Free Press –
Quakertown Community Day, Basil Shopping, Teddy Roosevelt on
Immigration, TV and Teens,
Dear Friends,
Good morning. Compared to Quakertown on July 4, the rest of Upper Bucks’ villages and towns must have seemed like ghost towns. Thousands came to Memorial Park during the day to participate in action packed events and great food. It was Community Day, and the 25th for organizer Ken Williams of the American Legion Post 242.
“What began as $1,500 worth of fireworks in 1982 has since turned into a $30,000 explosive adventure,” Free Press Editor David Anderson wrote (June 28).
Williams explained that 25 years ago, Quakertown firemen wanted to see fireworks in nearby towns but couldn’t because they were on call. So volunteers from the fire companies and the American Legion solved the dilemma. Community Day was born.
Bravo Ken Williams and all the volunteers who make this event such a success. I’d be curious to know how much food was consumed and the number of people who attended.
Item.
It pays to keep smiling and look lost, I’ve said forever. Someone will save the day. Last week, Mighty Betsy sent me on a mission to find basil. She was creating a mysterious dish, which required it. I obediently searched four markets and finally found the answer at Boyer’s in downtown Quakertown. I should have gone there first.
In the produce section, I picked up a plastic box of green sprigs and proceeded to a check out counter manned by Amy Sailer. She’s very cheerful and helpful. “Is this basil, I asked? Before Amy could respond, a nice lady behind me spoke up.
“No,” the lady laughed, “You have a box of parsley.”
She turned out to be Pam Rush a neighbor of one of our closest friends. Pam Rush offered a deal that I couldn’t refuse.
“I have lots of basil in my garden,” the Good Samaritan said. “If you come by, I’ll give you some.”
I did and
she did. What a nice person Pam Rush is. She saved the day. And the moral of
the story…keep smiling and look lost. It pays to live in the small towns of
Item.
Once more,
Congress and the administration have failed to cure the immigration problem.
Did anyone say term limits? That’s what’s needed, I say. In a week or two, I’ll let you know what Congressman Patrick Murphy thinks about term limits.
Here’s what Theodore Roosevelt had to say about immigration 100 years ago.
“In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant, who comes here in good faith, becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin,” T.R. began.
“But this
is predicated upon the person’s becoming in every facet an American, and
nothing but an American.”
Bravo T.R. Who will unite us…a divided people?
Last two items.
Keep your kids from the television set. “A 20 year study (in the New Scientist) has found that the more TV a teenager watches, the lower his grades slide,” The Week reported (May 25). “High school kids who spend more than three hours a day in front of the tube are twice as likely to forgo a college education. These same TV addicts were 82 percent more likely to drop out of school or to fall behind than their peers who watched less than an hour a day.
“The research also found that 40 percent of infants are regular TV viewers by 3 months old, and that 90 percent are watching at least 40 minutes a day by age 2.
“There is clear evidence that TV harms the attention span. Kids become accustomed to the passive enjoyment of entertainment and can’t muster the energy to read challenging material, solve problems, or otherwise engage their brains.”
And finally, a bit of fun courtesy of the same issue of The Week.
“After hundreds of Indian rail passengers were told to get out of their stalled train and push, it took the grunting passengers more than half an hour to move the massive train 12 feet so that it could touch live overhead wires and resume its journey.”
Huzzah! It must pay to live in a country with one billion people.
Sincerely,
Charles Meredith