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Show Pleasant Grove ReviewLindon New Utah! - Wednesday, June 13, 2001 - Page 2 Opinion ""m. 1 I Uii Early fire Utah closed its fire season officially on June 1, making any open burning without the proper permit illegal. This is traditional. tradition-al. But this year the closed fire season is particularly significant. signifi-cant. The state is entering this summer facing a major drought. This has serious ramifications for local water supplies, but it also means an early fire season for Utah's mountains and range land. The lack of water means plants in undeveloped land will dry sooner than usual, creating tinder for possible wildfires. Those dangerous conditions can be expected to last all summer lengthening the usual fire season. The situation is exacerbated by the growing numbers of homes being built in undeveloped undevel-oped or underdeveloped areas. Expensive homes are being constructed con-structed on our hillsides. The west desert is blossoming with houses in lands previously uninhabited, unin-habited, but covered with plenty of dry vegetation just waiting for a spark, lightning strike or errant firework. It doesn't help, of course, that It's yard sale It is yard sale season again and boy, was I ever ready for it. We started our serious yard sale adventure last Saturday, armed with four yard-sale-lovin' grandchildren, copies of the garage sale advertisements and a focused eye for signs on poles. Our well-developed yard sale system includes not getting an early start, going to the most likely looking sales in Pleasant Grove and Lindon, followed by north Orem or American Fork, depending on where we are at the time, and we try to never miss one in the Provo Riverbot-toms Riverbot-toms because those people have neat stuff over there. We usually ' do not go to Alpine and Highland as it is too difficult to find addresses there, although some times they have the most promising ads. My husband only likes to look for tools and, occasionally, fishing fish-ing equipment. I like books, some antiques, some furniture, and some crafts. My daughters like to look for clothes for their children and sometimes for themselves. I never look for clothes at a yard sale because I feel my old things are still better bet-ter than many other people's old things. There are a few frustrations with yard sales. One is those people who write in their ad that they are having a huge, multi-family yard sale and you get there to find one card table set up in the driveway with some old knickknacks on it plus three broken radios. Where is the "huge" that they advertised, I wonder? The next frustration is the people who think their old stuff is made of gold and they should sell it for the same price you can get it for brand new at R.C. Wil-ley Wil-ley or Kmart. Some people are smart and price their sale stuff for a little more than nothing and they are sold out by noon, unless all they have is clothes to dispose of. Others price it very high and when they still have all their stuff at 2 p.m., they begin to gradually reduce the prices but by then most of the yard salers have gone home. I remember one time before my youngest daughter got married, mar-ried, we went to a yard sale in north Orem and she found a gold crushed velvet love seat that was just right for their tiny apartment and it was only S10. After they used it for a long time they gave it to friends and heaven heav-en only knows where that $10 love seat is today. Those people had sold everything they had by II a.m. that day. Pleasant Grove Review NewUtah! (ISSN No. 1521-6861) (U.S.P.S. No. 435-780) 59 West Main American Fork, Utah 84003 danger our cities will have limited supplies sup-plies of water with which to fight possible fires. In a dry year like this one, it amounts to a disaster waiting to happen. While it is impossible to ward off natural fires, each of us can do our part to prevent man-made man-made fires from claiming forest lands, homes and possibly lives this summer. Individuals should secure permits before any open burning. burn-ing. Such permits should ensure that such burns are carried out safely, with proper precautions and under appropriate conditions. condi-tions. Care should also be taken to observe rules in forest lands concerning campfires and open flames. And in cities where fireworks are permitted, they should be used only with the greatest of care. Some cities will ban the use of fireworks altogether. This is the year to honor those restrictions. Fire prevention is a community-wide effort. This year we should make a special effort to make certain that wildfires are kept to a minimum. season again On the other hand, we have been to yard sales where prices were sky high and so we looked and moved on. Passing by the same property later in the day, we have noticed that there are still the same things on the lawn that were there earlier in the day. One time, many years ago, we were looking for a sofa and love seat for our family room. We found one in the Manila area but it was too much money. We decided to check back later in the day to see if the price had come down. Their sale was over and they were placing all the left overs, and there were many, into a trailer to take to D.I. They were just putting the sofa and love seat in. We asked if they still wanted to sell it and what the price was. We got both of them, and they were in good condition, for $125. After we used them for a long time, we gave them to our son and his wife and they used them for several sev-eral years. Our yard sale trip on Saturday Satur-day was fun but I did not buy any thing for myself or my husband. hus-band. However, each grandchild got something. Brittany, who is 12, got a stuffed toy squirrel; Markee, age 10, got an antique bottle with a cork that was filled with flower buds in water. Dallas, Dal-las, age 7, got an electric Poke-mon Poke-mon game which he did not put down for over 24 hours. He took it to bed. Stephanie, age 5, had a very hard time choosing something. Before we left on the yard sale trip I asked her what she wanted want-ed to get and she said, "Something "Some-thing for my Barbie collection." Naturally we had not found anything for her Barbie collection collec-tion or anything she would accept in its place by the time we were through shopping. Grandpa told her he would take her to D. I. to get something, figuring fig-uring the price would be about the same there as at the yard sale. He took her into the store and in no time she found just the perfect thing. It was a Barbie Bar-bie boat. She was happy. Grandpa Grand-pa was happy and we went home with four delighted kids and an empty gas tank. But we had fun. A member of NATIONAL NEWSPAPER ASSOCIATION Strawberry Days still fun without carnival I I think everyone will be a bit shocked to learn that there will not be a carnival at Strawberry Days this year. The City of Fun Carnival is a tradition. And not only is it a tradition, it's a local company. Unfortunately, the sad truth is that because of a scheduling conflict con-flict and confusion over which was the third week in June, the City of Fun Carnival will not be providing rides and entertainment entertain-ment this year at Strawberry Days. That doesn't mean the downtown down-town park will be empty and residents resi-dents will have nothing to do next week but sit on the grass and eat strawberries and cream. Alternative Alterna-tive activities have been planned and are still in the process of being planned. A company from Provo is going to set up a giant slide, an obstacle course, jousting, bumper cars and some other fun inflatable objects. The youth court is also going to set up some games and activities in the park. On Saturday Sat-urday there will also be a climbing climb-ing wall. The Boutique will still be held in the park as well Thursday, Friday Fri-day and Saturday. A trip back I took a ride in a stagecoach Saturday, and almost missed a photo in the process. Sharon and I were in Fairfield for the Pony Express Re-ride. This is an annual event where riders re-enact the 19-month experiment that carried mail from St. Joseph, Mo., to Sacramento, Sacra-mento, Calif., from 1860-61. The Stagecoach Inn in Fairfield Fair-field was one of the 100 stations along the Pony Express trail, where riders exchanged horses, and sometimes new riders picked up the "mochila" the leather pouch which contained the mail and moved it along. We had arrived about 30 min-:Xutes min-:Xutes before the planned transfer, gust in case the rider arrived I early. ' We knew there was a replica of a real stagecoach at the Stagecoach Stage-coach Inn because one of our corespondents, Charlynn Anderson, Ander-son, had written a story about it a few weeks ago. But what we found was even more intriguing. The stagecoach, : on loan from Iron Mission State Park in Cedar City, was no longer parked as a museum piece. Instead, two large Belgian draft horses had been hitched to the stagecoach, and State Sen. Bill Wright was giving it a trial run. Wright uses his horses to pull a variety of wagons in the state especially during parade season. No one was riding in the coach, although Mark Trotter, park manager of . Camp FloydStagecoach Inn State Parks who had arranged for the Sometimes it Sometimes it works. Sometimes Some-times it doesn't. It didn't work when I burned my finger and wanted the pain to go away. It took longer to work when our last child moved out and we were left with an empty nest. But many times it has worked and that's why I keep trying it. . Like most concepts, "positive thinking" is a cliche when someone some-one else is talking about it. It's Holy Writ when it works in my life. My favorite example is when our newspaper carrier changed. We were living on a quiet mountain moun-tain road that ended in a cul-de-sac. We had several neighbors but couldn't hear them from our house or yard. We left our doors and windows open on summer nights and slept contentedly in the company of a cool breeze and silence. Telephone Numbers Circulation 375-5103 News & Advertising 755-7669 Publisher Brett Bezzant Managing Editor Marc Haddock City Editor Karli Poyfair Subscription price S26- per year Periodicals Postage Paid at American Fork, Utah POSTMASTER: send address change to 59 West Main, American Fork, Utah 64003 Headlines Classified Advertising . . .Tuesday, noon Display Advertising Monday. 5 p.m. News Monday. 2 p.m. Missionaries Monday. 2 p.m. Weddings Monday, 2 p.m. Letters to the Editor . . .Monday, 10 a.m. Sports Monday. 10 a.m. Community Calendar . .Monday. 10 a.m. Obituaries Tuesday. 11 a.m. So while it is sad to know that there won't be a carnival, and I'm sure there will be many disappointed disap-pointed children, there will still be lots of fun things to do, so dont stay home just because there isn't a carnival. (Just think about all the money you'll save because you won't have buy ride tickets!) One thing I've always loved about Strawberry Days is all the free family activities. Next Monday Mon-day night there is a free Family Swim Night at the Veterans Memorial Pool. Then Tuesday night there will be a free concert by McCoslyn and Paye. I've even heard a rumor that strawberries and cream will be given out to the concert-goers. The Youth Theatre will be presenting pre-senting the "Magical Land of Oz" Thursday and Friday during the afternoon in the Keith Christeson Little Theatre. Children should really enjoy this production, and parents should enjoy it also, to the days of stagecoach, told us Wright. was. testing it out, getting it ready for the public that afternoon. Sharon asked if we could be guinea pigs. Sometimes it's really real-ly great to work for a newspaper. Trotter said sure, and Wright welcomed us into the open-air coach. . The bright red coach rides on a set of thick leather straps called "thorough braces" a precursor pre-cursor to the springs we now use to make the ride smoother. The result is a swaying movement, not just backWard and forward, but side to side, that makes the stagecoach ride a smooth one or at least smoother than it would have been with no springs at all. We drove down the Fairfield street, enjoying the motion of the coach, and the breeze blowing through the open-air coach. The leather seats were wide and comfortable. You could see how six people could fit easily inside this coach especially six small people. To be honest, our ride lacked a little in authenticity. The draft horses probably were slower than the teams of horses used in the 1860s, and Fairfield's paved streets were smooth, compared makes all the difference phi I took this blessing for granted until our newspaper carrier changed. This new carrier drove a noisy old car and insisted on delivering deliv-ering the papers at 5 a.m. Every morning I would be startled star-tled awake by the roar of her car engine coming up the hill. It would be quiet again for a moment while she paused at the first mailbox, and then louder than ever as she gunned the engine to get the car moving uphill to the next mailbox. She delivered about eight papers on our street every morning morn-ing and I took it personally. Who did she think she was interrupting interrupt-ing my sleep for a few measly .... we welcome letters to the editor. All letters mus' "' nenun7 author's name (printed AND signed) and a telepn u , ber. We reserve the right to edit letters for clarity, v tion, taste and length. By Mail P.O. Box 7, American UT 84003 In Person . 59 W. Main, American bemuse, once again, this eve J' f Other free family event. 1 day include Huck ;j Anderson Park from 9 . ay $ i noon, a pet show at Battl. p & Park at 10 a.m., and a p L ! contest at 6:30 p.m. at the nity center. Alsn W'.- -4 through Saturday ther 5 free tours at m T ,.Wbf The rodeo is 'on attractions of Strawberry n took my kids to the WB1 night rodeo last year and so much fun. The kids , marched in the Children's P., r earlier that Hqtt v.j ""IS uuU llaQ rrg v, . eta to the rodeo, so aU I had to fnr wna mr tiolrnt TV. , r-' n t crowded at all and it tun,' nut tn Hp q vonr , . evening. My advice won not wait until the weekend I attend the rodeo this year. Peorii were turned away from the Sarur day night rodeo last year 1 ,,cuii;ouaj ui inursaay ari(j mran V, mi -rV. 4.1 t"UUgu witre is no car. nival, don't stay home. Come ami enjoy the strawberries and sun. port the city's annual celebration See you there. ; "leaJ r.-r and t ' Oniric i .An h; the old west paw - ,Ihe re :jofmi . Plage to the bumpy ride that must-and a have greeted riders of an actual'. t( stagecoach. nader For example, we didn't W?microf any need of the , padded ceilk -pies of but I'm certain passengers used: Microp it quite often in the early dajvf-the-ai whenever the coach hit a large.- aJlectio bump on the dusty dirt roads. t:dude lc We were really getting intd the ride when we heard a hi galloping along the street neaf the Stagecoach Inn. It was all very western. Then Sharon real'; ized a galloping horse was jusl what we were waiting for and I was going to miss my shot, j: I jumped out of the coach jui, as tne rider approacnea tni new .horses anc-nder. I ran ovei with my camera in hand as h, passed the mochila from on-horse on-horse to another. The new rioV leaped to his horse, and took oft I made five frames before th rider was gone and the momen: was' past. , ; : :: ' All in all,'- it was a pretty thrilling to relive those days q. yore., even if just for a momen Certainly, there is no bettef- place for this than Fairfield, anj this wonderful: state park. stagecoach, rides are M J" nfforpH pvptv Saturday in M l 9 Blc from noon to 4 p.m. Cost is t person or $8 for a family. Tf vnn are fortunate, so bandits mav aDDear from K Cedar Valley badlands, thoir faces, an? UCLliao LUVtiing u""" ill omon all vmir money valuables. It's improbable, j i J easy to imagine from the seat 11 the Stagecoach Inn's stagecoacv. papers? I lost more sleep over J anger than the noise. The nw lasted 10 minutes. The anger J ed for hours, surfacing ofl an" . . i . - - moves 1 throughout the day a - i m,or me. 'i arowsmess came , frustration festered fcrwf i This It finally, it sunK m. cent paper carrier wasntg' jj, get a new car or sleep in. J-n change. I would change toe M thought about the noise she" )ney( I began to thinK oi engine sounds as souu. , . gunning motor wasrousj would comfort me. The s and starting engine woui" back to sleep. vvitnin two unys - , nf through- the racket ana again heard her drive up ju Although "positive pi' doesn't always work, arte n u exneriences like this I'm Ps" Hllrj want to keep trying it- ... ..t nr Letters are welcome on a"y I- r ii HOW TO REACH Ui By Fax 756-5274 By E-Mail editornewutah.co Fork.' Fork |