Newsday's Rhoda Amon, Channel 12, K-Joy and, of course, this newspaper will be covering our big Centennial Parade Oct. 1. With some 80 units, many floats, eight bands, pipers and mounted contingents, it will be the biggest parade in our 100-year history. Almost every organization and fraternal group in Mineola will be participating. The line of march will start at Wardwell Road and Jericho Turnpike and proceed east to Roslyn Road and then south to Wilson Park. There will be a spectacular fireworks display at the conclusion of the parade followed by a block party. There will also be entertainment with 10 separate acts, singers, dancers and others. On Sept. 20 at 6 p.m. in front of the old village hall on Jericho Turnpike we will dig up the time capsule that we buried 25 years ago to mark our 75th year.

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Sparta Diner on Herricks Road is gone now after a long, successful history. But in recent years business began to decline and in an effort to revive things, they made an ill-fated move to convert to a Mediterranean Food Restaurant. The Jericho Diner and the Williston Town House both have reported a slight gain since the closing of the Sparta. Several of the Sparta's waitresses now work at the Jericho.

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Speaking of the Jericho, they have been busy with all newly upholstered chairs and seats, both in the dining area and at the counter and they have all new blinds. The diner really looks great.

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Bill and Barbara Grant marked their 41st. They have lived in Mineola for the past 35 years and Bill is a sales agent for Rummel Realty.

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Met city cop Matt Duffy and wife, Joann, at King Kullens. Matt's brother, Gavin, lives across the street from us.

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Jimmy Braga works as a waiter at Aqua Blue in Roslyn and if he looks familiar, it's because he used to work at Little Portugal in Mineola. Jimmy lives on Nassau Boulevard.

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Carol Giordano attended the last pool board meeting and complained that the leisure passes were not being checked at the entrance and that the water is too cold. She would also like eating to be allowed at a designated area. It was explained to her that we had tried that on several occasions, it had not worked; that people were leaving trash all over the place and that the receptacles were largely ignored. Bruce Burns said that the swim lanes were not being kept open. On a happy note, our swim team defeated Stewart Manor. Ms. Giordano also suggested that we hold Family Fun Night earlier at 6 p.m. rather than 8 p.m.

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Paul Hanson and a friend, for charity, drove a cheap Russian-made Niva with a 1.7 liter engine from the UK to outer Mongolia, encountering deep ravines, giant pot holes, camels and many bandits in a long, harrowing trip. Paul is the son of Gerry [the music man] and the grandson of longtime Mineola residents Jerry and Gertrude Hanson.

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June Gallo does a good job as a lay reader at Corpus Christi Church. She and her husband, Louis, have lived on Lincoln Place for 28 years. June works at St. Aidan's Church in Williston Park in parish ministry.

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Often meet Frank Lynch of Horton Highway at CJ Gifts. Frank was formerly the secretary of the Hometown Party and worked at the Mineola Library.

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Eileen Higgins of Horton Highway and daughter, Mary Townsend of Medford, lunched at the Jericho. I also met Denis O'Sullivan there. Denis is very active in the Irish-American Society and his wife, Betty, was the Grand Marshal of the local St. Patrick's Day parade a few years back.

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Good talking to Fred Sweetapple the other day. Fred and wife, Lenora, live on Wardwell Road. He enjoyed the exercise classes at the Mineola Pool. Fred and I share the same birthday, July 22, and he, like me, rooted for the second hockey team formed in the United States, the New York Americans. The Boston Bruins were the first. The Amerks as the papers often called them, played at Madison Square Garden from 1926 to 1942. They never won anything, but we loved them. In fact, I named this newspaper after them.

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"Superfund Site," the title may sound good, but what it means is that the site has been condemned due to polluted ground water underneath the building, like the Tutor Time building on Herricks Road, formerly owned by Jackson Steel.

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If your daughter was missing, would you call the cops and say "My daughter's missing" or would you say, "My daughter went missing." Throwing in the extra word makes no sense to me, but all the authorities are using it on TV and even The New York Times. Times word expert William Safire explained it, but I still don't get it.

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Good to see Les and Muriel Teemsma. Les is a retired cop and used to work the Times Square beat back when it was a seedy hell hole of drugs, prostitutes and crime. He and Muriel still reminisce about the wonderful trip they took to Hawaii.

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After reading my column where I mentioned the broken walkways in Memorial Park, a man called me up and said he had tripped over a badly uprooted slate and had broken two ribs and a collarbone. He noted that two years later, the walkway had still not been repaired.