HIGH POINTS FROM EL CAMINO REAL
CHRIS DAVIS elcaminoreal@consolidated.net
Folks along El Camino Real were plenty busy last week getting ready for the all important Mother's Day. The right gift had to be bought and lots of thought put into the cards and flowers chosen to honor these very special ladies in our lives.

The weather couldn't have been any better to honor mothers than it was on Sunday. My wife was milking it for all it was worth, and I had to remind her several times that she wasn't my mother. She has three boys to wait on her for Mother's Day. I've got four bits' worth of news to get written and I don't have any extra time to get bogged down in "honey do" deals.

The Alto Yellowjacket softball team had a great season this year, but it ended in a playoff game on Saturday night. The Alto Yellowjacket baseball team was doing really good too until Saturday night. I wish that I could tell you who they were playing and what the scores were in the games, but I'm not a sports writer.

I tried to call the Scott kids for information since Abbey was on the softball team and Clayton played baseball. They didn't know anymore than I did and they were on the teams. We had several kids participating at the state track meet in Austin, but I haven't gotten any results from that either. I'm proud of all the kids and the great job they've done this year in all the sports activities, but if you want details you'll have to turn over to the sports section.

It's graduation time and a few of our young people have already received their diplomas. Alicia Johnson Adkison graduated from Texas A&M on Saturday. Her mom, Rosa, was telling me what she got her degree in, it sounded real important, but I couldn't remember it all. Alicia will be starting nursing school in San Antonio.

O.T. Allen graduated from Lon Morris in Jacksonville and is continuing his education at the University of Texas at Arlington. Aaron Low and his wife Amanda both graduated from Sam Houston State University.

Bryce Penn graduated from Stephen F. Austin Sate University on Saturday also.

I know that we have some more young people in our area that have received college degrees this Spring, but I don't know who they are without your help. Congratulations to all these fine young men and women on their big accomplishments.

The local elections are over and some new faces will be appearing on our city council and school board. These are very important positions in our community and the people who serve on them have some tough decisions to make.

Serving in either of these positions can be thankless jobs, and I want to thank everyone who signed up and ran for office for being willing to serve. Sometimes it seems like it is getting harder and harder to find folks willing to run for these offices.

Good luck to everyone who got elected and hopefully the ones that didn't get it this time will think about running again when the time comes up.

Please give the new officers a little time before you start calling them about stray dogs, pot holes and cheerleader tryouts.

The mother-in-law and my wife caused some confusion at our house on Saturday night. I was cooking some steaks for supper and they had been shopping. They told me that they had strawberry shortcake for dessert.

I like strawberry shortcake and was pleased with their thoughtfulness. Later I noticed that my wife had biscuits laid out on a cookie sheet and I told her that the steaks were almost ready and she didn't have time to cook biscuits.

She said that they weren't biscuits they were strawberry shortcakes. When it got time for my dessert, I picked up one of the strawberry shortcakes. It smelled like a biscuit, and when I pinched the corner off and tasted of it, it tasted like a biscuit. I didn't want to spoil dinner by complaining, so I asked where the whip cream was. The mother-in-law said that she didn't buy whip cream, but bought ice cream instead. At this point, I lost it and told them that this wasn't a strawberry shortcake.

We had a biscuit, some strawberries, and ice cream. The mother-inlaw started in defending the wife and said that a long time ago people made strawberry shortcakes out of biscuits. Then she said that whipping cream or ice cream didn't make any difference because they were both cream. I didn't need a history lesson, I just needed a plain old strawberry shortcake.

I ate the stuff without anymore argument, but I was not impressed.

The next morning I heated up one of the shortcake biscuits and added butter and jelly for breakfast. When suppertime rolled around, I grabbed a couple of the shortcake biscuits and poured gravy over them and had shortcake and gravy. It tasted just like biscuits to me. I'm not a picky eater, but there has to be some kind of normalcy in any kitchen. A strawberry shortcake is cake, strawberries and whipping cream and any other combination is just wrong. I don't care how many times the mother-in-law says it's not.

I'm not a cat lover, but I ended up with a stray cat a few years ago and she had kittens and then they had kittens. We have about four cats now and I figured as long as they stayed outside and killed snakes and rats it would be alright. Things aren't working out like I planned. The other day I caught a big snake right by the cat food bowl and the cats were just laying around paying no attention. I turned on the light at night and there are possums eating the cat food. The other night I looked out and a big raccoon was filling up on cat food. Sunday night I turned on the outside light and there was a big grey fox eating cat food with the cats laying a foot or so away watching him. I guess we've been stuck with a family of worthless cats. I might just cut back on the cat food and see if that will make them hustle a little more to do their part around here.

I guess I've complained enough for this issue. Maybe I'm just jealous because the mothers got all the attention over the weekend. If you have some good news that needs telling, be sure and keep me in mind. I'll see ya next week! And remember, A mistake is evidence that somebody has tried to accomplish something.