Happy Easter Central Valley

I've had what I would call an interesting week. When I was in high school, we would use the word interesting as a substitute for a different, less PC word. I had one of those kinds of weeks.

First, I had to take my minivan in to have the rack & pinion fixed (replaced), whereupon it was discovered that I also needed to have breaks done and rotors replaced. I take my vehicles to Discount Tires on Shaw in Clovis and I love those guys, I really do. Robert and Stephen were so helpful about coming and getting the van, then dropping it off when it was done. When my check didn't go through they didn't call the cops (it wasn't my fault, by the way - some kind of glitch in the electronic check payment thingy), Harry, who seems to by my own personal mechanic is always looking out for me and I can't be more thankful. Regardless of all this, it's really hard to love people when you are forced to hand over 1,200 hard earned simolians in such a manner. They also took my bitchiness very well. Thanks guys!

Second, my babysitter and her sister-in-law turned ladies night out into ladies night in the hospital when said babysitter totalled her husband's mercedez (should that be capitalized?). They were both bumped and bruised up pretty good, but they're fine and the good news was none of their collective seven children were in the car. The bad news for me, and it's all about me afterall, was that I didn't have a babysitter for a week. It was fun and all, more time with the munchkin, but it made working a bit harder.

Third, I drove all the way out to Paso Robles to pick up a print order that my father said was ready, and it wasn't! This was the second such trip and it was all I could do to keep the 5th commandment. That's all I have to say about that.

The silver lining was on Friday when I took munchkin with me on sales calls. First we went to Academy Feed in Sanger where she got to go crazy over their Easter chicks. She calls them cheeps. So cute. Then we went to Kelley's Pets on Cedar and she got to go crazy over their Easter bunnies. Still very cute. I'm glad I get such a kick outta that kid.

If you are in the Fresno/Clovis area, you have just witnessed one of the most beautiful weeks we will have all year long. Perfect air, perfect tempurature, you can see the copious snow pack and the lovely blossoms. I hope you took lots of mental pictures of the last couple of days, because you're going to need the happy memories to get you through the summer to come. From what I hear, it's going to be a doozy.

A nice person named Bill IM'ed me. I get a lot of random IMs these days - apparently I come up on yahoo's singles' search pretty readily. This guy was married, so I let him know right away that there wouldn't be any shinanigans - I don't know if he had shinanigans on his mind, but I wasn't taking any chances. Anyway, he's from England and has been here since 1988 when his company transferred him here. I asked him if he misses it at all. He said that his sister had emailed him from England and told him that they had gotten 3 inches of snow - NO, he doesn't miss it at all! LOL! In fact his favorite thing about the valley is the weather, even the hot stuff. His least favorite is the fog. Bill's favorite restaurant is an Italian restaurant named Parma at Fresno & Herndon (I've never been there) and his favorite things to do are golf, hunting, and fishing.

He loves the people in Fresno and Clovis - he says they are layed back... cool. Isn't that nice?

Why Clovis?

I live in Clovis, CA. Clovis is a suburb of Fresno. Oh, I know. How does a place like Fresno have a suburb? Well, for those of you who might have happened upon this silly little shrine to self-indulgence who don't actually KNOW Fresno, it's not as bad as they make it sound.

Over the next whatever span of time, I'm planning on doing some research on the Fresno/Clovis area. I don't know a whole lot, but I do know that I like it here. It's a little more conservative than I like, but people aren't rude about it. It gets a little too hot in the summer and the hot lasts a little too long, but there are mountains nearby on one side, and an ocean sort of nearby on the other to cool us off.

We are a community of extremes - the northside is rich, the southside is poor. The old folks want to build a wall along the Mexican border, the young folks ditch school to protest anti-Mexican legislation. We depend on our mountain snowpack to provide us with water through our 110 degree summers. We are the breadbasket of the west, but our per capita homeless and hungry is downright shameful. Fresno has some of the worst schools in the nation, Clovis has some of the best. Like any community, we have some of the nicest people you'll ever meet, and some, well, not so much.

I lived in Clovis during my senior year in high school - went to Clovis High, when their only rival was Clovis West (now there are Buchanan, Clovis East, and Clovis North). That's when Old Town was just....... Town. After graduation, I moved back to Orange County (waaaaaaaaaaaay before it was The OC - what a load). In 1993, I moved to Texas. I lived in various places around the Dallas/Ft. Worth area for 10 years. I bring that up because when I moved from Texas to Clovis, the first thing I noticed was that except for the lack of humidity, I had landed myself right back into Texas. Same politics, same religious fervor, same love for pick-up trucks, same music, same past-times, same frames of mind. In short, everything that I might have missed about Texas, was already here when I arrived.

I decided to write this blog because I am proud of this community. There are things I would change if I could, of course, but generally speaking, I love it here. I love how people who seem to be so different see nothing odd about standing together for things that matter to them. I love the blossoms in the springtime, and dancing at the Farmers' Market in the summertime, and the lights along 5th Street at Christmastime. I love driving by the horses and cows on Bullard, and the 1900's "highrises" in downtown. I love seeing high school football and minor league baseball on the evening news. I even love seeing how my daughter doesn't like it here because there's nothing to do, because I know that that very thing is what will draw her back someday. I love it here.

I need to figure out how to make the darn picture loader work - I plan on writing about and displaying my hometown. I believe that the best and worst of what comprises America can be found right here, and I plan on showing it to the world - well, to anybody who has nothing better to do than to read it, that is.