TV

One appliance in our household had the curious and dichotomous title of least functioning (saying something in our trailer) and most beloved: the TV.

We got three channels. Kinda. We just had snapped off rabbit ears because cable didn't come our to where we were from (not that the rents would have shelled out the cash to waste even more of our time). Getting the receiver to work involved shoving pillows back by the antennae (whether to hold them in place or as a dielectric, I don't know) and my personal favorite, having someone stand in the middle of the room. I don't know why this helped. But it did. Sometimes we'd stack pillows on a chair to try to simulate a person, which was less effective. Mom's sewing machine also sent the poor contraption into fits. I have studied physics and engineering for almost four years now. I have no idea how any of this works.

Really, the TV was meant for one thing, and one thing only (besides watching Masters of the Universe): Saturday morning cartoons. Nothing has ever gotten me out of bed so early quite as well as SMCs; I even got up hours before in anticipation sometimes. The first kid up would always turn on the TV, but not before placing our massive floor pillow (an entry in itself) over the speaker while we had to pound on the metal buttons to quite the static before we got it to the right channel so mom and dad wouldn't wake up and tell us to go to back to bed. X-men, Spiderman, Batman, Animaniacs: we all had our different favorites, and there were some we all loved (The Tick!!!!).

Other fun times with the TV were Saturday nights when we all rushed through showers to miss as little of Star Trek or Walker: Texas Ranger as possible.

We also just watched a lot of mindless TV, Fresh Prince and Home Improvement. We absorbed the stuff like sponges. I think in response to that, I now rarely watch TV.

Just when the poor contraption seemed to be at its nadir, Tracy and I discovered the wonders of running a cow magnet over the screen. The bizarrely warping colors were fascinating, much more so than reruns of Ghostwriter. However, each time we moved the magnet close, a little more of the color change became permanent, and pretty soon we had an all green TV. It eventually returned mostly to normal, except for a big green patch in the corner. Ahh, good times.

Any other thoughts on that wonderful hunk of scrap?

The Hills

The uninitiated would have hard time identifying any "hills" in a 20 miles radius of our house, but we know better. Once when the ditches were being re-dug Dad decided to ask them for some of the leftover dirt so we could level out the backyard (AKA The Back 40). Ha. Haha. We've since lost3 British exploration expeditions to the maw that was The Back 40, but the dirt remained in two rows of mounds stretching perhaps half an acre. Texan gumbo is Nature's most perfect plaything, luckily, and we put these "hills" to ready use. I'll only recount a few of the more colorful uses here.

Typically they remained overgrown pretty badly, which was ideal. First they served as bike and running trails. Then we started to dig massive holes in some of the larger ones, making a fort. Add water via hose, and this fort becomes a gumbo quarry, perfect for preparing ammunition in a mud war. Don't add water, and they still made perfect quarries for mud wars, but of a more violent and painful sort (I got beaned behind the ear onetime so bad it's still a memory. Brian threw it. He was expectedly impenitent. War is war, eh?). One of may favorite times was when we made the valleys between the hills into houses. Using sturdy dried out bloodweed stabbed into the ground around a perimeter and balanced over the top, we could use grass clippings and such to thatch a roof. These houses rarely survived a mildly windy night. The hills even had their own form of currency, red rocks being the standard. Luckily our driveway (made with loose river bed rocks) was an ideal source of the bullion. I think we even planted watermelons back in those hills one time.

We'd spend hours in those hills, sometimes so busy our parents must have wondered why such ingenuity and effort couldn't be expended on more useful chores, and sometimes just laying on the hard packed trail reading. Any more memories from the hills? I'm sure Brian has some horror story about having to mow them.

not gumbo...lava

anybody remember treating the floor like lava and seeing where we could get to without touching the ground. climbing up the narrow hallway was the funnest for me. i still remember all the shampoo.

Possible Re-hash

Maybe this has been discussed before, but I really used to enjoy the cropdusters. Not everybody gets an aerobatics show over their backyard every Saturday at way-too-early a.m. I remember when they would make the aluminum panels on our roof rattle as they buzzed the trailer on their way under the powerlines barely more than 200 feet from my bed. I remember seeing them clearly and them waving as they pulled up after their insane death-defying acts of fertilization and pest slaughter. Once, there was a loud cracking sound, and a cardboard square with a 12' white streamer fluttered down as the plane passed overhead. Perhaps it was there on the off-chance the commies invaded and locked on as he sprayed our yard with DDT - he had his chaff READY. At any rate, it made my day.

It was a sad day indeed when they stopped flying under the lines - opting (I'm sure out of orders) to fly over the lines - leaving 2 or 3 passes to be done parallel to the powerlines. It was too cool - and I wonder why my kids haven't gotten into airplanes - they don't get the airshow!

Warning: Not a happy memory

I wonder how many of you remember this. When I was twelve Mom received an anonymous phone call from someone who said, "I am going to rape and kill your daughter." Not knowing about the phone call, I was heading out to play outside when Mom told me I couldn't. I asked why and Mom hemmed and hawed and finally told me she'd gotten a phone call from someone who said he wanted to hurt me. It wasn't until I overheard her talking to Dad that I found out exactly what the person had said. Mom and Dad called the police who came over and asked questions. We never found out who had made the call. I think Mom and Dad assumed it was a prank call. I was scared out of my mind though. I had nightmares for a long time after that. One nice thing I can remember about the whole thing . . . Craig following me around outside with a big stick, protecting me.

Hey, look over there!

So, despite her docile surface, Mom was always the most crafty of us all. Her craftiness was primarily funneled into a single day, April Fool's Day. She seemed to slam us every year. One year she had us get up before the crack of dawn scanning the horizon on our rickety porch for a re-entering space shuttle. Dad put his foot down after eating a sandwich with a slice of cheese complete with wrapper (this only allowed her to exert further efforts toward duping her children). We occasionally retaliated, but after raising us all it was difficult to pull the wool over her eyes.

Once, after my mission, Mom invited me to share some experiences with her quilting group. The food was excellent, deviled eggs and the kind of spinach dip that everyone seems to think they're having for the first time every time they eat it. Looking for a quick exit, I divert the group's attention with a classic, "But have you seen that over there?" and made off with two handfuls of deviled eggs. Mom of course didn't buy it for a moment, never turned her eyes and just started laughing.

G-ma Oppelt and Color scheming

we all know about mom's mom's recent taking to knitting things for all of us. most of you get normal colors no matter how silly the item. not true for me. supposedly i told her when i was young that i liked bright colors and 15 years later, she still takes that to heart. however, my presents lead every Rugglet to the question, "how bright is too much?". i used to think that egg yolk yellow slippers or a destructicon themed hat were bad things. not today. you go outside wearing those to check your mail, every girl you see will talk to you. so i guess I'm trying to say, "thanks Grandma (even if you are trying to make me look silly on purpose) and does anyone have any good stories about her presents i don't know about?"