Don't it make my blue eyes red!

Watching as we yet again destroy a large portion of our food chain; the livelihoods of millions; and the worst part; the ecosystem that billions of lives depend on...hearing RFK, jr. on CNN explaining that the acoustic shut-off valve that would have plugged this well the minute the platform was no longer connected and is required everywhere else in the world was exempted on all platforms in the Gulf...

all I can hear echoing in my head are the words "when will we ever learn"?

That, pitted against the goings-on in Arizona; seeing racism and hatred legislated into law instead of out of it for one of the second time in less than a year... Though they backed off a bit this afternoon, re-writing a bit of it, I still wonder when they'll start pinning the little yellow stars on people; when they'll decide they don't like old bald guys with freckles...am I next?

Since I have little bits of everything in me, are we going to send my arms back to France and my legs back to Ireland? Does my nose get to stay for the bit of Indian blood in me?

I've been tired for a long time of those who assume every Latino/a they encounter must be an illegal...or every time they see an Vietnamese or Hmong that they must be a "boat people".

There's very damn few of us in this country who's origins are "from here"! Mine are from France, Ireland, England, with some Native American and probably some African mixed in. Each time I hear those words "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses" that are etched on that beautiful lady in the harbor who greeted some of those ancestors of mine, I'm grateful to the one who put them there; his neighbors probably wanted to lynch him!

I worked for someone once who was 2nd generation Polish-American. His grandparents had immigrated here just before the turn of the century to escape religious persecution in Poland. With children born both in the old country and the new one, the children were quick enough to pick up the new language, though Mom and Dad never learned enough to be fluent. They managed to pass their citizenship test, but my foreman told me no one spoke anything at home but Polish as he was growing up.

During WW1 they operated a bakery and grocery store; more than once the bigots in the small Kansas town they lived in broke the windows out and painted racial slurs on the front of their storefront, not realizing that Polish and German wasn't the same thing...

How far are we from that again?

How far are we from the interment camps we put American born Japanese in during WW2?

Shall we just start burning those we don't like, like we did at Salem?

When will they decide I'm next on their list?

May this beautiful spring weekend be kind to each of you!

alan

So much for that!

Cruise control didn't last long...I've just been ignoring it since it "kicked out"!

Mowed for the first time last weekend; after the terrace and the side-hill next to the driveway, on top of clearing gutters (lots of trips up and down the ladder and a fall when I missed a rung at one point) my knee was unhappy enough I had to ask Dottie to mow the "flat" parts of the lawn for the first time since she had her hip and knee replaced. Perhaps I'll be splitting all that into 2 days the next time it needs done, at least for a while! Perhaps next time I'll remember the sunscreen on my bald head as well; though it was only about 3 hours outside, I'm peeling...

That was after two days of wrestling with a clothes dryer; I'd never worked on one, didn't have a book, and though I managed to replace the belt and get it running again for just over $20, I spent a lot of time vacuuming lint out of places I'd never thought I'd find it, along with push pins, paper clips and other things the shouldn't be running around loose where I found them. I've cleaned french fries out of defroster ducts in cars before, and crayons out of seat belt reels, but didn't expect that!

This week has been spent filling out more job apps, getting things ready for a family birthday barbecue this weekend and finally, for the first time in ages, experimenting a bit in the kitchen. I hadn't really felt like it for a long time, but finally got out some of the books I'd bought before I retired and tried stuffing chicken breasts and grilling them on the George Foreman. The original recipe called for asparagus, tomato and fontina cheese, but not having fresh asparagus on hand, or the fontina, I subtituted Colby Jack and it turned out nicely!

The birthday barbecue mentioned above is the annual we usually hold for both sons; the younger, John, is 31 today. Last year it was so hard to get the family together that my sister had my nephew's birthday party late at the same time; this year, with him in college, he'll be sharing again. 

This will be the first time our older son, Bill has missed his birthday. At 32 I know we're lucky it's taken this long; I wasn't home for my 18th. Still, it won't quite be the same without him, though I understand that he can't slip home from DC for all the family events. So far his Mom isn't saying much, but I know it's weighing on her.

May the weekend be kind to each of you; may some unexpected joy find you along with a smile or two!

alan

Life is on cruise control...

and it's not that things aren't "going on" but after that last post, one of the nicest pieces of writing I may have ever done, it seems wrong to come back to the "mundane"...

May the days be kind to each of you; may your nights be filled with those you love!

alan

(De)Commissioning our history

(USS Lexington, CV-2, passing Culebra Cut, Panama Canal, early to mid 1930's)

As I watch Texas try and excise the history it doesn't like from textbooks, it has brought to the fore a longheld belief that they aren't the only ones who have been doing so.

Growing up I watched the aircraft carriers USS Wasp and the USS Hornet pick up our astronauts as they returned from space. Vague memories of a little boy, his first ones of our modern Navy. Later as I read history, both in school and on my own, the names "USS Wasp" and "USS Hornet" came alive to me, along with others like "Saratoga", "Lexington", "Yorktown", "Ticonderoga", "Bon Homme Richard", the "Ranger" I made a short cruise on and even the "Kittyhawk" I WESTPAC'd on derived their names from the history of our country; reminders of her heritage, of her victories and triumphs. Even the "Langley", the first carrier, was named after an aviation pioneer (albeit one our government had funded and then later promoted in order to fight the Wright brothers patents, much as they played Tesla and Marconi against each other to duck paying royalties).

Later, newer battles and victories were added to the roster. "Coral Sea", "Midway", named for the 1st carrier victories of the war in the Pacific; "Tarawa" found her way into history, and someone remembered "Valley Forge".

"Lexington" replaced "Lexington", "Yorktown" replaced "Yorktown"; the famous names were kept in circulation. But things were slowly beginning to change...

A carrier was named for the secretary of defense who had most strongly advocated them, James Forrestal. A few years went by with "Constellation" and "Enterprise" finding their way back to active duty while history did much to change our country. It was decided that a president, fallen while in office, was deserving of the tribute of a carrier named after him and the "USS John F. Kennedy" was commissioned.

The next keel laid was named after the admiral who oversaw and won the naval war in the Pacific, Chester Nimitz. Following was a keel named after a politician who spent the years between the World Wars advocating the Navy and rebuilding it after the disarmament treaties that ended WW1. He also was a champion of the first nuclear carrier commisioned, the USS Enterprise, and his name was remembered on the USS Carl Vinson.

Next came the USS Theodore Roosevelt, the USS Abraham Lincoln, the USS George Washington, then another naval advocate, John Stennis had his name immortalized to travel the world in steel.

All through this period, the old names were retiring, being decommissioned, some being scrapped, some being sunk, a lucky few being purchased to be made museums to the men who served aboard them and gave their lives to defend them.

Sadly, though the old names are all gone now, save the "USS Enterprise". Though I won't say that Harry Truman, Ronald Reagan, or George H.W. Bush (the names on the last 3 carriers built) don't deserve memorials or to have things named after them, my own feelings are that presidents have libraries for that, and no matter which political party is in power at the time, trying to immortalize their idols in U.S. Navy steel is not nearly as fitting as allowing the Navy to continue its own traditions. The ones that have served us since our Revolution, when John Paul "I have not yet begun to fight" Jones lost the "USS BonHomme Richard" and then commanded the first "USS Ranger"...since the USS Hornet landed U.S. Marines on the shores of Tripoli...or a later USS Hornet launched Jimmy Doolittle's B-25's in the first raid to attack Japan's home soil during WW2.

How wrong is it that our politicians would erase our history while even "Star Trek" remembers?

I'm grateful to the Marine Corps for keeping some of these names alive on it's LPH's, but I grow weary of seeing history erased in favor of political legacy...

(The very first link above will take you to a U.S. Navy website listing all of the carriers in commission order, the dates they served and their "disposition". Clicking on any of their names will take you to another page with a more detailed history and some photos of each. For more photos, http://navsource.org/ is a site I've spent countless hours exploring. The other links take you to Wiki entries or some of the ship museum websites.)

May the week be kind to each of you...

alan

"Sometimes you're the bug...

and sometimes you're the windshield!"

I heard Neil Bonnett say that once years ago and it's one of those perfect metaphors for life.

My wife not being a fan of Steve Martin or Alec Baldwin, we spent Oscar night watching a nominee from 1950 that she thought she'd seen but hadn't. A newly mastered DVD version with some extras, I was delighted to revisit it with company for once.

"Twelve o'Clock High" I read in my teens, before I ever saw the movie, though I grew up watching the series when I was a "tween" and it was in repeats. It's one of the influences that led to my love of airplanes and mechanical things. The authors, Sy Bartlett and Beirne Lay, Jr. were there in different capacities in the 8th Air Force and the story is a compilation of characters and groups they served with.

When I finally saw the movie I was impressed with all of the portrayals, none more than Dean Jagger who won his Oscar for it. Knowing the "flying history" behind it made it all the more personal for me.

Going back now and watching it brought all of those early emotions back, plus those of thinking of all the lives affected by the war and fighting it; the lives of people I know today, here and on the "other side of the pond".

Shocking was getting to the documentary part and hearing someone say that the U.S. Marine Corps lost 20,000 men in the Pacific in their campaign across the islands.

The 8th alone had over 26,000 killed out of 47,000 casualties; these were half of the Army Air Corps casualties for the entire war.

After watching the movie I dug in one of my bookcases to come up with some books I bought through Powell's a few years ago. One was Beirne Lay, Jr.'s account "Presumed Dead" of being shot down over Europe after he assumed command of his own air group mid-war. The 2nd I found was a biography of Paul Mantz, who flew the B-17 that "bellies in" early in the movie, sliding into tents etc. The movie company tried to get the then re-named Air Force to do it and were told "no way"; Mantz agreed to do it, flying solo. As he set her down, he figured out he could still steer her with the "toe brakes" although the landing gear was up and that was how he managed to snag the tent without doing any other damage downfield.

The 3rd I still haven't found, a paperback copy of the original book "Twelve o'Clock High".

"Presumed Dead" I consumed in my spare time in 3 days, unable to put it down when I could get a chance to read. Concise, but beautifully written, it's added to my love of the French countryside.

It also shocked me at one point. As they are transitioning from training to England, they flew a southern route considered safer because of the weather at that time of year over Greenland. On landing in Marrakesh, Lay writes about the last crewman leaving the plane, tossing the DDT bomb through the hatch and closing it...

No wonder so many of those of our "Greatest Generation" are fighting cancer! DDT was still in use by the Navy in '73 when I was on shipboard; the olive drab cans that I sprayed around my bunk to stop the roach invasions (which didn't even slow them down) had it painted on the cans. But tossing a "DDT bomb" into the aircraft who's oxygen system I'd be breathing from, where I'd be living and fighting and dying takes on a whole new meaning all these years later (as does lying in a bunk I'd sprayed entire cans around and in the locker of).

(BTW, the way we finally stopped the invasions on shipboard was to line the edges of our racks with 400mph tape, sticky side out, after taping every seam and joint closed, then waking up in the morning and roasting our catch with butane lighters!)

Beyond all that I spent one day last weekend watching my son and grandson outwork me as we helped my sister's mother-in-law move. The next I spent recuperating as my knee was not happy with me at all; it's still grumbling a bit 5 days later. I've also been fighting what is either the last cold of winter or the first cold of spring...whichever it is, I'm tired of it!

Monday I helped my son pick up more subfloor and underlayment along with trim for his house. Dottie was off yesterday and I was coughing too badly to go see a movie she wanted to, so we ran errands instead, getting the last of the fishing licenses and boat permits for the new year; finding some corned beefs she can fix for a belated St. Patrick's Day dinner this weekend, and since she felt sorry for me being sick, she bought me a slab of ribs for dinner that I'll also be eating for lunch and dinner today. We also went by the apartment that Mary Ruth moved to last weekend so Dottie could see it and helped her sort some of the things that went into her storage unit. A beautiful apartment with a brook and waterfalls outside her patio doors, I envy her a bit!

So it's now Wednesday afternoon and I'm still waiting for WalMart or Sam's Club or someone to call say that I'm worthy of their employment. After I eat something, I guess I'll try filling out an app for Home Depot, though I've put that one off because I somehow feel disloyal to GM if I go to work for someone that campaigns a Toyota in NASCAR...silly guilt button, I wish at times I could disconnect it!

May the week be kind to each of you!

Riding the range...

As I drive around my "home turf" I often feel the ghosts of those who were here before me...I've thought of writing about some of them and hope perhaps they intrigue you.

When I make my shopping run to Wal-Mart, I head west on I-70 then pick up I-435 south and cross the Kansas River. Visible from the bridge as I cross the river Mill creek flows into the river from the southwest. Somewhere through the years I've read that was the site of one of the Chouteau brothers original trading posts back in the days when beaver hats were "king".

As the road climbs from the river and I get to Shawnee Mission Parkway, I'm traveling beautiful rolling hills that once held a township named Monticello. It was there that a young man first wore a constable's badge and first tried his hand at law enforcement. He voted in the 1856 presidential election there. To know I'm sharing the same country that James Butler Hickok once rode always induces awe in me. You might have heard him called by another name; "Wild Bill".

It wasn't long after those experiences he met up with a kid muleskinner from a few miles to the north of here; one who would probably become one of the most famous "Westerners" of all time; William Frederick Cody. At 11 Cody lost his father to the "Border Wars" that consumed Kansas through her territorial days and continued through the Civil War, culminating in the 2nd burning of Lawrence, KS by William Quantrill. Cody and Hickok rode together in the Kansas Militia, leading both of them into scouting for the military and their other pursuits.

A few blocks north of me is the old Fort Leavenworth Military Road from what was then Westport to the Federal outpost that still exists. As he traveled to Leavenworth not long before the Civil War, William Tecumseh Sherman in his memoir wrote of spending the night at the Shawnee Indian School (now called the Shawnee Indian Mission), then rode west and crossed the Kansas River at a ferry owned by a white man and his Indian wife. That would be Moses Grinter; I've written of "The Grinter House" before, the first permanent house in my county. The house still standing replaced the cabin he and his wife had lived in for the 20 plus years before it was built. During the battle of Westport someone aboard the afternoon steamboat headed for Lawrence cut the cable on Grinter's Ferry, killing one of his hired hands; it was thought to be the work of one of the James boys trying to slow the troops from Fort Leavenworth reinforcing the Union troops. Later, after the railroad tracks that still parallel the river there were built, they were also said to have stopped a train or two.

The family of one of Hickok and Cody's friends from the militia days owned a tavern/rooming house called the "Six-Mile House" given its being six miles from the river on the Fort Leavenworth road. In a local history written by a school teacher she wrote of the shooting demonstrations that Hickok and his friend Theodore Bartels would put on after the war. Usually won by Hickok, she wrote of seeing him trot his horse down the lane, his revolvers pointing across his body, knocking bricks off the rail fence on either side...never actually taking aim.

Next to the downtown public library is the Huron Indian Cemetery; when the Wyandotte Indians were forced to relocate to Oklahoma Territory, they deeded over their land and buildings on the condition that the graves there would never be disturbed. In that same history I spoke of above, there is the story of what happened when the City Council decided they could take that land as there weren't any Indians left here to object. The aunt of Zane Grey, the writer, moved into the cemetery, with a shotgun and held off the sheriff while the City Council tried to evict her and legal proceedings were brought against them to enforce the original agreements. I've been told that my great-grandmother has a relative buried there...

A few blocks past the library, though the building is long gone, is where the "Free State" constitution for the state of Kansas was written (as opposed to the "slave state" constitution written earlier and never adopted). A couple of miles to the north lie the ruins of Quindaro, a settlement that had much to do with the transport of slaves to freedom via the Underground Railway. The high bluff they sit on was conducive for marksman to sit with their rifles, waiting to drive away the bounty-hunters trying to cross the river to recover those lives someone else considered their property.

The guerrilla Quantrill I mentioned earlier was a schoolteacher before the war, in a little town south of here named Maryville. What was left of Maryville was flooded by Hillsdale Lake as it filled, one of the lakes we fish.

My sister and her family live in Lawrence; burnt twice through the "Border Wars", the last time with much loss of life. When Quantrill and his raiders arrived they sent lookouts up Mount Oread to watch for dust clouds in case the military from Fort Leavenworth should come to the town's aid. 183 men and boys were executed; anyone old enough to carry a rifle up to the age of 90 lost their lives. The logos on the doors of the Lawrence police cruisers show burning buildings.

Mount Oread was where the University of Kansas was founded two years later, in 1865. It's where my oldest son and his wife both graduated from...

Those are only the ghosts from "my" side of the river...many more walk the Missouri side in the echoes of the music of the 20's and 30's...the echoes of the Pendergast political machine...the Union Station massacre...

I often wonder as all these ghosts gather 'round how many of those in the cars about me even know they existed? People always think "history" is somewhere else...that you have to "go somewhere" to find it...

But the ghosts wait everywhere, only waiting a chance to speak!

May the week be kind to each of you!

alan

The treadmill to oblivion...

Besides the name of a book I've been meaning to acquire for ages (Fred Allen's autobiography, if that name rings a bell for anyone), it means that finally after almost 2 months I've found my way back downstairs.

I survived 1/3 of the monthly shopping run yesterday (only casualty was my pride, as I drove further to a different wholesale club to get the Hershey's Dark Chocolate bars my wife loves as mine quit keeping them; got out of the truck and put my bifocals on so I could read the list and realized I didn' t have the checkbook). I was waiting for Costco to mail their coupon book to do the rest...it seems to come later each month. I'll be going there on the way home from the osteopath's tomorrow.

The knee ached a bit last night, but it wasn't "pain". So today after I'd been up a bit, eaten and taken the anti-inflammatory and let it have a bit to "kick in" I went downstairs and donned the "new" shoes I keep next to the treadmill and started walking...slowly...

I wasn't trying to set any records, only ease back into things. I made it 11 minutes pain free, at 12 it twinged once (possibly I took too long a step) and at about 14 it started to hurt with each step. I stopped, shut things down and after a few minutes to make sure it was OK I came back upstairs.

It's the first time in almost two months the steps haven't hurt coming up. I'm still wary going down; Saturday I went to do laundry and wasn't quite "awake" yet, led with my left and "jammed" it, feeling the bone bruise that's slowly been healing these last few months.

At the Supercenter on Monday (the first 1/3 of the payday trip) I had stopped at the magazine rack; I can't afford them anymore, though every other month I can't help myself and buy one ("Hot Rod Deluxe", with photos and cars I remember from the issues I saw 40 years ago). It wasn't there, but I picked up a copy of something else that caught my eye and stood there while I skimmed their article on men's knees. It spoke of ACL's and the other usual injuries, then had a section on arthritis. It told people about the "partial knee replacement" that Dottie had a few years ago; said to be wary of "scope" surgeries (?) and then ended with a piece that said no matter what, even if it hurts a bit, you have to keep moving because that is what "lubricates" the joint.

So, tomorrow, after the doctors and Costco, we'll see if I can make it to 15 before the "twinge" kicks in.

I haven't really gained since I hurt myself, but I hadn't really lost in over a year, since I hurt my back the last time...my best intentions got caught up in summer and other things and also, I think one of those laws of physics came into play...

Something about objects at rest tending to remain at rest!

It's time for some defiance...

A friend wrote this a while back and it has been weighing on my mind as well; having fought my way from 300 to 200 several years ago and yo-yo'd back to 340, I know well the demon he writes of! I made it down to 270 the 2nd time before I hurt myself a year ago December and have been rather stuck since within 10 pounds of 300...

Where's Excalibur when I need her?

May the week be kind to each of you!

alan

Watching train wrecks...

was the phrase used a bit ago to describe watching the news. Normally, I can keep my perspective, but today was not such a day!

Hearing an executive try to tell Congress that his is an American company and that the cars in question were American cars was the beginning...I am grateful that they are assembling some here and sourcing some of their parts here, but the design and engineering came from "home" and that is where the profits go...back to his country...the one that our military defends. My old ship was homeported there for her last 11 years as deterrent to China and North Korea; now one of her newer sisters is, along with crew and families and a helluva a lot of our tax dollars.

As the man realized he was upsetting the Congress people he tried to explain; it started to sound like he was blaming the workers when another Congressperson went after him.

Got in the truck to run errands and heard someone from Wellpoint explaining that they had to raise their rates 39% to cover their costs. When she was asked about her salary she said she got $1.3 million a year in salary, $8.5 million in stock options and another $73,000 for something else.

Geez, we didn't make $73,000 last year...both of us together!

Then I get back home and turn on CNN to find out that a "killer whale", held in captivity despite having killed twice already, had just killed it's 3rd trainer. While I'm not "anti-zoo" and I realize that there are some creatures we wouldn't have in this world anymore were it not for captivity and breeding programs, etc., I don't think Shamu is on that list!

I'm sure tomorrow I'll get up and start my day with the Weather Channel and MSNBC and CNN again, along with my news page and Facebook and Twitter and a half dozen other places I go looking for things.

But right now I'd like to climb in a barrel and pull the lid on after me!

May the week be kind to each of you!

alan

Sharing the wealth...

My oldest grandson spent the weekend plus his Monday holiday. After playing video games and watching movies and parts of Daytona and the WinterNationals, by yesterday he was ready for something different. I lit the furnace in the garage and after a couple of hours we went out and I started clearing more of my workbench; him putting things in the tool cabinets or the trash; me sorting other ones into the "20 year drawers" beneath.

As we got to the back there was an old Rochester 2 barrel carb, in pieces, that I had robbed pieces from a few years ago for something else. Being able to see all of its "innards" led to explanations of "idle circuits" and "pullover enrichment" and then finally "being on the mainjets" with him able to see how they all interconnected, along with the cautionary stories about needles and seats and what happens when they "stick" (a deluge of gasoline spewing out of the carb top usually followed by an engine fire).

From under the bench I pulled out an old Rochester "Quadrajet", the 4-barrel "performance" carb from that same era; when he saw the 2 1/4" back barrels in comparison to the little pair in that 2-barrel he suddenly understood a lot more about "hot rods" and horsepower and gasoline comsumption!

I promised him a few months ago that if one of Dottie's "Powerball" tickets hits, we can build a "deuce coupe" using some of the other things I have stashed away in various corners and some of the multitude of parts you can buy now. I'm kind of hoping that in the next year or two things work out and we build something anyway...he's a lot more intrigued by mechanical things than his Dad or his Uncle ever were and it would be nice to pass some of the knowledge along instead of taking it with me!

(Not that this has anything to do with my last post or anything!)

For now though, he's more concerned about getting the boat cleared off before spring comes!

Me too!

May the week be kind to each of you!

alan

February 13...

keeps coming back around, much as I wish at times it wouldn't!

Dad would have turned 83 tomorrow, and for all the baggage there was between us before I left for the Navy, we made up for it after I was out and moved home and his grandkids were born. That one son has no memory of him and the other only has the slightest ones is one of the sadder things I ponder altogether too often. 26 years disappear for me each time I touch his tools, or his old Ambassadeur 5000 (baitcasting reel)...it's yesterday again and he's chiding me about his "educated thumb" being the reason he can cast 15 feet further than I, with the same reel, rod and line.

Little did I know 'til I took his apart for the first time after he died how educated that thumb truly was; he had taken the brake cylinders completely out of it!

Know you were and are still loved Dad...and missed terribly!

May the weekend be kind to each of you who find your way here!

alan

Across the years...

"The Berlin Stories" have illuminated much. How anyone could have claimed "they didn't know", or "they weren't sure" in the late 30's is beyond me; people were telling Isherwood in '30 and '31 "just wait until they get them in the concentration camps".

With his words evoking the people and their times, I dug out a disc I bought a few years ago of Ute Lemper's called "Berlin Cabaret Songs". English translations of the original tunes playing in the clubs there when Marlene Dietrich was headlining...when Louise Brooks was lighting up the screen...

From the first track on the disc, 3rd verse:

"Politicians

are magicians

who make swindles disappear

The bribes they are taking

the deals they are making

never reach the public's ear

The left betrays, the right dismays

the country's broke and guess who pays

But tax each swindle in the making

profits will be record breaking

Everyone swindles some

so vote for who will steal for you

Life's a swindle..."

from "It's All a Swindle" written by Mischa Spoliansky and Marcellus Schiffer.

I'm guessing I shouldn't read anything into the fact that the composers, born in 1898 and 1892, died in 1931 and 1932...

Each day I hear people proclaim they aren't trying to take away my rights, only those of someone else. That I'm entitled, but someone else isn't. They step behind their masks of religion; they hide behind a flag and don't realize; I've seen it all before, if only in the history books, in literature, in poetry.

If the revolution is lost, now (and I fear it is) then it's only a matter of time before the knocks on the door start coming...

May the week be kind to each of you!

alan

Old loves...

While in Vermont this last summer, we visited the Shelburne Museum. Among the standard displays there (well worth a visit in themselves) they had two special attractions going on as well. There was a Tiffany exhibition (more later) and a motorcycle show, with not only some Arlen Ness "dream" bikes, but some of the loves of my youth.



I was lucky enough 36 years ago to meet an old gentleman in San Diego who was supplementing his retirement by selling basket case motorcycles he had spent his lifetime acquiring. He had been a machinist, a tool and die man in the aircraft industry; he used to say he never married because his job was so critical he wasn't allowed to enlist during WW2. He was the lead inspector at Rohr Aircraft; they were building engine nacelles and other things related to the war effort. He said that during the war all the girls wanted a hero; right after the war they wanted a returning one and then, suddenly, he was too old for anyone to want.

He was the first "Anglophile" I ever knew; his mechanical loves in this world were Triumph and Ariel motorcycles & British motorcars. Born in 1910, he had attended machinist school at Ryan in San Diego the year after they built the "Spirit of St. Louis".



In 1936 he bought his first motorcycle, a Royal Enfield. It had it's share of mechanical deficiencies and in '37 he sold it and bought a new Triumph Speed Twin. He was still riding that Speed Twin when I knew him, though he had pulled the original girder front end ("two sheets of paper with an axle bolted between them" was his description) in favor of a later set of hydraulic forks, and bolted a sidecar on it. He used it as his parts chaser and it was ridden almost daily, up until the day he died.

During the war he acquired an Ariel "one-lunger", a 500cc single cylinder bike for the economy during rationing. They became his second love and he had 3 different models of the singles while I knew him, along with two of the "Square Fours" that have gone by in the photos thus far. I was lucky enough, having worked for him a bit to earn parts, to have him let me ride his '56 Square Four to a show for him one day when he was taking the Speed Twin. It was a treat I've not forgotten!

After the war as everyone traded their "rigid" Triumphs for swingarm ones, he bought them; as the "non-unit" bikes were traded for "unit" construction ones, he bought them as well. He did machine work "on the side" and did some race tuning along with a lot of riding, including some with a group of "desert rats" that included Keenan Wynn and Steve McQueen back when you rode the same bikes off road you rode on the street. I have an accessory "oil bath" he made that was intended to keep sand from getting into the motors; apparently he made a good little fortune selling them. Later, after he retired he also was doing Smiths speedo and tach work and rebuilding magnetos and generators, as well as assembling engines and transmissions.





Though he really didn't approve, a lot of the knowledge I acquired from him was applied to BSA's and a few Norton's I ran across through the years. He had no use for Harleys at all- "tractor engine in a cultivator frame" was his description of them.

I bought three basket case Triumphs from him. Mine was a stocker, a 1958 TR-6 4-speed. The one I bought to put together for my wife was also a '58 and looked stock, but had later model 750 internals and a 5-speed (some of that machine work he was so good at was involved in relieving the engine and transmission cases). The 3rd was a '47 500 rigid. To this day I regret parting with them during a long lay-off from GM when my boys were small...

So with all the fond memories the Ariel above brought me, for me the Crown Jewels of that display were:



(a World War Two flathead Triumph messenger bike)

and



(a 1952 Trophy model racer)

We had always talked of buying a bike again once the kids were grown and gone (and every now and then I can't help but go price a new Triumph) but the reality is that with her hip and knee replacements she'll never dare get on one again and so I can't really bring myself to be selfish enough to ride when she can't...

After we had moved here, in the early 80's I got a phone call from someone I had introduced to my friend as they were looking for Triumph parts. During one of those awful Santa Ana days his emphysema had finally gotten the better of him and someone found him in his shop.

I was told his nephew was going to sell the parts off along with the machinery and keep the technical stuff for those he knew to use as an open library. I hope he did; there was far too much knowledge there for it to end up in a landfill somewhere!

Dwight Dean, it was an honor to know you and to call you friend!

I hope you and Lou Kaiser and Jimmy Phillips and Wynn and McQueen are all out somewhere having a helluva good time!

May the week be kind to each of you (especially if you made it all the way down here)!

alan

(a click on each photo will enlarge it. They have pretty good detail for handheld 1/8th and 1/15th exposures at 200 ASA setting...wanted to go back the next day with a tripod, but there wasn't time!)

The Doctor says...

keep doing what you're doing; if it hurts, stop doing it, at least for a bit!

He showed me the MRI slices; the bone bruise on the upper legbone that is still healing, the partially healed extent it started out at; the swelling around the partially damaged MCL ligament that "gave" and started this all; the fluid around the rest of the joint.

He also told me there is arthritis under the kneecap that was aggravated by all of this, but it's not something that needs surgery until much further down the road.

He told me not to start the therapy his assistant had written me the scrip for 12 days ago (was kind of avoiding that 'til I had the MRI results). He said I can go downstairs and start walking on my treadmill when I feel like; if it aches to get off it and let it rest.

They faxed me in a 90 day prescription for the anti-inflammatory, Meloxicam, they started me on the other week.

So that's the health update...time for some late lunch and maybe a nap!

May the week be kind to each of you!

alan

Awareness...

Not so many years ago, in reading Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus" I was astounded by her calling out of the treatment doled out by "Americans" to the native populations that were here when they arrived with their "manifest destiny". After all, an 18 year old, writing in 1816...her awareness of what was going on in another "world" far removed from hers was quite amazing to me.

Last night, partway into "The Berlin Stories" I've had another such moment. Christopher Isherwood bringing up the 1931 Japanese invasion of Manchuria with the ensuing murder, rape and pillage as he was writing in Germany during the Weimar Republic just before Hitler's rise to power. (In doing a bit of reading this morning, I just ran across a Time Magazine article from 1932 about a small part of that invasion and the "accidental" beating of an American ambassador by Japanese troops.)

I realize that nothing on Earth ever occurs in a vacuum; that there is always some news "out there" for those willing to look for it.

I also realize, having lived through the time of the Balkans and Rwanda and Darfur, that seldom are things like this ever halted before the wreckage of lifetimes is scattered. The toothless "League of Nations" of that day; the inadequately funded and under-empowered United Nations of this one aren't so very far apart in their abilities.

That so many generations have passed since Mary Shelley called attention to the plight of the Native American and yet 200 years later they are not given their due, or given apology, but have to fight in court against the government that has robbed them at every turn...

That so many years after our "War Between the States" to have a Senator stand up and say that had the "Dixiecrats" elected Strom Thurmond president in 1948 we'd all be so much better off now...

That so many years after "The War to End All Wars" the bullets and shells still fly...

That at this point that should be the pinnacle of human existence there are those who feel that they can vote away the rights of anyone they disagree with; they may imprison them in law as surely unjust as any prison camp...

That they may be executed or imprisoned for life if some of the "new laws" under consideration in some places aren't stopped!

Will we ever realize that every life is just as precious as our own?

May the week be kind to each of you!

alan

"No use permitting those prophets of doom...

to wipe every smile away..."

Lines from old songs haunt me; like the headers on a page, they set the tone or summarize; they cajole or commiserate.

I was playing music from "Cabaret" 40 years ago, in band at school and along with Armstrong albums; I knew a bit of the mythology of the story. It was many years before I would see the movie; even more before I read of "The Berlin Stories" that first the stage play "I Am a Camera" then the musical "Cabaret" were sourced from. On my "bucket list" of reading material ever since, I finally caught up with Mr. Isherwood last night and am delighted.

So now I'm having a hard time convincing me to go out and chip the icicles off the facias and such and do some of the other things I'd been putting off while gimping around this last month. T'would be so much easier to escape to the Berlin of Sally Bowles and Lulu, Peter Lorre and Marlene Dietrich...

"Life is a cabaret, old chum..."

May the week be kind to each of you!

alan

Beginnings...

It's been hard to come here and write of late; I've been "living" on hydrocodone a lot of this last month as I blew something up in my left knee four weeks ago. In the beginning I thought I could give it a week and it would be better, but that has not turned out to be the case and I have an appointment tomorrow morning so someone can figure out whether it was one of the cruciate ligaments I blew out, or something worse. It's not much good like it is, or me along with it!

I hobbled through the holidays; everyone else's were great! The grandkids, the boys and their wives; my sister and her family. Bill and Laura made it home to D.C. yesterday after a detour through North Carolina for a rockslide the wiped out the Interstate highway they were on as they trekked east. After an afternoon's rest in Charlotte, they got home about 1:30 Tuesday morning.

I've not been sleeping well, so falling asleep sitting in my chair reading, trying to watch TV, sitting here at the keyboard, playing a video game; they've all become new experiences for me. Part of my excuse for not blogging...waking up as you rock forward in the chair because your knee is saying "don't do that, dummy"! isn't fun!

May the rest of the week and may this month and this New Year be especially kind to each of you!

alan

Postscript: Thursday afternoon...

X-rays inconclusive; they don't show anything wrong, only the things that should be there...MRI tomorrow.

At least I know now it's not cancer! Not everyone's first thought, but my favorite jazz saxophone player went in 15 years ago for some knee pain, found out he had bone cancer and was gone in 6 weeks...as much as my family has been decimated by so many different kinds of it, it wouldn't have surprised me!

alan

New Year's Eve...

strains of Guy Lombardo's "Auld Lang Syne" remembered from my childhood playing in my mind...

Off to my sister's in a bit for the family birthday/New Year's Eve parties. My nephew (Christmas Eve), myself (the 29th) and Bill's wife Laura (Jan. 30th, but, hey; while she's here)!

I've often spent this last week of the year in a funk of reviewing and lamenting (see my last post) but not this year. I refused to wallow in it and have actually succeeded, though I'm not sure how much is due to my own free will and how much is due to how busy things have been.

Last year I said I was going to try to keep things here on a more positive note; that ended up with my not saying things at times because there just wasn't anything positive to say and my feeling guilty when I wrote things that weren't; neither was much good for me. So this year, I'm just going to write and let it fall where it falls.

I've made many wonderful friends here; each of you has touched me in ways that have helped me, guided me, healed me...I owe you all so very much!

So I'll hope that tonight finds you somewhere you'd like to be; that tomorrow you are still somewhere you'd like to be and that both of these days, the weekend and the New Year that begins tomorrow are all very kind to each of you!

alan

The day before...

always abounds in 2nd guessing and other musings; rather like reliving your life in short order...

What if?

Should I have?

Would it have been better?

The voices all whisper and this time I'm going to fight them off, because I know, deep down, that none of what is past can be changed by any amount of giving in to them!

This time, I will look forward not behind!

Ahead lies the time that is left me; the only things I can change are "now" and "the future".

So bring on 54 and we'll see how it plays!

May the week be kind to each of you!

alan

Christmas Eve...

and after a madcap week of shopping, cleaning, rearranging the house for guests, wrapping and more shopping it's all come down to these last few hours.

Bill and Laura and Obie just got here after a 19 hour drive straight-through from Maryland. Obie apparently did well on his first road trip, especially for a shelter dog who was so very sick when they adopted him. He's made friends with Angel and peace with Frankie, so that bodes well for the human's holidays!

What the poor dog doesn't know is that the rain they drove through for about half their trip is starting to freeze right now and we're in for some of that good old Kansas ice before 8 inches or so of snow comes down over it. Apparently he wasn't very happy with the blizzard they had last weekend in D.C. and here they've driven him into another one for Christmas!



Dottie works today and then since she just had her annual review, a slight pay increase and a warning that it's very hard to use up 4 weeks of vacation so she should spread it out, she turned around and said "OK, what about next week while my son is here?". Her boss said that would be great and (so far) none of the higher-ups have rescinded it so we're hoping she's off until New Year's Day!

So that will be a treat for the whole family...

I hadn't planned on her being off on my birthday (the 29th) and had planned to bake my own cake, along with maybe sneaking off to an arthouse movie that I know she wouldn't have liked; instead I'll be trading my movie for her making her Mom's chocolate cake, the "Miracle Whip" one that has been my favorite chocolate one since the first one I ever tasted...I remember observing that if they buried the Pharoah's with things for their next life, she needed to bury me with one of those cakes! That was before I settled on cremation; there's no way I could waste one of those cakes that way!

I am adding all that because with extra houseguests and my antiblogging spouse at home, the chances of me getting here are slim to none!

May Christmas find you near to those you hold dear, in your hearts if not in person. I hold each of you that way; you have all come to mean so very much to me!

And may 2010 be the Happiest of New Years for you all! We are all due for some bluer skies and maybe that silver lining I keep hearing of...

Though in truth, the silver lining is here...with each of you!

May your days be Merry and Bright!

alan

Another day, another letter...

I wrote my Senators last week (that word "my" is kind of sticking in my craw at this point; they sure as hell don't represent me) asking them to support the repeal of "Don't Ask Don't Tell". I even started my letter with "I know that next week I will receive a letter from you saying how much my thoughts on this matter mean to you, and then you both will proceed to tell me you support the status quo"!

Which is exactly what showed up a bit ago...

Mr. Brownback wrote to tell me how much my thoughts matter, then how wonderfully the current policy has worked and how "he'll listen to the military" when it comes to making policy...

Had Harry Truman listened to the military 60 years ago it would still be segregated!

The laws of inertia are that a mass in motion will continue in the direction it's going unless it's acted on by some outside force.

That "change from within" is impossible would be evidenced by the fact that during the Revolutionary War the army WAS integrated, as it was during the War of 1812, yet by the time of the Civil War it became segregated...outside forces had their influence and it stood for over 100 years!

I remember the rants in the 70's that there would never be women on carriers or their escorts; that there was just no way that could ever work. There was no way you could put women on ships that were going out for 8 or 9 months and have it not cause a problem.

Yet today women fill every billet in the Navy, just as they should.

'Tis truly sad that good lives are being ruined by those who reap political hay!

Didn't mean to start the week with a rant...

May the week be kind to you each!

alan