Michael Bates

Read the Psalms monthly in 2024

12/30/2023

For your consideration during New Year's Resolution Season: A little over a year ago, I decided I needed to do a better job of feeding my mind and spirit. I notice that my bedtime habit of listening to old British radio comedies (particularly Hancock's Half Hour) to help me drift...

- December 30, 2023 at 01:04AM
Read the Psalms monthly in 2024
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Western swing videos de-Flashified

12/29/2023

In writing the previous entry, I came across an old draft, from October 2006, with embed code for four YouTube videos featuring western swing: Noel Boggs playing "Alabama Bound" as a steel guitar solo, Bobby Koefer with Truitt Cunningham and the San Antonio Rose Band performing his extremely animated version...

- December 29, 2023 at 05:16PM
Western swing videos, de-Flashified
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Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys: For the Last Time at 50

12/29/2023

Earlier this month was the 50th anniversary of the last time Bob Wills recorded with his legendary band, the Texas Playboys. The sessions that became the album known as For the Last Time were recorded at Sumet-Bernet Studios, 7027 Twin Hills Avenue, Dallas, on December 3 & 4, 1973. There's...

- December 29, 2023 at 12:24PM
Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys: For the Last Time at 50
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Urban Tulsa Weekly and the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies

12/27/2023

Dusted off from the drafts pile: Occasionally I dump links and quotes in a blog draft on a particular topic just to have a record, with the possibility of expanding later into an actual published entry. Rarely does the published entry happen, but here's how "winning columnists" Barry Friedman and...

- December 27, 2023 at 10:29PM
Urban Tulsa Weekly and the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies
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Tulsa school board 2024 candidates

12/27/2023

Here's a brief introduction to the six candidates running for three seats Tulsa Public Schools Board of Education, drawing on public information, including filing information, voter registration records, and social media accounts. All addresses are in the City of Tulsa. Because there are only two candidates in each race, each...

- December 27, 2023 at 09:42AM
Tulsa school board 2024 candidates
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A bidding prayer for Christmas A. D. 2023

12/26/2023

Edited from the version originally published on December 25, 2012 Merry Christmas to anyone who happens by BatesLine today. This Advent (2023) I renewed an earlier attempt to turn the 4-arm, 5-globe reproduction Victorian streetlamp in front of our house into a kind of Advent candelabra. I installed three purple...

- December 25, 2023 at 10:56PM
A bidding prayer for Christmas, A. D. 2023
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2023 Oklahoma school board filing final day

12/6/2023

Today, Wednesday, December 6, 2023, is the final day of filing for school board races in every public school district across Oklahoma. Candidates may file at the county election board until 5 p.m. today. K-12 school districts will have a single seat, Office No. 4, up for election to a...

- December 06, 2023 at 12:55AM
2023 Oklahoma school board filing final day
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Al Clauser and His Oklahoma Outlaws and Patti Page

12/3/2023

Another blog article started long ago, July 26, 2021, but never quite finished, until now. In 1982, Oklahoma was celebrating its 75th anniversary, the Diamond Jubilee of statehood, and it was one of the focuses (along with Korea) of the Smithsonian Institution's 1982 Festival of American Folklife. The program book...

- December 03, 2023 at 09:58AM
Al Clauser and His Oklahoma Outlaws and Patti Page
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