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I had wondered sometimes, I knew that there was a lot of, a lot of effort and a lot of work went into a lot of that, and I just wondered if, if it lasted, and if it took, you know, like, uh, Uh-huh Yeah, I've, you know, some of the programs I would have concern about like, um, the language teaching, you know, I mean, why should we push English, Uh-huh and a lot of people were down there teaching English and when they talked about Hungary or someplace, one of the eastern law countries requesting Peace Corps to teach language, you know, to me that's a little bit marginal. I did teach economics at the university one night a week, and the textbook was in English, but basically I taught it in Spanish, because, I mean, I really didn't see the point in their knowing stuff rotely and writing it on a test. Oh. Yeah, my brother-in-law teaches at, uh, Northern Illinois University and they were in China, here a couple of years ago, and he was over there at, uh, the University of Shah and, and teaching ...
So, uh, describe your family budget. Well, I've, uh, for a lot of years I, I've pretty much flied without one, and, uh, just recently, uh, we, we set up a budget, and, and we're trying to stick to it. We just bought a new house. So we've got everything, you know, pretty much we know what our, uh, our fixed expenses are per month, and then we've got some ones that are variable, that pretty much stay within a certain range, and then, uh, then there's the ones that you never know anything about, and that's, that's the food Well, yeah, and to some extent, utilities, I imagine. well, the utilities are pretty much, you can pretty much figure what they're going to be, and one of the nice things here is the electric company has a plan where they'll average them out for you. They have that to some extent here, but it's not quite as good. Uh-huh. And, uh, transportation expenses, I guess you own a car. Yes
sir. And you know how much you're going to drive every week? Well, I used to, um, I used to know, uh, fairly close to exactly how many miles I drove, because I, I was very convenient, I lived, uh, nine tenths of a mile from work. Huh. So, so, it was, you know, two miles a day to and from work. So it kind of cut my transportation costs a lot. But now I've just bought a new house, and I'm a half hour, and so my transportation costs have gone up by, uh, five times Yeah, I understand that. We, we have a real similar situation. Ours, uh, have quintupled, at least. So there is a real family budget. Yeah, pretty much, um. The problem is there never seems to be enough money. I have three children, and it seems like the more money you make, the more money you have, the more things that they seem to need, and, uh, of course, nothing ever goes down,
I mean, uh, I remember, I have five children total. I have three left in the house. Yeah. And I can remember years ago, when school would start, and I'd go buy all five kids, you know, shoes, and I could get out of the, out of the shoe store without spending more than thirty-five dollars. Nowadays, thirty-five dollars buys about one pair of shoes If you're lucky. yeah, so I mean things have just really gone out of sight in the last, uh, I guess about the last ten years. Exempt or nonexempt. I'm exempt. Wow, must be nice. Part of the high price spread. Uh, no, well, we don't, we do, but we don't have a family budget. We have the fixed things we have to pay.
Uh-huh. And we have the things that are extras. But it seems that by and large the extras just don't exist. Yeah. And, well, you know, the auto budget, car payment sucks a hell of a lot of it dry. Uh-huh. And insurance, is insurance bad there? Um, I've got, uh, two older cars. There both, one's a seventy-seven and one's a seventy-eight. Well, we've got one eighty-nine. And my insurance is about, it was running about four hundred dollars a year. But when I moved to the new town I live in, because it's a different county, which has less crime, and, uh, less, you know, less highways and so it's a cheaper place to live, as far as the insurance company's concerned, so my, my, I think my insurance dropped about sixty dollars a year. Wow.
That's not bad, four hundred and something a year. That's, that's, It's actually three hundred and forty for each one of the cars. That's cheaper than we pay. Yeah, I was down in Texas for two years, and I was paying unbelievable rates for both car insurance and for home insurance. Um, Well, here in Colorado it's even worse because we have no fault. Yeah. Do you have that there? they have no fault in Maryland also. Well, no fault's rather funny in Colorado, because it seems that everyone pays all the time instead of just the guilty party pays. Yeah. Uh-huh. Yeah. It's kind of, it's kind of strange here the way things go. Uh, here if you have an accident and no one's injured, the police won't even show up. You're kidding. Nope.
They say if nobody's injured, you all exchange names and take it up with your insurance company. God. Well, if you, I don't know how familiar you are with Maryland, but, uh, Not at all. especially, the center part of Maryland where I Ninety-Five runs through it is really heavily populated. There's just so many people and so many accidents every single day that it'd take a whole another police force just to answer the traffic. They don't even try to keep up with it. No. God. Not a bit. So you lived in Texas for a while. Yes sir. Huh. I spent, uh, couple of years down there. Moved down there in eighty-seven and moved out in eighty-nine. Are, where you from originally.
Uh, right here in Maryland. Huh, so you just basically went home when you had a chance. Yeah, my family, uh, didn't like Texas, and I had a chance to, uh, transfer up. T I bought a company about seven months after I moved to Texas, right here in . That's nice. So I got an opportunity to transfer back, and I took it. God, that's great. Uh, I'm a native Texan. Uh-huh. West Texan. Yeah. There is a difference. Yeah, believe me, I know there is.
I lived in Plano, and I don't know if you're familiar with Plano Yeah. but Plano, maybe five percent of the Plano actually were from Texas. Everybody else was an import. Well, I'm a West Texan. Uh-huh. Lubbock, Midland Odessa Amarillo, Dumas, Panhandle. Yes. Yeah. A different world from down there. Yeah. So, uh, Colorado's been fun. But they have a real problem. Next to every window the state seems to have put up a turnstile. And every time you look at a, look at the mountains or think about looking at the mountains, you got to throw in a dollar. Yeah. Or so it seems. I may just be paranoid, but that state income tax is just eating me alive.
Yeah, yeah, they have a state income tax in Maryland. But I noticed when I was in the, in the, in Texas, they didn't have a state income tax, but they sure nailed you on those darn county taxes and, school taxes and property taxes, Yeah, yeah. Property taxes and, Oh my God, ate you alive. Yeah, well, Colorado, you know they have the state income tax, but then they also have property taxes, and they also have sales taxes, and they just get you every direction they can. Yeah. And I just don't know, sir, but it seems like they trying to get you every which way. Yeah, it sure does. Um,
there's, uh, some good books that I've read, um, that you might be interested in. Uh Oh yeah? Charles D. Gibbons is the guy who runs some ads on light night T V and he's got seminars you can go to, and they try to hook you into his organization, which costs about four hundred bucks. But he's got a couple of books out. One of them is called, uh, WEALTH WITHOUT RISK. I've heard of the book. Yes, it's a very good book. It's tells you how to cut money on your taxes and on your insurance and then what to do with the money that you save. Legally? Legally, cut money on your taxes. Yes, yes, Huh. legally, legally cut money on your taxes, and on your insurance, and then he tells you how to invest that money in order to, uh, you know, be wealthier. Uh, he also has a new book out that I purchased right before I moved and haven't had a chance to crack it open yet. Um, FINANCIAL SELF DEFENSE is the name of it. Uh,
the man, uh, has a lot of good ideas, some of them I already knew about, some of them I had already practiced. But I suggest it to anyone who wants to be better off financially to read it because, uh, And that includes everyone at T I. Yes, I'm one of the ones that had my salary frozen for ninety-one. Yes. Well, even, the, you know, the nonexempts, technically yet we haven't had our salary frozen yet. Yet. But when you're only at living wage it doesn't matter. You know, survival is a funny state. Yeah, I know what you mean. I, uh, when I was in Dallas I was supervisor, and I had four non exempts, um, under me. Yeah. And, uh, I was appalled at what, how they were paying them. I just couldn't believe it. Did, well, I've been with the company for sixteen years now.
I was a W F for several years, and it just never seems to improve. It, and it doesn't seem to get much better for the exempts either, unless you're twenty-eight or above. Yeah, yeah. It's really a shame. Well, I, I've, this company that they bought, they ended up buying a very high payroll. Oh. And, uh, the, you know, I thought I was making a good wage, So, how do you feel about the metric system? Oh, I like it. I, I, I have a foreign, actually I have more than one foreign automobile. And I, I, I find the, uh, I find the, the nondecimal system with all the halves and quarters, I was trying to build a shed and they give you these measurements like forty-two and three eighths inches and we had to go a little less and trying to figure what's less than three eighths, uh ... Yeah, and it's, I forget how many millimeters. So you used the metric?
Well, no. What we did was wind up using, and you just go, you just go down and, and you get out the, the, so many inches and, and we just marked a little bit less than that, uh, which is somewhat awkward but had it been millimeters, you could have done. I think what's interesting, the way engineering people do is they, they, in essence, have gotten around it by, by listing, uh, decimal inches. Uh, yeah, yeah. Do are you involved in any engineering drawing stuff that? Uh, yeah, yeah. Uh, I work in metal fab and tenths of inches are, are normal. And, you know, you know, it is broken up in, you know, the inch is broken up and has been for quite some time for, in tenths, hundredths, thousandths, ten thousandths, of an inch. Well, have, have you, do you, are you involved in any other, uh, metric type things like ... Yes, I am.
I, I have a Suzuki motorcycle and, and I've had motorcycles, Japanese motorcycles for years and years and the metric system comes easy to me. But my ... I think it's interesting you you know, when you go out there and you're looking for a wrench and you want the next size larger. I've got, I inherited some, some stuff like fifteen thirty seconds. Right. Well, now that one's fairly easy, because that's probably slightly under half an inch. But some of them, like, like, twenty-seven and, and there are some thirty seconds and some of the things that, that, uh, don't translate. Yeah, yeah, yeah. To go from, from eighths to sixteenths to, uh, thirty seconds and remember where it falls, it ... Yeah. and, and you've got to go over there and try it and I suppose, you know, I need a larger one. I need a smaller one.
I mean obviously you can look at it and say well, anyway. I think the other thing that's interesting is that a lot of our stuff is already changed that we haven't, I don't know, do you, do you drink adult beverages? Yeah, I drink beer. have you noticed that, um, that a lot of the, um, a lot of ... Yeah, whiskey is in liters. Yes. And, and the next, yeah, point seven five liters and then liters and then one point seven five liters, yeah. It's like a fifth, like fifths of whiskey I thought was always kind of strange. Yeah. What's a fifth of whiskey? Yeah. I, I always wondered about that myself. It was a marketing ploy.
And, and they had quarts at the same time though. Yeah. But the idea was, is that by, with five fifths, um, they could, uh, they could, uh, they could sell five and, and, um, it was simply a ploy to, to get people, you know to buy, to buy more for, Yeah. it's, uh, I find that interesting. It's ... But it's like, you know, the, the, the, the soda and this kind of things coming in one liter bottles Liters. and, um, I, I think it's kind of generational. Yeah. It, it's, like I say, I work in a machine shop and, uh, everything's still inches. Everything's still fractions of inches, or or tenths or thousandths, or, or ... Yeah. It's, it's hard to think though. Yes. it is a mental thing. It is a conversion thing. It's like a mill, you know.
We, we do, uh, um, well we use a one mill bond wire or one point five mill bond wire on on semiconductor devices. Right. And well, what's a mill and ... Yeah, yeah. But what really annoys me is the way we, in the United States, have been converting to metric. We have a eighty-nine Chevy Blazer. And before that we had a Horizon. Uh, you know, Plymouth Horizon? Yeah. And both of them were a mismatch of both American and metric. Don't you find that interesting? Uh, that they, that that they're doing that, uh, in any field, for why, why, why pieces, could you, could you get any connection on which was metric and which wasn't. Uh, okay. The engine itself was mostly metric because it came from Canada. Oh, okay. And the starter was Bosch American, so. The bolts were, were were, were English then.
Yeah, yeah. It was, it was annoying. One, one half of the starter you know, three bolts on the starter and two of them were American and one of them was metric. Now that's strange. And, uh, you go from the, uh, water pump up to the radiator and on the water pump, it was all metric. And, and on, you know, the factory fittings, you know, the factory, uh screw lock uh, uh, radiator hose clamps. Yeah. Uh-huh. Yeah. Essentially they do that though because if, if you look at General Motors, the size and, and, and of course, Ford and Chrysler. If they all went, if they all went metric, but in a sense, um, you know, it's like when a measurement though, when, when you put, uh, you know, one point four three two inches, when you're milling something, uh you simply set your, uh, equipment, Yeah. or, or you or you got your calipers there
and, and you measure, you know, you mic it to see if it's accurate and. Right. It's it's not a problem either way. No. Like I said, my only complaint is where they mixed them on the same car. Yeah. And you go to look at it and you don't know which set to reach in, American or metric. Yeah. and, and, you're never quite sure, well, is that a metric bolt. You get you a pair of metric pliers, right Right, right. And you beat on it and a metric hammer It, it can be annoying and my other concern is, is the American government going to force us to go.
Oh, I think, I don't think so. I, I think that, uh, I think they've now just taken the attitude that, well, if it happens, if it, because it, there a lot of things that, that, uh, um, like sports, you know. It's a hundred meter. Oh, absolutely. And, uh, uh, but automobile races if it, I don't think they'd ever, it's still going to be the Indianapolis Five Hundred. They're not going to ... Yeah, Yeah. They're not going to change that to meters. It will always be. Yeah. And, and it, I, I don't think it, I don't, you know, I don't think, I don't think it's particularly bothersome because in reality, uh, you, it's like troy ounces in ounces of gold. How many ounces of gold, you know. Twelve. I was trying, I was trying to figure up gold content on something.
It had, has, uh, gold plated, uh, header. And, and they're trying to think of what's a Troy ounce. Yeah. There's twelve troy ounces to the pound. Yeah. Now that makes, you know. Yeah. And, and is that going to change too? Well, I mean, and, and then there's a metric ton and then there's a ton. But what's a metric ton? Uh, I don't know. I don't remember. I, I read it. And are we still going to maintain drams for perfume? Yeah. And, and then, but then the medicine. And, and some of these other things and, and the chemistry in those kinds of areas,
milliliter. It's all metric all ready. Yeah. And, and so, um, but, but when you go to order a drink, um, you know. say, they, they, I don't know, it's uh ... And what will a shot be? Will a shot be an ounce? I don't know. And, and, but, you know, when you go to the store and, and you're trying to figure, you know, well this box is, is, uh, is, is twelve ounces and, and this one's, uh, uh, three pounds, um, and you ... And the other one's two point one kis, and, and you're, you're lost. That's right. And, and I don't know. I, I think that, I, I think, I think the Federal government is going to, more or less, leave it alone. I think they've got, I think there are more pressing problems. Oh, yeah. The economy. Yes. Uh, what I was thinking about is an economical issue concerning it. Uh,
a machinist has a huge number of dollars invested in tooling. Personal tools to be able to do his job. Yeah. But, but are, are the tools that, uh, if you're cutting, are you talking about cutting equipment or tools for for set up? Uh, tools for set up and for measurement. Uh, you got to have a one tenth indicator, it's a hundred dollars. Uh, five tenths uh, usually two one tenth indicators at a hundred dollars each. Uh, Huh. five tenths indicator at about a hundred dollars. You got to have, uh, six inch set of calipers at anywhere from sixty to a hundred twenty dollars. You got to have a zero to one for sixty dollars. Uh, one to two inch micrometer for sixty dollars. A two to three for eighty dollars. A three to four for eighty dollars. So you've got thousands of dollars or so. I mean you get a thousand dollars worth of tools. Real fast.
Yes. Real, real fast. Edge finders and ... But I was thinking about though that, that when you actually get to the milling equipment though, when it starts turning ... Well, I know, because, okay. Your end mills will be measured in inches or fractions of inches. Yeah. You know. But you, when you, when you simply drilling a hole, I mean, a real simple thing, like gee, I need a hole there. What size hole? Yeah. As in metric size hole or a, or an American sized hole? Yeah. And, and what, but the thing is then you've got to with screws and that's the other issue. Uh, the pitch and ... Yeah, yeah.
Well and thread, Uh, I don't go to the movies a whole lot, but, uh, I went two or three weeks ago for the first time in a long time and saw DANCES WITH WOLVES, which turned out to be an extremely good movie. I haven't seen that yet. I, I, I hear, we, a whole bunch of us were going to go see it. It's playing at school actually in about two weeks, I guess. So we're going to go see that. But you enjoyed that? Yeah, it's, it's something that, uh, my brother lives over in Fort Worth, and I was telling him about a couple of weeks ago, and he said, Well I'll wait until it comes out on, uh, tape and rent, rent the video. And I said, no, this is not one that you want to do that with. That's what I heard, yeah. It's, uh, the scenery and the landscape and the country that they're in needs a big screen. It's just beautiful country with the hills and the trees and the buffalo and the whole thing,
it's just, uh, just amazing, amazing picture. Yeah, I've heard it, it, it's not one for the videos. No, it's one I think, but, you know, every now and then you find one that you say, yeah, this is my favorite movie. Well, this is the one for me this time. Really. Yeah. What have you been to lately? Um, let's see. Well, uh, this is almost, sort of funny. I was just um, friend and I went to see OUT FOR JUSTICE which is Steven Segal, because, uh, we're both big karate fans. Yeah. Oh, yeah. So we wanted to see what this is like. And, uh, impressed with actually. Is that right?
Yeah, I wasn't, I mean, I've seen his other movies, and I just think he's pretty good. Yeah. But, uh, this movie, I'm convinced now he can act. Uh-huh. How's his karate? Oh, his, his, his karate is pretty good. I think in this one it wasn't so good. I generally, um, movies like that scare me, though. I'd be just fine without them, because, you know, kids come running out wanting to beat each other up. Well, well they do, they get Fighting. I remember when we used to go to see, well I remember when GRAND PRIX came out when I was a kid, and some other movies like that. We wanted to jump in the cars and race. Right. And I suspect today what they see is bound to be what they want to do when they get out of it.
Yeah, yeah, well, that, that was number one for the week actually, too, so, so it was a little bit, uh, I was thinking, Wow, people must be into crime movies again. But, but in the middle of that conversation we sort or picked an, um, an interesting point. Last year's number one movie for the year was GHOSTS. Is that right? I don't know if you saw GHOSTS or not. I did see GHOSTS. Yeah, and, and, and that was, that, that helped us sort of feel good about, you know, about ourselves and about one around us, in that at least, at least, if everyone's running around seeing karate movies and stuff like that, at least they're still going to see the real good movies, you know. Yeah. I think that GHOSTS was one of those that a lot of people didn't think was going to be any good. Yeah. And it turned out to be an excellent movie. Yeah. It was, it, I was absolutely enthralled by it. I've forgotten the guy's name who was in it, who had the lead role.
Oh, Patrick Swayze? Yeah, and I especially like him. Yeah, he's very good. He's a really good guy. Other than that, DANCES WITH WOLVES seems like to be the only thing I've seen in the past several months to have any, Really, I'm trying to think what else I've seen recently. What else have we seen recently. Oh, you know, what's pretty cute actually. Um, DEFENDING YOUR LIFE. Is that right. Have you heard of it? I've, I've seen the ads for it, but I'm not real sure what it's about. Yeah, um, I actually hadn't heard anything about it, and some friends called up and said do you want to go see this movie, and, and they said it starred, um, Meryl Streep and Mel Brooks,
at first they told me. Yeah. And I thought, what a strange combination, Mel Brooks and Meryl Streep. That is a strange combination. Well, actually, it starred, that, that it's actually Albert Brooks, so it's lot better. Mel Brooks you probably know. Yeah. I know, so it, it was a strange combination. But it turned out to be a very cute movie. I mean, the whole premise is that they go out and, and they die Oh, yeah. and they have to, Both of them. Right. Both of them are dead, and they happen to meet in this, this town, um, this, this sort of city where you're set up.
You know, they go and they decide if you can move up to the next level. Oh. I don't know if you've ever read Jonathan Livingston Seagull, but it's something like that. Yeah, years ago. They sort of move up to levels, and, and they have to decide whether or not they're good enough, and as it turns out, you know, they meet there and fall in love and stuff like that. Oh. So you can guess the rest of the plot. It actually, it's, it's really funny because they run through, you know, what they have them do is sit down and see scenes of their lives. Oh, yeah. And then defend it. And that's pretty good actually. Well, I guess that's where the title comes from then. Yeah. And it's you actually have to go up there
and you have a, they have an attorney for, you know, attorney for you and attorney, a defense and a prosecution, and you know, the prosecutor's job is to make sure you don't move up a level, and the defense's job is to make sure that you, you do, you know. It's, uh, it's a neat little story actually. Yeah, it is. I was, I was, I went thinking it'll be okay, not great, and then I actually came away thinking it was really pretty good. So, It's funny, we've got a couple of movies out recently, GHOSTS and DEFENDING YOUR LIFE, that have to do with, uh, after life, I guess. Yeah. And it kind of makes you wonder, I'm also, besides working at T I, I'm a graduate student at North Texas and working on master's in communication. It's the behavioral science part of communication, and I think about these things and people trying to define their own world view, and, uh what exactly do we, you know, do we see about this world, Um. or why are we so fascinated with the other world.
Is it supposed to be better? The other world, yeah. Sometimes I think we think it is. We like those things that way. Um, I'm, I'm sure that it seems like, it certainly would, would explain the preoccupation with , but I suspect it's always been a preoccupation with that sort of things. Well, it has. All the way through history, there's, I guess, if you want to call its mysticism or the occult or whatever. It's always fascinated. I guess because we don't know, and there's no real way of finding out. Right, well. There's only one way of finding it. Well did you ever see, um, FLATLINERS. No, I did, uh, did not. The girl next to me saw it,
and she really liked it. That's, that's, that's probably one of those ones that, you know, it's on video now, I think. Yeah, it is. Probably, probably worth seeing on video. Actually we really enjoyed it, but it was also right along the same lines. I mean they, they would go ahead and kill themselves for three or four minutes to see what happens. Yeah. Yeah, they said, she said that this was almost believable that could really happen. You know, you get the medical profession doing these kinds of things, and you never know. Almost, yeah, I, I, it's a little far fetched to, find a bunch of medical students doing it, but but, it was, um, it was, it was odd enough, you know, Yeah.
and they didn't just sort of make it silly. It was, you know, it was done fairly well, I think. So. Actually, I actually enjoyed that as well. Yeah. I like it when they will do something and not get too silly. I've been disappointed in some movies that, they don't know how to end it, it seems like, so then they get crazy and, and it doesn't end like the story has been going. The story sort of keeps going and going. Well I guess that covers our topic. Yeah, great. Well, it was, nice talking to you. Nice talking to you. Bye. Bye-bye. That sounded like one. Uh-huh. Um, I think that there is something definitely wrong with our school system just because of the results that you see coming out of the school system, as far as, uh, people dropping out of school, uh, grades on test scores being low, uh, more and more people taking G E D trying to get out of high school instead of just going through high school. Uh-huh.
Yeah. You know something must be wrong as far as, uh, not just the teaching techniques but just motivation, within, within the schools themselves. Yeah. Yeah, excuse me just a minute, uh, Uh-huh. I'm on the other line Karen. I'm sorry. Oh, it's okay. Okay. Uh, she, uh, yeah, well the, the results, I, I hear what you're, you're saying about the results. Uh-huh. And, uh, it's, what to do about it I guess is the, the big thing. Yeah. I'm, I'm in a kind of an interesting situation in that my, my wife teaches school here in Plano. Uh-huh. And, I know that, uh, the results that they get out of the system sometime is, is certainly not you know, up to what the effort they put into it, you know,
I've seen that for years, yeah. Right, and, I know, uh, I work around, you know a lot of teachers and I I understand how, uh, supportive they are of their students and how excited they are, Uh-huh. but some how, I don't think the students are getting excited. Yeah, I've often wondered if it doesn't come back to the, the home environment. Oh, yes definitely, uh-huh And, uh, it, if, uh, no matter what they do in the, the classroom, if they go home at night and, you know, it's all totally undone, uh. Uh-huh. The, the thing that, uh, uh, that Karen, my wife, has, has run into so often is that you run into a group of kids that are going to succeed no matter what, no matter how bad their teachers are, no matter what a lousy system they're in, or anything else, Right, right. Uh-huh. these people somehow manage to, uh, you know, push on through and are successful.
Progress, uh-huh. It's, uh, unfortunately probably what, maybe twenty-five or thirty percent of them do that. Yeah, not, not even that much probably. Well, that would be, be at the absolute most. Yeah uh-huh. And, uh, you know, those, those that, you know, come out, you know, fall out of the system, that are, are real trouble, Uh-huh. I, I wonder whether that's just a, uh, uh, a part of the system, you know, Uh-huh. if, you know, in a democracy where, you know, people have kind of, uh, a freedom to sort of do what they want, you know, there, there's an inefficiency there, Uh-huh. Uh-huh. and you've got to let those, you know, those, And speaking, speaking of doing what you want, uh, just in society today being that it's nineteen ninety-one, um, a lot of teenagers and young people have a lot more freedom as far as what they do, as far as, you know, even, even something as simple as staying up late, um, watching television late, um, going out late, start dating, Uh-huh. Oh, oh yeah. Uh-huh.
you start dating too early, you know, Uh-huh. just little things like that, that do start in the home, Yeah. that can, that plays a big part because you spend eight hours of your day, or more in school and so any other part of your life, that's going to definitely affect your school life, because you spend so much time there. Yeah. And sometimes in some systems they make everything so competitive, you know, Uh-huh. you, from the minute that you walk in until, until you leave, your, your competing against somebody else or your competing against, uh, a system or, or something, you know, Right. and then, a lot of there is a personality type I believe that is really noncompetitive. They're cooperative rather than competitive, Uh-huh. and when they get into a real competitive system they just say, oh well, what the heck, and, uh, tend not to, you know, do too awful well . Uh-huh. Right, I talked to, a guy the other day
and he is now in, in a program that's trying to get him out of high school because he, he fell back several years ago and he's going to, he, he will have gone to school five years. Yeah. Um, and the reason that he was doing so badly a couple of years ago was because his mother died, Uh-huh. and he was having to, uh, support his entire family, take care of his brothers and sisters, you know, Uh-huh. and all that had an adverse affect on his school life. I would think so, yeah. And, yeah, and that, and that's a perfect example of how your home life, you know, plays a definite part. And, you know, any other aspect of your life, Yeah, yeah. an, but now, now, that he's in this program and, you know, he's, I guess okay, he's, he's making straight A and, you know, it just, it, it was there, it was just, I guess school was not a number one priority for him at that time. Yeah, it, uh,
right, survival becomes more of a priority than, than education, Uh-huh, uh-huh. and unfortunately, you know, there's, uh, there's and old joke about, uh, you know, education's wasted on the youth anyway. You don't, you don't really appreciate it until you're much older anyway. Right, exactly. I know when I went to school, uh, my attitude was kind of one of, you know, these people are, you know, taking a tremendous amount of my time, you know, Uh-huh. and I've got better things to be doing than sitting here listening to this stuff over and over again. exactly. I guess today that would be, uh, some how or other there would be a program of some sort that would take care of that sort of thing, but. Um. The, uh, the cure, some of the cures that I've heard for this that, that sort of make sense, Uh-huh. uh, most teachers after they have taught for a very long, especially at the, the lower grades can spot a problem almost immediately. Uh-huh.
And, uh, it's kind of these intervention programs. Now, a lot of people will get to looking at these and say hey that's socialism and that's communism, Right. and that's, you know, and then it gets political. Uh-huh. But, uh, boy. When people start talking about programs that help, for me, I don't care if it's socialist, or I don't care, as long as it's something that's going to do some good or that looks like it could be beneficial, Uh-huh, yeah. I mean, that's the point I'm at now. I mean that's the point we all should be at, is like finding some solution, Um, yeah. I mean, you know, nothing totally radical, but if it's something that, you know, might help, you know, because there's not a lot being done. Well, you know, the, the radical programs in some cases are just totally unacceptable. There are kids, families, that should just simply be taken out of the homes, you know. And, uh, uh, you know, uh, just removed from those situations,
Uh-huh, uh-huh. Right. or they're never going to get anywhere. But yet, politically that is not a very popular view. Uh-huh. I'm sure that if you, you know, ran on a platform of, you know, we're going to find the kids that are having trouble at home and we're going to take them out of the home. Take them out. Yeah, you know how far you're going to get with that. Yeah, not very far at all. Uh, but unfortunately it's, it's something like that, in lieu of that, you know, is the intervention programs in school where the, these kids are, are spotted fairly early on, Uh-huh. and, uh, you know, there's, well that's get to be a problem in Texas, you know, because different school systems have got more or less money to take care of that sort of thing, I mean it's, it's almost like, Right, right. you got counselors and all that. But you know, you can counsel a kid eight hours a day
and then he goes home and, and, uh, you know, in the, in worst cases he's got parents either on drugs or, or something like that, Right. or they don't care. You know, mamma, guess what I did in school today, well who cares, you know. An a lot of it, a lot of the parents now are so young. True. You know, that they're, they still, they still don't know what's going on and how are they supposed to, you know, teach their kids that are coming up, you know, what's going on. I mean it's just, it's a vicious cycle, that we're, you know, dead, smack dead in the center of Yeah. and we have to try to swim out. You know, kind of like the Bermuda Triangle, we're just sinking and it's almost impossible to swim back up. Yeah. But, um, yeah, there's definitely problems, Yeah
I'm, its just the solutions that, you know, they're going to be in our political system, they're going to be on everyone's mind for quite a while, too long. I don't know if you've ever had too much to do with, uh, oh, especially Asian, Japanese families coming, here in Plano we've got, uh, quite a few. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Uh, engineering types, people who have come from Japan, Right. and they put their kids in the U S schools and they're appalled. Uh-huh. You know, not so much at what the schools are teaching, but what they let the kids get away with. Um, uh-huh. You know, they, they see most, uh, they're, they're quite upset about the, uh, the disruptive influence of school. Most of them would say, you know, those people should be removed from the school system. Uh-huh, uh-huh. And in Japan they would be, you know.
Right. But, uh, here again, you get back into a political thing, where, uh, Yeah there's, there's, right. There's definitely too much leeway as far as, Uh-huh. I mean, I've only been out of, I've been out of college only two years, Uh-huh. and you were saying that you don't appreciate education until you get out and I, I already, you know, I really didn't, I really don't see myself going back to school or anything, but, I appreciate more what I had. Uh-huh. And I had all these classes and all this knowledge and this big library across the street from my dorm, Yeah, were you at Baylor? and I just didn't take as much advantage of it as I should have. Yeah, did you go to Baylor? No,
I went to U T at Austin, uh-huh. Oh, oh, okay. I'm, uh, So, I mean all kinds of resources and, you know, just there, Yeah. and I'd give anything to have that right now in my, in my regular I mean you, you have everything given to you. I don't see why people wouldn't want that. I don't know, I, but then, if I was young, I wouldn't see it. Uh-huh, well that's, that's it you, you don't have, uh, you don't have the view. But you know, now that it's gone, I, Right. I graduated from Texas Tech, more than two years ago, I guarantee, Uh-huh. and, you know, I kind of look back at it sometimes,
well that was a lot of fun, but, you know, I'm not sure that, that I took the greatest advantage of, you know, what, I went through there. Uh-huh. Right, yeah, I did a lot and I experienced a lot and I, I feel like I got a good college education but just when I got out I feel like I should have spent more time in the library, I should have taken those continuing educations classes or whatever they were, you know, Uh-huh. the informal classes that you don't get credit for, you know ... All right, I guess our, we're in the process of a home repair right at this point because we're, we're painting the outside of our house. I don't know, I guess you would consider that a home repair. Huh-uh. Certainly, uh, uh, and interesting enough, this time we're changing the color which makes it an addition.
What is your most recent, We just did that, too. You did that recently too, uh,? Yes. Does it make a big difference? Oh, yes we have brick on the outside and, uh, the colors that were there changed the, and the colors that we painted changed the entire look of the house. Huh-uh. Completely. That's neat isn't it. Yeah. That was really exciting. It was fun. I was really, really tired of the color. That it's, it's helping. We're not quite through, but it's, it really is looking good. Uh, we went through a process of, of, uh, home repairs on a, on a rental house we had, probably the most extensive and, uh, the interesting part of it was how much we learned about what we could do.
Um, we didn't have very much money and so we had to do it ourselves in kind of a slow process, but we learned how to do, uh, retile bathtubs and, uh, oh, just all kinds of things that are unusual. Huh-uh. So the other thing that we did was the roof of our house. Huh-uh. And, uh, we did that a different color also. Yeah. Of course, uh, being a woman most of these things were done by the men. Huh-uh. And, uh, so I wasn't directly involved but, uh, they really were helpful, I know, to our house. It's nice to not have a drip through from the roof, isn't it Yeah Yes That's awful. Um, Howard and I were talking about home repair the other night and, uh, in connection with scouting. We've got a scout coming up and, uh, uh, I think it's neat for young people to learn how to, uh, take care of their, of a household, you know, like, uh, fixing faucets, dripping faucets, and putting in panes of glass and stuff like that. Huh-uh.
As a matter of fact, one thing, I have a young son and one thing we did, was we had paneling on the inside of our, uh, front of our house, or the hall way of our house, rather, and we were repainting the, the front room in the hall there, and we took down that paneling and he helped me and, and, uh, he was, it was fun to work with him. And, uh, and, uh, help putty up the holes together and, and do things, like that. Huh-uh. How does the paneling, it looks lots better than, do you like it better? Oh, I like it so much better. It makes it so much lighter. Yeah. You know, it really does. You know, and people that have been to my house before and then now really have liked, much better, too. Huh-uh. That's nice. It's been fun. Nice to have it come out positive and look, look good. Yeah.
Yeah. Exactly. Well, we have a lot that needs be done. We have, uh, uh, carpeting, and, and we did have a new, uh, floor put in our kitchen. And, um, I have my mother living with us and so she was in a room with a carpet and, of course, she's quite aged, she's ninety-three now, so that meant she had problems now and then and it was really good to get the carpet out of there and put a linoleum down. So it was easier to clean and see where the dirt was and so that was a really positive, uh, uh, Huh-uh. it was fairly expensive though. I, I was impressed, I think, that, uh, we had somebody do it and it was, it seems to me like it's probably more expensive to put down linoleum almost than it is to put down carpet. Huh-uh.
Kind of depends on the quality of carpet, I suppose, Yeah. but, uh, in the case of the linoleum they have to rip up everything and, and fix the floor so it's, uh, I don't know, what ever, but they have to put stuff on the floor and it's, uh, kind of a process. Well, it sounds like you have some pretty good experiences with, uh, with, uh, uh, home repair. Huh-uh. We have. It's been really fun. Yeah. All right. Happy home repairing. Okay. You too Bye-Bye. Bye-Bye. Hi,
what do you do with your credit cards? Oh Well, my husband and I have gotten into some, some problems with credit cards. We don't handle them very well We, we tend to run them up to the maximum and then ask for more. Oh, jeez. They, they're, they're really bad for us. Um, matter of fact, we've gotten rid of all of our credit cards except for a MasterCard and a Visa, and we pretty much keep those maxed out. Oh, I was going to say that, that sounds like, like pretty many. But I see what you meant, you had them for each of the individual stores. Yeah, we had I had probably twenty credit cards for, Uh-huh, uh-huh. I had, I had an American Express, American Express Gold, an Optima, all the different department stores, um, two Visas, two MasterCards Oh, gee. I mean, I had, any time anybody would, you know, send me an application, you know, preapproved or whatever, I went, I took it,
and it really ended up getting us in some real serious trouble. Oh, sure. Um, because, see, the more credit cards you have, the more people offer them to you. Uh-huh, uh-huh. And the more you use them, the more they send them to you. But each of these had an annual fee also, right. Exactly. The American Express was probably the worst, um, because with the Gold card, I can't remember how much it was because I didn't even have it very long before I gave it up Uh-huh. but I know the Green card was like thirty-five, five dollars a year. Yeah, forty five. Right, uh, I, Which was a lot, because I mean, you had to pay it in full every month. Exactly, you know, I, that's it,
I really resented the fact that they were charging me for cards, so I sent back all of mine, except the ones that were free. Uh-huh. And, um, then, then I also limited it to one of each, one MasterCard and one Visa, and here, most of the stores will accept those, and actually I then got a Discover card since they pay you back. Uh-huh, yeah, I had a Discover, and that was one of the ones in the group that I ended up, um, closing. Um, it really wasn't my choice, though. I mean, I ended up having, I ended up actually losing my credit cards. Oh. Um, I ended up going through a credit counseling service um, because my husband and I just don't handle credit very well Uh-huh, uh-huh. Uh-huh, yeah. and, um, when, when you do that, they automatically, once you start with their service, they close your accounts out. Oh, I see.
So, I'm still paying on all these accounts, but my accounts are closed. Yeah. So, and I would prefer to keep it that way. Once we, once we're paid off um, I would prefer just to have one MasterCard and one Visa Uh-huh. and that's it. Yeah, yeah. Actually I pay off my cards every month. Only once in my life have I not paid. I think that's a really good way to handle it, because that way, if you, if you paid off every month, you never have to worry about, well, how much do I have to pay these guys, you know, this month, you know. This, you buy what you can afford. I mean if you handle it just like you would like a check or cash it's a lot easier to keep it in check. Right. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Well, and also in a sense, they're giving you a loan for a month so that you know, if I were smarter, I would have that same amount in savings and get the interest, which I don't do, Yeah.
Uh-huh. but, but yeah, the, the thought of adding, you know, X percent to, to the price of what I buy, I just, I can't accept. Yeah, and I, and I think at this, at this point in time with the economy the way it is, I think that, um, it's going to get even worse. Um, I'm, I'm glad that we're starting to pay our debts off, now, um, you know, we, only we started this last year Uh-huh, uh-huh. and we probably still have about another year to go before we're completely out of the hole. Uh-huh. But I think this, they way the whole economy is going right now, it's just not good to be in debt. That's right, that's right. Yeah, yeah, that, I would, that would be a very scary feeling for me to know that I was, you know, juggling payments to different people I guess because I never experienced it. Uh-huh. And it's not, because you know, I'm rich or anything, it's just, a mental concept that I have. Yeah,
Yeah. that I just. Well, when you, when you're getting rid of the whole credit card cycle, and if you really get into the mind set, I got really good at juggling money and basically robbing Peter to pay Paul, and it was scary, because I was so good at it. Uh-huh, uh-huh. And I thought, this is not right. I mean, this has got to stop, because eventually it'd end up catching up at, catching up with me and it hit me in the face. Right, right. Um. But it sounds like, you know, you, you learned from it and you're coming out of it all right. I, yeah, I have, I've learned a lot from it. Uh-huh. I've learned that credit cards are extremely dangerous in my hand and my husband's too, because he's, he's the same way I am. Uh-huh,
uh-huh. Uh-huh. I don't, I don't think that, well, when we buy on credit we just don't have a concept of how much money we're spending until the bill comes in. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. And then all of a sudden you look at the bill and you go, Oh my gosh, I spent this much. But now, the fact that you still have two cards, are you, do you use them, more judiciously? Yeah, we pretty much use them for emergency type things like transmission fell out on our car Yeah. and that paid for a new transmission Uh-huh. um, and, and things like that. Um, and we try not to use them for incidental type things, like, you know, gas and stuff like that. Purchases. Uh-huh,
uh-huh Clothing, sales. Yeah. Sales I find are a pain. Yeah. I've, I've gotten, I've gotten a lot more away from, from credit cards, and I pay by check a lot more now. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Well, it sounds good, you know. Like I said, it sounds like you're, you've really got it under control. I, I admire you for having, having that mind set for not, not even getting, you know, past the thirty days, I would, that's ideally the where, where I would like to be. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Yeah, and like I said, once, once it, it happened I couldn't because my son's tuition came due, and I guess I had, you know, not really counted on it quite at that point Uh-huh. but, um, yeah,
I didn't like it at all. I was very uncomfortable. So, I can imagine. You know, and, and I mean, it was, I thought a lot, sixty dollars interest or something for, for just a couple of months, and I'm going jeez, that's outrageous, Yeah. but in, in, you know, retrospect it wasn't all that much, I mean a lot of people pay a lot more and and, you know, but still, I mean, I figured I didn't need those items if it cost me sixty dollars more to have them. Oh, yeah. Uh-huh. Think about what you can buy for sixty dollars. Exactly Groceries for a week. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I, I think about all, all the money that, that we've spent on interest on all of our credit cards,
Uh-huh. and it's just incredible. But now did you use to not feel so badly because you could take it off your income tax? We've never been able to take it off our income tax. I'm, I'm fairly newly married. I've only been married less than two years Uh-huh. and before that, I never owned a home or anything, so I never had any deductions. Right, right. So, really, it was always just money thrown away. Thrown away. Yeah, jeez. And I never really thought about it because, You were good at it Yeah, I was so good at it that it just kind of got stuck in the back of my mind and just never um, became a real problem until all of a sudden it came an insurmountable problem. Uh-huh.
Yeah. I suspect that, you know, thinking about it and looking at my friends and the number of credit cards that they use and, you know, the amount that I know they buy, I guess probably a lot of them are in a similar situation, and, you know, just don't talk about it. Yeah. Most, most people don't like to talk about money. They feel uncomfortable, I think. Uh-huh, uh-huh, You know, for a lot of people it is very personal. very personal. Uh-huh, yeah, and especially if you, if you don't feel you're handling it quite right or that somebody might make fun of you or that it would be, Yeah. But I think the, the average American is probably pretty heavily in debt. Not, not including like a mortgage. A mortgage is an understandable debt because that's, you have, you have to have a roof over your head. Uh-huh. Right. And I would much rather own my own home than, than be renting it like we're doing. I mean, we're basically, you know, kind of throwing seven hundred dollars a month away. Uh-huh,
uh-huh. We're renting a house. Uh-huh. But, you know, right now with the way our credit card situation is, there's nobody in the world that's going to give us a mortgage on a house. Right, right. But, but, once I suppose you, you prove yourself by paying this off next year you'll be in very good shape. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's going to, it's going to take quite a while. Uh-huh. Hopefully within five years we'll be in our own home. Uh-huh. But, um, I'm not really counting on it real soon. Okay You want to get a start? Certainly. Uh, the weather here is warm. Uh-huh. And it has been sort of raining on and off.
Uh-huh. And, uh, I am an avid gardener so I measure the rain in our rain gauge on a, on a regular basis. So I can, can avoid wasting money on watering. Oh, great, great. Uh-huh. And, uh, but it has been threatening to rain for the last couple of days, and it has not, really. Which is a bit of a disappointment. But it is very warm here, which is typical for this part of the, time of the year. Uh-huh. Yeah. How about I think you are, I think you are earlier than we are, as a rule, aren't you? Your, your, your growing Summer starts a lot earlier than ours. It starts in, uh, March as a rule. Uh-huh. See that is quite a bit, we are just beginning. People are, have got their gardens in, a lot of them now.
We could still have a frost. Really, this late? Uh-huh. Could you have snow? Uh, probably not. But we have had, we have had a frost as late as, as in June. Oh, well, we do not have that problem Early June. So, but we have also had nice weather. An unusually, uh, nice Spring. It is almost like an early Summer for us. Oh, that is nice. Uh-huh. We could use a little more rain, I believe. Uh, well, we will be glad, I will be glad to give you some of ours Uh Usually we get it in, in great quantities in April and May. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. And then it stops for three months.
Yeah. If it could just be spread out a little bit. Right. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Yeah. It has really been nice here, uh, we are supposed to have some rain this weekend, but I don't know if we'll get it or not. A lot of times in our area the weather forecast has missed us. The, the weather they forecast for our area seems to go right past us and misses us. Just by, well not too many miles. Uh-huh. Are you in an agricultural area? Yes, uh-huh. We have, Well, I know the I know the weather is very important for people who make their living off of, off of the land. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Yeah.
We have quite a few farmers. We, we live out in the country. We are on a farm, but we are not a farming person Uh-huh. Uh, we have a garden. Uh-huh. But, uh, but we are not farmers. Huh. Well, you know there are some disadvantages to being down south. Uh-huh. And that is, it gets so hot that, you know, a lot of things die during the Summer from the heat. Oh, yeah. They get burnt off. They, they really do, Uh-huh. and you have to be very careful to make sure you keep everything watered. Uh-huh. Yeah. Well, and that makes it bad too, because, uh, when more, with water being at a premium.
I know our aunt in California, they, they have really been rationed on their water. And it makes it real hard to have a yard or, uh, or anything like that, a their garden, their farms. Their farmers, I guess, are hurting because of that also. Yeah. Well, my parents are now in San Diego, and, and they've got pebbles in their yard because they can't, almost nobody there has, has lawns. Yeah. Yeah. Well, they are not allowed to water, so what do you do? Yeah. Yeah. Uh, it is very, it is very rough on them so, Uh-huh. Actually I think, I think it is pretty moderate here in Dallas. Because the, the Summers are extremely hot. Uh-huh. But your humidity is different though than ours I think,
and it makes a, a bit of a difference, too. Um, what is your humidity like? Oh, I don't know. I think our humidity is higher normally than what it is in Texas. I could be wrong. Uh, I do not know what, what it is percentage wise but I, I do not know for sure either. But it always seems well, it just felt different like when we were in Texas. It had a different feel to it. Yeah. It is, it is drier in Dallas than it is in Houston or San Antonio or even Austin, which is further south. Uh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. But it is not dry. And, and I have lived here for many years, and I think it has gotten more humid over the years. Where the water is coming from, I don't know. Uh-huh.
Well, it could be. I know my brother's home has been flooded a couple of times, uh, Oh, does he live near the lake? Well, there is a lake not far but it is more run off from surrounding, you know, areas and that. Uh-huh. Uh. And, uh, he is just in an area where it is just low enough that it's, you know, it, it collects there. Uh-huh. And, uh, he has had a couple of inches in his house several times. That is, that is a problem, uh, they tell you when you are looking for a house or, or, or buying land to build on, to be very careful and check the drainage because, uh, it is, it is deceptive. Uh-huh. Uh-huh, uh-huh. Because of that. Uh-huh. And, uh, I know exactly what you mean. We are fortunate or, uh, we are on a, where we are we get flooded, it floods below us behind us. Uh-huh.
But we are, uh, we are high enough that our house itself we never, you know, have had any problem like that. Oh, well, that is fortunate. Yeah. It is an old farm house and, uh, we really like it here. Uh-huh. Well, I, I like it, I like it here. Uh, I, I grew up here. I have lived other places and, and, but I, I did grow up here Uh-huh. and this is very much home for me. Uh-huh. And, It is nice down there. I, I, I liked it when we visited there. I hope you visited during the winter. Uh-huh. One of my, one of my theories is that you always go to warm places during the winter and you go to cold, cool places, that, well, I go to cool places during the Summer if I can anyway.
Right. Right. That is the best time to go. Yeah. and usually it has been when we have gone, it has been nice. It has been hot, but it is, it is hot to me in the wintertime down there. Oh, sure. I mean You know But it is nice, it is a, it is really a nice area. I, I had a friend from England visit once at Christmas, and we could not get her out of the what she called the English back garden. Because she wanted to go back with a sunburn. Oh, really? Oh. And she went back to the north of England with a sunburn Oh, good heavens Not me I avoid the sun
Well, yeah, basically I do, too. Yeah, it takes me about four and a half hours to do, to mow our grass. And I try to cover up when I do the lawn Well, I, that, that is really healthier, frankly. Yeah, well, I have had a little, a couple of problems and, uh, I decided it is not worth it. Uh-huh. That, I, I like to get tan in the Summer time because I think you look healthier. And, uh, we are just crazy But you, you know, it is interesting because you get out in that sun an awful lot. Now my sister is a, a sun fiend. Uh-huh. And, uh, she is five years younger than me, she is more wrinkled. Is that right? Yeah,
It, it just makes your skin more leathery. and I think that is why. It, uh, it, Exactly. yeah. So, I think it burns off the, I don't know the, the, the theory, the scientific principle. But it burns something off, the natural oils or something like that. Uh-huh. Well, the elasticity of your skin, the collagen or whatever they call it. They say it destroys a lot of that. Yes. And you lose a lot of that. So, uh, Yes, uh, that sounds like a good, that sounds like the right theory. Yeah, but, uh, but we have really had nice, the weather,
I can't complain. We have really had really good weather of late. Good. And when it has rained, it it's been a good soaking rain and, uh, it has just been a really nice Spring. Well, that is great. It has been, it has been very nice here too. And I hope it continues because my parents are coming to visit this evening and I want them to have nice weather for their visit instead of driving around in the rain. Oh. Oh, that is great. How long will they be there? Uh, probably four or five days. Uh-huh. Well, that is great. Well, I hope the weather stays real good for them. And, and, uh, that you have a good visit and everything. Well, thank you Thanks. And I hope your garden does good. Yeah.
And the same to you. And, so. Okay. Well, it was really nice talking to you. A pleasure. And, uh, good luck in your, this venture. It is, uh, like I said, it has been real interesting. So I hope you enjoy it as much as I have been enjoying it I am sure I will. In, in fact, if I had not been preparing for this, the out of town visitors, I probably would have been making some phone calls in the last couple of days. Yeah, I forget to. The day goes by, and I forget to make a call usually. Well, I am glad you have broken the ice with me because now, I will, I will start doing it Great, great. Okay. Okay. Well, thanks, Jean.
Uh. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Okay, is, uh, that a sport you like to participate in? No. Actually I'm a spectator, and I'm a second hand spectator as a result of my first husband's, or my late husband's, interest in golf. Uh-huh. My husband likes golf also, he's, uh, I guess he'd be a fanatic if he thought he could get away with it But he, he limits it pretty good. I, um, have tried to go out and play golf. He would love it if I would go out and play with him, but I stand there and swing and swing, Uh-huh. and I can't even hit the ball I can't even play miniature golf well. Yeah, I don't either Well, there are just some things that we're good at and other things that we're not,
but I am very good at watching it on television. Right. And he was really, uh, enthusiastic about keeping up with the tournaments. He could tell me exactly what day and what time of year and where the tournaments were going to be held, and what the nature of the hole was and, Oh, so he's really into it. Oh, yeah, he was a good golfer. Wow. And as, and did some, you know, instructions at the country club for a while. Oh. But, uh, golf tended to be I am not really deeply involved in any, following any of the sports. Yeah. But golf was one that I developed a working knowledge of a lot of the golfers, and therefore I enjoyed following those particular players. Right, more because of their personalities than their sportsman Uh-huh. Well part of it was the personality and their sportsmanship. Another part of it was I'd pick one out that was different than what my husband was rooting for
so you know, the competitor, and I became involved in following his career. Right And, uh, I know that, that my husband, Tom Kite was his fair haired boy. Oh. And he thought he was spectacular. I said, Whoa. I'm not going to, I'm not going to stay interested in him. So I decided Andy Bean was good competition Uh-huh. Any time they both played, why, he was just real excited when Tom was, you know, shown on the television, and I followed Andy Bean. Uh-huh We both followed Lee Trevino into the Seniors. Oh, he's interesting. He is. I like to watch him. He is a character not just a golfer, Yeah.
but he's quite a character. Yeah. And there are some really, really wonderful people in the game of golf who do give wonderful role models. Yeah, yeah, I think you're right. And I think it's critical, it's critical to have a good role model in any field, any sports. Yeah. I like to watch those skins games. Uh-huh. Do you ever watch those where they just play for a certain you know, for each hole they win they get the money for it. Uh-huh. I think those are pretty exciting. Well, I myself, really have not seen a whole lot of point to the game of golf. You hit a little ball, you chase it, you go find it, and then you hit it again and lose it again. Uh-huh,
yeah. And I know the whole point is to get it in that little bitty hole, but seems to me like if they made the hole bigger it'd be easier. Oh really I sometimes wonder why men like it so much because they get so frustrated and mad at themselves when they don't do well. Oh, I know. Oh, yeah. My husband and his buddies are not very good. They play like maybe once a month or less Uh-huh, uh-huh. and so they all hit like in the low nineties, and they think they're having a really good game Oh, yeah. So. Well, my husband's average ran in the mid seventies Wow. so he wasn't bad. Yeah, that is good.
He was pretty good, but as far as influencing young people, I think that that is, uh, that is one of the sports that you can carry into old age. You can't play football at fifty-five. Right. But it is a good healthy, wholesome lifestyle, uh, anything can be warped. Yeah. But I think that that is one of the sports that's a good healthy way to, to move into maturity safely. Uh-huh. Something to stay active at for a long time. Uh-huh, uh-huh. That's right, that's right. Yeah, yeah. And a lot of seniors, a lot of elderly people don't even take up golf until they're, you know, in their later years. Yeah, and they can still get good at it. That's right,
that's absolutely right. And it's something that, Well, maybe that's what I'll do when I have time later on, Yeah, when you're too old to do anything else go play golf, Yeah yeah But it's, it's also something that husband and wife can participate in Uh-huh. or, you can both enjoy the same sport and participate in separate circles. True. You know, you can go to the country club together. You can play with your friends, he can play with his friends, but you've both been out and exercised, and you have enjoyed the day. Right, yeah. Or my favorite, just ride around in the cart with him
You bet, you get a lot of exercise that way. Go somewhere really nice, like Hawaii, and just look at the golf course. Uh-huh, well, I'll tell you what, if if they're not real good golfers, sometimes it is not fun to ride around and listen to their exclamations all day long. Oh, yeah. But my husband's pretty tolerant, so he's not too bad to watch. Uh-huh. Oh, mine had a very short fuse. If he did something bad, he's liable to take that club and throw it as far as he can throw it. Oh, no, yeah. He's replaced almost as many clubs as he has balls. I mean, just get so mad, he'd just wham that club up against a tree and break that rascal. Gosh. Now my husband has a temper, but he doesn't seem to show it on the golf course. He's, because he'll talk about the other guys he plays with doing that and how immature he thought it was and stuff. Uh-huh.
Uh-huh, uh-huh. So I guess he's real laid back about it. Uh-huh. He, he'll come home though, and he'll shoot when he was shooting in the hundreds, and he'll tell me what a great day he had, and about this great shot he made and everything . Uh-huh, well I shot in the hundreds, but I made this one good one Yeah, this one, on this one hole Did you have to listen to long stories about, now on the seventeenth hole I hit it and went this way Uh-huh. those are, it's hard for me to, act nice about that when it goes on and on, Well, one thing that is a, is a drawback about it, I think, is the cost. Yes. Membership in the clubs is expensive, the equipment is very expensive, requires special shoes, requires special, you know, special equipment.
There's so many, Right, and then they want to play another course that's not, they're not a member of That's right. and other fees. That's right, that's right. It really is high. It can get very expensive, and I can imagine what kind of costs are involved if you're going to try to go pro, because you spend hours and hours and hours practicing. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And they don't give those sessions away. And nor do they give, uh, instructions away. Right. As a matter of fact a friend of mine asked me if I thought I'd be interested in golf. I said I don't know, I'll have to try it and see. I've always watched it. Uh-huh.
And he said, well, fine, he said, we'll just take you over to the course, he lives near Brookhaven we'll just take you over to the course and get you some lessons and let you see if you like it. Uh-huh If you do, then we can go golf together. Uh-huh. Oh, whoa, great, I get to walk all around a little green field all day. But those kinds of things happen, though, you, you get a little taste of it and you say, Hey, this is not bad. Uh-huh. And you really begin to develop an interest in it. But I am not an athlete at all. Me either. You know, I'm always the one that got hit by the bat in baseball, and, hung my fingernails in the net in volleyball. So I am not an athlete. Maybe golf is a forgiving sport. I don't know. Yeah
at least you're just you're competing against yourself, I guess, more than everybody else out there. It doesn't appear to be Uh-huh. I really, I, I haven't really acquired an interest in it, but I'm open to try anything, you know. Yeah that's, kind of the way I feel. The one thing that is also detrimental as far I'm concerned, my skin is very fair Oh. so I'm going to have to golf in the evening or I'm going to have to golf at a time when the heat of the day does not cook me. Right. And I don't think the, Okay, have you participated in anything like that? Well a little bit, we mostly do our newspapers. We keep our newspapers, and stuff like that and we keep our newspapers and stuff like that and we take them to be recycled. Uh-huh,
uh, we, we have a pretty nice recycling center, uh, in our city now and we take the newspapers and plastic and glass up there. They're open like two days a week and you can just take it up there and drop it off. Uh-huh. It's kind of fun. And everybody up there looks pleased with themselves when they're taking their stuff in like they're doing something good to, help the earth, I guess. Yeah. And a lot of people complain because it's really not convenient for them. Yeah. Yeah my husband was complaining the other day because he said every time I turn around you're telling me some new rule about recycling like yesterday I was tell him, you have to, you're supposed to squeeze the plastic jugs before you take them up there. You're supposed to what. Every time he turns around I'm giving him some new rule, where you're supposed to squish up the, you know, like collapse the plastic jugs. Instead of taking them up there solid. But what are you supposed to do with them. Oh, okay. And I wish that our recycling center took paper bags. They won't take those.
We like to put our, just put our newspapers in a paper bag, you know, and then carry them up there that way. Uh-huh. And we have to bring the paper bags back every time. Because they won't take them. Yeah. Do you, uh, take your papers somewhere or does someone pick them up? We, we usually collect a, you know, collect a quite a bit and then we take them, take them in. Uh-huh. We, um, we don't take our cans up to that center, though, our aluminum cans, we like to take them to one of the places where they pay you for them. Yeah, we don't, we don't, um, use aluminum cans, Uh-huh. so, we generally don't have those to do. Yeah, it takes us about a year to save up enough to be worth, you know, worth bothering to go in and do, but. Do you, um, have any ideas on anything that would make, You know, they, they charge you, you know, it's like a flat rate I think for picking up your garbage.
Uh-huh. And I know a lot of people it would, would solve the convenience problem if they had curbside pickup and some communities are trying to do that now. And I think that maybe if they only charged for the garbage that you did not sort and have set up for recycling, Right. they, they charged you by, by weight of how much trash you were actually sending to a land fill. Yeah that would be a good idea. That that might be a better way to do it. Yeah. And then people would, would know that it was going to cost them money to not sort their trash. Right. Yeah, that would be a real good motivation for people. You know, because then it would, then it would make monetary sense to them, you know, to say, hey, you know, if I just spend the time to, to sort this out where this stuff can be recycled then I don't have to pay for them hauling it off. Right. Yeah, my father was telling me about some program he read about where you buy your bags, like you buy your garbage bag from the city, Uh-huh. and you pay more than just what you would pay for an empty garbage bag
but then you don't pay any monthly fee or anything, so how ever many bags of garbage you throw away, that's how many you have to pay for. Oh, yeah that's about the same kind of thing. Yeah. Yeah that would be a real good idea. I'm trying to think if there's anything else I could think of. They are talking about going to curbside pickup in our, in our city . Where do you live? Rowlett, Texas. Oh, okay. Do you know where that is? Yes. And I don't know if they decided to do, or not, but I think they said it was going to add like either a dollar or three dollars a month to your bill to have them do that. Although, I think a lot of those programs can operate at about a break even, break even point, without charging people. It seems like they would be able to. Yeah I don't know, uh,
I guess it just depends on how they manage it. Uh-huh. I don't know how much they get when they sell all that stuff. The center that they've got now where you take your stuff in I, I think that should be making some money. Since they just have to hire someone to man it a few hours a week. Yeah. And they sell, I guess they sell everything to some waste company that comes and gets it. Yeah. But I wish that, uh, more of the cans, you know, like the cans you buy vegetables and fruit and stuff like that in were recyclable. I don't, a lot of that's that recyclable steel and I don't know anybody that takes that. Yeah, that's true . my husband likes Pepsi and those cans are steel instead of aluminum, so we can't, can't ever recycle them. I think it's a good reason to quit buying it. Um, now I didn't know that, cause we just usually if we're going to, uh, buy sodas they're in the, the two liter bottles. Yeah,
that's what we buy the most of, unless we're going on a trip or something where we want to, put the cans in a cooler Yeah. But, well that's all I can really think about for recycling. Okay. It was good talking to you. Okay. Uh, bye. All right, bye-bye. voice said what's that voice said, where were they There you go. What do you think invades your privacy? heavily Oh, well people that call on the phone all the time to try to sell you something. You know, that, that try to sell you the newspaper, and, uh, carpet cleaning, and, uh, what else, roof repair And enough, well I think it's a waste of paper, the people that always leave, uh, junk mail and, because, um, you just end up throwing it away most of the time. Probably eighty percent of the, the junk mail that you get is, is, um, something that you don't need. And the same way with those calls. What is it, oh M C I, M C I really does. Even when you tell them no, they keep calling back.
M C I what's that? M C I it's the long distance telephone company. Oh, now see I, I really don't have much trouble with, I just say no thank you and hang up. Uh-huh, well they they won't take a no for an answer here for some reason. They just keep calling back. I had a carpet service call up three times, all within in an hour, Uh-huh. but, I, uh, I do telemarketing, Uh-huh. so, uh, I'm very polite and I just say no thank you, and say no thank you very politely and I hang up and, don't bother me after that. Uh Yeah. So I think the only thing that really bothers me is if when somebody contacts me and they try to get information out of me. Uh-huh.
Like the Census Bureau, United States Census Bureau. Oh yeah. That bothered me. Uh-huh. I didn't feel they had a right to know how many bedrooms were in my house even. Right. That I think is my invasion privacy because it's the government and I don't understand what their need to know is. Uh-huh. And I think that is my biggest objection to anything as far as invading my privacy. If somebody wants personal information out of me, but telephone calls I figure, they don't bother me one way or the other. Uh-huh. Uh, I know when I do telemarketing, um, I'm a soft person, if, if someone says I am not interested I'll just say fine and back out. Uh-huh. And I make very good sales, but I'm not, uh, as I said, I'm not half as pushy as these people because, I don't really care. I mean, if, if they're not interested fine. You know that's it. You can't force them to be.
Right. No. And I'm not pushing something down their throat that, uh, I don't think is a good item anyway. Uh-huh. That I don't think I could do anyway. But I feel like, oh, movie stars, or sure, it's part of their, I guess they're portray being a movie star they get themselves in these rag sheets but, uh, I think they go too far. Oh, yeah I think that's invasion of privacy. because they follow them around twenty-four hours a day. Yeah And you know they do Ted Kennedy. Oh, yeah. Of course, he's breaking the law all the time, so it's a different story then. You know, but, but Ed McMahon, I mean, you know, who cares about Ed McMahon. He's probably hasn't done anything interesting in the last thirty years that they've been on the air, you know. And he has a chauffeur.

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