Yesterday was a red-letter day. We were planning to spend the afternoon attending sessions at the WTHA in Abilene. I started to walk in the morning when thunder brought me back. It started raining and rained all morning. By 1 p.m. we had 3" in the guage. We were planning to go in for the 2 p.m. session, but the radar indicated thunderstorms and the TV was saying possible hail. Sue called from CP saying they had hail. I watched the storm in red on the radar move into Abilene. At 3 the radar indicated that the storm had cleared Abilene moving toward us. I told Lou we could get to the garage and drive through the rain and get in HSU. As we backed out of the garage the rain drops started. By the time we got to the top of the hill it was raining and got heavier all the way to I-20. I drove about 45, still heavy on I-20 had to stay at 55 through Baird. By Clyde the rain had lessened to let us drive 65 on in. Got to HSU about 4:15 after stopping for gas. Lou missed Joe Specht's talk about WT music. She got to visit with Noel Parsons, manning the TT Press booth and signed a JANE RUSHING book for Lewis Toland, who had presented the honorary award to her Friday. We went to the reception where Lou got to visit with a lot of friends like Margaret Waring, Tiffany Fink, who was one of the local hosts, Paul Carlson and his wife, Mildred Sentel and her daughter from Synder. I asked Janet Nuegebauer how she got Laura Bush to write the forward to her book of archival WT photos and essays by Walt MacDonald about WT. She said Judith Keeling arranged it. Laura did a great job. Janet is hoping to get George W. to do the foreward for her book on Kent Hance and George Mahon. I will bet that he will do it. He is that kind of person. When we drove back down 2228 we ran through two debris piles on the highway indicating high water earlier. My guage measured 4.5" for the day.

This morning Lou decided she had too much yesterday, got me up at 5:30 so that I could make the session I was chairing. It had been originally scheduled for 8:15, but changed in the official program to 8:00. I started on time with a few in the audience. By 8:15 the room was full and even one of the speakers came in. Dr. Toland was the first speaker, telling about immigrants from south of the border in Kelton's stories. The second speaker was Ashley Wallace, from Ireland, a student at Angelo State working on a MS in history with a great story about a hispanic woman, now 94, who overcame discrimination to become a leading teacher, married an oilman, helped him create a fortune that after his death she has used to encourage students to achieve their goals. The last speaker was Matt Tiffen, a newly minted Phd from TT who is teaching at Stephen F. Austin this year. His claim to fame was that Lou had taught his wife, Lesley, at Cooper HS in the same class as Bob Estes, the golfer now leading the Houston Open. In addition Lou taught her mother at McMurry. Tiffin's paper was a chapter from his dissertation on the history of German Texans describing their persecution during WWI. I mentioned I had read WILL'S WAR about a German descendent on trial in Abilene during that time. Also my father was interviewed by the FBI during WWII because his German name made him suspect. I always have to get my two cents in. I attended sessions and went to the dinner where my friend Travis Roberts, an engineer from Dallas with ranching interests in the Big Bend was inducted as President. Cheryl Lewis, outgoing pres told us more than we wanted to know about Hamlin. I got home at 3:15, napped till 4 and wrote my LW column.

Lou is still hurting when she tries to move but is hoping to get better. She plans to not be too active for a while.