Alison Noon

The annual Northern League Honor Orchestra lessons and performance took place today at the Fort Morgan High School. The orchestra is a gathering place for some of Colorado’s best high school instrumentalists to learn new skills and songs from great performers during school, then strut their skills in front of an audience in the evening.

This year’s director was Steve McNeal, an orchestra teacher in Poudre for 36 years and CSU Music Dept. helper.

One of ten participating northern Colorado schools in the Honor Orchestra, FMHS involved 11 students in tonight’s vivid auditory delight: Scott McClary, Austin Steffen, Thomas Bratrosovsky, Emily Goggins, Josh Jinkens, Nichole Atwood, Kassie Ziegler, Celia Smits, Abigail Tolson, Jessica Donez, and Kiana Colburn.

To this Hoofbeat staffer, the performance was nothing short of honorable.

RIIIIIINGGGGG!
It is finally lunch time at Fort Morgan High School, a long-awaited portion of each students’ day. The lines fill quickly to gobble up what the seven cooks of FMHS have slaved over that day. While the meal costs a mere $1.75, the daily prep that these seven ladies go through is tenacious, fun and, lastly, tantalizingly tasty.

Most members of the cook squad have worked at FMHS for around three years. A couple, such as Varlene Mann and Gail Windsheimer, have remained for much longer.
Varlene is in her 22nd year as a cook at FMHS, “going on 23,” she boasts. Her granddaughter, Kaylee Mann, senior, gets to see her grandma every day for lunch. Varlene’s favorite meal currently served at the high school is Chicken Fajitas.
Gail Windsheimer, currently in her 7th year with FMHS, is another great cook at FMHS. She keeps things lively in the kitchen.

While all the ladies have interesting stories of their time spent together in the kitchen, Gail might’ve had the most dangerous..
“We had a flash fire in out steamer!” She exclaimed while keeping an eye on her tidying. “It was the end of last year. It just caught fire!” The “steamer”, shown above, had electrical problems and apparently was capable of starting itself on fire, then extinguishing itself.
“It was scary,” continued Gail, but “it’s scarier when you yourself light the stove on fire because you spill the butter… I’m good at that.”

Varlene, too, had some intriguing stories to share. After the butter statement, Miss Mann told of the old, infamous pepperoni dip sticks that the FMHS cafeteria used to make from scratch.
“We had just made a huge batch of dough and it was all in a ball,” she explained. The dough ball was too heavy for any of the lunch ladies to carry, resulting in it’s departure from the clean, kitchen table. “It went rolling on the floor,” Mann said, making me picture a human-sized bread dough snowball rolling around the halls of the cafeteria. “We had to get the whole thing to the garbage can and the garbage people had to haul it away.”

 Dispite a few setbacks in the kitchen, these seven lunch ladies hold things together well for FMHS lunches. The colorful kitchen, above, is full of love and laughs of the FMHS cooks.

Seglke’s Spanish classes worked on translating sonnets in class this week. Each student made a video, and the above is mine. A Sonnet is a traditional writing style that began with William Shakespeare in England, long ago.

Locally owned Domino’s Pizza is one of over 8,500 world-wide corporate and franchised stores that has only recently changed their recipes for the first time in fifty years.

Despite their long history of delicious pizzas (currently the second most popular in the United States behind Pizza Hut), Hoofbeat wonders if the new crust, sauce, and cheese combination will be pleasing to FMHS students.

After tedious studies, a panel of of 7 judges (Doug Schocke, Moises Lozano, Bella Heepke, Scott McClary, Malorie Winberg, Sean Turner, and Mr. Jensen), all part of the FMHS community, have found the new recipe to be satisfactory. The new garlic crust, especially, was a hit with the panel.

Mr. Chapman, owner of the Fort Morgan Domino’s Pizza and featured in the above video, stated that the new recipe has not shown to squander any sales statistics. The garlic crust, mixed cheese topping, and spicy sauce have all proven to be adequate to the critics of Morgan County. He added that while the pizza recipe is a big change for the Domino’s chain, the addition of Bread Bowl Pastas and Oven Baked Sandwiches to the Domino’s menu has also been a large but worthwhile adjustment.

Try the new Domino’s Pizza, my pizza-loving peers…you will not be disappointed.

The exhaust of waiting in lines to renew and inquire about books is being nearly eliminated by Morgan County’s newly-upgraded library system. The District Library System was connected over Winter Break and allows for anyone, anywhere to use the internet to quickly check in on library books, due dates, and reviews.

Students are now able to personally renew checked out books before their due date, request a book be held in their school’s library, and keep track of their assigned textbooks.

The District Library System boasts bonus features including student book reviews and recommendations. “Like on Facebook,” says Miss Cranson, FMHS librarian, “you can have friends and recommend things to them.” Like Andre Agassi’s new book? You’re now a mere click away from telling your tennis-enthusiast friend that he should read it, too.

While the new system is installed and ready for use on the internet, students may find it difficult to use it right away. Login accounts have yet to be administered and the latest library server is not yet connected, making the system slow. With logins on the way, though, Cranson says that the students of RE-3 will soon be crazy for some Library.