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Penncrest
High School
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Spring 2001 Spring is advancing up here in the Northeast. Our bird feeders will have a considerable amount of traffic for a little while longer as the birds situate themselves for another season of entertainment. We will once again have front row seats as the birds feed, nest, fly, and generally maintain an envious activity level. We have watched some rabbits in the back yard over the winter and given their closeness, it is a good bet we will have a bumper bunny crop as well. We usually rely on them for morning and evening shows. Undoubtedly, the chipmunks will return to recapture the stone wall, the patio, and the flowerpots. It seems that no matter where anything is placed, it is in their way requiring a considerable amount of leaping from point to point. Hopping from pot to pot they appear to be the epitome of the upwardly mobile backyard rodent. I hope our snake comes back this year. In years past he has made our patio his
home and makes effective use of the boxwoods for daily basking. This would make
a little more sense to us if the bush were actually in the full sun. At this
point, I assume he just likes to hang around us. It isn't all that alarming,
but if you are sitting in the sofa on the porch and look over the back, through
the screen, you may see a cute little pair of eyes staring back. I have gotten some interesting email addressed to Sandy@Penncrest.com. One young fellow wrote to say he heard "a lot of good things about Penncrest"and wanted to know how to apply to the school for the next term. As far as I know, the major entrance requirement is still geography, i.e., where you live. Still, it is nice to have the reputation. We seem to have attracted attention from the "Divorce Made Easy for Amateurs and Professionals" web sites. They have taken noticed that the word, "divorce" occurs more than once in our web site biographies. Therefore, they send me advice and the opportunity to avail myself of their services. Fortunately my wife has a sense of humor when it comes to the volume of "How To"divorce literature I receive. You may have noticed that someone posted a long letter describing a pyramid scheme that will make us all wealthy. In fact, if you follow the rules, it should make everyone in the world wealthy. Apparently our pyramid poster believes the scheme becomes legal if you ask people to send money at least three times. Keep those messages coming. A number of other Penncrest classes use the board as well, making it a good starting point to find old friends. The Usual Stuff Contributions to the class fund to offset our 40th Reunion expenses should be sent to Sandy or Rick. Make the checks out to Penncrest High School, Class of 1963. Please update your biographies, and remember to keep us informed about a change of address or new email address. Check our class list to make certain that we have the current country or state, and email address. Our web site now has the "Other Class" list for the rest of the school to use. If anyone has the time and inclination, I would love to have a few contributors to the newsletter. I'm told that I will probably not get contributors until I make a mandatory assignment to describe your summer vacation in exactly 500 words. (It is my firm belief that the quanta of literature are in precise 500 words increments. If you have no idea what the heck I'm talking about, quickly skip over this sentence and the one before.) Any opinion on distribution? Should we continue to mail these newsletters, or just post them on the web site? Please sent your ideas or suggestions to me, Sandy@Penncrest.com, or consider posting them on the message board. If you can find some time to assist Paul Gibson in his efforts to find all of our misplaced classmates, contact him at pgibsons@bellatlantic.net. I'm still waiting for suggestions regarding the 40th Reunion. According to my
calculations, it will take place in the year 2003. A propitious year by any
astrologer's reckoning. Sum the digits 2+0+0+3 and the total is 5, which
represents our graduating class. This can't be a simple coincidence. If you
multiply the digits you get zero, which means absolutely nothing. Back to the 40th- Do we want a dinner with a band, dancing, etc. or should we follow the garden path and have picnic? Certainly there are numerous options in between. Are there any volunteers out there willing to take upon themselves the planning and organizing responsibilities? If this is just the opportunity you've been dreaming about, let us know. Maybe it is time to cut the Media cord and consider having our 40th reunion at a
hotel in the big city. For the night, we could forsake our rural heritage and
venture into the bright city lights of Philadelphia, and let the city love us
back. Jay News From this day forth, no newsletter will be complete without a "Jay News" item. I have been wondering about a few other things. Jay MacLaughlin told me he was carving a duck for me- a teal to be precise. Given that the project has been underway for a few years, I'm beginning to worry about the size of the duck and whether it will fit through my front door. Jay Fenwick is still recovering from the Eagles loss to the Giants in the Super
Bowl. There may, or may not, be a cure for Jay. But he has suggested that if
people send him green things (Eagles' colors) it might help him get over the
loss. As always it is best if the green things fit into basic business
envelopes. All of the money in our class fund will be used to reduce the cost of future
reunions. The costs associated with producing newsletters, mailings, and phone
calls are contributed by the writers, mailers, and callers. The same is true of
the web site. The class has not incurred any expenses for the web site, and we
have actually made a few dollars from people ordering books via our Amazon
link. I am looking for suggestions to increase traffic on our web site. A number of
classmates have sent me e-mails asking why so few people update their
biographies and why others have not written them at all. They also wonder what
it would take to have more activity on the message board. My experiment of
separating message boards by class seemed to cut down on all of the messages so
I went back to the original format. (If anyone can recommend a better "free"
message board, I'll be happy to try it. In the meantime, I am certain we can
make do with this one, even though it is not Y2K compliant.) Sandy and Rick completed the first planning meeting for the 40th reunion. The meeting took place in an undisclosed location over a two week period. A number of major issues were resolved at the meeting- 1) It is time to start thinking about scheduling a date for the reunion in 2003. 3) We will pester people mercilessly to contribute to the class fund by writing checks, or purchasing through the Amazon link on the web site. 4) 40 year old photo ID's may be required to gain admittance to the reunion. 5) If we continue the multi year custom of a two person reunion committee, you may end up with a 40th reunion that involves a Circle Line Tour of Manhattan Island in the dead of winter. 6) We'll do our best to make the party as financially painless as possible. Please send your thoughts on the 40th so that we can start to plan. You may also
consider posting your ideas on the message board. This is the most recent list of lost classmates. Any assistance in
finding them is greatly appreciated. If you have any information, from a
current address, a parent's address, last know address or better yet an e-mail
address, please sent it to Rick using the enclosed form. You may also send
information to Paul Gibson at pgibsons@bellatlantic.net. Gloria Lee Baker | ||
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Updated on 12/11/12 |
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