Waipahu, Hawaii has just won the Northwest Regional Legion Baseball Tournament in Billings MT
With a Texas state flag as background, and trusty guitar “Trigger” in hand, Willie Nelson and a few friends and family provided a short concert for a full house at Alberta Bair Theatre last Wed evening. I have never heard or seen him in person before. He had a surprising number of very enthusiastic young fans in the audience, some of them begging for a sweaty sweatband that Nelson would occasionally throw into the middle of his adoring fans.
The voice gets a little irritating after awhile but the fancy guitar playing never gets old. His sister played a little piano in between what looked like onstage mini-psychotherapy sessions with someone from off-stage. The guy on amplified harmonica did well. Compared to the large band of Lyle Lovett, which preceded Willie for about 90 minutes, and considering the difference in skill level, I still think Willie and friends and family came out on top.
There is a nice little biography of Willie Nelson on Wikipedia here.
New Stockman Bank Downtown Billings
This will be a good-looking building featuring brick on the bottom and glass on the upper floors. On the corner of Broadway and 4th. On the other end of the block from the new library, he says hopefully.
Hey, is that cool or what. When I lifted what I thought was one picture the whole bunch of them came with it. Hot dog.
My guess is that this Reformation stuff is in their DNA. Of course, in addition to their theology, I am talking about their classical academy. Check them out.They are located near the corner of 24th and Central and West High School. Here is their mission statement:
“Mount Olive Lutheran School
A Classical EducationWisdom, eloquence, and virtue – these are the goals that a classical education cultivates within its students. The ancients knew that education should be about more than “basic skills” and mere competency. A good education transformed, elevated, and refined the mind and the soul. For thousands of years, the classical arts of learning were the standard for education. These arts were timeless and proven because they focused on the timeless and proven. The Good, the True, and the Beautiful were objects of this sort of education. Eloquent confessors and wise leaders were its results. Our communities badly need just these sort of men and women. In an endless pursuit of the latest educational dogma, most of our schools no longer have the capacity to judge what is Good, True, and Beautiful, much less teach it. In forsaking the soul for the mind, they have forgotten how to educate both. Classical Education is a return to excellence in teaching, curriculum and expectations.”
Wow, I wonder if our school board knows what these folks are up to?
This is very tasty, tangy and freshly squeezed orange juice, together with excellent coffee to start. Followed by corned beef hash and scrambled eggs and toast.
Sadly, I made a special point of reminding the waitress how I liked the scrambled eggs cooked. First of all, the griddle needs to be hotter as you can see the eggs above spread much too thin, and then even more importantly, one has to continue to pay attention by breaking up the yolks initially, then pushing them around so that they don’t stay flat, and taking them off at just the right time, fluffy and slightly wet. The good news was that the manager was embarrassed and offered to do them over. This is a good place to eat.
<a href=”http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/90/1464144/restaurant/Downtown/Stellas-Bakery-Billings”><img alt=”Stella’s Bakery on Urbanspoon” src=”http://www.urbanspoon.com/b/link/1464144/minilink.gif” style=”border:none;width:130px;height:36px” /></a>
- Commenting on your own blog has to be a lame thing.
- The more I look at that flattened egg concoction I am thinking who got the fluffy scrambled eggs instead of ...
The Big Mac Index
“A light-hearted attempt to gauge how far currencies are from their fair value. It is based on the theory of purchasing-power parity (PPP), which argues that in the long run—the long run where you are not dead I guess they mean—exchange rates should move to equalize the price of an identical basket of goods between the two countries.”
A recent study called to our attention at this nice website suggests herbivore animals influence tree ring growth more than temperatures. Amazing.
It seemed like the only relatively large town on the East side was Billings. They did not do well. Their offense sputtered and their defense was fairly spotty. Thanks Heavens no one looked to hurt somebody on the other side. The cheerleaders, about two dozen in all looked great and did a good job of cheering for both sides at the same time it seemed to me. I think the West was in the red and the East in the yellow.
Montana has a lot of athletic talent though I noticed a few names on the East side that I recognized from the Legion baseball program.
I don’t know whether it was the extreme heat, or the scaling back of the vendors, the location, the entertainment, the many other things going on, or maybe the folks who usually go to these things stayed home because of the economy. Whatever it was there were fewer attendees than usual this year.
Sock Puppets at Attention
Even the sock puppets were lonely. This was Saturday afternoon.
Out of town visitors were surprised and impressed by the size of our native free-range animals, especially of the chicken persuasion.
These Bourbon Chicken Skewers were very tasty. They also served pork chops on a stick. I looked around for someone eating those but couldn’t find any. Maybe I just didn’t know what they looked like.
Farmers Market Opening Day 2011
Got there by 11 am. Not a lot of goods on display, not surprisingly. The Garlic Guy said all his stuff was about 3 weeks late because of the curious weather we have been seeing this spring and summer. Most of the Asian goodie-wagons were missing as well, probably because they were at the SummerFair out at Veterans’ Park.
Blueberry Pie from Time 2 Savor
I bought a pie from the ladies at Time 2 Savor after sampling some of the above. It was very good. They told me their best seller was a combination of strawberry and rhubarb, so I bought one.
Unknown stringed Instruments at Farmers Market
There were some instrumentals at the Farmers Market, a beginning trumpet player who was doing scales and simple exercises, as well as an old guy playing the harmonica and this young fellow playing a nice-sounding stringed instrument which I did not know the name of and forgot to ask.
Things will get better as the crops come in. What was there seemed surprisingly high-priced though come to think of it, isn’t that basic economics? Our friends from the Hutterite colonies did not seem open to bargaining either.
The place was the usual: downtown centered on that big sail or whatever at the corner of 2nd and Broadway.