New Year's Day

New Year's Eve day a couple of friends invited us join them marching and playing African percussion instruments in a State College parade. We hadn't seen the annual ice sculpture displays before, and it sounded like it might be fun, so we loaded all the kids in the van and went. I played a shaker and Natika played a bean rattle, and Ianniq played some hand carved rolling pin thing. Natasha and Elmira carried poles with animal likenesses on top. Temperatures must have been in the low teens. Fingers got cold and stiff, but we still had a lot of fun.
We enjoyed dinner and desserts at The Diner afterward. It's always neat just to check out the kids who work there. One of the prerequisites for hire must be an accident involving a tackle box. The girl who waited on us was sweet enough, but the cooks in the basement were either smoking something or they had an early start on the New Years champagne. The French Onion Soup was awful. When she first served it to us, the cooks witheld the standard mozzarella and croutons. She gave us just a bowl with onions and broth. The waitress with fish hooks in her lips did all she could do to make it right, reheating the soup with croutons and cheese, as we requested. Still, the best French Onion soup in town comes from the Corner Room, not the Diner, that is for sure.

Every New Years day I think of Roberto. I was only ten years old, but like those who remembered where they were when Kennedy was assassinated, I remember like yesterday where I was when I learned about Clemente. We were in the car, on our way to visit Aunt Gladys and Uncle Norman and cousins Larry and Norm. I think we heard it on the radio right there in the car. I spent most of that year 1973, believing that Roberto Clemente couldn't possibly have died in that New Years Eve plane crash. For months, I figured that one day he'd show up on a beach somewhere, having swum safely to shore.The Nittany Lions seemed lost at sea this afternoon as they were thoroughly beaten by USC at the Rose Bowl today, 38-24. A couple penalties at crucial times during the first quarter cost them the game.