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Callahan's October 1999 Bar Rag!"To Callahan's Warmth
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"So.....To good friends! They may be hard to find, ******SMASH****** -- Parrish (PARRISH3) September 11,1999 Our annual poetry contest was extended a few days into October but we're all anxiously awaiting the announcement of prize winners - scheduled for October 10th. We'll also announce them in Message Board News here next month. Delphi Internet has introduced two new features, one of which is the Related Forums link, and the other, a Polling feature for the Message Board. They are described a bit more herein but we hope you enjoy and use both regularly. As I pointed out last month, there is now a very nearly complete staff working at Callahan's. In fact, I'm only looking for a Website Manager to round things out nicely. Staff has met twice recently and nothing but good things come from such meetings. One such 'good thing' to come from a staff meeting is a renewed commitment to making Callahan's more supportive of the needs of patrons who wander in.. After all, sharing pain and joy are central to who we are. This is also the time of year that I remind people that the holidays are coming - and that we often get visitors who find themselves unhappy during the holidays because of the holidays. We are not a support group by any stretch of the imagination. We have no trained counselors on staff or tending here. But if you know of ways we can all be more supportive of one another, of ways to share pain along with joy, of ways to increase and improve the magic you've found here, I'm all ears..:)
And the beat goes on...! CSTAR sent in the news that Texican dropped by one night to announce the birth of his new son, Jacob Edward. BabyTex was born on September 10th, and adopted by the Tex's only days later. Congratulations to Texican, MizTex, and welcome to BabyTex! Peter reported that Poetry Night took place a record three times in September. We had participants from four continents, as well as the hosts of two other Delphi writing forums. We'll meet again on October 14 and 28; expect some SCARY poetry on the latter date. :-) September was the month for our annual poetry contest at Callahan's. This year, our poetry 'tender, Peter Desmond, selected 'poems about work' to be the theme. The winner will be announced October 10th, and I know we're all looking forward to the announcement. A cash prize of 50 US dollars will be awarded for 1st place, 30 US dollars for second place, and 20 US dollars for third place. A book prize will be awarded to any winning entry on the Callahan's theme. So far, we've had poems about teaching, corporate power plays, farming – or not, dreading going to work, the art of working, returning to work, sewer work... nearly a hundred entries that I've counted. We also had a few very special poems posted this month. Ilyana (ILYANA) posted her DRAGON POEMS (one of which still makes me squirm a bit,) and showed her love of dragons. Lizkat (ELIZABETHKAT) posted a poem written by her first grade class, SPIDER AND MOTHER, about two seamstresses, one human, one a spider, and their ultimate sharing of space. Thanks to all of those young people, for sharing their poetry with us. Talent certainly knows no age boundaries. To go along with our work theme from the poetry contest, we've also been talking about jobs. From the strangest we've had, in YOU DID WHAT? to ones we'd like to have, in STUFF DREAMS ARE MADE OF… Our friends have registered births, trimmed Christmas trees, made maple syrup, worked in a psychiatric hospital. They've dreamed of being a marine biologist, a housekeeper on a cruise ship, a video game programmer, the official scorekeeper for a major league baseball team, a replacement security officer aboard Deep Space Nine, and a first contact specialist! Delphi Internet has introduced a couple of new features recently, one of which is the Related Forums link, and the other, a polling feature. The Related Forums is handy for moving quickly to other favorite places. The polls enable us to take a quick vote on any subject. I look forward to more polls being posted, and the fun we can have with that! Have you stuffed your ballot box today? Happy Anniversary JP!! JP (JP8) wished his wife of 25 years a very Happy Anniversary!! Hurricane Floyd threatened the United States Southeast Coast in September, and had us all concerned for a few days there about our friends in the path. We were relieved when Lou, JP, KathyC, Parrish, kestrel, Dan, and Annewyd, in THIS FLOYD ISN'T PINK, kept us informed about the progress of the hurricane. We're glad you were all safe from the hurricane winds, and hope our friends in the Carolinas are coping well with the flooding the storm brought. There were several serious discussions this month, including, BREAKDOWN OF WORLD RELIGIONS, PRIDE IN SYMBOLS, SYMBOLS, SYMBOLISM & SACRAMENTS, and a long discussion on THE ART OF HAPPINESS. Some stunning stories were presented this month in Creative Writing, including BIRTHDAYS AND NEW BEGINNINGS, by GreyLensman. Grey talks about his oldest son, now grown up, moving away, and whether anyone was ready for it. Midus (MIDUSTOUCH) had us on the edge of tears with her story of a long ago love, PISCES REACHES PERFECTION, and its' companion piece, A LETTER TO MY PAST. Digger (DIGGER98) nearly started a controversy of his own, with a story called RAGE. This was a story of a stalker, two teenagers, and one's violent solution. It seems that sometimes writers are so good, that we forget they're telling a story. Birthday Greetings were heartily extended to:
The indomitable Ilyana solved our September 1999 riddle on her second try! And Bright, well known on our board, solved it next. Congratulations to both! We've had lots of tries but third place honorable mention but it's *still* up for grabs! It's a lot easier to create a riddle than to solve one. We're always on the lookout for help with content here so send us your riddle creations today! And see Mikel's October 1999 Riddle for your chance to win a Spider Robinson book from our bookstore! DOG CROSS BREEDS The following breeds are now recognized by the AKC:
Collie + Lhasa Apso
Spitz + Chow
Pointer + Setter
Great Pyrenees + Dachshund
Pekingnese + Lhasa Apso
Irish Water Spaniel + English Springer Spaniel
Labrador Retriever + Curly Coated Retriever
Newfoundland + Basset Hound
Terrier + Bulldog
Bloodhound + Labrador
Malamute + Pointer
Collie + Malamute
Deerhound + Terrier
Bull Terrier + Shitzu -- from Cortland (KA5S)) Dr. Z left this poem on our board:
her eyes were like ice-cubes To which Punstergal responded,
Her heart was frozen -- DZ & Punstergal September 1999 The Punday Night topic was "Weddings" and it started out like this. BEITH sounds like an engaging topic Walt medical weddings? GreyLensman Hmmmmmm... has a familiar ring.... MobyPunRef we could band together on this one MobyPunRef Aisle vow to press on, then. Neil May divorce be vitchu.... MobyPunRef Neil's in an altared state, looks like BEITH hmm if our local winner of the wet T shirt contest gets married, we could all wish her wetted bliss GreyLensman Keep an eye on Neil... you never know WHAT that chapel do! BEITH aisle have a beer please, tender CHATTYGIRL1 let the games begin.... CHATTYGIRL1 and may the best man win...... BEITH spider man gets married..webb-ed bliss -- Punday Night September 21, 1999 I look upon every day to be lost, in which I do not make a new acquaintance. -- Samuel Johnson We hope you find the Bar Rag entertaining and informative. We can always use good pieces and writers here. If you have something you would like to submit, or have a comment, good or bad, about the newsletter, or if you wish to be added to or removed from our Bar Rag mailing list, simply send us a note. |