By Elaine Rassel
Last week it was the City Council meeting and this week is was the MMCRU School Board meeting. There is also a Band/Choir Concert on Tuesday at MMCRU High School and on Thursday a Middle School Band/Choir Concert at Remsen. These are Fall concerts that have to be given to make room for Christmas concerts. It doesn’t seem that the days are getting few before it is Christmas!
Last Sunday when I went to send my articles to Lori, the Personals wouldn’t be sent. So back upstairs I went only to find they had been “saved” so I had no choice but to change the date and send again. This time is worked! I have no idea why it didn’t go through in the first place.
I was in Sioux City the other day and ate at a place we hadn’t been at since the COVID bit. It has changed as most places have changed. I usually got trout but this time all that was offered was flounder or cat fish. I ate “flounder” fish that was ordered broiled. I didn’t know they could fillet this little fish as much as they did. And, it had a lot of moisture, which makes me wonder if they boiled it! It had some red seasoning on top of the many very thin pieces. That night, I was sick! It had to be that fish as it couldn’t have been the baked potato. (Maybe it had mercury in it_who knows. I just won’t eat this again.)
We were recently to the Colonel’s that is now open for business other than still using the drive through. I wanted to go to Culver’s drive-through but instead we went to the Colonel’s. Never again! There is no buffet anymore and there will never be as it has been remodeled for no buffet line. You pay at the counter and a few feet away is the “soda” machine. No buffet in between. I had four very immature wings, a small container of coleslaw, a small container of potatoes, and a biscuit for $8.99. That did not include the drink. Zachary had a four piece meal of a small breast and three dark meat and the rest the same as mine for $12.99! The chicken was so greasy that I put a napkin on my wings to try and absorb some of it. We will not be eating there again! That’s okay with Bethany as she never did like to eat there.
Harold’s Photography place has not been in Sioux City for awhile as it went to Sioux Falls. I went there to see what was making my pictures have a dark look to them as when I focus them, they look fine. After I take the picture, that is when they don’t look the same. The guy that waited on us wasn’t any help at all. I went back to a picture of the kids getting off the Fire Truck. All he could say was that I should have better lighting. I informed him that that picture was taken outside where there couldn’t have been any better lighting. Then he came up with the idea that maybe a censor was burned out in the camera. (I didn’t know cameras had censors.) He did tell me that my camera wasn’t made anymore and it was old. I asked him if he had a camera with a 12x zoom. We walked halfway across the store to have him pull a very small box off a shelf with many more the same size.
I asked if I could see it. He didn’t take it out of the box and told me it wasn’t ready to go as the battery needed charging up. There was only one battery in this camera that I had no idea what it looked like. When I pulled out my check book, he informed me he had to have a credit card or cash. At that point, there was not going to be any kind of sale with this guy. Actually, I saw no other cameras anywhere in this store. It certainly isn’t like the Harold’s that was in Sioux City. I don’t think the salesman knew anything about cameras.
When I looked at last week’s Marcus News, I could see why Lori had to have 12 pages instead of the original 4 pages. There were 14 sale bills plus legals that were printed. People must think that this is the right time of the year to sell!
Now the rains are coming! Just when farmers are trying to get the crops out of the field, the rain appears. As long as there are a few days in between the rain, I guess we shouldn’t complain. Leaves are falling but not as many until the first frost comes. Cold weather has been predicted and maybe it will hold off until the kids are done with Halloween!
Have you been watching “The Price Is Right”? Even that has changed where the audience is sitting. Many people were sitting in the audience out front. When COVID hit, people were no longer sitting in the audience but were called from “behind” where they were not seen. Now they are sitting in three’s and with distance between each group of threes, still behind but where we can see them before they are called to “come on down”. They are still standing in marked spots away from Drew Carey. Have you often wondered “who” Mama May is that the announcer, George Gray, speaks about after he introduces Drew?
I wonder if things will ever be the same after this COVID thing has passed. When I see how the restaurants have changed, the prices going up in order to eat there, it makes a person think that they are going to continue with what they have. There are a group of people in California that have managed to pass a law where there has to be so much room for what they call a “mama pig” to move around in. The space shown was about half of my dining room. Because the spaces are getting larger and there are not enough of these spaces_there would be less pigs. They predicted that the price of pork could go up to $8 a pound! (Some of these confinements are crowded and it is easily understood why there should be more room allowed, but what they showed, really was too much.)
There was an article recently speaking out on how the Chinese are limiting video games. There is a new government restriction that limits children to just three hours weekly of online gaming time_an hour between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. on Friday, Saturday and Sunday most weeks.
The restrictions that took effect earlier this month, are a tightening of 2019 rules that banned children from gaming overnight and limited them to 90 minutes most weekdays. Experts say it’s unclear if such policies can help prevent addiction to online games, since children might just get engrossed in social media instead. However, it’s up to parents to nurture good habits and set screen time limits.
The new rules are part of a campaign to prevent kids from spending too much time on entertainment that communist authorities consider unhealthy. That also includes what officials call the “irrational fan culture” of worshipping celebrities. One state media outlet has called online games “spiritual opium,” an allusion to past eras when addiction to the drug was widespread in China.
Adolescents are the future of the motherland, and protecting the physical and mental health of minors is related to the vital interests of masses, and in cultivating newcomers in the era of national rejuvenation was said by the PRESS. A campaign by Chinese President Xi Jinping is to cultivate a healthier society for a more powerful China.
Their government reports that in 2018, it was estimated that one in 10 Chinese minors were addicted to the internet. Now centers have sprung up to diagnose and treat such problems.
Under the new regulations, the responsibility for ensuring that children play only three hours a day, falls largely on Chinese gaming companies like NetEase and Tencent, whose wildly popular Honor of Kings mobile game is played by tens of millions across the country.
Would this work in the U.S.?! When I go to these school programs, a good share of the younger kids there are on their gaming device instead of being interested in the music programs. The parents are not bothered with the child as long as the child has this in their hands.
Voting is coming up. Have you sent your Absentee ballot back in (if you went this route to vote). Take time to vote at the designated place. If you don’t vote and things are not going the way you think they should be, remember you had a chance or forever keep your peace.
I see where there are really quite a number of people going for a school board position in Sioux City. One of them has a grudge against the school system because his 4 year-old daughter was bullied by a 6 year-old girl and when reported, nothing was done about it. Others interviewed state that things could be a lot better. Some are questioning the administration as well as the present school council (for being weak). I wonder if these candidates that are negative about many things, will get votes. Most of these committees really don’t want a “no” person but rather people that will say “yes” even though they don’t feel that way.
Don’t forget trick or treating downtown on Friday and house to house on Sunday, Halloween night. If you have a pet, put it in another room so it doesn’t “escape” when you open the door to give to the treaters. Don’t let your pet near any of the goodies. They can get very sick, especially on chocolate.
Talking about pets, Bethany has 5 kittens she is trying to find good homes for. They have all had their shots and are all people friendly.
Because it is close to Halloween, I found an article where there are listed 19 places that are historically haunted The Winchester Mystery House located in California; The Amityville House in New York; Foley House Inn in Georgia; Lizzie Borden house in Massachusetts; Historic Farnsworth House Inn in Pennsylvania; Hull House in Illinois; Story Inn in Indiana; Stranahan House in Florida; Jared Coffin House in Massachusetts; and Villisca Axe Murder House located in Iowa. Each one of these haunted places has a brief story to go with it. I am going to put the Villisca murder in the paper when there is room. It was probably one of the most gruesome one in that time (1912) frame.
Remember in your thoughts and prayers those who have recently lost loved ones to death, have health issues; are struggling to make ends meet even though they have a job, those who could work but choose to wait for the “right” job; and continue to help those who are trying to get shorter distance between friends/families.
I will leave you with this quote from Katy Yoder “There is a peace in simply being content in what I have. There is no time for pettiness or holding onto grudges or remembering past hurts and past mistakes. All this takes too much time and too much room. The most important deadline of all is when we take our final breath on earth. Don’t put this deadline off if you are waiting for the 11th hour to make amends, as you could be called Home in the 10th hour and have to take a canteen filled with ice with you.