another interesting tidbit

My niece Hattie heard records played for the first time last Sunday! She was awestruck -- her jaw dropped, literally, and all she could say for a few minutes was, "Wow...freaky!"

I thought that perhaps that was an experience she had not yet had in her eleven years, so I pulled my ancient, dusty record player out from under my bed (no, I'm not that old -- it was my grandfather's!) and proceeded to put in some records by Tennessee Ernie Ford, The Mamas and the Papas, Judy Garland, Vaughn Monroe, and quite a few others. She sang along with Tennessee Ernie Ford's Chrissie carols, which amused me to no end...think of the generation gap!

I put in Vaughn Monroe's record and thought it was broken; it was lurching along at this molasses-in-winter speed and sounded like a very sick cow. Hattie and I laughed so hard we cried. My mum and dad looked in the door, trying to ascertain the cause of our shrieks of laughter, then, amused, told us that we had it at the wrong speed. We flipped it up two notches to a 78 record, and then let 'er buck. That was better!

Then we left it up at 78 and put in a different record; this time it sounded like frenetic chipmunks quibbling over a leftover acorn. Again we laughed until we cried.

Ah, my Hattie is good company. We sat and played with beads together all arvo at a family gathering, then she rode back home with us and we listened to the records. After that we started watching the second half of Gettysburg, which she begged for after seeing the first half. Imagine an eleven-year-old girl wanting to see Gettysburg!

When her brothers arrived with their parents a while later, they bounced into the living room and were chattering and laughing and shrieking a kilo a minute; Hattie told them in no uncertain terms that if they wished to stay in the living room, they were to belt up, and right quick! LOL, good on ya, Hattie.