Inside City Hall, 7-22-09

The Farmer’s Market is still alive. Thank you Robin Leija for taking the time to pack up your tomatoes and other veggies and go to market with them. We are proud of you for braving the unknown and stepping out like that. Hope to see you there again Saturday, and that you will have a lot of customers. There should be plenty of black-eyed peas around, won’t someone pick a few and bring them to market so some of us who don’t have a garden can buy some.

The East Side Park is here, or there, across from Dollar General. Contractors began working on the site last Friday. Work on the grounds and sidewalks will go forward soon. However, the etching of the photos on the large piece of granite will take about two months to complete. Keep your eyes on that spot. The powers that be say it’s okay for anyone to cut weeds and grass around the area where the park will be. So if that is what you have been waiting for to volunteer your time and equipment, well, go for it. Your destiny awaits you on east main street.

Talk about weeds. Do you know what the most populous, not popular, plant in Munday is? We’re not gonna count Bermuda grass. Have you looked around town lately? Careless weeds are everywhere. If we crossed Careless weeds with cotton plants what would we get? Would it become a six-foot plant with small white boles that stack up like careless weed seeds do now? Or a shorter version with ball-like fuzzy green pods? The big question, would it be drought resistant? Would insects go for it?

The way we earthlings allow Careless weeds to take over our yards and all, space travellers would probably think we love them. These hardy ladies line our roadways, squeeze through the cracks in our sidewalks. They grow in our gutters, fill our flower beds, take over our alleys and vacant lots. They have invaded again, hell bent on producing as many seeds as possible.

I’ve noticed a couple of the critters outside Dairy Queen, growing through the crack where the parking lot meets the sidewalk, a few feet from the east door. At first I thought I should pull it, being the Jolly Green Giant that I am. But my sinister side took over, and I decided to wait, to see how tall it would grow, and how long before someone from management removed it. Any wagers? I’m sorry, we can’t do that in Munday.

By now the word should have reached everyone in town about our litter-free community. We at City Hall have accepted the challenge of Keeping Munday Beautiful: Munday is now officially a Litter-Free Community. We, as citizens of Munday have an obligation to help keep Munday clean, or cleaner. I invite everyone in town to become Litter Lifters, your job description is to pick and pitch: pick it up and pitch it in the trash can. Everyone can do it, no special training needed, in most cases. Pretend that litter you see on the ground is a fifty dollar bill. If you really saw a fifty, or even a one, you would pick it up. I even bend over to pick up pennies.

As Litter Lifters, what are our boundaries? Naturally you should do your own yards first, all your yard: lawn, beds, curbs, gutters, alleys, trees and drive ways. Does that leave anything out around your place? If so, use your imagination and come up with a solution. Now it gets tricky. Let’s say you have a neighbor that is out-of-town or out-of-the-country. You would appreciate someone doing your yard for you if you were on an extended stay out-of-town. Right? Then you know where I’m going with this idea. It won’t hurt any of us to do a little extra for someone else. And it will make you feel good about yourself. When you give yourself away, it always makes you feel better.

Munday town is looking good. Take a little drive around town this evening, or this weekend, and you will see the difference. Especially aroun the overpass. You’ll feel proud to be from Munday: there’s no other place on earth like it. Careless weeds or not.

Don’t forget to market Munday every chance you get. And be here the fourth. Start thinking about a Christmas to Remember in Munday. Let’s do something special this year.