Good Morning All & Happy Good Friday!
On this day we remember the sacrifice that the Son of God (and “Son of Man”) made on the cross at Calvary for each and every one of us. I’m always blown away with the thought that even if I was the only person on the face of the Earth, He would still have done what He did that first “Good Friday.” Isn’t it wonderful that we have a Creator who loves us so much that He would give His only begotten Son that all who believe in Him might be forgiven and have eternal life. What a promise and what an act of supreme love! Happy Easter upcoming to you and your loved ones!
Speaking of celebrations and thankfulness for life itself, Happy Birthday wishes go to church friend, wife of John, mother, accounting office manager & lover of souls extraordinaire, Kristin, who celebrates her birthday today. Here’s to you! Also, let me be one of the first to wish long-time friend and middle school teacher extraordinaire, Debi; husband, father, bass player, childhood friend and all-around outstanding human being, Tim; and financial wizard, hiker and husband, father & grandfather extraordinaire, Dan; who all celebrate their birthdays tomorrow, April 3rd. Here’s to all of you on your special day of celebration! Enjoy!
Happy Birthday to one of my very favorite tennis players, David Ferrer of Spain, who celebrates his 39th birthday today! He plays tennis with lots of passion and panache. It’s always fun to watch him fly across the court. He leaves everything out there everytime he plays. He gives it his all… Here’s to him on his special day of celebration!
Here’s another excerpt from my Dad’s oral interview as part of the Washington State World War II History Project:
“Question: So you went through Iwo and everything wearing an 8 1/2 (shoe)?
Answer: Yeah.
Question: When you should be wearing a 10?
Answer: Ten and a half. Yeah.
Question: It would have made the war a lot easier, I think.
Answer: Well, some people—that’s what I said when things get tough with me and I can’t figure something out or have done something that doesn’t make sense, then I always revert to what I always say, you have to understand, I’m just a slow learner, that’s it. So, well you didn’t complain in the Corps. I mean you just, I mean you could complain, after you, in awhile, you learned the ropes a lot, but it never occurred to me that—that I was wearing—that was what the problem. It just didn’t occur. So, but boot camp was interesting because they would do things such as—we were out bayonet practicing one day, and in the Marine Corps recruiting depot and boot camp there, thrusts somewhat on the beach—beach of the harbor of San Diego. So it was about, it much have been 500 yards down to the water, I don’t know, I can’t recall now. And I’m out there, you know, we’re trying to learn how to parry and thrust with your rifle and a bayonet. That was the practice of the day, whatever we’re doing. He (the drill instructor) says “Newbold,” he’d do this to everybody, a lot of wet sand, “take off at high port.” That’s what they—that’s how they talk. So, high port. So I take off at high port, go down where the water is, grab a hand of wet sand and run like crazy to get back to him. I hand him the sand, he goes, “too dry.” “Take off at high port.” Well, I got to tell you, I got every ounce—I mean I burned every ounce of energy I had to get there, get that wet sand and get back up there, because I don’t think I could have gone the third time without falling over. He looked at it and he said, “Well, not too good but go ahead, finish the drill.” Well, there’s a reason, and there was one tough time that I remember. There was one kid kept getting in a lot of trouble. Really seemed to get in a pickle or get in a mess, you know, and he was—he did something, and finally the drill instructor (DI) said “come over to my tent.” This was after—after—after we’d eaten, in the morning. So he was going to chew this kid out, you know. And he went over to the drill instructor’s tent. Well, the drill instructor usually had an assistant, so there was at least, usually two, two drill instructors to a platoon, and sometimes they had three, depending. Depending on, I guess, their manpower supply. I can remember they took him over in the tent of the drill instructor which set apart a little bit. He had some wooden things, what do you call it, a hanger, he can hang his blouse, you know, and his trousers on and what not. Now we didn’t have that. We just rolled ours up, you know, put them in a sea bag. But he had this kid and so—and also the DI also had a foot locker. Usually a wooden to metal footlocker. He was allowed to keep his goodies in. So he has the kid stand on the edge of that and has this—the instrument that he hung his blouses on, you know, a hanger, stand, and hooked his nose over this, and made him lean at an angle into this and (of) course when the guy came back his nose was torn loose, (gestures) you know. So pretty soon the DI—the other DI walked over to him. Told him, “you go down to sick bay, get that fixed, you know. Well, I don’t think they really wanted to—whoever was running the brigade, I mean the commander of that particular group of platoons, may or may not have (inaudible) but they covered for each other a lot. They were—but they expect you to be tough enough to take it, see, this is—and when they said move, they mean move now, and I mean on the run. And all of that, was to teach you that when you’re in combat, if you ever got there, was that when they say move out or they signal you go this way, you go that way and you do it now. In other words, it’s—I wouldn’t say blind obedience, but it was trained that you would do what you’re asked to do when you’re asked to do (it) because the lives of others and obtaining the objective depended on this type of teamwork action, not somebody turning around say why me, you know. Or do we have to go? (laughs). And so I think that’s one of the reasons, among others, that the Marine Corps built pretty effective combat teams. All in all…”
—Donald (Don) M. Newbold, interview with Karl Schmidt of Bristol Productions as part of the Washington State World War II Oral History Project
Speaking of good reads, I’ve been enjoying Charlie Mackesy’s book “The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse,” a book given to us from our dear friends the Bakers. You’ll want to get a copy and read it again…and again…and again. Here’s an excerpt:
“Do you have a favorite saying?” asked the boy.
“Yes” said the mole.
“What is it?”
“If at first you don’t succeed, have some cake.”
“I see, does it work?”
“Every time.”
Well, I came across another one of my 1964 “Outer Limits” collectible cards (Card #19)…this one is a sequel to Card #18 that talked about the “Invasion Of The Sea Beast.” This card is entitled “Sea Beast Strikes.” The narrative on the back of the card reads like this:
“A U.S. plane flies over a small island in the Pacific after receiving reports of giant lizards coming out of the ocean. The pilot circles the island without seeing anything amiss. Just as he is about to head the plane back to its ship, the pilot spots a huge, dark shadow creeping along the beach. Swooping low, the U.S. flyer is stunned at what he sees—a giant lizard-like beast was crawling along the sand!…(to be continued on Card #20, except I don’t have Cards #20 & #21 in my collection! Oh well, we’ll just have to use our imaginations!).
Here is the word definition for the day:
“Majuscule”: “The capital or upper case letter of a word.” I never knew there was actually a word that describes a capital letter…how about that!
Here’s the trivia question for the day, which is quite appropriate since it’s about Eggs Benedict, one of the most popular features of an Easter Brunch, don’t you think?
Q: Where did the popular brunch dish “Eggs Benedict” get its name…Pope Benedict XVI?…A restaurant goer?…Actor Benedict Cumberbatch?…or General Benedict Arnold?
A: While it’s up for debate which chef invented the dish, this tasty breakfast dish was created in Manhattan during the late 1800s. Both competing theories posit the dish was named after a particular restaurant goer. One story is that chef Charles Ranhofer of Delmonico’s Restaurant made it for a regular, Mrs. LeGrand Benedict. The other theory is that it was invented in 1894 at the Waldorf Hotel for a hungover gentleman named, you guessed it, Lemuel Benedict.”
Speaking of trivia, here’s a trivia fact for the day:
The first competition in the world’s first Olympic games, 776 B.C., was a foot race. The participants were all males, and ran in the nude. (I’ll bet they ran pretty fast, don’t you think?)
Here are some thoughts for the day, courtesy of tennis great David Ferrer of Spain:
“You can write “little beast” if you want, but my name is David Ferrer.”
“I always try and do my best and put out the best and find the best in me, as well. But I’m not thinking about it beforehand.”
“Tennis doesn’t owe me anything. Tennis is one of the fairest sports. It’s given me so many extraordinary feelings.”
Here’s to a great Friday and Easter weekend everyone and don’t forget…GO ZAGS! On to the National Championship and a perfect season! Go Drew Timme…Go Aaron Cook….and all of the ZAGS!
Press on,
Papa ‘a (Dad, Uncle Mark, Mark, etc.)