Behind Those Autographs

     Last week I blogged about how my prized autographs had been largely obliterated by time.   I wasn’t planning to get any autographs when I went to those long ago concerts of The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, and John Denver; I had just gone to listen to the music.  However when the opportunity arrived to meet those guys, I scrambled through my wallet to find something that they could sign their autographs on.  What I found were some cards for various things that were blank on the back, so that is what I had them sign.

    Last week when I studied those cards where the autographs occurred, I happened to turn them over and I found it interesting, because they told of some of the things that I kept in my wallet back then.  

    Perhaps the most interesting to me was the back of the card that featured David Crosby’s autograph.  It was my old Bob Schaad Record Club card, something that I had totally forgotten about.  I remembered the name Bob Schaad, but little else.  Bob Schaad had a record store in downtown Evansville, my home town.  I don’t remember much about the store, but evidently I was a member of their Record Club.

    It looks like if I bought ten record albums, I got a whopping $.98 off of my next album.  Back in the 1960’s albums were very expensive, especially for a teen like me, who didn’t have a lot of money, so it would have been a big bonus to get 98 cents off, after buying ten.  

    This Record Club card tells another story.   See the two “X’’s over the stamps.  After I got David Crosby’s autograph on the other side of the card, I certainly didn’t want to turn it in when I became eligible for the free album, so I must have taken the card into Bob Schaad’s and explained the problem, and they marked the two “X”s over the stamps to indicated they were no longer valid, then they gave me a new card, with the same amount of stamps, so I could still get my $.98 discount, and at the same time keep my David Crosby autograph.

    The other cards that I had gotten autographs on the back of, were:

        A 1963 Driver’s Education Certificate so I could be taught how to drive at my high school when I was 15 years old.

        A high school “Letterman’s Pass”  (I was on the track team).   The pass allowed me to get into all of my high school’s “home”  games.

        My college student ID and also my college library card.

    At my age, I have been enjoying looking back at the life I lived, and certainly, seeing these sixty year old artifacts that I used to carry around in my wallet, stimulated some long buried memories.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca 

    

Theme Parties: The Blues Brother Party

     One of the more memorable parties that we attended at our neighbor’s house had the theme:  The Blues Brothers.  The Blues Brother movie that had recently come out on video tape was full of great music and a lot of laughs.  Above and below you can see the invitation to the party, and fortunately, one of the partygoers took some photos which you can see at the very bottom of the blog.

        I have been constantly surprised at how rich our social activities were in the Robson Valley during the 1980’s and 90’s.  We were surrounded by a wonderful group of like-minded friends with whom we visited, watched VCR movies, dined, played volleyball, and partied.  Luckily, we lived right next door to Kjell and Celine, whose house became the party-central for many of those get-togethers.

         They hosted many theme parties that required costumes, food, and music related to the theme.  The “Blues Brothers” party happened in 1989.  Dark suit coats, hats, and glasses, were donned by the males, emulating Elwood and Jake, the main characters in the Blues Brother movie.  The women also wore dark glasses to accent their swanky dresses.

        The on-going eating and dancing to the blues music, was interrupted by the Blues Brothers Air Band performance.  I was impressed at how much Bruce, the high school principal, (shown holding the girl) got in to the part.  When he wasn’t mouthing the words during the song, he gyrated and dangerously swung the microphone around by its cord. 

        The women performed as a dance troupe named  “Ruby and the Red Lips” and grooved to heavy beat of a driving blues song.  It was a wonderful party of abandonment with our alter egos, and I am sure it is remembered fondly by all of the participants.

        Ah, to be young again.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Theme Parties: Come As You Were

    Another one of the many “theme” parties that was had during the heyday of our social life during the 1980’s and 90’s in the Robson Valley, was the “Come As You Were” Party at Monroes.  The idea was to dress as some historical figure you might have been in a past life.  I really don’t remember who I went as, I think I went as Mark Twain, but I see on this invitation it has me down as Sigmund Freud.  I don’t really think that is how I came as, because making a beard would have been a problem.  Being Mark Twain (one of my heroes from the past) would have been more logical, since I often used the long white mohair from my Angora goats, to make a mustaches and hair for costume parties.

    I do remember making a dance tape for the party, because one of the songs on it was Dire Straits, “Money For Nothing” which had just been released, and was was a big hit during the party.

    Our large group of friends sure had some stellar times back then.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Theme Parties: The Jamaica Party

     In the late 1970’s we moved into the small and isolated community of McBride, in BC’s Robson Valley.  For 4 years, my wife and I had been living in even smaller places without any friends our own age, so we hoped that in the Robson Valley, we would develop friendships with people who had common values, and fortunately, that is exactly what we found.  For us, the 1980’s and 90’s became the Golden Age of our social life.

    One big reason for all of that exciting social life was our neighbors Kjell and Celine.  They were very social-oriented and who were constantly organizing “theme” parties, where party-goers were expected to dress up to fit the chosen theme of the party.  The food, music, and entertainment were also expected to fit the party’s theme, and were always wonderful.  We were amazed at how the participants could always come up with, and create; unique costumes for the theme, from items they found in our tiny one-horse Village of McBride.

    This morning while going through one of my old file folders, I found the invitation I created for the “Night in Jamaica” party that our neighbors put on.  I was always given the task of creating the invitations to the parties and you can see what I came up with for the Jamaica party.  This was before you could do much on a computer, so I had to use pen, photos, and a black and white photocopier.

     I think I dressed up as a plantation owner to the party.

    

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

View From the Tete Jaune Bridge

     Yesterday we took Kona to Valemount to get a haircut.  The Village of Valemount is about an hour’s drive from McBride.  Quite often when we go, instead of taking Highway 16 to cross the Fraser River, instead we cross at the Old Tete Jaune Bridge because it offers such a spectacular view of ragged peaks of the Cariboo Mountains.  I rarely cross the bridge without stopping to take a photo.

    This is how it looked yesterday.  The sun was blasting on the mountains, whose tops were completely blanketed with snow.  I thought it made for a stunning shot.

My paintings can be seen at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Snow-Capped

      I always have my eyes on the mountains, watching the changing light.  Here is a shot I took the other evening from Hinkelman Road of the snow-covered peaks of the Park Range of the Canadian Rockies.

    We are off to spend the day in the neighboring Village of Valemount, where we are taking Kona to the groomers for her haircut.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Fortunately, I Was Wrong

     We live during a time when we are flooded with misinformation.  I hate that.  I love honesty and truth.  Well, in last Wednesday’s blog about finding $1,600 of old Canadian paper money in our safe, I went online to see if it was still valid, since the Canada now just has plastic bills.  I found the website shown in the photo above and misunderstood what it said.  I thought it meant that all old Canadian paper money no longer was legal tender after January 1st, 2021, and that is what I blogged.

    On Friday, I was paying for the insurance on my truck and mentioned my “worthless” $1,600 to Rosemary in the insurance office.  She told me that she thought that I was wrong, and my paper cash was still valid.  She advised me to ask at the Credit Union, so I drove over there.  There, the clerk assured me that those old paper bills were still legal tender.  That left me really confused, so when I got back home, I checked again on the internet, and re-read what I had found there.

    It was then that I discovered that the Canadian paper money that was no longer legal tender were just those  dominations, that had been discontinued:  One Thousand dollar bills, five hundred dollar bills, and two dollar bills, not the old paper money that I had.  So happily, the cash I found is still good.

    Like I said, I hate the flood of disinformation that is online, and I certainly don’t want to be the author of any, so I thought I should put it out there that I had been wrong, and old Canadian paper money in denominations of $1, $5, $10, $20, $50, and $100 are still valid

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca