It turns out Katie lost her dog tags on mother’s day weekend. Perhaps Clyde was to blame because they played so hard together.

Both Clyde and Charlie Fishback wore tags ordered over the internet from BoomerangTags.com. I had a very hard time remembering or finding this website when ordering for Clyde, so I’m writing in down here for posteritiy.

This is a great example of internet ecommerce. You can tell the owners are dedicated to a quality product, provide you a lot of extra information if you want it, and they can mail you the product in a regular envelope.

Despite this caution, I ordered the medium brass tag for Clyde. I put his name, our name, and phone on one side, and address on the other side. (If he had had his url at the time, I would have put that.) The hole is reinforced, and the engraving is deep with some kind of color embedded in the grooves. I recommend putting a piece of leather between the tag and the aluminum “government” tag to help keep the two metal tags from wearing on each other.

Kelly had a leading role in the 5th grade musical performance, I Need A Vacation. She played the mother in a scene about a family driving across country to see the sites.

Kathy was able to attend the morning show, and DC, MCC, and I attended the evening show. Kelly got up on stage for a spontaneous solo after the show was over….

She was then joined on stage by her brother and sister for a trio performance.

Back stage, Kelly rests in Mrs. Jones’ director’s chair..

Kathy had a big mother’s day weekend. (Gramalie and Grandad were on Duck Island, NC.) I picked up Nicole after finals to stay for the weekend. Friday night we went to watch Kelly and Mary Claire perform in the children’s choir.

On Saturday we took Clyde over to Ted’s house where Katie and Cleo welcomed their cousin with a lot of fun and play. Susan, Beacon, and Bell joined us later for a walk down to the pond. All the dogs got in the water, with Katie and Clyde doing the most swimming. Danny took Clyde for a run along the shoreline with an extendable leash. Clyde launched himself into the water trying to swim for some Candadian geese. Kathy and all of us had a great laugh at that sight.

The next morning, Kelly and Mary Claire got up to fix Kathy breakfast in bed. We went to morning mass for a repeat performance of the children’s choir. Kathy was in tears when the girls sang the song about biblical mothers Jacobed, Hannah, and Mary and then Ava Maria.

After mass, we went flower shopping. Kathy placed all of her new flowers, bushes, and bog plants around the yard. While she and Danny drove Nicole back to Athens, Kelly, Mary Claire, and I planted the flowers. Everything was in place for her return home inspection.

April 4th vs. Berkmar

JV wins by identical score as last night – this time they hit the ball instead of getting hit.?? Tristan Toorie (2B, 1B, 1B) and Kevin Cordell (3B, 1B, 1B) would get three hits apiece while Matt Covington would collect two.’ TJ Pilla, Rob Holden, Ross Walker, Chris Murray, Josh Erisman, and Bradley Hughes all added one hit each.

Walker and Cordell had three RBI’s, Toorie two and Pilla, Holden, Murray, Erisman, and Hughes would have one each.

Danny Cashel pitched the second strong game in a row for the Broncos with a complete game two hitter.?? Cashel pitched 5 innings, gave up only 2 hits, 4 walks and struck out 3.?? He was helped with some strong defense including a 5-4-3 double play and a runner being thrown out at the plate.’

Kathy took Danny up for his first game last night. I carpooled the girls to Sunday school (on Wednesday night) and watched the war. None of us knew he was going to play, but after a terrible third and fourth inning of walks and mistakes by three of the pitchers, the coach called in “Cash.”

He inherited one man out, two strikes, and one man on base. Over the next two innings, he quickly delivered two strike outs, two pick offs, and one fantastic relay at first, and the game was over! Danny says it was the most fun he had in two innings in all of high school. Good thing, because all of the varsity coaches were in attendance.

Zero earned run average!

Continue reading →

Mary Claire took a look at this picture and said, “Clyde looks like that cartoon dog with the big nose.” “Do you mean, Snoopy?” I asked. “Yes!” she laughed repeating how he looked just like Snoopy.

[An article written for the Atlanta Macintosh Users Group newsletter. 2/4/1992.]

MY MOTHER

THE MAC

Of family, friends

and their Macs

by Jeb Cashel

My mother has been a calligraphist for many years. She is so devoted to the profession that her license plate reads “CALLIG.” I often worry that it calls to mind Caligula more quickly than Calligraphy.

In 1987, Mom bought a Macintosh. This was an extraordinary event in the world of computing. (But typical in the world of Macintosh.) Mom had never touched a computer in her life. Within a few months she was publishing the newsletter for the local calligraphy group, Friends of the Alphabet. Guy Kawasaki could have been no more proud than I.

Of course, it was very controversial. Postscript fonts are the unworthy enemy to the artisans of hand-lettering… in a war fought with mouse pitted against pen, with ink pitted against toner. The Friends of the Alphabet scoffed at the mathematical precision of scalable fonts.

Such precision leaves no room for subtle fluctuations in style or mood.

So the postscript wizards returned fire with kerning, bending, and even random bits of built-in imperfection. Fonts! Fonts! Hundreds of fonts! The hoarders of type rejoiced.

Mom ignored the war, and cranked out one of the finest calligraphic newsletters in the country. You don’t hand-letter a thousand word newsletter with a two-day deadline.

The simple Times or Helvetica text was graced with grand hand-lettered headlines. Articles were often introduced with an elaborate first letter, reminiscent of those that would begin some monk of old’s calligraphied passage of scripture.

In her own way, Mom brought together the powers of wizards and artists.

Epilogue: Within a year of Mom’s Mac purchase, she was elected president of The Friends of the Alphabet.

Kathy’s Peace Lilly bloomed for the first time this year. The white flower shoots out of the leaves and has one large, white leaf. At the center is a hard white finger with little nubs.

Kelly was investigating these little nubs and said: “Teeth!”

Nicole and I went to the library and then to Home Depot. I wanted to get materials to make a coat rack to hang in the pantry and a second rod to put in Danny and Kelly’s closet.

The night before we had all gone to the Meadows for a Tiger Cub meeting to pick up the pinewood derby kit for Danny. After finding everything, I told Nicole we needed to find sandpaper to work on Danny’s car. We looked up and down a few aisles when Nicole said, “Maybe you can get one of the pieces off the roof.”

“Do you think the roof is made of sandpaper?” I asked her.

“Yes,” she replied, surprised to hear that it might not be.

I agreed that shingles looked like sandpaper, and went on to give a quick shingle lesson. I wonder if Carol thinks her roof is made of sandpaper.

Girls should clean out the gutters just like boys.