I had a great time riding in the Garden Grove Journal car in the Strawberry Festival last Saturday. Thank you so much for all the nice comments about the Garden Grove Journal. Really deserving of that praise are Jim and Marilyn Tortolano who put in many hours every week to put out a top-notch product.
Agreeing with that unbiased assessment is long time Garden Grove enthusiast John Bushman. He, and his wife Karen, has been announcing the parade for 20 years. High above the intersection at Euclid and Chapman they risk their lives every year on a rickety stand to tell the busy intersection of onlookers about each entrant in the parade. Over 250 this year.
The former Garden Grove City employee said the Journal was “The best community newspaper anywhere.” Thank you John.
John and Karen are real sports fans too. John works for the Angels, dealing with the fans that pay the big bucks for tickets at Angel Stadium. Usually every summer they travel to see the Cal-State Fullerton Titans vie for the NCAA World Series college baseball title.
This year they are going to visit about five pro baseball stadiums they haven’t been in before including the new Yankee Stadium. Sounds like it will be fun! I just hope the Angels win!
It was also nice to see Mayor Bill Dalton and councilman Bruce Broadwater. Bruce always wears his Angels’ jersey. In fact, he had a lot of his family come to the VIP breakfast and they are all wore Angels gear. So this year I wore a bright red Angels shirt.
The breakfast table that won “most beautiful” wasn’t a contest. Queen Leah Cecil and her court of princesses were all stunning. Leach will be starting her quest for Miss California soon. Everyone who has met her wishes her nothing but the best. The harp player, Queen Leah, couldn’t be a better representative from Garden Grove.
I got in some hellos to Ronald McDonald and Snoopy as well as some of the headliners and got on bus number 12 to be driven to the parade route escorted by the GGPD.
Marilyn was again a wonderful companion in the parade, as always. She literally answers every wave while she waved the latest issue of the Journal to the crowd.
I hope Jim decides to ride in next year’s parade. I know he won’t. He walks the whole parade route taking pictures so you can get a flavor of the parade in today’s paper. So I guess I’ll ride next year, if they ask me to. Tough job, but someone has to do it!
Meanwhile, I hope Angel fans can cope with the Angels. They are struggling to play .500 ball but are right there going for the AL-West lead.
When I watch the Angels I get the idea they are trying. The Dodgers, on the other hand, look like they are just going through the motions.
The 2011 team is dead. I can feel sorry for the Dodgers or I can just forget about them. I’ve followed this team since 1958. This is the first time I have declared them “done” in June.
Their leadoff hitter, Rafael Furcal, is batting .125. The new manager, Don Mattingly, is telling us Furcal has to keep playing and find himself. Take away the top five hitters and the rest of the team is batting .239 or a lot less. My Little League team in the 1970’s had more home runs in a lot less games. The bullpen is either on the disabled list or non-existent,
But there is more. Even the “outs” are weak. Attendance is so far down it’s embarrassing to watch the Dodgers on TV. They can’t even give seats away. Believe me, they are trying. The owner might lose the team and there is uncertainty on who even owns the team now! Kinda depressing. Good thing I have parades to perk me up!
Contact Don Alexander at Journaldon@aol.com.
Don, you are so sweet. It has been such an honor knowing you all these years. Thank you for all that you have done for the GG Journal; my family and I love reading your articles! I am so excited to represent GG at Miss CA; I hope to make GG proud!
Love, Leah Cecil
Miss Garden Grove 2011