Walking (some got to ride) the Parade

It was hard to believe that Thursday of this week was the day for this town's Memorial Day Parade. It actually has to do with the Future Farmers of America and is held in the early evening on the Thursday prior to Memorial Day each year. This year was special for us -- for a lot of reasons. One, we have moved and are now close enough to walk to the parade route and not have to search for parking -- as a matter of fact there were cars actually parked near our house to attend the parade and the fair following the parade.

It all began with an invitation for Gail to ride the Dry Creek Vineyard float (their first for this event) in recognition of the 40 year anniversary of the founding of that winery. Gail has been associated with the winery all these years. I dropped Gail off as close to the staging area as possible and then Dino and I drove back home and walked to the staging area to catch up with them. It turned out that we did not have to hurry as it was a while before their float joined the parade -- in the meantime I snapped some of the above photos.

I (Dino and I) walked beside their float and in front of and behind the float during the route. The route was lined with spectators the whole way -- we had to watch carefully where we stepped as we were not too far behind the equestrian unit pictured above . . . all in all Dino and I walked 2.3 miles that evening -- I did not really feel the impact until some time later during my sleeping hours and the next morning . . .

The event was a lot of fun and there really is something for almost everyone to enjoy. When the parade concludes a lot of the spectators wander over to the football/baseball fields where booths and other attractions have been set up for eating and playing. The next two days there are auctions and animal judging. Along the route I spotted the above beautiful auto -- I am not sure what make or year that it is -- only that it probably looks "better" than new.

The theme for DCV was nautical and in keeping with that the riders all wore nautical type dress and there was a "pirate band" playing along the way -- very impressive and enjoyable. The whole event made it special for us.

Resting Up for the Events


Actually I would have rested more if I had realized that I was going to walk that much. But during this week I did do a lot of indexing for the 1940 Census. The indexing is "coming along" nicely -- almost about halfway completed. I have indexed some census pages in almost every state. Soon everyone will be able to search for their relatives effortlessly.

I do have to say though that if good penmanship had been a requirement back in 1940 we might be much further along . . . it is really a shame that some folks are going to NOT be able to easily find their relatives because of horrible handwriting. This week I had two census pages scribbled by morons people who must have been in a big hurry or who did not sit down to write or for whatever reason did not make it clear the names that they were enumerating.  I can only hope that that was not the case for the census takers talking to my (and your) folks . . .

Click on the above and you can see a little of what I refer to -- very tough to decipher writing -- most of it I could make good guesses at, but some were impossible . . . above too you can see the twenty states that are now completely indexed. There is still the need for volunteers to help out -- I do the indexing for Family Search and their program is excellent -- if you have some time -- check it out . . .

Around the House Today


Spring is here and this morning I took a few snaps of the blooms of the season. Dino always looks forlorn as he peers out of the window wondering why he is not out there with me . . .

The blooms do come with a cost -- we noticed a bit of a change in our water bill this month even though we had quite a bit of rain -- the pool may have something to do with it too . . .

Dino's Week


Dino turned eight months old this week and he tipped the scales at over 70 pounds. Our GDB training this week involved a visit to downtown historic Petaluma. All the younger puppies and their trainers met in front of the theater in Petaluma and then did some training exercises and then walked throughout the area. We walked along the waterfront on wooden railroad ties and across a bridge and up and down stairways. The pups are exposed to as many different surfaces as possible and like this trip the youngest pups are put in between two older pups so that can see how the older puppies handle things . . .

Dino took the training is stride and the whole adventure was enjoyed by all -- even in the windy cool . . .


The Search Goes On


One of the nice things about genealogy is that "it is never over" until it is over . . . my search for information about my family continues and the search for Gail's family as well.  In the 1940 Census, we did not see my father -- we saw my Mother and Brother and Sister -- but not my father. The 10 year period from 1930 to 1940 is unclear to me. In the 1930 Census my father was a soldier stationed at Fort Sheridan near Chicago.

We believe he left the Army shortly after that census to get married on 14 Jan 1931. In the following picture we see my dad and mom standing in front of Walter Reed Hospital in Washington, DC on 15 April 1932.
My brother recently gave me that photo and I was able to remove the black paper from the back to see the date written clearly in my Mother's distinctive handwriting.

Now one of the other pictures shows my Father in the 26th  Army Infantry Unit in Plattsburg, New York, for the period of 1932 -- 1933 (top left in the photo). We know that he was in Walter Reed because of an injury suffered at some point in his military service (all peace time service) but we are unclear as to many of the circumstances of his military experience -- this is due a great deal to the fact that most of his records were burnt along with the records of millions of other servicemen in the St Louis fire several decades ago . . .
We will continue to try to piece together his military records -- I know he served in Hawaii at some point and supposedly along the US / Mexico border as well . . .

Family Dinner


This week too, we picked my brother and his wife up from the airport in Santa Rosa after they visited their kids and grand kids in Portland . . . for that they invited us over for dinner last night. We got what we feel is the better end of the deal -- we did not have to cook dinner and they served us a delicious chicken dinner, roasted potatoes with onions and fresh carrots not to mention a very tasty dessert of ice cream, strawberries and very thin cookies -- we thoroughly enjoyed it AND we will have our traditional burgers on Sunday night . . .

Even Dino enjoyed the visit -- though he got his regular food when we returned home . . .

Lastly -- It is Memorial Week-End


We feel as though we have already celebrated Memorial Day, but it is actually tomorrow -- and so that is a good thing. Even though I don't have the day off as such because I am "off" every day, I'll have the sense of a holiday and especially while driving throughout the town and up (and down) our street.

Some of the above flags are flying in our neighborhood and some are flags spotted in photos of some of the National Cemeteries across the country. It does remind one of the significance of this day. Have a good Memorial Day and we'll see you all in a few . . .