For your reading enjoyment, we continue to publish Rambling Vines by the late Marylea Vines as she recalls events and names of Corning folks from many years ago. We are currently in the year 1990

This weather is something else… hot or cold makes me no big difference so long as it will stay one way. It is this changing every other day that makes it bad for people to know what kind of weather to dress for… regardless of what I wear when I leave home in the morning, it is the wrong thing by noon. I’m not the only thing confused, there’s this bridal wreath bush in a neighbor’s yard… there is not a leaf on it anywhere, yet it is blooming like everything!

I have the strangest new light attached to the street side of the garage… it is an insecure security light! The thing is supposed to come on only when it is dark, stay on for a few minutes and automatically click off. But it is not working property… it comes on day and night and is more of a flashing light than anything else. It probably just needs a wee bit of adjusting, but I have promised myself to leave it alone… my tinkering is what got it in the mess. If my neighbors were paying attention last weekend, they probably got a charge out of me. About a dozen times, I climbed the ladder, made adjustments, then walked out toward the street waving my arms to see if the light would come on… I am sure I looked pretty dumb out there performing, but there was a lesson in it for me… I am not an electrician, so don’t be bothering electrical things!

A telephone caller informed me that vandals had broken every single light around the Veteran’s Memorial in the Courthouse yard. I’m not surprised and told her so. Anytime a town has people in it who will stoop so low as to steal off of graves, they can expect most anything. Vandals have taken flowers from Corning Cemetery off and on for years, but I just looked in disbelief when someone took the small American Flag that I had placed at my brother’s grave. Had they just told me, I would have been more than glad to buy them a brand new American flag.

Speaking of flags and graves, how’s come we have this nice flagpole at Corning Cemetery but we never see Old Glory flying from it? Who’s place is it to see that the flag is raised and lowered there each day? If it is the responsibility of old maids, someone needs to let me know and I’ll do my part.

Back to the Veteran’s Memorial, a group of people spent a lot of time and money to get that memorial, and it is pretty disheartening for vandals to constantly torment them… they wish that people would respect the memorial for what it is and educate themselves and others that it was never meant to be a playground.

A co-worker brought some pie to work the other day which she called Sugar Pie. It is almost identical to what we used to have at our house that we called Poor Man’s Pie because it was just like raisin pie without the raisins! Our Poor Man pie never had a top crust, only nutmeg sprinkled on top.

We liked it during our growing up years because it was so firm that we could run through the kitchen, grab a piece of pie and be on our way.

I am really surprised that we ever had pie of any kind at our house… had I been my mother, I would have given up trying to please everyone and refused to make any pies. Regardless of what kind of pie she made, there had to be one to be cut in half and shared by my brother and my daddy, then the remainder of the family shared the second pie… all except me and I refused to eat the insides of certain pies, (my sister’s Vinegar and Buttermilk pies for instance) so she had to make extra crust, cut it in strips and drape it over upside down pike pans and cook it for me… anything to get through just one meal in peace.

Other pies that I don’t like include all fruit pies, all cobblers, all lemon pies, raisin, rhubarb, green grape, gooseberry, custard, and mincemeat. I’ve never tasted mincemeat or rhubarb. I can just tell by looking that I don’t like them. I especially like coconut cream and pineapple cream pies and can eat a little dab of pumpkin pie if it looks to suit me, if not, I can give it a good letting alone!

If you look through the pages of this week’s Courier you will find an Earthquake Survey from that you are welcome to fill out. We are participating in this at the request of Chris Wetzel and Lew Queener of Rhodes College, Memphis. Queener is married to the former Alma Lea Gibbs of Corning and is well acquainted in this area. I became acquainted with Wetzel, via telephone, through Queener and after looking over the Earthquake Survey form, found it interesting. I intend to fill one out.

It is only fair to warn those who participate that… if we don’t get wiped out by an earthquake on December 2 or 3… you will be receiving a second survey sheet to fill out. Wetzel feels that there is much to learn from studying the before-

3 survey answers, of residents of the New Madrid Fault area.

If you want to participate, just clip, and fill out the form, attach your name, address and telephone number and bring or send it to me here at The Courier, Post Office Box 128, before November 26. Late on the day on the 26th, I will send the returned forms to Wetzel and he will be in charge from there.

Update on my kitchen curtains… They are still missing, and I am still searching. So far, I have gone through every box in every closet, through all the drawers and cabinets, looked underneath the beds and searched inside the shed… I am afraid that some time or another, I mistakenly picked up the bag holding them and placed it out beside the trash truck. I know that whatever happened to them, I did it because I made them to start out with and no one except me would even consider using them.