May 18, 2007 Bonus Blog
Here's a couple photos from Wild West World, located four miles north of Wichita, Kansas. Cheryl and Thomas Ethridge are standing with Jeff Hildebrandt in front of the cowboy ferris wheel. Note that those are not chairs, but covered wagons. The photo at right shows Orin Friesen sitting astride a scrambler type ride outfitted with saddles, instead of seats.



I just did a phoner with an internet radio program about libraries. Here's the host's response and the link:

"Thanks again for an excellent interview. Your media experience definitely showed! All my guests have been interesting, but few have been as well spoken. You're particularly good at saying what you want to say, then stopping. A rare skill, in my experience. The program is ready to listen to or download at

http://communications.strose.edu/Radio-PeriodicalRadio.htm

—Steve Black, Reference, Serials, and Instruction Librarian, Neil Hellman Library, The College of Saint Rose, Albany, New York

At about ten this morning, Samantha came back and told me a couple up front wanted to see my "art gallery." I was posting my earlier blog (see below) and I told Sam to inform them I would be up in about five minutes. After hitting "Publish Post" I walked up front and met Dirk and Tonya Rash from Fountain Valley, California. I gave them the tour and showed them all of the paintings in the office (about 50). They really liked a Bisbee stagecoach robbery scene (from CGII, page 67, bottom) in Carole Glenn's office and asked me how much it would cost for me to paint them one like it, five feet long and 30 inches high. I said a grand and they said, no problem—please, paint us one. So then we walked up front and they stopped in the library to look, one more time, at the big Billy the Kid oil painting that was supposed to be in the Hutton show, but I forgot to send it (it was also on the cover of Arizona Highways). They asked how much that one was and I said, "Five thousand dollars." They told me that was a fair price but they didn't have it. They bought two of my books, I signed them, we shook hands and they left. Five minutes later, Sam stuck her head in my office door and said, "They're back." They wanted to know if I'd take half down and the other half in thirty days and I said of course.

Not everyone was happy with the opening of Paul Hutton's Billy the Kid extravaganza in Albuquerque last week. In the guest book I found this comment:

"He was a killer. Why is he being glorified? Is social responsibility of the museum missing here?"
—Patricia Keane

To me this just proves the old saying that guns don't kill people, people kill people, because I want to shoot her.

"We are free up to the point of choice, then the choice controls the chooser."
—Mary Crowley