I’ll begin this week with a random thought: Did you know a half-gallon of ice cream went from 2-quarts down to 1.5 quarts and now they are down to 1.44 quarts. Really?

I was walking down the freezer section of the grocery store and thought; those ice cream containers are so small.

So instead of raising prices, the trend for many years is, downsizing the packaging with less volume and charging the same amount of money. Surely, the thought is to fool and conceive the consumer.

No, many of us are not fooled, but if you want ice cream for your home, what can you do?

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So manufacturers are paying to redesign the packaging to look like it always does, but make it small and less ingredients.

I guess we can boycott ice cream, but if we were going to do that, we’d have to boycott practically the entire store.

I first noticed the smaller packaging with cereals. That is a shocker if you could remember the old cereal boxes from years gone by.

Okay, rant over, but next time you buy ice cream, you’ll see what I mean. Maybe not all manufacturers are doing it, but you know if one does, they will all do the same.

Well, the Tomato Festival is over and outside of some Sunday rain, I’d say the event was a complete success. They did dodge a few bullets when rain was predicted for two of the four days on Saturday and Sunday, but the rain on Saturday never materialized.

I could not make it to the festival on Thursday, the first day, but they said the crowd was fantastic and it was a great start to the weekend.

On the second day, the crowd was immense and the food lines were strong and steady making the vendors happy. I hadn’t seen a crowd that large in recent memory. It reminded me of the early days of the festival.

The kiddie carnival rides were busy and highly successful this year.

I’m sure festival officials were particularly happy on Saturday with rain holding off because of all the visitors from Jim Thorpe traveling by train to go to the festival.

When I was covering the spaghetti-eating contest, I could not believe the size of the crowd in the afternoon when the event took place at 1 p.m.

I took a photo that the City should use for promotional purposes of Sarah Donahue as she stood on the stage holding the spaghetti-eating trophy, “The Mangia” in one hand raised to the air with the large contingency of visitors behind her in the background.

Looking at the photo, you’d say it was shoulder to shoulder with folks making it look like it was packed… which is was.

The spaghetti-eating contest was bigger this year than last and it pretty amazing considering the winner practically swallowed a pound of pasta with sauce in 2:40. I saw the winner at the start and then turned my head to photo other contestants and in a blink of an eye, it was over in record fashion. Even last year’s winner was only halfway done with his plate.

The Tomato contest had the biggest, smallest, most perfect and ugliest tomatoes. The judging was fierce but the winners were chosen. As I mentioned in last week’s column, special judge Matt Pacifico, City of Altoona mayor, was amazed by the day’s activities including the tomato contest.

Mayor Matt ran in the 5K, took in the parade, watched the spaghetti-eating contest and judged the tomatoes, so it was a great day for him.

The music entertainment was well-received and good job by the selection committee.

So congrats to the City on another fine festival.

School will be back in session tomorrow for most area institutions and by tomorrow at 8:00 a.m. you will be able to hear a collective sigh of relief from all the parents out there. It’s been a long summer for the parents and a short one for the children.

Friday night, I was back on the football field shooting the Wyoming Area at Crestwood game. I can’t believe it’s that time of the year. The Merry-Go-Round is spinning faster and faster and events are coming up in the blink of an eye.

The night started off great weather wise and soon enough, you could feel fall in the air and before you knew it, darkness took over and temps dropped to 60 degrees.

I felt a bit rusty in shooting my first football game of the season, as there is always an adjustment to be made going from one sport to another in photography. Even Times Leader sports writer John Erzar said he needed to shake the rust off as well. By next week, we’ll be fine, but it’s good to get back to shooting high school sports again.

Julie Lucarella, a member of the Second Presbyterian Church, Pittston, called me to ask if I was available to cover her church feeds breakfast to the Pittston City EMS, fire and police departments in honor of 9/11, on Sept. 8.

It feels like yesterday when I covered the breakfast and in a blink of an eye, it’s here again.

Time is flying.

Quote of the Week

“You’re braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.” —A.A. Mine

Thought of the Week

“You are the sum total of everything you’ve ever seen, heard, eaten, smelled, been told, forgot—it’s all there. Everything influences each of us, and because of that I try to make sure that my experiences are positive.” —Maya Angelou

Bumper Sticker

“Try to be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.” —Maya Angelou