Editor's Log
Sun, 05/01/2022 - 12:00am
Polkadate April, 2022: Believe it or not there was two distinctive music styles in Central Texas in the last century.
Columns & Opinions
ON THE BEAT ...with MICHAEL MORRIS
Fri, 04/01/2022 - 12:00am
Rural East Bell Co., Texas – The year is 1998. It’s summertime and the heat and humidity are typically Texan…scorching and oppressive. The skies are blue and the atmosphere is humming. And somewhere in a ditch along a dusty gravel road… under a discarded and faded Shiner beer can…an idea to form a brotherly-love polka band is percolating…evolving… growing…taking shape…and is about to emerge on the scene. And that, my friends, is how and where the Praha Brothers were born. SPOILER ALERT: Not one member of the band is from Praha (Texas or the Czech Republic) and none are brothers. Credit long-time friend and band supporter, Ron Horick, with conjuring up their catchy moniker. It just stuck. End of story.
Editor's Log
Fri, 04/01/2022 - 12:00am
Editor’s Log Polka Date, April 2022. The month of April has two familiar dates that contrast: April 1 , better known as April Fools’ Day, and April 15, tax deadline, some people think they’re not that different... below is some fact and foolishness.
Editor's Log
Tue, 03/01/2022 - 12:00am
Editor’s Log Polkadate March 2022. The sausage has been a food staple of many cultures throughout the centuries. This writer’s introduction to sausage was a weekly Saturday morning journey on his bicycle to the City Market (still in operation) owned by the Smrkovsky family in Schulenburg to fetch a link of hot sausage. Parking my bike in the alley behind the market, walking by the glowing pits, in the back door, and placing my order while eyeing the large mounds of wieners, my order arrived. Arriving home with the parcel wrapped in pink butcher paper with a little grease stain on the bottom, the noon meal was unwrapped on the table and the McKee family dove in, sometimes getting zapped with a squirt of grease as the fork went in. Flash forward fifteen years, aboard the USS Independence, upon opening a “care” package, from my Mother, the most wonderful gift presented itself, several links of dried Smrkovsky sausage. This precious commodity was quickly hidden as bunkmates generally shared our packages. Not to be thought of as greedy, the slightly moldy sausage was shared with my best buddy, who was from San Antonio, because, you know only a fellow Texian could appreciate sausage.