For those that don't know the history of Paul and me together as The Breakfast Flakes, one of the things we did early on was school lunch visits.

About 1991 (when we still read all of the school lunch menus on the air every morning), we were reading that day's menus and got on the topic of how bad school lunches were back when we were in school. We wanted to see if the quality had improved. So we picked a school each week that sent us their menu, and we went and had lunch with the kids. The next morning we would give the report of our "inspection."

The folks at Western Awards gave us an official plaque to award the cooks at each school kitchen. And folks, there are a lot of schools in our listening area.

We didn't go to all the schools in town because we were trying to bring attention to the outlying areas that never got much attention from radio stations.

So, we've had lunch in schools from Gardiner to Melstone and every school in between.

We went to Gardiner because before the internet, we had translator stations. We were the only radio station that you could get in their town at the time. So, we made the long drive up there in the Cat van, and they had it towed. They wouldn't tell us where they took it. So we were in that town for quite a while.

Visiting the one and two-room schoolhouses was a blast. We would get out there with the kids and play field hockey or basketball and the kids loved it.

One of the small schools just south of Billings didn't even have a kitchen so we took some pizzas that Godfather's donated for the cause.

Fast forward to about 2010 and I'm sitting at the Rex one night having dinner when this guy comes walking up to me and asks if I'm Mark, the Breakfast Flake. I said that I was. He then asked if I remembered visiting Independence School. I sure did. We only visited there once and remembered it well because Paul and I played keep away against the entire second grade on a five-degree day.

Keep in mind that this guy is about six foot six and does not appear to be in the best mood. He then asks me, "Do you remember a kid that you pushed down in the snow?" In fact, I did. I was beginning to put two and two together here.

So I said, "I DO remember, and if you see that kid, will you tell him how sorry I am?"

Which brought a smile to his face.

So he sat down and had a few beers. He told us how cool all the kids thought it was that the Flakes came to their school.

Great memories from six years of seeing what was for lunch.

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