Chinaberry Tree Blooming -- Time to Plant Cotton

I haven't been out much so I don't know if the chinaberry trees are blooming but the middle of April usually finds them full of blooms.  In North Louisiana that was a sign that it is time to plant cotton.  Louisiana is still among the cotton producing states but it is no longer the top money crop as it was for more than a hundred years. With cotton at a record price and the boll weevil exterminated, I wonder if area farmers will convert more of their acreage to cotton.  I don't know if the government still tells each farmer how many acres he is allowed to plant to cotton.  Those controls, plus programs like the soil bank, knocked small farmers our of cotton planting and concentrated it along the Mississippi river in Louisiana.

My last cotton crop was the summer between  my sophomore and junior years at LSU.  I had to have others plant my crop but I hoed it, plowed it, picked it, and took it to the gin. That summer I also hitchhiked to Springhill nearly every day  tor several weeks to apply for a summer job.  I turned down the offer of a permanent job to go back to LSU.  The next summer I attended LSU to make it possible for me to graduate at midterm. I intended to enroll that fall but had a persistent job offer so I accepted it and went to work.

Directing the Ship As We Reach San Francisco

Among my memories of  San Francisco, fog plays an important part especially when we arrived back in San Francisco after an absence of almost a year. The battle for Okinawa was still  waging fiercely when the Pickens, her duties performed, left for Saipan to drop off the Second Marine Division.  From the Marianas we set sail for Noumea, New Calidonia, to pick up some materiel and deliver it to Saipan.  We  left there  in late July arriving in San Francisco August 3 to load on troops and prepare to invade Japan.

We entered San Francisco bay before dawn with fog so dense lookouts were practically blind.  It fell my lot to be manning the radar.  The navigator was calling every minute for the range and bearing of landmarks so he could determine  the ship's position.  Fishing boats were heading to sea and the blips on the radar for the boats and for buoys were the same.  I had only seconds to determine whether a blip was moving, thus a boat, or stationary and a buoy. I was under so much strain I had a burning in my stomach.  After that it seemed that every time we came to San Francisco we arrived just before dawn in a dense fog, and I had to be operating the radar. I wondered why we couldn't have delayed our arrival a couple of hours to allow visibility.

Nation's Problems Plus Mine Put Me in Bad Mood

I was not in the mood to post on this blog yesterday and I'm even less in the mood today.  With the government set to shut down, oil at around 110 dollars a  barrel, gasoline out of sight, inflation everywhere, and worse of all, income tax time is here. Taxpayers in line for refunds have mostly filed early to get their hands on the money they overpaid or, in come cases, get money they  didn't earn, like General Electric. Obviously, you can tell from my tone, we are among those who are required to pay more this year.

President Obama is having it all his way.  He wants to shut down the government so he can blame it on the Republicans, although the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress and the White House and refused to propose a budget.  Obama also gets high oil and gasoline prices, both of which he wants.  Billions of dollars and millions of jobs are going overseas because drilling is limited in this country while Cuba, China and the world are invited to drill in the Gulf and off our shores. I have been asking for two years,  "Can this nation survive Obama?"


 

Visiting on Skype Gives Pleasure but It Can't Give Hugs

Mark and Julie called Sunday afternoon and we visited on Skype, although the phone connection kept breaking. Lily is delightful; she really enjoys naming letters.  I asked for an O and she located it and held it high over her head.  Jen was on the way from Baton Rouge and missed this visit with the granddaughter. Josh was here and Lily spoke to him as well as to me.  Pictures are good, Skype is better, but a visit would be best.

After giving up with the Skype, Mark and I visited on the phone.  I think he is the most regular reader of my blog, although he accused me of making up stories, not understanding that certain things will jog my memory of something that happened as far back as first grade.  He mentioned a hitchhiking story, though not getting it completly right.  One time, for some reason ,I got rides along Highway 167, finally reaching Minden.  I entered the bus station and asked for a ticket to McIntire, which I think cost 15 cents. I went to pay and discovered I didn't even have 15 cents.  It was late at night but I whirled around and began a five mile walk home. I had not gone far when I heard someone in high heels running after me. A womanwho worked in the station caught up with me and gave me  a ticket.  She said, "don't every say I didn't give you anything.:  

Times Article on Church Music Gets Strong Response

Sunday morning the congregation responded with many hands raised when asked it they had seen the article in that monring's paper lamenting the disappearance of  church music as something called contemporary intrudes and replaces familiar hymns.  Persons who have read this blog know that I have commented several times that I would like for us to sing more traditional hymns.  I took a quick glance through the Methodist hymnal and found over one hundred songs familiar to me that we haven't sung in 20 years.

When we had Sunday night services, the song service had more familiar and enjoyed hymns than was true of the morning worship.  What has happened to the enthusiastic decision to have a community singing each month? This would help to keep alive much of the great music and great messages of our hymns.  What a shame if we lose the messsages in song of Charles Wesley, Fanny Crosby and Issac Watts, among many others.

Programed Alarm Clock Throws Me for a Loop

This morning I heard the clock in the den toll six times, turned over and dozed off.  I woke, looked at the clock in the bedroom saw it was past 7 so I got out of  bed, made coffee, ate, took my pills, fed the cat, and got the paper. Josh was just getting up and I went in the bedroom, saw the clock said 9:21, leaving me not much time to shower, shave and dress for Sunday School.  When I got to the church  I saw only one vehicle, Don's van.  I looked at my car clock and saw it was not yet 9.  My bedroom clock had done it to me again;  it cannot grasp that daylight saving time starts early now, not the first Sunday in April.  I didn't throw the clock against the wall, but I felt like it  What makes this worse; the clock did the same thing to us last year and we let it go on believing daylight saving begins in April.  Is the clock stubborn or am I stupid?

USS Pickens at Okinawa Easter Sunday

I wrote about this a year ago but I have committed to commemorating this day as long as I am able. It was April 1, 1945,  and the Pickens was among some 1200 ships and crafts from the United States and Britain. The Pickens was second behind the  USS Hinsdale, APA 120, in a column of attack transports carrying the Second Marine Division. The time was a few minutes before 6 a.m.; we had been at General Quarters since around 5. We had experienced kamakaze attacks at Iwo Jima and knew we could expect to be attacked in much greater number, We radarmen were watching the screens intently and lookouts on deck were searching the skies.

About one minute before 6 a Japanese plane hit the Hinsdale at the water line, exploding several bombs and blasting holes.  Another plane head towards us but caught the mast of an LST to our port, exploding on the deck and setting the LST on fire.  We quickly put boats in the water and helped pick up survivors from the Hinsdale and LST's 884 and 724.  The flag officers from the Hiinsdale  transferred to our ship.  As an auxiliary hospital ship we were equipped to take care of wounded marines and seamen, many from the LST being badly burned.

We were able to carry out our assigned duties, which were to act as a diversionary attack force while troops were landing at other places.