Satellite AV Contest - GEOSATpro microHD - Enter to Win - Drawing on 6/11/2012

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Back on the eastern Arkansas farm in the late 1940's and early 1950's our days started before sun-up, and ended just before the sun went down. We always enjoyed sitting down to the supper table with home grown vegatables , cornbread and biscuits. It didn't take long until we were ready for bed, after a full day of driving a two row model A John Deere tractor, or in my case following behind a mule because I was too young and small for the tractors yet. I remember making cold chocolate milk when the ice man came by each week,and we got two 50 pound blocks for the "icebox". Thats before the days of having an electric refrigerator. We even had homemade ice cream on Sunday, by using a one gallon syrup bucket with a bail on it, placed inside a 2 1/2 gallon water bucket with ice in it. You turned the syrup bucket back and forth with the bail. And to think, they took away all those times of laughing and talking by inventing an electric ice cream freezer. I miss those times on the front porch, I think they were made for visiting. We sure used ours for that and for sleeping out on during those hot summer nights. You couldn't do that now, could you? We didn't have a lock on any of the doors, didn't need any.
 
Fishing in my Grandfather's pond. I would occasionally camp out by the pond, but had to watch out for the snakes.
 
We had a small house and my bedroom was the porch. So in May, I would put up a tent and spend the next 5 months sleeping in it. Sunset occurred about 10pm in June and dusk lasted another hour. I could play as late and as long as daylight lasted.
Eventually I went to work for local farmers stacking hay bales and shoveling grain so that I could have money to buy the things I wanted.
 
Ah, summer as a child meant two great things; no more school and a trip to Seattle to see my relatives. Being from Southern California it was like stepping into another world.
 
In my youth in Summer, I used to play games on a Pong machine when I was in college in 1979. It was a lot of fun except for the fact that we played on Black & White TV in the evening with the lights off. It had the same effect on my eyes as a quick peek at the Venus transit had yesterday even with two pairs of sunglasses stacked upon each other. Later on I was conducting a computer training session for a well known federal agency and I started to wax philosophically about Pong. The unexpected response was: "You were in college in 1979??!!!"
 
Ahh those old summer time days…
The very next day after school ended for the summer…
going down to the creek to go wading, swimming and fishing.

Nothing but pure relaxation!
 
We use to hit a little river with a culvert and grab some innertubes and such and just float around for a few hours.
 
The best thing about my summers other than being off school was going on vacation. We would travel somewhere every year. At first, we went to the same place every other year renting a house on the beach for a couple weeks or so with other family members who lived far from us. The years in between we'd pick somewhere different to go. Road trips across the continent to places like Yellowstone National Park, Mount Rushmore and everywhere in between. Sometimes we were really lucky and went to Hawaii or Europe. As I grew older I ended up traveling many places on my own. Before I could drive, I'd ride my bicycle 100km being gone for the whole day. When I could drive, it was worse. I drove 2500km to Mexico! To this day, I still love to travel. I've seen half of Canada, almost every state, and been on four continents giving me priceless experiences and memories, and it all started with my childhood summers.
 
Though it has been over forty years it seems like yesterday when my brother and I would spend our summer with our grandmother cutting grass and baling hay and extra work around there for a few extra dollars. Our playtime was spent fishing and swimming the river and the bayou near her Texas coastal home. Many enjoyable memories of those times which are never forgotten but all too often overlooked.
 
Every summer weekend my father would my take brothers and myself trout fishing. We would try to go to to a different place each time, we had some favorite spots but we liked to explore and learn about the land. We always mange to bring home a few trout. Those were the days.
 
We liked to play in the two creeks that ran through the property, wading to cool our feet, digging in the mud to make little ponds, building tiny dams, catching salamanders (then we let them go), chasing minnows, and Watching out for water snakes....
 
When I was a kid I loved the summer days at the beach; playing in the waves, building sand castles, finding sea shells and sand dollars, and digging for Gouy Ducks.
 
As a student of elementary school, I had many friends from our neighbourhood, with whom I played soccer, and went to swim in a pond. We used to climb street trees, and also (to the horror of our parents) the hydro poles, but we knew not to touch the wires (220 Volts AC then). We rode adult bikes with right leg under the frame bar, as we were too small to mount the bikes. We ran behind bicycle rims, pushing them with wire hooks made by ourselves of 3/16 thick wire, shaped on a big hammer (as an anvil) with small hammer, so the wire had a U - shaped guide for these rims. During Easter, we liked to make bangs, exploding matches' heads inserted into keys (keys with holes) with nails, its ends filed flat, tied together with a piece of a shoelace, this set being hit into a wall. For more bang, we used half-gallon metal cans with metal lids. We made (with a nail) small hole in the bottom of the can, inserted a piece of carbide stone in the can, spat on it and close the lid. The can was placed horizontally on the ground and held down with left foot. After several seconds there was a mixture of acetylene and air in the can, so, when a burning match was brought to the small hole, an ignition took place, shooting the lid away with loud bang. In todays standards, we were sort of menace to the neighbours, but in that times, people were more tolerant and patient. Regards, polgyver
 
favorite childhood summer past-time or activity

Spent just about every day with friends at the public swimming pool a block away, from 1-5 and 6-9. Had a blast.
_
Neil
 
Going up in Texas there was fishing and cow tippin'. Every summer consisted of me riding my bike in 100º+ until I blacked out, and kept riding until my vision came back. Eventually I'd reach my fishin' hole and jump in. The rest of the afternoon involved 3-5 pound bass and 20+ pound cats.

Not much has changed except I'm in missouri, the bass are smaller, and I ride my suburban.

--> I'd love to have a micro HD!
 
Wow! Where do I begin?? So many childhood memories growing up. I lived in a neighborhood that had a lot of kids and Summer time meant waking up early to play basketball, wiffle ball, or football. Then bike ride to the nearest 7-11 store to pick up a slurpee and packages of sports cards, go home and play some more ball until it was time to eat dinner. After dinner all of us kids would play hide and seek until it was time to go in for the night. Some good ol atari video games until bedtime and then do it all over the next day. Man, I miss those summers as a kid. Not a care in the world!!
 
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