Rejoiner to Kelly

Let's think about grandpa and grandma for a moment...

Did they have air conditioning?

no air conditioning.. still most people around there don't have it

Did they have more than the pickup truck?

Yes they had a brand new Dodge.. cornet with push button transmission settings

Did they take long vacations and if they did, did they drive? take an airplane?

They came out to see us every Christmas except a couple.. where we went out there. Most of the time they took the train. Sometimes they drove.. the southern route through Las Vegas. They had friends all over the state.. from the peach orchard. when they drove down to see us in Monte Vista we were all invited out to a lunch in Creed where some acquaintances had a trout farm

How many nights a week did they eat out?

They always ate out one or two nights a week. One time at the Mesa drug store lunc counter. Sometimes in the summer at the Peak drive in.. (the place that Grandpa dumped a large cup of ice on the counter that had minimal soda in it.. Claiming that he would never go back again. He did go back but we always stopped at Colescotts to get our sodas from a bottle) They were also patrons of Furrs cafeterias.

Did they have a color television? What were their hobbies?

No color TV... wasn't invented yet. They watched every day Art Linkletter's Kids say the funniest things.. just before their afternoon siesta. Grandma loved to collect pretty things. Granpa was a hunter and fisherman.. but work and managing his 30 acre farm was his first priority.

I once did a comparison with my weekly grocery list and what grandma's would have been. We eat waaaaay more processed food. We believe in food from foreign countries.

You might be surprised with this one. They always had Karo syrup... clear and maple flavored. The biscuits were often "tube" biscuits. She never made her own mayo. She bought store pectin. And those "kindergarten chickens" were store bought in the deep freeze.


Backyards are becoming more and more expensive. As we look at housing options, one that is looking really good is a condo in downtown SJ... but that would make growing peaches rather difficult.

Do you think that a backyard would be expensive in San Jose in 1970? We were looking at a home on the Foster Lagoon in about 1963.. you could sail to your grocery store.. price 22,000. I think my point on this one is that people have backyard with room for a fruit tree don't plant them.. they would rather plant an ash tree or a birch. Then they don't eat fruit.. that is changing.. or it is a real luxury item. When Heather was bringing in her sack of fruit from us on the elevator was asked by a fellow elevator rider.. do you have fruit in there?" It is a real luxury for condo dwellers.

My commute is 26 miles each way... is that 52 miles a day? When I was working in Sonoma County, I drove at least a hundred miles of backroads every day. Will fuel increase our use of public transit?

This is the question for all of us to consider. If gas gets to be 8 dollars a gallon.. how much commuting can you afford to do?

Pat