RICHARD C. DASTRUP ******* I HOPE YOU RECEIVED THIS LETTER

Date:  2 years ago ?

Dear Mr. Dastrup:

If you are “the Mr. Dastrup” that taught choir at Orem High School in Utah in the late 50’s and early 60’s then you are the one I’m looking for.  If not, please disregard this strange letter.
I had two teachers that made a very positive impact on my school years and you were one of them.  The other was a grade school teacher who passed away before I could express my thanks to her.   O.K. she lived into her 90’s so I guess I have to accept all the responsibility for not thanking her.  You can’t wait around forever to be thanked.   Anyway, I thought I would give it a shot to see if I could find you and thank you for being such a good teacher.  
There isn’t a Christmas that goes by that I don’t find myself singing along to “The Messiah” on the radio, a CD, or in church.  My husband was actually very impressed to discover that I knew the entire “Messiah” as well as “Requiem” which as I recall we would sing at Easter.    You first admitted me to choir in the 10^th and 11^th grade and then allowed me to be in Acapella Choir my senior year.    This was a real feather in my cap during high school  because you were known to be very discriminating   O.k. I also made Tigerettes my senior year but I think I was a “mercy” vote-in because I had tried out for cheerleader 5 times (varsity and junior varsity) and never made it.     Anyway—loved to sing and being in Acapella and Choir allowed me to do this loudly with quality people.

Many years later as a young mother I joined the Women’s Choir in my church.  You can imagine my surprise when the leader of the choir informed me that “I couldn’t carry a tune” and it might be best if I sat in the audience.  This was the first time I had been told I couldn’t sing.   And you know what, I think she was right.  I truly believe I’m tone deaf.   In fact, I’m amazed at how badly I sing. 

I can only assume that you in your generous and kind way saw a young girl that wanted to sing and had no talent and so you put strong people on either side of me and let me sing as loud as I wanted.   For this I will be eternally grateful.    I had the great fortune to marry well and not only is he handsome but he has a great voice.  You guessed it---he won’t join a choir, or sing in public.  Says he can’t read music and I tell him “neither could Frank Sinatra”.  I also tell him that in his next life I’m going to have the beautiful voice and he will be tone deaf because he didn’t use it in this life. 

So to close, thank you for fostering a love of music and singing that might never have bloomed if you hadn’t been so generous.  

2ND IN A SERIES OF TEASERS

It's late, the water's cold and I'm old---lucky the hot tub pool is up and running.

WHOOP'S



I used the phrase to a Dr. today and he said "I've never heard that phrase before".  How do you get through college and X number of years in medical school

and not know Shakespeare.       Whoops, its first quoted in Paul in his letters to the Corinthians.    Keep in mind, I didn't go to college.



TOMBSTONE TALES 2011

Grandson of Ted James Sr. of the Grand Lake Lodge



Patience Kemp grew up in Grand Lake.  Thanks to her we have the Historical Society.



Portraying Mrs. Ish

Beautiful fence around family plot.

Dave is so cool and it's so fun to hear him tell historical stories.

Judge Wescott-- 1st white man to spend a winter in Grand Lake.  This grave
was probably moved 2-3 times so lets hope he's really here.

Katie does a great Mrs. Kauffman.



Unknown Baby..................





Portraying Mrs. Pettingill. 



Our wonderful neighbors when we bought our property.  Still have furniture that they gave us.



P.G. Smith.    Father of Gracie Eslick    of Eslick Cottages



This is what I'll have to do since Dad won't bury me here because "it;s too cold".

Matilda was old enough someone should have known her last name.

OTTER POPS

NEW YORK CITY DAY 1 PART 2

New Blog Site:    roseytosey43.blogspot.com


Everything's go'in to be just fine. Found a Whole Food's Market.

Finally made it to the "New Museum"

on the Bowery.
It's kinda like the Guggenheim only taller,

and downtown-----but.......
if you donate enough money they let you

paint the elevators any color you want.

These are huge and take up a whole wall in a dark room.

Current Exhibits

This is huge and multi-layered. I said to the guard "my grandson made one of those

with 4 cans of playdoh the other day". Very seriously he said "How long did it take him".
I replied "20 minutes, he's 3". He stroked his beard, looked at the floor and didn't say a word. It was then that I knew he spoke limited English or had a really bad

sense of humor. Or maybe not???

But I did love this painting. It is huge, about the size of our living room windows.


At Last---a Graffiti artist with a sense of humor

Now this is truly scary. We didn't just run onto this place---we

actually went looking for it. I had read a piece in the Times about
it and thought Dad might enjoy it.

This is the guy who guards the door when Billy won't be back
for an hour. "No, you can't go in" but we still came too close
to trying to bring a large "Dr. Pepper" tin sign
home with us.

No Idea What This Is Suppose To Be........


If This Steamer Trunk Could Talk...This on the other hand---It's bad enough that the dog is stuffed

but it has blood on it's mouth, dripping from it's tongue and
on it's paw. It's just gross.

Notice how I segway right into something more pleasant.

Hua Mei Bird Garden


Dad picked this dress out for my 16 year old brain.



Two cute Elders in Sara Roosevelt Park. One from Carlsbad, Calif and

the other from Mexico. It was the one from Carlsbad that was complaining
he couldn't find good Mexican Food in New York. We directed him to
Tortilla Flats on West 12th Street. I wish he'd been more impressed than

he seemed to be

New Blog is:     http://roseytosey43.blogspot.com/

NEW YORK CITY DAY 1 PART 1 2011

Evidently Google objects to 70 + photo's in one posting so this is our

first day, no order to anything but over 11,000 steps in a little

over 4 hours. So much for taking it easy on this trip.

Liz Christy's Memorial Garden
It's great but locked up tight. They must work
on it on weekends.

Found my Kitchen Aid but it doesn't come in Yellow--

If they don't have one of these in the "Book of Mormon" play

they missed a good one.

We're sure we witness'd our first "large" drug deal in this doorway.

Man yanks open door and man standing outside hands him a

wad of rolled up bills about the size of a pint bottle. Man outside

is yanked inside and door slams. All this as we are walking past

on the sidewalk.

Look who has their name on the Star's trailer on a movie shoot.

Any time you see alot of trailers lining the side of a street,

a catering truck with expensive goodies laid out, about 50 men

standing around doing nothing, and miles of electric cable

you can be sure you have stumbled upon the filming of a

"movie" or "t.v." show. This is a pilot of a new t.v. show

called "Girls". The story of a bunch of young girls

making their way in New York City. What a novel idea,
can't imagine why no one has thought of that before????

Old Marble Cementery

There are two of them a block apart.

Cute family out walking their paper mache' snowman.

Cooper Union Building--- Part of NYU.

Brunch---We shared and Dad ate most of the fries.

I call this "New York Tile". If you see it you know where you are.