Enid's July First Friday, and a Fourth mini-update

This downtown First Friday was much better attended than the June First Friday, but by church people.  Somebody must have rallied the pulpits to turn out or something. Oh, I'm not complaining, considering that the Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons turned out--you might be surprised that I'm a fan of both of these sects.  Much of the same points I make in debates about Bibles are also made by Jehovah's Witnesses, and insofar as we agree on those debatable points, I think they're spot on.

But Mormons too?  Yes, Mormons too, and I'm a fan the same way I'm a fan of the Salvation Army: when it comes to helping out a community, by golly, they rank right up there better than any of the other denominations especially with how they run their thrift shops, and in the thrift shop department, when it comes to Deseret Industries vs Sally's, well, Deseret wins hands down.

But Enid doesn't have a Deseret.  Well, I'm familiar with how Deseret works because of Mesa AZ and vicinity.  Mesa AZ is Little Salt Lake City, and I'll bet not a whole lot of people in Enid even know that much about it--and I told Enid's Mormons so, telling 'em that I'd be the first in the door if they ever decide to open up a Deseret's in Enid.  Well, Deseret is run similar to Goodwill, only better.  And in Enid, there's a Marshalese ministry.  Same can be said for the Jehovah's Witnesses, too.  I really had a good time talking to both of those groups; didn't say much to the Baptists who showed up, though.  Good music was to be had at the Five80 Coffee house (another religious outfit) although I definitely missed the Star Tek hotdog/brats.  Goldspot ice cream parlor was closed both last time and this time; it was open only on that first First Friday of the year.  But somebody rather talented showed up with his wife and kid in front of the CDSA building.  Enjoy!

mini-UPDATE, Independence Day Edition:  Since the City of Enid decided to be draconian about traffic and parking this year, I decided to skip the Meadowlake fireworks altogether. I'm glad I was able to hear the Enid Symphony Orchestra rehearse for that event, though, and the music is better when you hear it close up anyway. There was a problem, though--soloists didn't have a microphone and got drowned out by the orchestra in the rehearsal...except once. And it's that once that was a priceless performance that nobody at Meadowlake would be able to see across the fields in the dark. BOY am I ever glad I went to the rehearsal! I believe I'll do that every year henceforth!

Blogger won't permit me to upload the higher quality mpeg2 file here (it's still being stupid about file size limit) so I'll post a sucky Windows Media file here instead.  But! You can View the mpg2 quality video on Facebook (you need a Facebook account to watch, of course, and yes, the above paragraph appears on Facebook, too).

You can find tenor Brett A. Payne on Facebook, too. And on YouTube.