There is no ocean in Fort Worth Texas

To get a picture of me into my blog profile, I first have to post it to my blog. They make this high tech stuff so difficult to get along with. So here I am. I flagrantly stole it (the photo) from Cathy's blog. If the Band Nerd had done it, I would have to call it fragrantly rather than flagrantly, and then he would have given me the Axe for it. It struck me (the photo, not the Axe), as Cathy said, as just being me. Take note: At least it is not in the obituaries, which, by the way, I do have to check regularly to make sure I am not in them.



So, leaving the discussion of the great weekend that was had by all in my family to be described by my more glib and jabber-jawed children, I proceed with just a modicum of family history this time.

There being no ocean in Fort Worth, Texas, we will journey to the Atlantic Ocean.

In 1989 I did a watercolor for Mom of a fishing boat aground at low tide in Seal Cove on Grand Manan Island in New Brunswick, where her father was born. I named the boat Claire, Mom’s middle name. She, MommyMooCow, Hi Tech Honey, West Texas Cheers and I visted there in 1983. And boy, are there stories to tell from that trip. But that will be for another post.

The painting is below. Following it are three shots I found on the web of the same place from different angles, the first one at low tide, roughly from the same spot as where I took the picture I did the painting from. The boat would have been to the right of the old pier in the center of the first photo. The second two photos show buildings just across the narrow channel from where the painting was made, one at low tide and the other at high tide. Sounds like an advertisement for laundry detergent, doesn't it? Anyway, Grand Manan is at the mouth of the Bay of Fundy on Canada's rugged East Coast, where the highest tidal bores in the world can be found.

And so as not to bore you further with this little maritime history and geography lesson, just enjoy these and the rest of the pictures where key part of our family history happened. All are from Grand Manan Island, New Brunswick, Canada.

So I have this beautiful place on the Atlantic Ocean as part of my heritage, and I spent 13 years of my life about 2 miles from the Pacific Ocean, and I end up in Fort Worth Texas, 1500 miles from either ocean. What a life!

All pictures except the one of me and the painting came from www.flickr.com and were shot by others, not me.

This is the painting I did in 1989.






Some other neat Pictures of Grand Manan Island. Nice place for a visit.

Not funny but at least interesting

Above: Longhouses in Ravno Selo, Vojvodina, Serbia.

This village was called Schowe when it was occupied

by my German ancestors from 1785 - 1939. These

longhouses were built very near to 1800 and have

been continuously occupied since that time.

I shot this photograph in November, 2006.

Though I cannot even begin to compete with the wry humor of my children, at least now with my own blog I can defend myself from spurious posts and their not so cleverly hidden attempts to paint me as an nothing more than an eccentric octogenerian.

But in keeping with my DiscoveryChannelesqueand professorial nature, I publish a few things here that are interesting to me and have been important parts of my life and which have nothing to do with PVC pipe.

Famous People I have met and talked to one on one:

1962 Southern Californina children's show host Engineer Bill -- at Pacific Ocean Park in Santa Monica. CA- On the green light you go and on the red light you stop, because no engineer would ever run a red light.

1964 or 1965 -- Walt Disney at Disneyland in California.

1965 Academy Award winning composer Georg Stolle - My great Aunt Katherine was his housekeeper, and I got to meet him and hold one of his Oscars at his home in Benedict Canyon, CA.

1966 US President Ronald Reagan in Santa Monica, CA - I was on his campaign staff when he ran for Governor of California.

1966 Actor Sebastian Cabot - he sat next to me in the audience for a marionette show.

1967 NBA Star Kareem Abdul Jabbar - I ran into him on the floor at Pauley Pavillion at UCLA in Los Angeles when he was Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor. I asked him what his shoe size was, and he told me 17 1/2

1971 LDS First Presidency Counselor N. Eldon Tanner - I met him at the Denver Stapleton airport on my way to serve as a missionary in Peru.

1972 LDS President Gordon B Hinckley - I was interviewed by him in Lima while on my mission. He was a member of the quourm of the 12 Apostles at the time.

1974 LDS President Spencer W. Kimball I met him in the Church Office Building Parking Lot.

1975 Actor Charleton Heston - I asked him an acting question on a radio call in talk show.

1977 LDS Apostle Neal A. Maxwell - he married us in the Provo LDS temple and we got to have an interview with him before we got married.

1978 LDS Apostle Dallin H Oaks. He was then President of Brigham Young University. I met him in the locker room at the Smith Field House.

1989 Actor Patrick Duffy (he played Bobby Ewing on the TV show Dallas) at the Sheraton Hotel in Dallas.

1996 World's richest man Bill Gates at a reception for Microsoft employees in Irving, TX.

Famous people I have seen up close but did not get a chance to talk to:

1963 - Sandy Koufax pitches a no-hitter against the San Francisco Giants. We were in Dodger stadium that night, about 12 rows up behind the third base dugout. Koufax pitched a perfect game until the 9th inning when he walked a batter.

1960's between 1964 and 1967: Composers Alfred Newman (How the West Was Won, Airport) and Ferde Grofe (Grand Canyon Suite, Mississippi Suite). I worked with and was directed by these composers as a junior high school choir member at programs in the Santa Monica, CA Civic Auditorium called Stairway to the Stars. Alfred Newman won 9 Academy Awards and was nominated for them 45 times.

1967 The Smothers Brothers at a concert at a theatre i n the round somewhere in the San Fernando Valley in California. Seats in the third row.

1976 Singer John Denver, at a concert in Salt Lake City. I had front row seats.

1983 - Prince Charles and Princess Diana in St Andrews, New Brunswick, Canada. We were about 10 feet away from their car.

2000 - French President Jacques Chirac - we just happened to be passing by the Elysee Palace in Paris when his car exited the building with him in it. We we were about 20 feet away from him.