More than a couple of readers have asked, \u201cWhere do you get ideas for your blog?\u201d \u00a0The latest person to ask was my wife.<\/p>\n
\u201cIdeas are all around,\u201d I explained. \u00a0\u201cAll you have to do is keep your eyes and ears open.\u201d \u00a0Saturday night we were on the way to dinner, in celebration of our tenth anniversary.<\/p>\n
We were in an area where she used to live. \u00a0As we pass a new shopping center, she says, \u201cGood. \u00a0It\u2019s about time they put Steinmart here.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSweetie, you don\u2019t live here anymore. \u00a0It does not matter,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, you\u2019re right,\u201d she agreed. \u00a0\u201cBesides, they didn\u2019t include a Steinmart here. \u00a0They should have – I have been saying for years this area needs one.\u201d<\/p>\n
I reply with a non-committal, \u201cHumpf.\u201d \u00a0We drive another mile and find yet more construction – another shopping plaza. \u00a0With a Steinmart prominently placed in the middle of all the stores.<\/p>\n
\u201c\u2019Bout time they listened to me,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s a blog,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s a blog,\u201d I repeated.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou mean I\u2019m going to have to watch everything I say around you from now on? \u00a0Or it might end up in your blog?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnything is possible,\u201d I say, smiling. \u00a0I keep driving and we keep thinking about which restaurant to go to for dinner.<\/p>\n
Then she starts reminiscing about her days in college at the University of Florida. \u00a0I was there at the same time, and as it turned out, we were nearby during the same events \u2013 like the streaking.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In the mid-1970s, kids decided they could get away with streaking (running very, very fast) through a classroom, preferably just before a final exam.\u00a0 Naked.\u00a0<\/p>\n
We reminisced about how it turned into a mass-streaking event with about 2000 to 3000 participants.\u00a0 We observed with that number of streakers, they didn\u2019t have to run so fast.\u00a0 The university police along with the Gainesville Police decided there were way too many kids to try to arrest.\u00a0 So the students switched from being streakers, to well, ah, being \u201clollers.\u201d<\/p>\n
As we finish the conversation about the streakers, we drive by a familiar building where she and her girlfriends listened to a particular local band when the place used to be a neighborhood bar. \u00a0After talking about UF in the 1970s, my wife switches to talking about the Celtic band she and her girlfriends liked to listen to when the band played gigs at the bar. \u00a0She and her friends went to listen once, maybe twice. \u00a0Probably drank a beer or two, also. \u00a0One of the singers, she says, wore a kilt. \u00a0All these years later, she still wonders what he wore under the kilt.<\/p>\n
She has already forgotten that what is said could be used in a blog.\u00a0 And it was only a couple of minutes ago we that we had that discussion.<\/p>\n
We decide on a restaurant and as we walk in to enjoy a wonderful meal and time together, I think about all the blog topics she may supply me with in the future.\u00a0 This is going to be good, I think.\u00a0 I will have material to write about for a very long time.<\/p>\n
Then I think, I can\u2019t believe ten years has already flown by.\u00a0 Thank you, Sweetie, for a wonderful decade.<\/p>\n
-30-<\/p>\n
\u00a9 2010 J. Clark<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" More than a couple of readers have asked, \u201cWhere do you get ideas for your blog?\u201d \u00a0The latest person to ask was my wife. \u201cIdeas are all around,\u201d I explained. \u00a0\u201cAll you have to do is keep your eyes and … Continue reading