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Weekly Newspaper and Travel Guide
for Pecos Country
of West Texas
Opinion
Tuesday, September 13, 2005
Squarely Pegged
By Peggy McCracken
Spending time with
Grandkids is grand
Grandkids. Have you ever wondered why they’re called “grand?” I can tell you. They are grand.
Scott is my second grandchild, sliding head-first into the doctor’s hands in Phoenix, Arizona on August 12, 1976, just one month behind Amanda. It was several months before I met him, but when I did, I was charmed, to say the least.
Pictures from that visit remind me that he loved pork chops and peanut butter. Together. As I recall, he gnawed on a pock chop bone, then dipped it in peanut butter to make it taste even better.
Sunday, Scott and I sat at my computer and created him a new homepage for his web site. After two hours, we had a pretty decent-looking page.
“It’s scary that you know how to do this,” Scott said.
He is not computer illiterate, having had his own CPU since he was about 10. He built his current unit. But he just hasn’t spent the time it takes to learn how web pages work and to write the tags that tell a browser how to display information and photos.
A friend designed and built his web site, but Scott is not pleased with it. We made a deal last time I was in St. Louis. He used his plumbing skills to reverse a stupid piping mistake made by my house’s former owner that had hot water running to the commode tank. Then he fixed the commode and faucet.
“I charge $40 an hour,” Scott said after spending 1.5 hours on the messy job.
“That’s O.K.,” I said. “I charge $75 per hour to fix web sites.”
So now we’re even. Fixing the home page is just the start, though. He wants links to pictures of the remodeling jobs he has completed, plus some pages for friends who operate various businesses. It may take awhile to get all that done.
Last week, I might have said I won’t have the time. But on Friday, Neta Rhyne encouraged me to go to her oncologist for a second opinion on my cancer. Since he is in Midland and affiliated with Baylor Medical Center, I may call and see if they propose a course of treatment I can live with (pun intended).
Having grandkids around can make you want to live. And I have had so much loving support from friends and acquaintances that I am encouraged to stick around awhile and spend more time with people than with books.
Smokey tells me I can quit this job at any time, or stay until I am 100. It’s been my second home, but I do let it keep me from pursuits that might be more productive. We’ll see.
“The Lord blessed the latter part of Job’s life more than the first.” Job 42:12, NIV
EDITOR’S NOTE: Peggy McCracken is Enterprise business manager. Contact her at peg2@pecos.net
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Pecos Enterprise
York M. "Smokey" Briggs, Publisher
324 S. Cedar St., Pecos, TX 79772
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