From my view on the Pioneer Woman fringe

I remember reading The Pioneer Woman a few years back, when I saw pictures of countryside and cattle and horse activities that were new to me. It was interesting  and it was obvious she wasn’t lacking for anything. It was a place of no worries. Oh, I figured that from time to time there would be mention of something on the downside happening, but that it would be dealt with in a “keep your head up; show your backbone; deal with it” pioneer mentality. You know, real things.

Who knew Shangra-La was in Oklahoma?

Marlboro Man’s maternal grandfather passed away and there was no mention of the man, his life, his death, the trip to the funeral. Nothing.  It was an event that occurred in the natural progression of life. I thought it would have been a connection that crosses all lifestyles and economic groups. I didn’t think it would shake the image of the good life in the heartland.

Somewhere along the line, the blog began to  generate those feelings one gets when a Christmas Letter comes in the mail from those families who have perfect lives and perfect kids. Surely sometime one of those kids got a “B-” or one of the family got a ticket for speeding. Did no one ever lock themselves out of a car . . . even it it only meant going inside to get the extra keys safely kept in a jar?

I get a kick out of the blogs that poke her with satire. Well, that’s one vote for Pie Near Woman. (Rechelle Unplugged for those not in the know.)

I missed yesterday

It wasn’t my fault that I didn’t get on this site yesterday and post this photo of my grandmother and several other grandmothers from Kingman, Indiana. No, my mind and fingers were kidnapped by a computer game – one about finding a lot of clues to get to the bottom of what happened at Ravenhearst in 1895 when Emma and her twin daughters went missing. For those of you not familiar with such games, they involve traipsing around trying to find out what you need to know and then getting that done.

For instance, let’s say it slowly dawns on you that a certain drawer has to be shut halfway to allow the secret passage door to open, only the drawer is stuck all the way open.. Nothing in your inventory will cause it to move – not a hammer, not a magic potion, not a screwdriver, not rope. Then, after you are just ready to give up and do something useful in real life, you think, “Oh, let me go into the game’s bathroom and see if it will let me pick up a piece of soap?” So you soap the sides of the drawer and it closes halfway and,. voila, you open the secret passage and  . . .

For some people this activity is like balm on the brain – for others, it is total nonsense.  I am in the first group, dontcha know.

But, now for the picture. It occurred to me that often the back of a saved newspaper article can be interesting as well, so I am showing both.

Net Grismore is a typo; it should be Nell Grismore.

And now here is the reverse side, showing that this picture was published in 1966 – according to the ad about the fair.