You put your mouth on one end and yell, "TA-DUH-TA-DUH!"

We couldn't afford a piano.

Giant Squid Kisses and Octopus Hugs

This past Saturday night was our monthly all-alumni high school gathering which I began insisting people attend about three months ago and which has become a rousing success. If you're fortunate enough to have friends you've known for over 30 years (and in some cases, your whole life), you know that the standards for acceptable behavior are very low when you're all together, especially if alcohol is involved.

Saturday I was standing around minding my own business, when I was waved over to a group of people to have my picture taken. Looking back, I remember them having unusually big grins on their faces, but I just thought they were really, really happy to have me join them in a picture. Did I mention I was drinking?

When I got to the group, they said, "Stand by, Jay." I stood by Jay, posed for the picture with my lovliest smile and Jay kissed me on the cheek. I started to walk away and he said, "Let's take another one. You're supposed to kiss me." The request for a second picture should have tipped me off to a possible setup, especially since the grins of the people behind the photographer (*) were growing even larger, but it didn't. Did I mention I was drinking? I did?


I posed once again with my lovliest smile and was kissed again my Jay...with an overwhelming amount of tongue and wetness. Everybody laughed their asses off. It was, as I had not suspected, a setup. I did mention I had been drinking, right?

I did my best to keep my lovely smile on my face and not freak out like Lucy when Snoopy would kiss her. For hours after the smooch sneak attack, I visualized Jay's tongue as something akin to the giant squid I had recently seen on the National Geographic Channel.

I walked back over to my friend, Brent, and said, "I just got French kissed by Jay. It was very wet. They took a picture. Now, I'm going to have to pay Luke for that picture. I need to wipe my face. They took a picture. There's a picture."

"Don't worry," Brent said. "The picture will only cost you about two bucks."

"Yeah." I said.

"Of course, the negative is probably going to cost about fifty."

(*) The photographer is our classmate Luke who takes pictures at clubs and sells them back to us. Clever bastard.

What will we drink?!

Our office doesn't have water coolers, but we are furnished free bottled water. The refrigerator has a filter on it and so does the sink. My water pitcher at home also has a filter.

Occasionally, we run out of bottled water at work which was a temporary cause for alarm recently. I say temporary, because as Carly and I were wondering what we were going to drink since we were out of bottled water, we remembered that the sink had a water filter.

Then, we started talking about how spoiled we've become water-wise. We pondered how much salty, possibly polluted beach water and urine tainted swimming pool water we've swallowed in our lives, mostly unintentionally.

We reminisced about hot summer days drinking water out of the water hose, after it had been lying in the grass among the creepy crawlies. We also found that we shared a favorite childhood bath time activity...sucking on the wet washcloth.

Gosh. I haven't done that in weeks.

Coach

Vanessa, my sister Bonnie, me and Christel

A few months ago, I joined a "social networking site" set up for all alumni from my high school. My siblings and I attended Thomas Jefferson in Port Arthur from the fall of 1970 when I entered as a freshman until the spring of 1980 when my youngest sister graduated.

Having spent our whole lives in Port Arthur and, in fact, in the same neighborhood and in the same house, the number of great friends as well as casual acquaintances my siblings and I know from high school is huge. (Each of our graduating classes had several hundred people in them.)

Last night, as a result of the website and the hard work of some of our classmates, we had a "gathering" of several hundred people at a local club. Seeing people I hadn't seen in over 30 years who I used to see every day of my life was mind boggling. Add a few beers and the overall affect was surreal.

Early in the evening, a guy who used to be a coach when we were in high school came over to our table. My sister Terry told him who we were and that he had coached our brother. He said he remembered Stuart and said hello to everybody at the table. I wasn't really paying attention because I was talking to somebody else when he walked to my side of the table, looked at me and said, "I remember you."

Being the least athletic of my siblings and the keeper of the lowest profile of the family, I was stunned. My mind began to spin wondering what I had done in high school that would cause a coach to remember me. In the split second between his remark and my response, I tried to pull memories from the deep dark recesses of the 1974 portion of my brain storage unit and came up with zilch.

Had I unknowingly walked out of the restroom sometime in 1973 with my mini-skirt tucked in my pantyhose? Had I tripped down the stairs in my platform shoes one sunny afternoon in 1974 and landed at his feet and blocked it from my memory? Did I run over his foot in driver's ed the summer of 1972 and bury it in my subconscious?

I looked up at him with saucer eyes, fearing his answer, and helplessly asked, "What? No, way. Why? Wait. What? You do?"

He sheepishly said, "No. I just didn't know what else to say."

Attending a reunion advice:
"I remember you" isn't a good opening line unless you have something to follow it up with.

As God is My Witness...

The absolutely, positively best sitcom Thanksgiving episode ever. HAPPY THANKSGIVING, everybody!!!

Watch the whole episode here. There's a six second ad at the beginning, so I'm pretty sure it's legal. You should all make watching this classic episode part of your Thanksgiving tradition. Enjoy!

Thomas Jefferson High School Last Homecoming Video

This is my high school. I'm still trying to find out how to get a copy of the whole video. If any alumni want a copy, I'll let you know what I find out.


Find more videos like this on TJHS - Yellow Jackets Alumni

While I'm Obsessing Over Hurricane Ike...

...here's a little something to keep you busy.

Click here.

Thank You, Captain Kangaroo