Outings with the ARC

Saturday my posse and I joined the ARC of Tempe in a bowling tournament put on at the AMF alley in Tempe. These lanes are not too far from the ARC's Rec center, so we go there most of the time when we bowl. They are generous and give discounts for our population, so we go there for our Special Olympics (say Speshulympics) practices, leading up to the state competition every fall. That is a noisy, crowded event, held over 2 days and attended by teams from towns all over Arizona. Recently they did pare down the competitions to regional events so there are limited towns with whom each ARC or town competes. I appreciate how streamlined the last tournament was.

Today's little competetion was a unique one not having anything to do with Special Olympics, but just something for random fun. It was put together by the Knights of Pythias. I'd never heard of them before, but the local chapter has a soft spot for the ARC. Their Tempe leader, Joe Emery, had a daughter with a congenital problem, and the ARC helped the family get a needed bed and hospice care before the child died.
So Joe talked with his fellow Knights and they've decided they'll run this little tournament each year for us. After our games were done, we went to their hall for a pizza dinner, put on by the Pythian Sisters (their wives?) I learned from the local president, Keith Almand, that the Knights of Pythias is the oldest chartered fraternal organization in the US. Lincoln felt that its promotion would help heal a broken nation during the Civil War. http://www.pythias.org/about/pythstory.html



They also gave out a medal to each bowler. Beth got 'Best follow-through' and grinned as she went up to get her medal. Jenny SHRIEKED in delight when she won 'Happiest Bowler.' I could hear Jeff muttering a bit as he went up for his medal. But it wasn't until afterwards I understood.



"Congratulations on getting 'Best Tenth Frame', Jeff"



"OH, that's what it was? I thought they said 'Best Tenth Grader' and I couldn't figure out why they cared about my 10th grade of high school!" (that's him above with his girlfriend, Kathleen.)

The ARC has plenty of other supporters in the various service groups in the community - The Rotary Club puts on a wonderful Christmas party on the first Saturday of each December, with a bag of gifts (nice things like DVDs, or team apparel for their fave sports team,) and a big pizza party after Santa comes and gives them each their gift.

The participants are all adults and too big to sit on his lap, but they sit next to him on the couch and he chats with each a minute before handing them their gift bag. And then we get to eat pizza. It is a VERY popular event and the 'kids' look forward to it each Christmas.

That's Jenny with Santa, she LOVES getting any gift.

Another regular supporter is Best Buddies, who have a chapter each year at ASU and they arrange Sat morning bowling, dances and other activities.... and usually more pizza. (You can see now why I never send out for pizza for our family. ;c) Another group from ASU who puts on activities with the ARC is Alpha Kappa Psi. In fact, many of the employees at the ARC over the years have started as volunteers from the university who come to love the group and stay on to work.

The ARC has always also gotten support from various businesses in and around Tempe.
In the past we've enjoyed food donations from just about all the grocery stores in the area; For several years our annual fundraiser, The Greatest Human Race (a walk around the pond at Kiwanis park in Tempe,) has had hot dogs and all the trimmings donated by Safeway, and our sodas were provided by Kalil (not to be confused with Kal-el, son of Jor-el.)

The Knights of Columbus sponsor a camp each year up in Flagstaff, that's another popular outing, because it involves sleeping away from home. They get to canoe, fish, roast hot dogs and make s'mores. (The hot dog being the ARC's other staple food.)

So you can see why I like my job, it's full of fun folks and plenty of interesting things to do; I've been to every museum in the area, more than once. I have attended Greek, Japanese, Hawaiian, Irish, Scottish, and Latin Cultural events; If there is a festival somewhere in town, we've all piled into the vans and found it, including Halloween festivals, the annual Peach Festival, and even the Ostrich Festival, where we got to watch the Ostriches race, as well as some squealing little piglets - Beth and Robert got to be cheerleaders for that one. Then there are the state and county fairs, where we get to sample the current fried phenoms... you know what they are; Deep Fried Twinkies, Snickers bars or just the ordinary corn dogs.
I'm sure over the last decade of coming with the ARC to the fairs, I've eaten my weight in Navajo Tacos and Funnel cake. I hear now on the County Fair circuit you can find Chicken Fried bacon (on the requisite stick,) as well as Deep Fried Butter. ---->
Huh?? Okay, some things even *I* won't try. But maybe next time we'll hunt down the Deep Fried Peaches n Cream. Stops your heart just reading about it all, doesn't it?!