Family Archives

July 22, 2013

Birthday Season Starts Early

Mother decided several years ago that a birthDAY in October wasn’t enough: she wanted a birthday season. Well, she has outdone herself this year.

Wife Lila, Friend Anne and I descended on her in late June. It’s past mid-July and I’m still in town. I have to head out to Ohio to do a photo exhibit and a couple of presentations, then (if there are no hurricanes headed to Florida), I’m headed back to Cape to work on some more projects.

Several years back, we gave Mother an iPad to replace her obsolete WebTV. It has become her favorite toy. Son Matt had a newer iPad he wanted to upgrade, so he let Brother Mark and me pick it up cheaply, then he offered to kick in a share of it for his birthday season gift. Her old model was WI-fi only, so she couldn’t use it when she was at Kentucky Lake unless she cruised around looking for hot spots. (For the digitally uninitiated, a hot spot is a place where you can pick up someone’s unsecured internet connection. It has nothing to do with the place across the river from Cape.) The new one can run off cellular service.

The new one will let her do Facetime with her grandkids, too. (If we can ever get it set up. Mark spent half the afternoon trying to get her Apple ID working.)

“It’s a bleeping lawnmower shed”

The Tulsa branch of the Steinhoff Family: Amy, David and Diane, came into town because David had this crazy idea that mother needed a shed to hold her riding lawnmower. Mark came down from St. Louis so he could join me in chanting “It’s a bleeping lawnmower shed, for bleep’s sake.” David, you see, has never found a project he couldn’t over-engineer.

To keep him from building some kind of teak and mahogany Taj Mahal, I found a $144 10x10x8 soft-sided shed the instructions said could be put together in two hours by 2+ people. The catch was that you had to have the right 2+ people whose names were not Steinhoff. You’ll get the full Shed in a Box story later if I can bring myself to relive the experience.

Amy and Mother

Mother timed the demise of her microwave oven to coincide with a houseful of guests. Faced with imminent starvation, the Tulsa Branch came up with a new microwave for Early Birthday Season. Amy, an accomplished shopper, aided in the search.

There is a rumor that other Florida Steinhoffs may be landing just about the time I depart (assuming I ever do). If the sheets ever get cold in Cape, she says she may jet out to see Granddaughter Kim’s new home in Austin.

No telling what she expects us to do with her 92cd rolls around on October 17. I guess I should start looking around for someplace she can go skydiving. (As always, you can click on the photos to make them larger.)

July 1, 2013November 4, 2016

When Did You Quit Smoking?

I have no idea why I took several photos of a TV screen, but this image caused me to pause because you won’t see it today. Cigarette ads were as ubiquitous in the 1960s as car ads are today. (To be honest, I don’t know what ads are running these days. One of the advantage of TiVo is that I bleep right past the ads like they were names in a Russian novel.

The last national cigarette ad

Want to take a guess what the last cigarette ad was and when it ran? I’ve already looked it up for you.

On New Year’s night, 1971, millions of Americans were tuned in to NBC to watch the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. At 11: 59 Johnny went to a commercial break, something he had done thousands of times since he took over the Tonight Show in 1962. But there was something special about this break, a 1 minute commercial for Virginia Slims cigarettes. Cigarette commercials had been a mainstay of advertising in the first 25 years of television. But this commercial was different. It was the last cigarette commercial broadcast nationally in the United States. One minute later at midnight on January 2, 1971, The “Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act” went into effect. This law banned the advertising of cigarettes and tobacco product on television and radio.

Dad quit cold turkey

It was rare to see a photo of Dad without a cigarette in his hand or nearby when I was growing up.

One New Year’s Day I found him crankier than usual. I had stayed out a little later than I was supposed to and he jumped all over me. That usually didn’t happen.

A couple of weeks later, he let us in on his secret: he had decided to give up smoking at the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve. He threw all his cigarettes in the fireplace without telling any of us until he was sure he could do it.

He never smoked again, although he chewed a lot of gum and ate a lot of hard candy for quite awhile.

I was lucky. I never took up the habit. Maybe that’s why I’m still around. Dad and his brothers died at or before 60.

June 26, 2013

Meddling With Medals

Nothing like packing for a trip to empty out the sock and underwear drawers. Buried in the back of one of the drawers were two plastic boxes with foam inserts holding a bunch of pins and medals I accumulated while at Central High School (and, maybe SEMO).

When we got close to Cape, the weather alert kept going off with Tornado warnings; Lila was pulled over at a rest area north of town because a twister was reported south of her. Mother was headed to the basement. Things calmed down by the we all got home, but I decided not to unload the car tonight. We’ll fill you in later. Here’s a piece I put aside in case I needed a filler.]

The turtle and arrow at the top left signified that I was a Brotherhood member of the Order of the Arrow, the national Scout honor society. The turtle was our lodge symbol. I enjoyed Order of the Arrow much more than regular scouting because we were older boys and did work projects that had lasting value.

Missouri College Newspaper Association (maybe)

The rectangular pin on the left is one I don’t recognize. It has the initials MCNA. I was a member of the OCNA, which stood for Ohio College Newspaper Association, so I’m going to guess this was the Missouri equivalent.

National Forensic League

The next four were from debate club. The blue medal was for being elected Outstanding Representative at the State Student Congress in Jefferson City. The red one was for being Superior Representative. NFL, in my case, did NOT stand for National Football League.

The two pins showing the guy in a robe were for the NFL, too. I think the top one might have been a charm like you might put on a bracelet (no, I didn’t) or necklace. The other was a pin that you wore on your lapel.

Journalism and academics

Top right is a pin for National Honor Society. Some of the class of ’65 got in early in the year. I was in the ones who just barely made it. In fact, I’m pretty sure that it was activity points for stuff like debate and the school publications that counted for more than my grades.

The second pin was for Quill and Scroll, the journalism honor society. It notes that I was a photographer. You’ve move up in rank based on the number of column inches of your work you had published. I was working at The Jackson Pioneer and freelancing for The Missourian, so I had a lot more opportunities to get in print than someone who might do a couple of stories for The Tiger. On top of that, picture column inches counted the same as written column inches, so photographers could wrack up inches faster than writers.

June 24, 2013

The Anniversary Card

I was sleeping the sleep of the just this morning when I heard a movement over by my computer. It was Wife Lila, on her way to church, leaving something. “Go back to sleep, she said.”

When I achieved consciousness some time later. (We won’t admit to how much later.) I immediately recognized what it was.

Anniversary card

As near as we could piece together, she remembered buying this card when Son Adam was into radio controlled cars when he was 10 or 12 years old. He’ll turn 33 July 7, so that makes this card at least 20 years old.

We forget to celebrate

I described last year why I can never remember our anniversary date of June 23: Buddy Bob Rogers asked when we were going to get married. (Lila and me, not Bob and me.) I told Bob to name a date; he picked June 27. That didn’t work out for some reason, so June 23 was the alternate. (Lila was standing there, so it’s not like she didn’t have any input.)

But, I’m not the only one who forgets the date, hence the card. So long as it’s around, we don’t have to make a mad dash to the store to pick one up at the last minute. On top of that, cards are expensive these days. I bet we’ve saved close to a couple hundred bucks on cards by recycling this one. (I mean, you wouldn’t expect her to spring for a cheap one, would you?)

Five years ago she included a photo of me with Grandson Malcolm. I had been on a bike ride and had hooked up with them at Dreher Park in West Palm Beach. Malcolm insisted on climbing a hill in the park, then wanted a drink out of my Camelbak hydration pack.

He’s almost as tall as his grandmother these days, and we have two more of the most perfect grandsons in the world.

It’s been a good run. I can’t wait to get the card again next year. (And, thanks for letting me sleep.) She – and it – become more special every year.

Game plan is to head back to Cape noonish on Monday. See you all there. I’ll have a bunch of calendars for anyone interested in Cape. I’ll let you know where you can pick them up if you are there. If you would like one mailed, hold off a few days. Lila says she’ll play postal person when she gets back in town after the 4th of July.