Seventy-six trombones

Went to a brass chamber music concert Sunday afternoon for that Fourth of July bandstand feeling without bugs and sweat. The concert was in the delightfully air-conditioned Texas Discovery Gardens building at the state fair grounds. The concert hall is walled in glass, so you look out at all the gorgeous trees and gardens behind the musicians while you listen to the music. I toured the hothouse conservatory of exotic plants after the concert. Even took a very slow walk through the gardens, and enjoyed the swallowtail butterflies.

Part of the concert was serious, and some was silly. The quintet played "The Flight of the Bumblebee", but in the middle it morphed into the theme song from the Flintstones. Yabba-dabba-do. Raising the boys I've often felt I was the Wilma of a modern Stone Age family.

Judging from the conversations in class today, my students had busy, patriotic weekends. Boys tried to out-do each other with the number of hours they had spent in the swimming pool. Girls did the my-country club-is-better-than-your-country club,-and-my-lakehouse-is-bigger-than-your-lakehouse routine.

I was glad when the kindergarten kids began to discuss presidents, even if they were deceased. Their first topic was Ronald Reagan*:

"One of our presidents died. His name was Ronald Reagan."
"Ew! He's the mean one. In the war!"
"No, that is Donald."
"No. Someone shot him."
"But he didn't die."
"But he's dead."
"The first president ever shot was John F. Kennedy."
"A guy shot at Reagan, but he aimed too low."
"He didn't hit him."
"But he's dead."
"George Washington is the president now."
"Did someone shoot him?"
"If George Washington dies in office, who will be president?"
"Chang. P.F. Chang."
"Ch-ch-ch....?"

We are planning a write-in campaign in November for P. F. Chang.

*Didn't anyone but me read in the newspaper that it is time to stop flying flags at half staff?