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Show y s. Review - Wednesday, November 28, 1984 - Page 2 Santa Claus must have been a mother p.g. blub . v By MAKCEIXA WALKKK Thanksgiving came and went just like that and now they tell us Christmas is just around the corner. Actually, you see signs of it everywhere with Santa arriving at every mall and town in the USA. (He sure gets around.) You see it in the decorations hanging across the streets in several local towns, in the decorations at every store and shopping center. You see it in the size of the daily newspapers which become so cumbersome that the delivery boy needs a tractor-traile- r to gel them out. You see it in the eyes of the little children. You see it in the haggard expression of the mothers who are trying valiantly to be ready for Christmas before the last minute. You see it in the gleeful grin of the businessmen who are really raking it in. You see it in the grandmothers who ha ve a ball at this time of year. However, you don't see it in the dads, or any man for that matter. It is not that they don't love Christmas. I'm sure they do. But they leave the thinking to the mothers and then they go shopping with them to keep from feeling guilty. - That is not always true. Some men I know will not go shopping with their wives to get the Christmas stuff. They put up the money but stay out of the rest altogether. In almost every family I know the the children were small we always had the shopping done early. We began in September and by December we were ready except for last minute impulse buying. Something has happened of late. We get slower every year. And every year I make a committment, right after Christmas, that I am going to have it all done early the next time. Bah, humbug! It doesn't happen. Part of the reason is that during the entire fall, on Saturdays when we can shop, there are BYU ballgames to either go to or listen to. One cannot sacrifice a ballgame to go shopping. That would be unheard of with me, as you all know. By the time the football season is over it is almost December. The stores are too full of shoppers and it is hard to find what you want. You know, a lot of the problem is because the children are now all older. When they were young you could get them anything for Christmas and they loved it. They would be happy no matter what. A 'hen come the teenage years. You hae to be very, very particular. . YnCi have to take the child with you a V.wAtimes to learn what "they like, thV;v'you have to go back and get it wheji they are not there and by then it has been sold. You are right back to where you started. I hear mothers say all the time that it is really scary to buy for your teen. You are petrified that they will not like CothesareaL'wiU. along with exji hatS l , stereos, VCR? "4 ? animals. ' and j Last year one of our tto a cockatiel. That ahead of time andkJH , waited until the Christmas and then !1' i. okay. worked , 0" top of all this, two teenagers, 'Sio married kids. Wha are fc should we give them,n 'he money more than anvih e) take iiJ 6 eitheranditisno'Sjt?' unwrap.) WaPorV(. He is no problem this Year the girls receive a doll are too old Patch dolls aret What else is available already have? lnatlH: In the next a frenzied lady ru2 ;u to get good ideas r ? without letting the kid! they are getting. Please j; cloud of dust she leaves fi is all for a good cause. Lhn for the family. Now, let me see. What would, parents hke? What about ,' husband? What about me' mother comes up with the ideas for Christmas for the most part. She may discuss the ideas with her husband but in most cases, anything is alright with him. The mother also bakes the goodies, sews the new clothes, makes the dollclothes, prepares tv, treat for the neighbors, and shops " and shops and shops. I was talking to Sherri Atwood, the Police Department's pretty secretary and dispatcher, and she said that she is at it early this year because she did it late last year out of necessity and it about did her in. I know whereof she speaks. When i; itorial USTS needs to calm concerns Officials from the'Utah'Department of Social Services need to act soon and decisively if they are going to stabilize the atmosphere of uncertainty that now surrounds the Utah State Training School in American Fork. Recent events at the school, coupled with new directions in care of the handicapped traditionally housed at the state institution, have created an unhappy situation at the school. Add to that the unknown but sure to come changes in state government that will accompany the transition from a Democratic governor to a Republican one, and there are a lot of people who are worried about having a ; job next month, and even next week. At the higher levels of state government, no one is quite sure what is going to happen. Governor-elec- t :! ; Norm Bangerter claims he has no plans to carry out a ; wholesale replacement of top appointed state offices. But he has said he will make changes where he feels they are necessary. It is a wait-and-se- e game to find out where those changes will be made, and the head of the Utah Department of Social Services has said he will remain in that position. Even that is still speculation, and other high ranking officials in that department are probably going to lose their jobs. At lower levels, jobs are threatened by the govern-- : ment's plans to move some residents out of the Utah State Training School and into community based residential programs. ... .. It is part of a nationwide trend based on the theory that large institutions like the Utah State Training School are not the best way to care for the handicapped. Although state officials have been careful not to commit to any sudden moves, and claim that residents will be evaluated at depth before they are placed in residential tare programs, it is pretty certain that the trend will mean a shrinkipg number of residents at the training school - and! a resultant decrease in em-ployment at the institution. The sense of insecurity created by these conditions is magnified by recent changes among top level ad-ministrators at the hospital. If those changes were made when the other problems did not exist, they would probably not have the same effect, As it is, however, employees at the Utah State Training School --and there are a lot of them - are left in a position of waiting for the other shoe to drop and wondering on whom it will land. Through the upcoming weeks, clear signals from state and local leadership at the Utah State Training School would help a great deal to dispel the uncertainty that now surrounds the school. It's not fair. Fly ME to the moon, please - h)t-- yr O O O O O O O 0 the editor COlfffltH By MAKC HADDOCK It's just not fair, Jake! All of my life, at least ever since I can remember, I've dreamt of taking one, just one, trip to space. Is that too much to ask? And now you are going. I watched the early ac-complishments of our astronauts with a mixture of admiration and envy. And when I was about eight, my parents presented me with the best Christmas present a boy ever had; my own Cape Canaveral complete with rockets, launching pads and little men to send into space. It came with a record the count-down and lift off of John Glenn's historic flight into space -- - a record that I listened over and over again as, in my mind's eye, I recreated that space launch. A few years later, when the folks brought home a large cardboard box and took out whatever was inside it. was soon transformed into a spa capsule complete with a homemade console complete with a container for what I considered to be the ideal space food - tiny pieces of chewing gum covered with candy. I stocked up a light-year'- s supply. I would disappear into the box for hours at a time as I would blast off, orbit and splash down. And I hoped has logged a lot of hours in has worked hard to keephiml in shape. And he is the chairman,' senate subcommittee that has i" to do with the funding ihaikwp)1i; National Aeronautics and Administration airborne. He's just one of those people', happens to be in the right plat,, the right time, with the right sin' to pull. And he's going lo gel space. A school teacher will follow it eventually a journalist, since ji publicity has a definite cldm funding as well as U.S. senators. But the journalist probably w be a newspaperman from a sma town in Utah -- especially not ami newspaperman with a fh: of heighths whose only flight ti perience has been on the aisleseai a Boeing 707. 'And so," I'll probably never jc there - at least not through newspaper route (ouch! i. But Jake is going, and ii jt doesn't seem fair. Gosh, do you think I should run Ik office? There are bound to be a Ink! people who would like to send me the moon. I'll even promise won't come back. for the real thing to come along. The interest in space travel matured,, rather than waned,, with age. Soon science fiction novels were taking me on journeys to other' solar1 systems and galaxies even though Neil Armstrong had not yet set foot on the moon. There were more models, more books and more dreams about reaching out beyond the confines of the envelope of air that defines our earthly habitat - but the dreams became more fanciful as the reality of space flight became more tangible. The idealism of youth gave way to the facts of life - while a lot of people might get into space before I would die, I would not be one of them; ' r' I was no test pilot, nor even an astrophysicist. I wasn't even a politician. You wouldn't think that would matter, unless you considered the case of Jake Garn, who has been told he will be the first senator in space. Not that Jake isn't qualified for the job. He is a military pilot who Three-ca- r accident reported A three-ca- r accident was reported Nov. 14 at 12:35 p.m. at the in-tersection of State Road 89 and Main Street in Pleasant Grove, according to Officer Jeff Wilson. He reported that a car driven by Gregory D. Peck, 20, American Fork, was headed west on State Street when a car driven by Gloria J. Dunn, 41, American Fork, pulled in front of him. The officer said that Mr. Peck swerved to miss the Dunn car but still hit it and then careened into another car which was driven by E. Dee Olpin, 52, Pleasant Grove. No one was injured in the mishap. Damage to the Peck vehicle was listed at $600, there was $1,000 damage to each of the other two cars. There ought to be hazard pay for this tidbits .& Copyright 1984, Sharon Morrey By SIIAKON MORKKY This is treacherous duty, this reporting business. If someone isn't yelling in your ear about how you misspelled their name or left them out of the story, somebody else is writing you death threats because their child's picture never ran. I don't know if it's worth it. I mean, here I am, small-tim- e reporter person out on assignment when I should be cooking dinner and all I have to do is climb a couple of 40-fo- ladders and back up to take a roof photo. Why should I be concerned? Why should I mind. "I get paid for it. don't I?" (not enough! ) And then again I'm spending the morning with my claustrophobia and 25 sixth grade kids underground in a bomb shelter tunnel, I find myself wondering ... is this the life of ease and fame I dreamed of? Is any story worth the risk? I never intended to get rich doing this (and I haven't) and I never Even then I was getting into trouble with my stories - my mom didn't like how I dredged up little juicy details about life around the house. And my brothers reacted negatively when their escapades made the front page. There would be good days and bad days, a mistake now and then, libel suits, letter bombs, unhappy editors and peeved politicians. I knew that. I planned ahead for that. I try to be ready and "believe it or not" I even try to make sure I don't make the mistakes that drive people crazy and cause them to cancel their subscriptions. The problem is that a reporter's "little" mistakes usually are in GREAT BIG LETTERS, for the world to see and with a tatlletale by-line to make sure people know "whodunnit." And it's always the sleepers that get you, the PR (public relations) pieces or the freebies you did on your own time just to be nice. I always hear about theoneonili back page where 1 cut a crwialbii" information 'in half (to gel iu where there wasn't room) or lit to represent the other side in about the PTA member drive. And then once in a while when I' get it right, the reader gels it m and I'm still in the doghouse iT years ago when the Alpine Su District thought I was sent F; sonally to persecute them have been tickled to know sum called to accuse me of W district's little puppet." You can't win. And somen wonder why 1 fight sick sense of wanting to be maybe I don't gel kicks at home. t I don't have the answer i journalists and newspaper this. Most of us know Ml ; someofuscouldbehappierm occupations. 0 Maybe it's because Bufdon't quote me on tnai. really set out to make friends (although it would be nice if people didn't lob tomatoes at you in the schoolyard.) Bull thought it would be fun and keep me out of trouble. I thought I knew the score as I went in. I've been putting out papers since I was five and published the "Hancock Gazette." Peasant (Sroue ftcuietu U.S.P.S. No. 0 11 South Main Pleasant Grove, Utah 84062 Published weekly except y for Thanksgiving and Christmas by Newtah, Inc. Telephone Numbers Advertising & Circulation. News 3 Publisher Brett R. Bezzant Editors Marc Haddock Marcella Walker Subscription price $12" per year Second class postage paid at Pleasant Grove Post Office Postmaster: Send address changes to P.O. box 7. American Fork, Utah W003 Two injured in accident Pleasant Grove Police Officer Dave Vickers reported that two individuals were injured Saturday at ' 1:30 a.m. when their 1984 Renault struck a utility pole head on at 739 E. 200 South. The two received head, leg, and chest injuries and were taken to American Fork Hospital by Pleasant Grove ambulance. Names of the injured were not released. Check with State Farm Competitive Rates. Guaranteed Lifetime Income. Waiver of Premium for Disability Option . "Good Neighbor" Service x I fcm J v-- - staii im Like a good neighbor. i J (fS State Farm is there L I Stale Farm Life Insurance Home Oflice Bloommgton. Illinois A TwT 1 MIKE'S SUBS BB OPENING M LEHI m DECEMBER j (Across from Lehi Bakery) 6 inch to 6 foot sandwiches tffZi Sundaes-Cone- s ; 7, flack!! rri- -. . fM''2x Chili I i 1 A Classic Meal in a Bun iffL |