Wrapping It Up

I finished putting together the new issue of the Gypsy Journal yesterday evening, and we are wrapping it up today. After Terry gives it a final proofreading and I make the necessary corrections, I will upload it to our Web server and then send the link out to our subscribers. Unless something really weird happens, everybody will have it by this evening.

We’ve got a pretty good mix of stories in this issue, including an article on being prepared to evacuate in the face of a natural disaster, a feature story on Doctor John Gorrie, who changed the way we live while looking for a method to comfort yellow fever patients, an article on a historic site that preserves ancient Indian mounds here in Florida, a visit to the dramatic landscape of Hell’s Half Acre in Wyoming, a feature on the US Army Transportation Museum, another on a unique general store in Ohio’s Amish country, a visit to Iowa’s National Farm Toy Museum, and a feature on the home of author Pearl S. Buck. And this is just some of what’s waiting for you in the new issue! If you haven’t subscribed yet, what are you waiting for?

When the mailman came yesterday it was like Christmas at our house. We received several packages from Amazon, including a couple of glass tea jugs that Miss Terry had been waiting for, and a reference book I had ordered. But the best thing of all was this beautiful wooden bowl, a housewarming present from our good friends Charles and Chris Yust from C&C insurance. Chris included a card saying they bought it last summer on a visit to the State Prison in Maine, where it was made by an inmate. Chris knew that Terry lived in Maine for a while when she was a little girl and thought it might be a reminder of home. I guess maybe she figured I’d done time in the Big House, so it would remind me of home, too.

Several readers have asked me when the second book in my John Lee Quarrels series will be out. I’ll take a break for a couple of days to catch my breath from getting the new issue of the Gypsy Journal done, then I plan to get to work on it. I never give a definite date for when a book will be finished, because I never know until I get to the end. But I’ve got the plot worked out in my head and I’m eager to get going on it.

I got some interesting e-mails from yesterday’s blog, with readers suggesting places we might want to visit and do a story on. They included the Don Garlits Museum of Drag Racing in Ocala, which we did a feature on several years ago, the Air Force Museum in Dayton Ohio, which we also did a few years ago, Yellowstone National Park, which we have not made it to yet, and Alcatraz, in San Francisco Bay. I try to avoid going to prisons except at family reunion time. I’m always afraid they’ll keep me.

One blog reader wanted to know if we’ve ever visited a nudist park, or have plans to do so. No, the closest we ever got was the nude beach at Playalinda, down on the Canaveral National Seashore. But all we did was make a U-turn in the parking lot. It’s bad enough Miss Terry and my doctor have to see me naked. There’s no reason to subject anybody else to that. I’ve never even gone skinny-dipping, though I have done some chunky dunking in my time!

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Thought For The Day – Being young and in love is beautiful, but being old and in love is comfortable.

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