Another Year

Well it seems that the way I keep up with the passage of a new year is that once again Sandy refused to allow my presence at her place of employment's annual Christmas Party. It's not exactly like I've been excruciatingly bad; maybe 6 on a scale of 10, but that is fairly good for me. She let me accompany her to the Soap Babe's open house and I did pretty well until they told me that the Babe rented a Billy Goat to keep with the nanny goats, and maybe I did draw a little analogy to my own place in society, but hell it wasn't all that bad. We're all adults. A friend happened to mention that "It's easier to ask for forgiveness than for permission" and I suddenly had one of my infrequent revelations. That has been my mantra, since it seems someone is always begging me to ask for forgiveness. I think the old girls had a brunch today as well, and I think they deliberately time the occasion at 11:30 AM in the hopes that I won't happen to pop in. I've known these three friends of Sandy's for over 30 yeares and I'm still struggling for some common ground. There are probably inmates on death row that I could communicate with easier than these three former English teachers. I guess I made too much fun of them years ago when they were constantly pregnant, and wanted to talk about their babies. Regardless of that, I wander from my story of utter desolation. What other man has been banned from Holiday gatherings? I bet even Ernie Fletcher has probably gone to a couple of social soirees. I thought about some of this yesterday on my way home from Hyden, Kentucky. It seems that I can only get along with myself and sometimes even that is a struggle. I was leaving home the other morning and realized that as always I did not have any money in my possession. I did the honorable thing and shouted up the steps to Sandy, asking if she had any bills. She waltzed over the landing and nonchalently dropped a handful of tens and twenties into thin air. Being the realist that I am, I missed every bill and spent five minutes grovelling on my knees as I searched form them amongst furniture and flower arrangements. I think I know how the the French peasantry felt with Marie Antoinette gave her cake speech. Don't get me wrong--I stached those bills in my shirt, thinking how good that Large Coke was going to taste in less than five minutes. Speaking of Drive-up service, I always go and order my morning coke, and the little woman always asks me if I want two apple pies for a dollar and I always answer no. I'm afraid to go nasty with this woman because she holds the key to happiness in her hand. Someone once told me that while working in a restaurant the workers would put Murine in the drinks of rude people and this caused immediate diarrhea. Lord knows I've got enought trouble in my life without that. We were in New York a couple of weeks ago and Sandy and I were walking toward Sachs, and there was an expensive black leather boot lying on the sidewalk in the rain. Now I thought some young lady has partied too much and went home without her boot. Well on our way back we were on the opposite side of the street and came across the other boot about a block away. Now that would have been my kind of girl about 35 years ago. Not now though-have you ever priced ladies shoes in New York? One thing is certain: it wasn't one of those old previously mentioned English teachers hurling her black sexy boots in Mid Town. Did I just say that????? I'll be crying about ostracism this time next year. Olive brightened my day with Christmas gifts as she sent 6 or 7 tubes of castoff hand lotion that must have been molding under her bath vanity for the past two or three years. She didn't have the decency to clean the nasty tubes up. I asked her about this and she said my hands needed lotion since they're always chapped. I guess I'll go on construction sites smelling like Bath and Body Works Vanilla. Won't that create a memory?

Angels' Wings

This past weekend the crew did our annual trip to the Big Apple ,and the sights of the holiday decorations of the city that truly goes out of its way to bring in the season. Christmas in NYC spans every religion and denomination known to civilization, whether it be believers or not. Coming from a village in Central Kentucky does little to prepare one for the rich heritage and diverse customs so apparent in our largest city. It's as if a banquet of exotic food is placed before your eyes , and you don't know where to start. I always try to go into St. Patrick's Cathedral as I walk up 50th street from our hotel, and this time we went in and sat briefly in the dimly lit,vast cathedral. It seems as if God is somewhere near, or if not ,at least he's been recently. I look up towards the high vaulted ceiling and see faint shadows from the hundreds of burning candles below, thinking maybe that I might hear the soft rustlings of angels' wings as they flitter amongst the towering stone columns, much like moths above flames. Are angels drawn to the prayers and candles ? Do I really hear murmurs and angelic rustlings up near the dark, arched ceilings? Did I really see a shadow flit swiftly across the ornate stained glass rosette facing Rockefeller Center? Or perhaps the spectre was of some spirit from New York's past, seeking comfort with living bodies down in the polished pews below. I read somewhere that rough deckhands on a tramp steamer had found an angel with an injured wing in a crate of bananas bound North from below the equator, but then after seeing Michael on the vcr I think maybe the story wasn't true. I just know that the Catholicism thing is as alien to a Southern Baptist boy as Judaism or even the Muslim Religion. As I grew up in a small community it was difficult to see how picturesque and idyllic the place really was. I guess in hindsight that the ribbon that bound us all together was the Baptist Church , which like all surrounding communities, was not very tolerant of thinking very far out of the box. Every sermon ended with invitations to join and become a member of the fold. Imagery always centered around shepherds and flocks of sheep. The music was slow ,somber, and very traditional. If at times I didn't enjoy my childhood it was because I was mortally afraid that I or my family would die and go to hell. The Ministers most often spoke only in passing about a God of Love, and dwelled upon a Vengeful God who would surely send us to Everlasting damnation and torment. Neil Diamond sang of Brother Love's Travelling Salvation Show, and I was always there. I could see the Devil lurking outside the doors, waiting to snatch us away to hell. I didn't know whether the scenerio was like Hansel and Gretel in the forest with the wicked Witch, or some slick talking guy in Robin Hood attire as he played upon his flute like a modern Pied Piper of Hamlin, magic sounds coming from the flute, and occasionally seeing the glimpse of horns under his silken hood. Whatever the scenerio, we were always doomed to hellfire and brimstone as the katydids sang on those stiffling August Nights. I've often wondered how Neil Diamond, being the Jewish lad from Brooklyn,could have told of the fear and agony of poor little Protestants from Lincoln County Kentucky in 1965. How could I have been so traumatized as a youth as I walked home from church, not hearing the whipporwills or insects as they sang amongst the black velvet , sweaty night? I would only occasionally glance over my shoulder to see if Satan truly was glowing evilly, and ready to snatch me away. Sweet Jesus!! Keep him away. I was so young and my world was so centered around me that I didn't realize that Satan had a pretty big schedule , and that I was fairly low on his priorities. There was more than enough suffering around the world than in my own little realm. Maybe he should have gone after Lee Harvey Oswald, or Lyndon Johnson, or Richard Nixon, or Nikita Kruschev, or Fidel Castro, or Idi Ahmin. Just anyone but me. Back to today, I hope those angels are truly up in the far ceilings of Saint Patricks ,and thanks Neil Diamond.

Nights at The Opera

Being a country boy from the suburbs of Geneva , Kentucky, I have often been hopelessly unprepared when I have been exposed to events of a cultural nature.Over the past few years I have accompanied Sandra Kay to theatrical and musical shows that present challenges to the previously naive mind of yours truly. Growing up amongst the country boys and colleagues from Danny Coffman's Garage, the closest things to sophisticated culture was going to the Davis Drive-In Theater and watching the likes of John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, or Charles Bronson as they applied a little bit of manliness to the big screen. Given the choice of watching Dirty Harry or The Vienna Boy's Choir posed no dilemma to me; "Go ahead, Make my day!" was the rally call for my life. Somehow in the past few years I have taken some wrong path and I have gone to far too many plays and concerts of what we of my childhood would have considered less than manly. The first chink in my manliness was "The Phantom Of The Opera" in New York City. Any self respecting man from Lincoln County would not have gone, but the things we do for love. The time passed rather rapidly as I honestly slept through 3/4 ths of the debacle, only to go the next night to Rockefeller Center to see the Christmas Gala. I stayed awake through the Rockettes, but must admit to a couple of catnaps. Speaking of which , "Cats"has to go down as the lowest level that I have ever sunk in the ever scandalous plunge that I have been taking in the name of culture. Numerous trips to the Louisville theaters , Broadway shows in NYC and Chicago, and several events at Centre College has done little to raise my sagging self-esteem. A couple weeks back saw Sandy, Tim, and myself go over to the Norton Center for the Arts in Danville for a touring performance of a Swedish group playing the music of Abba. Now as much as I love music I have to admit that I didn't like the sappy, soft rock of Abba when they were actively performing. I never owned an Abba Disc until I had seen "Mama Mia". I think my willingness to participate in this theatrical stuff is directly related to Diovan or Lipitor , or maybe a lower sperm count, but nontheless here I am. Back to the Abba show, we walk in and see the stage is festooned with big rock amps, drums ,and ass kicking guitars. Maybe this thing has potential. It ain't Merle Haggard but it sure isn't Swan Lake either! I must explain that the Centre College Norton"s Program has traditionally been a glimmer of light in an area acknowledged as bereft of anything but fall festivals and pie suppers at the local schools. That is not to say however that attendance at such galas is not without perils. The average age of Norton Centre Subscribers is just short of 80 years old , and their intolerance for anything short of the Boston Pops is legendary. It has amused me that most of the lower areas left in protest when "Rent " came to town. It seems the Blue Hairs didn't care too much about 525,600 Minutes. In an equally poignant moment one of the goddesses of culture walked out on B J Thomas as he sang "Amazing Grace", acappella, no less.She must have felt he didn't live up to the standards of her local Presbyterian Choir. Somehow B J didn't live up to her standards. As I watched the old codgers slowly file in and take up their seats in the orchestra area just 3 or 4 feet from the stage, I told Sandy that there would be grey hair, blue hair , and toupees blown upwards to our cheap seats by the amplified instruments, and I was not disappointed. The opening number was so loud that some immediately left. There were two female singers that did a very servicable job musically ,as well as showing a lot of female anatomy. The younger of the two, a buxom blond , while perfectly presentable, have been a lot more comfortable in white tights 2 or 3 sizes larger than she wore, while her companion , an older redhead seemed more comfortable letting most of her butt cheeks swing unimpeded fron white satin hot pants. I certainly believe in female liberation and her liberated ass cheeks inspired me to more attempts at equality. The couple to the left of Tim probably met as teenagers in 1915, and had dressed up for an evening of entertainment. The tall, stately gentleman rose to leave during the third song, and his companion pulled him down. She was not so successful at the next song, and they both stumbled over our feet in their haste to leave. I don't know what they were thinking the show was to be. Maybe the next time they'll research the groups. To give them the benefit of a doubt maybe Granddad was inspired by the swaying butt cheeks of the redhead and had compelling amorous intentions, but I think not. They looked like they thought this show was Swan Lake. In hindsight the Abba show had its moments. Dancing Queen was done to perfection , and Voulez-vous seemed acutely appropriate to the red head's derriere . As I gaze back through the Mackeral skies of late autumn maybe voulez-vous has become my new anthem. Folks down in the lower, aristocratic seats said the red head was pretty old compared to the buxom blond. That's another reason to get cheaper upper seats , as your fantasies have full rein without doses of reality.

In Love With A Voice

In 1968 I was a sophomore at the Eastern Kentucky School of Partying in scenic Richmond , Kentucky. The world seemed pretty simple as we were trying to obtain an education and dodge the draft that was becoming increasingly close to the carefree days of our lives. Robert McNamara was becoming as much a part of our lives as Robert Martin , the President of our college. Now Robert Martin undoubtedly is the driving force that made old EKU what it has become today, much unlike the current ,smiling lady attorney whose sole objective seems to be hogging the photos in the Alumni Magazine (37 times last issue). It was an age of innocence at a risk of sounding trite, but it definitely was an uncomplicated time of our lives. Most of our time was taken in going to class often enough to keep our 2-S deferrments, and to see just how many love connections could be made on limited time and finances. There were many different groups and subgroups that looked upon socializing in diverse ways. There were the Frat boys who did everything together. These fair haired wonders partied together, attended classes together, and picked fights together. I always liked to get one isolated from his brothers and then look him in the eyes. They were not comfortable one on one and usually found an excuse to exit the situation. They generally dated the Sorority babes with the bouffant hair and the drink till you pass- out attitude. Think Marlo Thomas or Mary Tyler Moore At Specks with a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other. I worried that sometimes they would pair up and get their diamond studded pins hung together, but somehow they survived. My own world and that of my friends was a lot different than that of the frats. The golden haired boys in Weejuns were the top and we were the near bottom feeders. The real lowlifes were the Rotsie Lifers but that's another story. One of my casual compadres was named Eddie, and he was a business major from Indiana whose love in life was playing cards all night and smoking unfiltered Camel cigarettes. Eddie , like the rest of us in Todd Hall never changed his sheets but once a twice a semester and never made his bed, which was the card table. Imagine a dirty grey table cloth with ground in cigarette ashes, pizza stains, and you 've got a visual image of Eddie's sheets. Eddie himself was somewhat a clean cut Jerry Garcia who tended to dress in Madras shirts and levi jeans. Think maybe Richard Dreyfuss in American Grafitti and you have mostly Eddie. One memorable night Eddie and the boys were playing euchre and the phone rang; Eddie answered and she had him from hello, again coining a phrase. Now Eddie wasn't much of a ladies man in the broadest sense,but the room sat back in awe as he skillfully converted a wrong number into a blind date the next night, which coincidentally was Thursday, the biggest night for socializing on a suitcase campus. We half-heartedly tried to tell Eddie that he didn't know what his blind date looked like, yet to no avail as Eddie was enraptured by the sound of her voice," The Voice Of An Angel"!WE tried to look her up in the yearbook but she wasn't there, another ominous omen, but Eddie wouldn't listen. He was so enamored with his success with a woman that he lost at cards the rest of the night. He crawled in between his filthy ash-encrusted sheets that night with visions of an angel in his mind.Now the truth of the matter is that even today college campuses have students that everyone knows by sight as either beautiful sights or the extreme opposite. Now EKU at that point had a couple of girls that through no fault of their own are the living barometers of how ugly a woman can be. Unkind as it may be, men have to have things to compare other things by. As Eddie headed out to Walters hall that eventful fall evening in 1968, we all wished him the best , yet with dread in our hearts, for Eddie's picture was in the yearbook and we knew no Babe would have accepted a date with him. Simple as that. Think Eagles" There's going to be a Heart Ache Tonight".Well as I said we almost christened him with champaigne as he departed Todd Hall in his crisp madras shirt , his Bass lace ups buffed to a glow and his Camel pack(s) bulging from every pocket. Eddie was our man on a mission, probably the second date in his college career but with the hope of all humanity as he swaggered over to Walters Hall in a Cloud of Camel Smoke and spitting shreds of tobacco. True to form the Maiden came down at his bidding, and true to form it was one of the two aforementioned coeds that the campus judged ugliness by. She said' "Are You Eddie"? He was so shocked he honestly said"Yes". I would have said NO but I wouldn't have been ther in the first place. They started downtown and nature came to the rescue. A fall drizzle started and neither had an umbrella, whereas the girl told Eddie she had a friend in Clay Hall that she could run in and borrow an Umbrella from. Eddie , being an Indiana gentleman, agreed and waited as she went upstairs to get the thing. Eddie, again being the gentleman did the honorable thing and ran like hell back to his dorm as soon as she was out of sight. He entered the room where the card game was in full force with a red faced, out of breath state. Eddie wasn't used to physical activity and had run a quarter mile at record speed , much as if the Headless Horseman was after him. In hindsight the Headless Horseman was probably more attractive. We all learned a lesson that night,what I'm not exactly sure, but Eddie slipped into that card game afterwards just as easily as he crawled into those filthy sheets every night. Somewhere Eddie is probably a grandfather who has a woman that changes sheets once a week ,needed or not, and who once took a walk on the wildside. Thanks Eddie for the memory.

Down Rose Street

Today I had several areas to call on in downtown Lexington, and like always I somewhat preplanned the route most advantageous to getting the tasks completed without wasting a lot of time and precious gasoline. Traffic was moderately light as I went from Winchester Road , across East Main , and then hit Rose as I was headed for a destination in Southland. Now Rose Street is always an adventure as it takes you right through the heart of the University of Kentucky School of Big Blue Athletics, and right through the busiest walkways of students heading back and forth to class. There are literally hundreds of students of every description as they remind me of a colorful insect colony invading the concrete streets. It is as if something has rattled the walls of a colony and they have suddenly poured out to attack the intruders. Two things are certain: 1) Every student on the prowl is ages younger than me, and2) It isn't a UK football triumph that has them agitated.I am amazed at how young this group of students look as they scurry across streets both legally and with jaywalking aplomb.They are a mass of pink shirted sorority girls talking with great energy on their cell phones, and they are jerking masses of music listeners as they are wired to the newest and smallest I-Pods. I can't help but think back on my own college days at Eastern Kentucky School Of Partying, and how similar, yet worlds apart we were to this generation. When I started in 1967 Neil Armstrong was just one of several astronauts, and we still had the vision that the moon could be green cheese. We registered for classes the old way without computers, and it wasn't until around 1969 that we had punch cards with colored, striped borders. Have your salmon colored card ready at the end of the line.Don't forget to go through the Deferrment Station to register for your 2-S, or you might end up in The Mekong Delta.The pretty girls were in endless numbers, and the Mini-skirt was the greatest gift from fashion that could ever be expected. Everyone got those gift packages at the Campus Bookstore that had Deodorant, Hair-oil, and toothpaste. We would buy our books , new 33rpm records, and EKU maroon and white t-shirts to wear back home. I listened to Purple Haze and Foxy Lady like everyone else and thought this is a long way from home! It was a magical time as everyone would go down to the Ravine on those warm autumn evenings and dream of getting in trouble with that girl in English 101 class that had the impossibly long and tanned legs. We'd walk downtown Richmond and eat at Ma Kelleys, where for $2.50 you could eat the best fried chicken on earth. Or you could go down to Shepherd's Pool Room and eat chili and onion covered hamburgers that came close to what Mom used to fix. I never remember the students looking so young and baby-faced as I saw on Rose, yet we must have looked somewhat innocent. I remember mini-skirts and tall black boots and a furious snowball fight between the Combs Classroom Building and the Old University Building. Everyone won and everyone lost. I won a blond named Valeria for too short a time, but I was a Freshman and she was a Junior, and Freshmen have notoriously short attention spans. Then there was the angel faced little blond from Louisville that I let cheat off of my tests in Chemistry 101, knowing even then there was a barter available. Little did I know until later that she was letting two Senior Athletes copy from her as she copied from me. Just as well as those two Athletic Idiots had nothing I wanted to trade. As I stumbled along I realized that being from a poor family did not set me apart, as most of my fellow students were equally poor. What did set me apart was my ability to crank out essays and term papers for students who either could not or would not write for themselves. I made a lot of money in my new line of work, and I like to think that many successful students traversed the perils of 101 and 102 because they had a guardian angel watching over their English proficiency. Well maybe "Angel "is a little grand for what I did, but the system worked. Even today I can't help but smile when I hear of the failure rate in English and think of the tricks I pulled with those papers. Sometimes I think I knew as much about Fitzgerald and Zelda as Fitzgerald himself. I wrote enough papers on Jay Gatsby and Nick Carraway to go from here to Hazard , Kentucky. That was in the days of the old clip ink pen, and man when Bic invited that new pen I was in heaven . I could not type then , and can do no better now, yet I always traded written papers to girls who could type my own papers for me when necessary. Some could call this unethical or even plagarizing, yet I called it a job. Some of my buddies sat in Todd Hall and smoked cigarettes while playing cards all night while I slaved in the Sweatshop writing for new found friends from the mountains. Fudlow came pounding on my door at 3 o'clock in the morning needing an essay for the next morning, never thinking that he had been drinking at Specks all night and spent all of his term paper money. Not being in a good mood at being awakened at such an hour by a penniless customer , the Angel of writing cranked out a paper in 45 minutes and Fudlow left with an A quality paper, but minus a nice leather coat that I had been admiring since his mother had bought it for his birthday. I said I was A Guardian Angel and Not Mother Theresa . The next day Fudlow got an "A" as expected and his teacher told him" Paul, you have such wonderful Insights" He didn't disagree as those insights had come at a high cost, you know about the wages of sin? I started on Rose and ended back in Richmond 38 years ago. Fudlow is a successful insurance agent and like Harry Chapin says,"We both got what we wanted such a long time ago".

Amish Rumble

As I was heading out of Stanford this morning my thoughts were on my appointment with a banker in Hazard, and I barely noticed the Amish Buggy that I met near the Cedar Creek Dam. A couple was riding along in their go-to- town buggy at a pretty fast clip.These buggys are something of a marvel as they have roll-up windows and a windshield. They also have a required set of headlights and turnlights, as well as a huge orange triangle as fitting a slow moving vehicle on a fast travelled highway such as US 150 . As I said I didn't pay much attention to the buggy until I met the next one, then the next one , and finally a total of 10 fast moving Amish vehicles in a row. Wow!! This set my mind to thinking; is it a convention? And then it hit me , I was privileged to see the staging and start of an AMISH RUMBLE! I'd never thought that our humble, kind, stand-offish citizens were capable of any emotions, much less being royally pissed off! As I continued toward Hazard I thought of how little I actually knew about our gentle fellow Lincoln Countians. My previous experience was restricted to standing behind a couple at Food Lion as they bought huge amounts of whole chickens. I remembered two things, one the gentlemen didn't have back pockets on their funky dark blue jeans, and secondly, they paid for their chicken with a First Southern Debit card. Somehow the plastic card and old Dobbin out in the parking lot seemed at odds with each other. These kind people try not to pay taxes to the government, and will not go to war. Some of them drive, but this is a different sect, I think. Mennonite maybe? I couldn't help but think of our contrasting lifestyles. Obviously we are dissimilar in many ways besides the lack of back pockets. I believe that $3 a gallon gasoline doesn't affect them the way it does me , but maybe they have a Brother Thomas who has cornered the market on hay , and they would be equally perturbed. As a matter of fact they may have been going en mass to protest rising hay prices. When I read of rising natural gas bills for the coming winter are they worried? I think not . They'll just cut a little more wood and cuddle up a little closer to their stately wife, and be happy as people without Bob Seeger can be. I doubt from the looks that the UPS delivers many Bow Flex Machines to the Amish, and I doubt that they are terribly worried about Iraq, Katrina, or American Idol. ( You know there may be something in Amishism after all). I stayed in Hazard all day marvelling at how mr. Caterpillar is making it possible for Appalachia to become more like Kansas every day. As I neared home I met the same parade of carriages in about the same place heading in the opposite direction. They all seemed to be smiling, and I perceived they had had a good day. If indeed there was a rumble then they must have kicked some ass. If , on the other hand they were celebrating something else then I surmise it had to do with making money. People who make money smile like those Amish were doing. Go for it Amish People. Feed those horses and wear those funky clothes while you eat Debit card chicken. What could be better? As for me, I'll buy $3 gasoline at BP and listen to Smokey as I elude the Blue lights. Cruise by Manchester listening to BABY BABY DON"T CRY.

Chicago

A couple of weekends back the crew went on a Saturday excursion to Chicago. Now I would choose The Big Apple any day over the Windy City, but this weekend we could get tickets to see "Wicked" and it is always sold-out in NYC. Chicago is a beautiful city and a late summer visit is generally a winner as Lake Michigan provides a beautiful blue backdrop for all activities. We checked into our hotel, The Allegro, which we have stayed in before. It is located within the Loop and is only a block down from the Oriental/Ford Theatre where "Wicked " was showing, and is on the same block of buildings where the Cadillac Theatre is located. When you say"Broadway Show" in Chicago then the better plays are inevitably in one of these two theatres. We ate dinner in the hotel restaurant which is decidedly more upscale than the Kentucky Depot in Stanford or Colemans Deli. Tim had riceroni and Erika had some funny colored ravioli, both entrees which were called something else with Italien names, but being a sensible country boy I couldn't be fooled.I chose chicken something. It definitely wasn't KFC but what do these snooty mid-westerners know about chicken?We had opted to take the Architectural River and Harbor Tour which is a fantastic way to see modern Chicago. It's interesting that one of the Idiotic tour bus drivers for the Dave Matthews group had dumped his toilet holding tank over one of the many bridges over the river and completely covered a filled riverboat with human waste! Talk about bad luck!! It seems the boat was filled with a group of senior citizens that suddenly was inundated with a deluge of Rock Star Feces. Wow! If Chicken Little thought the sky was falling think about Granddad and Grandma covered at the start of an otherwise perfect day with Shit from the skies. You can bet that this country boy listed with one ear about Mies Van De Rohe and watched the bridges for Dave Matthews.Mies had designed many of Chicago's towers and helped shape modern glass and steel architecture.The 1927 Barcelona World's Fair was Mies' coming out party and that's a long ways from Chicago. I've been fortunate enought to see some of Frank Lloyd Wright's stuff as Chicago was his playground, and I'm in awe of how The Prairie School gave way to Mies and eventually the Sears Tower and The John Hancock . I think Chicago is a great big Louisville because the place, unlike NYC, closes down about 8:00 pm even on the weekends. The Majestic Mile(Michigan Avenue) for all its smartness and upscale shopping appears to start closing around dinner time and you cannot find many restaurants to eat in after 8pm. Maybe the Suburbs are more exciting but Downtown seems to be the pits. I might add that the architects have taken the Bear's home , Soldier Field and made it perhaps the ugliest facility ever devised by man. Talk about bi-polar, the building looks like an ugly space creature has landed on the old columned front and taken up residence. Everyone in Chicago hates the look, but it's a done deal. We took the Elevated railway back to Midway and it cost$1.75 , a bargain by any reckoning. I must admit that Chicago has the most user friendly cabbies of any city I've ever visited, including Stanford. All in all I like Chicago for it's midwestern laid-back attitude,for its legions of blond, farm- fed girls ,and for the less than one hour flight from SDF, but give me New York for everything else. I like those dark exotic looking babes dressed in black as they rush down Madison Avenue, or those wild looking travellers on the subways as they exit at Grand Central Station or maybe Canal Street. The last visit to NYC this past spring was wonderful as Sandy and I sat on the curb in front of the Plaza in the warm sunlight and watched the Carriage riders and horses on the edge of Central Park. Chicago is ok , but it is almost like visiting Aunt Ruby, while New York is ,well New york.Maybe Dave Matthews was making a subliminal statement.And "Wicked"?I'd probably rather have seen Nascar at the Indy Speedway, but I'm trying to take a higher road.

Ass Bumping at 85

As I was leaving London, Kentucky this afternoon I entered the usual mess of traffic headed north-bound on I-75 . There was a bit of rain and haze in the humid afternoon as I merged onto the rough pavement, and I began searching for my dancing partner for the next 20 miles to the Mount Vernon exit. I have found over the past twenty some years that the trip goes faster if you can find a compatible dance partner to trail along in their slipstream or let them draft your wind to expedite the journey. It's a high stakes game as you slip away from the 65 mile per hour limit and dare to enter the realm of the fast. Sometimes you just feel better locked into a partnership as both vehicles weave in and out of the three lanes just short of three digits of mph. It usually lets one get away from the Boys in Grey (or Brown also now). I figure a 50% chance of a speeding fine is far better than 100%. As I merged I immediately got up to speed and started looking for dancing partners. A big old(but New) Lesabre with an elderly white haired lady seemed to be cruising at around 80. Her husband was riding shotgun with his head on the headrest, facing towards the ceiling, either dead or fast asleep; probably not a lot of differance considering his age. As I pulled beside her at 80 I glanced over and sent out my best vibes ,"Wanna Dance Granny?"Judging that her straight forward locked- in stare and the clenched claws on the Lesabres wheel in the proper 9 and 2 position told me this old chick was ready to rock and roll. I gracefully slid behind the old girl as we shot down 75 at 80. We went by the old Weigh Station and I realized that Granny's dance was the Waltz. Now sometimes I don't mind a waltz or minuet for a change, but at our speed we had travelled a mile in about 45 seconds, and this was not the day for ball room etiquette. Sandy Kay was expecting me home at a decent hour, and I didn't feel good with this sinus infection. As I slipped around Granny and her dead mate I mentally thanked her for our 45 second relationship and sought out a new partner, maybe somebody that wanted to bump and grind. As the Lesabre receded in my rear view mirror I watched the red ,white , and blue Ohio plates get lost in the haze of the Silverado's backwash . I though that maybe when you're headed back to Florida we'll redance the waltz Granny. From the looks of things Grandad won't be along and maybe you'll be in a mood to get down and rock. I 'm cruising at sublight and pull beside an older red Chevy pickup with darkened windows . "Can I have this Dance?"I can't see the driver through his illegal tinted windows, but I sense interest at 88 , and we start the bump and grind toward Mount Vernon. Even granny shows a sign of interest in my mirror as she gets up to 85." Get back Granny, you lost your chance and this isn't a three way square dance!" I slipped in front of my new partner and hit the 90's as easily as you please. Thanks to Sandy Kay and Tony Andrews I had a new secret weapon-a brand new matched pair of white lettered 235 R 16s to give me confidence and carry me home.Like Jeff Gordon I feel that my vehicle runs better in clean air and we proved this as we bumped and ground our way through the 55mph when wet area just before the bridge at a little under the century mark. Boy those 20 miles really go rapidly when you have a good dance partner, and all too soon you have to blink the signal that your dance is over and say goodbye. As I glanced in my mirror I was somewhat more at ease that Granny and the corpse had hooked up with a Chrysler mini van. It looked like a fox trot to me. My biggest problem is to stop practicing my dance moves on old crooked US 150. Entering Brodhead at 70 probably woud get the attention of their Barney Fife and his cruiser. He does have one bullet.

Key West

Over the past few years fate has somehow ordained that I would be a party to brief visitations to the Southernmost city in the Continental US-- Key West , Florida. Having had more than its share of genuine characters in its past, the city seems in no danger of losing even a percentage of its resident hooligans. Long known for Ernest Hemmingway and his antics at Sloppy Joes, his frequent watering hole, the city probably is much like he left it at his untimely death. Hemmingway left a legacy as a genius writer and hard drinking scoundral, yet his most talked about link in Key West is the tribe of oddly mutated cats with an extra toe on each front paw. These felines, like the legion of scrawny bantam like chickens, wander the streets at will, and without enemies save for the occasional aging yankee in his rental convertible that often leaves a ball of feathers or cat pelt smashed on the narrow blacktop trails leading to Duvall Street. Key west is perhaps one of the few remaining tourist haunts in the US where you're awakened from your $200 a night room to ugly little bags of feathers crowing angrily at the rising sun. I can personally vouch that the place would be far more pleasant and clean if the police were allowed free hunting with a double barrel twelve gauge and a load of birdshot on these miserable creatures, The chickens only live to eat ,defecate, and procreate; yet in hindsight that's what most of my buddies do, and noone is hunting them with birdshot, except for a few ex-wives. Back to Duvall Street one's sense of normalcy is laid to rest as every dreg of society from pickpockets, hustlers, streetpeople, hookers, and con artists meld somehow together to lend a festive air. Tourists come here and spend bunches of money to be insulted, conned, and treated badly. They find amusing the things that people are regularly arrested for in Times Square. Let the day draw to a close and everyone heads to Mallory Square to watch the sunset and the performers. Junk is sold and everyone is drinking silly little beverages with paper umbrellas, while every Jimmy Buffet wannabee is Singing Margaritaville with a cup close by for donations. Mr. Buffet himself comes in regularily to his Margaritaville Restaurant and his giftshop. You can always tell when he's visiting because there's a fleet of Brinks Trucks to take his money to his island estate. You know where it's 5 O'clock somewhere? The streets are filled with gross sights of fat,obese yankee men and women riding rental bicycles with far too skimpy shorts and tops displaying obscene draps of flesh. What possesses these grandparents to display unsightly old ,fleshy bodies while they're in Key West? Do they cross The Seven Mile Bridge and suddenly want to display their white corpulent, disease ridden bodies?Does Sam and Lucille from Buffalo suddenly think that society wants to see their drooping ass cheeks as they placidly peddle their bikes down Duvall?? I think not. There should be some remnants of decorum even after crossing the bridge. And street people. These characters have been here so long that their bodies look like my old Sperry Topsiders after a Summer on Cumberland Lake. They have not one ounce of body fat on their filthy bodies, as they scrounge behind the restaurants in competition with the cats and chickens for morsels of homosexually produced finger food from fruity little restaurants with French names and Cuban food. Everything is a "wrap" with red wine something and balsamic vinegar. I promise you can't find a balogna and cheese any nearer than Tavanier, and that can be doubtful. Every year in October is when there is a week of debauchery nonpareil called Fantesy Fest , when even the wild ways are topped! The clothing du jour is body paint for women and alcohol for the men . Everyone participates, regardless of sexual persuasion, body type or financial standing. Did I mention Key West is an outpost of homosexuality, for women as well as men? I guess in hindsight that it is an outpost for a lot of things. For some it is a group of middleaged men being led around by wives and being admonished to "Put your Eyes back in your head!" If at times I seem weary of the Conch Republic , I must be excused as fatigued. Come October I'll be searching for Cheap Miami Tickets, and the best rental car deals. Its become a ritual ,and I look forward to the ugly ,depraved sights. If Sandy would just consider letting us plan for Fantasy Fest week. Right. It won't happen.

Beauty-Skindeep or What?

I've often tried to figure out what it is that allows men and women to be attracted to the opposite sex, and what subliminal signals we pick up that makes us think of an attraction. Now a knockout woman always will stand out in a crowd to almost any man, but women are more complex in what they see as attractive and find interesting in a male. I have personally developed a criteria of my own of what makes a woman interesting to me , and oddly enough this changes as I get older. I once read that changing trends had been studied and researchers had found that young women were attracted to older men--great news! The downside was that their definition of older men was 30!That's just another wedge in any feelings of self esteem that I might otherwise have had. My favorite quote that some charlatan like Doctor Phil had come up with was "Men talk to have sex, and women have sex to talk". Well as sensitive as I and my colleagues have become, this solves a lot of problems and lets everyone build up their self-esteem. Women and men are so vastly different in what makes a woman attractive that the two sides will never agree. Women dress and lose weight for other women, as no sane man wants a skinny woman. The chicks just don't get the message that nearly all men want a woman with curves and a little more meat on the bones. Rubens was not wrong when he painted his statuesque models.Men like friendly,yet mysterious women who act like they really enjoy being with the man. I think from my limited knowledge of todays younger women and men that both sexes are more interested in having the right clothes , right hair, make-up ,and the right car than they are of impressing the opposite sex. Olive tries to explain to me what some of the new vocabulary is. Take "Hooking Up" for instance. It is not what I initially thought it to be. Alice and Jerry can hook-up ,and yet not be intimate, and they can become intimate and that can be a type of Hook-up. I think I hooked up with Sandy when I met her downtown for lunch, but I can't be sure of what degree of hook-up we partook of. I don't think it was especially good for her , but I was sensitive to not ask. You cannot say that a relationship is "Rolling "as this means having sex under the influence of drugs. People used to ask how work was coming along and I would say "We're rolling along". Not anymore." Players" are both admired and scorned, and it depends on who has been a part of the play--I think. And Metro sexuals??? This seems to be a male who is straight, but spends a lot of money on haircuts, shampoo, manicures, pedicures, and body lotions. I don't understand the Queer Eyes /straight guys phenom as I plod through middle-agedom. I am told that even Hazmit had his brows waxed to enter a body building contest. You know talking to a male buddy about his brow wax is like having your father talk to you about sex- you just don't go there. I travel a lot and somehow just the glimpse of a flashing earring in a mirror on the car ahead of you will instinctively tell you whether the chick is a babe or less. I can see a little bit of tanned cheek or flashing white teeth and go on the witness stand as to what degree of beauty a woman has. Maybe it's some subliminal way her head is turned, or maybe her confidence is psychically projected, but nontheless most men have radar when it comes to babes. The one exception to the rule that all men can vouch for is that you cannot trust the sound of an unseen woman's voice on the telephone. Every man on earth has a story of hell that came from the blind date with the beautiful voice. Guys-trust me, get a picture before you commit. That's what college yearbooks were invented for. I guess these insights were most helpful to some people unless you are a narcissistic metro-sexual or a woman,in which circumstance I guess hooking up would be an exercise in futility either way. I'm still trying to be more sensitive toward the opposite sex but I just don't have any patience.

The New Frontier Part Two

Blogging is a relatively painful experience for me as I never learned the joy of typing, hence a perfect way for me to spend an hour typing out even a short paragraph. At times I am so envious at the ease which good typists race across the keyboard and magically make stories come together , something I will never achieve. I have often, and truthfully stated that I would exchange two college degrees and assorted other college hours for the ability to play guitar like Eric Clapton,as college degrees come and go but God-given talents are few and far between. As previously stated Americans have always had safety valves in the frontier until the US became settled in 1892 with the end of the frontier era. There was an interesting book about a decade ago called THE POPCORN REPORT which made the premise that it was the first time in history that the civilized areas of the world was more dangerous than the wilderness. Now that got me to thinking ,and the author was right on the money. We often have more people killed daily in Central Kentucky in automobile accidents, shootings, and acts of violence than in the battlegrounds of Iraq! Early Kentucky settlements in Kentucky often had huge numbers of settlers killed due to Indian attacks, accidents, and illness. Some historians calculated that the average Kentucky settler lived only two years after they crossed the mountains in the 1770s and1780s. The year of 1777 was known as the year of the "Bloody Sevens" because so many Kentuckians were killed by the British and Shawnee Indians during a siege that lasted nearly the whole year. Those settlers certainly had the intestinal fortitude just to come across the mountains. Can you imagine how bad were the conditions along the east coast to make them cross the formidable hills as a safety valve? We, on the other hand must constantly look to diversions in modern life for our own safety valves, and there certainly seem to be a myriad of choices to lure us away from the everyday , mundane hours of our lives. Some choose the easy route of narcotics or alcohol to bring some sort of relief, while others will go deeply in debt to attempt to buy relief in the form of happiness. One thing is certain: the wealthy never have to seek relief as much as the poor. Happiness and relief can fall on people with new hobbies as Jimmy Olsen and Pepper Anderson found in Golf. Maynard finds relief catching big fish , and he was recently crestfallen when he found a comrade who supplied him with fishing bait was moving out of state. "You can replace a wife, but a source for big shad is moving and can't be replaced". True quote. Olive can replace total depression on a single visit to the cosmetics counter at Lazarus, and my brother will sit for hours waiting for a turkey or deer. Speaking of which, countless billions of dollars are spent yearly by otherwise intelligent men in the pursuit of wild turkeys. How some creature with a brain the size of a large marble eludes all these grown men is beyond me. Some men ride Motorcycles, and others drive fast cars. Some women buy clothes and look better through plastic surgery;the common denominator being that we each have our poison, the only difference being how much we need and how much it costs.Youth makes a difference as the population of the United States is obsessed with youth and vitality, whereas the true youth is obsessed with the money that the Baby Boomers are spending in pursuit of their youth. No person is happy with what they have.First time job applicants out of high school want supervisory jobs from the start without consideration that they have no skills. Newly wed young couples want new homes in the best subdivisions with Hummers in the driveway. Job skills have gone South and no worker can seem to put in a 40 hour week;I have become the person at 56 that I ridiculed and despised at 26. The other day Olive and I were going to a job site and she was driving with 50Cents screaming hate filled invectives out her CD player and I felt really,really old. I felt like my Dad as her ranted about the Beatles and The Rolling Stones. I don't understand rap, and I don't much like Kenny Chesney, who reminds me of a precocious chipmunk. Musically I'm a dinosaur looking for a tar pit to fall into-headfirst. It takes so long to type this that my trains of thought meander around like some old man trying to go to the bathroom, and paragraphs? Hell, I'm lucky just to type with some of the proper letters. I would trade a lot to play like Eric Clapton , and I wouldn't have to type. I'd let my guitar do my talking for me.

The New Frontier

In the early days of American social development Civilization travelled from thev East Coast ever Westward. Frederick Jackson Turner had "the Frontier Thesis" that stated that the Frontier was a safety valve that acted as relief to social conditions to a growing mass of immigrants to the new world. A Frenchman, Alexis De Tocqueville wrote later of the raw spirit of Americans on the frontier in his memoirs about American Democracy. His travels along the frontier during the 1820's were fascinating reading to later historians and Europeans. He was particularly fascinated with the habit of spitting on the muddy sidewalks that the frontiersmen exhibited with regularity. Nothing good lasts forever , and the United States Department of Interior officially declared that the frontier was no more in existence in 192; the Safety Valve was gone forever! One might ask how then do modern Americans relieve stress when they cannot just pack up and move across the mountains when things become unbearable?Well, we as a society have had to become very innovative and invent new ways to beat stress and monotony. I vividly remember my grandfather who was born coincidentally in 1892, the end of the frontier. He never worked a day in his life that I can remember and raised a family of ten children on a small subsistence farm. He never had running water in his house , and resisted any effort of his children to modernize or come into the 20th century. He had a wood cookstove that my grandmother prepared three meals a day like clockwork on, and the rest of the time he sat on the porch chewing tobacco and whittling. In cold weather he sat by a coal stove and did equally nothing , just like summer. He didn't read or participate in anything intellectual. Not being a particularly religious man, he "allowed" my grandmother and the children to go to church, yet refrained from going himself. Living to be around 80 years old, he probably only saw a MD a couple of times in his life, and stayed remarkably fit and healthy for the lifestyle he chose. Not a believer in any form of alcohol, chewing tobacco his only vice, he was all in all a very honorable and proud man. While refusing to come into the modern world, he would have me take him to the grocery store once a week in my then Ultra hip Ford Grand Torino with the big tires and shiny chrome wheels, the 351 Cleveland growling as we went up Kings Mountain Hill in a streak of metallic blue. PawPaw would have his elbow out the window watching the scenery go by as we talked about times past, his favorite riding horse while he was a young man down in Middleburg,Casey County , the scene of his youth. He never seemed to think my hair was getting too long, or that I was anything other than his companion on short adventures. PawPaw died in the Seventies after I graduated from college and he was buried in Middleburg Cemetary next to his father, who was buried next to his father who was buried next to his father. Later in 1990 my own father was interred next to PawPaw, way too early, but laid to rest nontheless. Altogether there are five of my ancestors laid peacefully in a row, overlooking the pretty little valley that most of them had called home since the early 1800's. I sometimes envy them the peace and harmony that they shared in their lives; a commonality that I have never known or attained, and not likely to ever achieve. I have always envied their inner strength and composure and felt alien from their world. My own life is too jumbled to ever have peace, and I guess I wouldn't want it any other way. I've often wondered if I would have gotten along with my ancestors and inevitably come up with the conclusion that we wouldn't have much in common from what I've heard and observed. I guess I've gotten too much from my mother, which isn't a compliment to her at this life. Old De Tocqueville was right in a lot of things to be a Frenchman. I learned most of this while drawing numbers on round track cars for my mentor Danny Coffman and his band of henchmen.

What about Brittany?

OK, so I'm writing this in my most peaceful and tranquil color since I need a little solace about now. It's not easy being a 56 year old man in today's fast paced society.When everything hurls at you at 100 mph , and you are only capable of a maximum speed of 65 , then debris starts hitting your body, if not completely overwhelming you. Tonight I was watching the weather channel when Carl Edwards broke his forecast to say that he had been handed a bulletin saying Brittany Spears was pregnant. I was as shocked as his co-anchor , the Babe Jennifer Lopez! No , not the J. Lo with the marvelous set of buttocks, of P. Diddy /Ben Affleck fame, but Weather woman Jennifer Lopez. I try to keep up with the weather babes because all in all they are pretty nice window dressing for a normally boring subject-the weather.Now we've all seen Jim Cantore nearly blown away by hurricanes, or Mike Sliddell in snow up to his bushy eyebrows, and who hasn't listened to Dr. Paul Kochin as he tries to talk in a gravelly voice? After all he is the winter weather expert. I was completely taken aback as the announcement of Brittany's pregnancy came out of a meteorologist's mouth. I hope this is not a new trend, as all the airwaves will be following this story. How could something of the magnitude of the Pope's death be even followed by such drivel? I personally have know many ,many couples of the caliber of Ms. Spears and her husband , and none have even gotten an announcement in the papers of a new child, yet none have the money and notoriety of the soon to be mother. I guess what I'm saying is that I would like a break from this trashy bunch of the nouveau riche and their constant escapades. I wish Michael Jackson , Robert Blake, O J Simpson, and Anna Nicole Smith were somewhere else. Court TV has just about been locked out on my tv, along with the shopping channels. And E , Entertainment TV, has actors that recreate the daily carryings-on of the Michael Jackson Trial. Where did they get that androgynous creature to play Michael? I hope that's all make-up and not a true person just like Michael. Could he have spent millions of dollars cloning himself? Has Dolly the sheep come back to haunt us?And still on Michael, am I the only one that thinks the long , straight white hair of his lawyer is just a little too similar to Jackson's long straight black Hair? Good Lord is this"Ebony And Ivory" come to fruition? Is this Ying and Yang? And now we are told Mr. Home Alone with his jelly filled lips was a playmate at Neverland. I'm waiting to hear that Robert Blake spent some quality time with Jocko. All this ruminating leads to the conclusion that our country has somehow lost our focus and ethical priorities. Nearly one half of a Million people perished in December's Tsunami, and have received less press coverage than these little court cases. Up until recent times the most talked about court cases were the Lindberg baby kidnapping, the Neurenberg Trials, and probably the McCarthy hearings . Never have so many words been so wasted on such unworthy subjects. We all know about Paris Hilton's sex tapes, Pamela Anderson's sex tapes, and Bill "I DID NOT HAVE SEX WITH THAT WOMAN", and nothing shocks us anymore. I remember in college not so long ago that "orals" meant something altogether different. Thanks to the Oval Office even Blue haired grannies talk about oral sex. I think this is not a healthy direction for our society. I feel that Nicole Brown Simpson, Ron Goldman, Jon Benet Ramsey, Chandra Levy, and Bonnie Blake went awfully easily and cheaply down the drain.Some people care, but not the legal system, as fame and power has a way of eluding justice.This weekend the future King of England remarried, and nobody cared. It was like two old plow horses that had been living together for 35 years suddenly made it legal. They didn't get much more publicity than if the nuptials had been performed at my mentor Danny Coffman's garage.In this particular case I was proud of the restraint of the fifth estate. Maybe all this blabbering has to do with my bio-rhythms being out of whack. Does anybody remember Bio-rhytms? I think those went out with The BeeGees and Dance Fever, but I feel somehow disconnected with Ms. Spears and her upcoming birth.Will we have to send gifts? Will she have showers? What do you give to the"OOPS I DID IT AGAIN" new mother?I  do somewhat understand Paris Hilton, as I knew some like her years ago. 

Speaking of Botany

As spring fast approaches here in Kentucky I was walking through my yard and surveying the usual sad shape of the lawn, when I came up with the idea that we as humans are really no different than plants. Here at the end of March most of us are coming out of the doldrums of winter , and our exubrance at the coming warmth and sunshine is tempered by the pallid colors of our too-fat and flabby bodies. I sensed that life ,like my lawn is full of weeds and a few flowers, along with the usual wannabees that change their stations from time to time. Take me for instance, I've always been a weed, and always will be ; but remember- not all weeds are created equal. Some weeds are reprehensible and scorned by humanity, as in the lowly crab grass ,or what gardener hasn't cursed chickweed as it grows like a cancer amongst the obedient and doting vegetables? Other weeds have grown followers and cult status as in Tobacco for its nicotine and marijuana for the obvious highs.I began to think of colleagues and fellow workers and what their plant world status might be.Take Maynard the Mighty for instance. Maynard does not have to prove himself to anyone ,yet who would have thought his start as a small brier would have grown to such a formidable businessman whose sense of acuity is a legend at the boat dock. How did such a phenomenon occur you might ask? Well Maynard married a red rose and as they twined and twined he became a force to be reckoned with , as in Jimmy Grove and Barbara Allyn. They had Olive and she came out as an azelea, fiery red in color and temperament. Just a couple of weeks ago she was breezing through Wal-mart and caught her elegant, trailing, but highly fashionable scarf in the shopping cart wheels, and had to be extricated by store personnel. True story, yet even the prettiest azalea falls to frost every once in a while. Pepper Anderson , ever the enigma and feared office manager has taken up golf! I overheard Jimmy Olson giving her a gift the other day, and low and behold it was a dozen psychedelically colored golf balls!! Talk about an alliance and friendship made in hell! Good Lord these drifting spirits have found companionship in golf- the sport invented for the weak and infirm! I have come to believe that Jimmy is still recovering from his inflamed uvula, and that Pepper is on some sort of middle-aged crusade that only women and other golfers can comprehend. For their new-found affability I must elevate them to the status of desirable plants and hereafter they shall be a cabbage and a head of lettuce. I can't quite give them a flowering status because of the golf defect, but nonetheless they can be found on the gardening trays at Leroy Boone's Hardware store. If Jimmy would just quit wearing those silly little short socks with the dangling balls. Now Lois Lane , pure and simple is without a doubt an ornamental plant and it is quite easy to ascertain what variety she is. Last year she went to some strange store and bought everyone in the sawdust Kingdom these weird plants called "Sensitive Plants". Talk about a plant with a strange habit-- just touch one of these little bushes and the leaves curled up where you touched it!! The thing just begged for you to touch it to watch it curl up in embarrassment. Maybe the thing is just bashful, but I feel it has the most chronic case of an inferiority complex in the plant kingdom. I took mine home and messed with it every time I passed by. It shrivelled up every time I forgot to water it , but miraculously sprang back up when it rained. I loved the plant so much that I left it out all winter . I fear the thing was too sensitive and expired around 15 degrees. For her love of this plant I ordain Lois lane to be A "Sensitive Plant". I married Sandy Kay because of her disposition and her cheerful personality and she is undoubtedly a cheery little pansy as it brightens up the early days of spring. Her brother ,Old Timothy A. however is an enigmatic eggplant. Why an eggplant? Because like Tim' the eggplant will never, ever tell you anything. All this foolishness comes to a culmination as to my own status as a plant. What type of weed am I going to be? After much thought and inner reflection I must admit to being Kudzu, because I,Like this invasive plant have run rampage in Eastern Kentucky for years, which isn't all bad. After all Maynard got his rose, but I stole a pretty brown-eyed pansy. Olh Hazmit got grey sweatpants. Read about him at http://hazmit.blogspot.com./

You may be what you smell

Modern science has written the sensory perceptions of humanity as being wrapped up in the five basic senses, or at least five senses in most people. I have known some people who have somehow evolved into creatures of even more perceptions, whether it be ESP, UFO sightings, or just being lucky at winning things like a lottery. Sandy Kay for instance has a 6th sense of when I might not be telling the truth, something like a lie-detector. Or she can immediately sense when I am about to question someone at a party about embarrassing details of a personal nature, and she will take me home, often without any warning. I guess however, after comparing notes with other male colleagues that most woman have developed this 6th sense to a perfection. This revelation brought to mind how many other differences have taken place between men and women regarding the senses. One of the few senses that I have retained is the sense of smell. Sandy has an acute sense of smell as well ,yet her recognition of odors is not as readily available as mine. She can smell dirty socks from out in her car as it pulls in the driveway, but she doesn't recognize the smell of burning brake pads, or the acrid odor of a bad catalytic converter of the old Pacer in front of us at the light. She thinks that the catalytic converter odor is someone passing gas. Women have developed this unhealthy fascination with candles, and it seems the more I question this- the more candles we have. We not only have candles , but we have little hot-plate looking things that melt the wax without flames. What for? The good smell of course. I have eavsdropped on women and heard them talk for hours about candles. Good Lord this is the age of Halogen lighting--what's with the candles? A few weeks back I walked into a bank and noticed a funny smell and I asked the teller what it was. She pointed to a burning candle and said"Sex on the beach,Baby". It suddenly dawned on me that that was the name of the candle giving off this vaguely coconut smell. Now I wasn't in a position to debate the merits of the description ,but it was not like sex on Boonesboro Beach 35 years ago, and certainly didn't stimulate some of the other senses that had been involved, but that will remain an unknown blog. I must admit that Sandy has no patience with her candles and throws them away with regularity; maybe they don't live up to her expectations,but I have been taking them out to the whirlpool spa and floating them around in the soothing waters as I bask in the warmth on cold winter nights. I can testify that they will float placidly around with a soft glow so long as I don't turn the jets or bubbles on. It took a lot of effort to clean up the water when I sank a whle fleet one night just to see what would happen. A final note to candles is that the girls should start marketing candles for men . Think about the rush to buy them if they could market candles that smelled like gunpowder or a wet birddog on the ride home from the hunt. Some guys would pay a lot of money for the smell of Harley Davidson exhaust mixed with Coors Lite and Baby powder. And what man wouldn't want a combination of Baseball Opening Day hotdogs mixed with Drunken pizza eaters? I personally can remember the smells of Homecoming 1970 as my friend's date ate all of her huge yellow pompom mum that was pinned on her left chest, somehow leaning down and gracefully nibbling until nothing remained but a green stem . The candle associated with that episode would be called Bicardi and Coke. I recently had an olfactory experience when an associate that I'll call the Soap Babe gave me some soap that her company manufactures. Now I'll admit that I was perplexed when she asked what fragrance I wanted to try. I asked for choices and finally settled on Peppermint and one called Patchouli (I think). Quite to my dismay I really liked the peppermint, but made the mistake of telling her in front of Maynard, my overly sensitive and ever- politically sensitive boss, who immediately questioned my masculinity because of my liking that scent. Now Maynard somehow sees himself as a deadly combination of Charles Bronson and The Rock, and so long as he continues placing his masculine signature on my paycheck he can fantasize about his image all he likes. I , on the other hand would like the Soap Babe to develop a peppermint smelling bar that floats like the old Ivory. Just think, I can bask in the hottub with Sandy's cast off candles and sweet smelling peppermint soap that I can always find. Now won't that be sensory overload!!

Little Nascar

Often in my everyday work schedule I will find myself on I-75 headed Southbound towards Knoxville or points that branch off in either Eastern Kentucky or Tennessee. The common thread of all the miles travelled is that one just never knows what adventure lies around the next mile marker. I always travel Old 150 to Mt. Vernon and enter the Interstate just above Renfro Valley. When I still had the black jet it was light it up and lift-off about 9 0'clock in the morning most of the times when I was heading towards points south of Knoxville. The routine never wavered---the jet would be approaching 75 mph as it merged with the usual commercial traffic of the interstate, knowing that if I averaged 80mph that I would be buying a medium coke at exit 129 in Tennessee in one hour. That was taking in account that we would slow down to 75 for the speed trap before the Livingston exit, and the army of bored troopers as they ticketed hundreds of unwary yankees as they approached the first London, Kentucky exit. There is always a calvacade of Canadians as they are either coming or going to Florida. Sometimes it seems that Eisenhower just developed the Interstate System to accomodate our Canuck neighbors to the North. Now in all sincerity some of these Canadians look old enough to have participated in the battle of Quebec when Wolf defeated Montcalm, but that's probably just the effects of a lifetime of harsh winters and too many shots of liquor after a hard day at General Motors. It is hard to foster genuine feelings of comradeship with these fellow travellers when you're nodding at them at upwards of 90 mph as you tackle Jellico Mountain with a vengeance.I have been over that mountain hundreds of times over the last 20 years and it's always the same , and yet always different as your reflexes receive a workout dodging old retirees, strung out truck drivers, and interstate alligators(huge carcasses of blown -out rubber truck tires). Everything slows down about mile marker 134 (Caryville, Tennessee) as the tan and dark brown trooper cars have a propensity to ruin the days of carefree travellers.The saddest thing about this area is that those nasty little beetles have killed all the pine trees on the side of these mountains and left gaping black holes in the sides of the forest. Over the past five years there has been a battle of morals as a church started in a metal building complex off of Exit 141 and then moved to a larger unseen building to be replaced by "ADULT World GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS". . It seems the church crowd is battling the den of iniquity with a 5 story metal cross, but it appears there are more semis parked in that old nasty gravel parking lot every time I go by. For the un-initiated Exit 141 is the place that has the fluorescent ferris wheel that flashes in day-glo orange and yellow that fireworks are to be had. I guess I could stop for Fireworks or "GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS" but I know that just 12 miles down the road is my first destination-- McDonalds and a smoky smelling restroom followed by a large coke in a plastic cup that always has something about the "Vols". How that coke can taste so good in that nasty orange cup is beyond me. As I near Knoxville traffic picks up and the chore becomes harder as I-40 and I-75 converge and cars play ping-pong with each other with regularity. There's always construction in Knoxville, and wrecks are as plentiful as the old Canadians are headed to Tampa. It seems in retrospect that the retired Canadians and the Michigan malcontents are imprinted like Canadian geese to head south every fall and north every spring. Michigan drivers are a totally different story. They are usually the old geezers that are attached close to your bumper, flashing their high beams in their impatience for you to pull over to the slow lane. I think most of them are always in such a hurry to get to Florida because they are so old that they think they are out-running the Grim Reaper. I have had them flash their highbeams at me while I have been doing over 90 mph, to pass me in a metallic flash of chrome as they have the cruise set on 105 in their lumbering Cadillac Deville or Buick Park Avenue, usually accompanied by a blue-haired female with a yapping white poodle draped over their shoulder.I often wnder if someone is dreading their arrival in Florida, or if someone in Michigan is elated that they have finally gone South for the winter.The beauty is that I'll never know all these answers as I finally hesd North out of Knoxville again, headed to the first Mt. vernon exit. The only certainty is at the Williamsburg exit is a waiting medium coke with my name on it doled out by some pimply faced Cumberland College student. I can hear the ticking metallic sounds of the jet's motor as it is cooling down from the subsonic descent down the mountain. I check the cell phone for messages, and light the motor up, the jet fires and its back to Helm Street and the inner city.

Maybe they shouldn't

This weekend besides being chilly, nasty , and depressing was made even more miserable because KET was having a fund raiser, and was featuring rock music of the 60's with a lot of the original stars singing their hits. I wish to go on record that I love KET and music is one of the greatest pasttimes in my life, but watching your college age idols as they attempt to sing their greatest hits is not a pretty sight! I watched with amazement as a group of fat , bald or balding men tried to sound like The Grass Roots, The Birds , And even Steppenwulf! What mockery was this, and who had the audacity to sing the Sacred songs like this decrepit aging bunch of old men!? Then the awesome truth befell me that this was a gathering of the real artists that I had listened to and worshiped as a wet-behind -the ears college freshman at old EKU. It didn't help that the cheering audience was an overweight, aging group of men and women that were swaying and dancing in stiff arthritic movements like they would have done back at Specks on Water Street in 1968. Could this group of glassy- eyed, post- menopausal females be the same group of babes that set my heart ablaze over 35 years ago?? Good Lord!!! 35 years ago?? My own mortality settled on my shoulders as I realized that this pitiful audience was ME! What happened to the star struck lad from Mckinney that travelled to Richmond for an education. To become the first person on either side of his family to obtain a college degree was my goal. Success is in the eyes of the beholder as Maynard tells me he knows "fools who graduated from Eastern."Maynard himself measures success as "Marrying the first girl down the street whose daddy owned a Ford Dealership."I can't argue with his yardstick for success but that's a different story. As I started college during the "Summer Of Love" I was stunned with new ideas , people, and life. South Fork didn't have sorority babes and a long legged blond gymnastic star that talked like an angel. I became tongue-tied and awkward every time she smiled with those deep dimples and crinkled those brown eyes. Mckinney High didn't have gymnastics, and this 6 foot tall goddess of svelteness and muscletone like a cheetah troubled my mind like nothing had ever done before. The same emotional overload had only previously been felt when screaming Baptist preachers had screamed about the fires of hell and coming damnation on those hot summer nights as heat lightning had played across the black country skies. I just knew the devil was reaching up to snatch me away as the katydids screamed outside. With this tall girl /goddess from Columbus I had the same intense emotional overloads to my little mind. She troubled me like the Baptist preacher but she offered no redemption. The same heat lightning flashed across the hot autumn skies and she had her own intensity and heat that scared and fascinated me , even today not totally understood. I would go to class and parade around the parking lot in Uncle Sam's green ROTC uniform with 2000 other unwilling cadets that Eastern said had to attend for four semesters. This was the year of Kent State,as we put a whole bottle of Vitalis and slicked down our hair to fit newly grown, but forbidden locks of hair under the ugly little, flat army caps. We shared 1-S deferrments, bottles of Vitalis and Brasso , and the gathering storm clouds of Southeast Asia . I would walk to class filled with dread of Corp Period Day and Sergeant Gregory as he encouraged us to sign up for Advanced ROTC , my only hope that some of the upper class babes who were Sponsors would be out there strutting with their tight little mini-skirts, shiny black high heels, and green ROTC blouses. If they weren't there I would think of the gymnast and helping her with chemistry at the John Grant Crabbe Library until 3 o'clock in the morning. That always helped with cursings from the ROTSIE lifers about unpolished brass and long hair. They hated for us to call it ROTSIE and we hated everything about them. We listened to the Temptations and the Four Tops, ROTC listened to the Star Spangled Banner. I liked a blonde tall goddess ,and they liked the idea of killing Cong. I watched Earth Day 1968 down at the Ravine and heard "Hell no ! We won't go! " for the first time. I watched Bobby Kennedy gunned down on tv, and observed both cheering and tears when Martin Luther was killed in Memphis, all the time listening to the music that later came to be called the "Sixties". Some went to Vietnam, and all came home , either in body bags or changed forever. I was a pallbearer for a friend I started first grade with, graduated high school with , and 1 year of college with. He went to Vietnam , returned in one piece, and I saw him at the drive in movie, full of plans to go back to Eastern the next semester on the GI Bill. He was killed in a car wreck the next weekend at Ft. Dix, New Jersey; not a victim of Uncle Sam's war but his own wild ways. He'll always be 21 years old. I hope he's somewhere good , and laughing at me and those aging rock stars down here as we take anti-cholestrol medicine and watch our blood pressure. I watched KET's segment on the Carpenters and renewed my bond with Karen Carpenter, the greatest female singer ever to perform,but I wish I hadn't seen those Fat Boys with pony tails and those audience grandparents making fools of themselves. I wonder what my heat lightning gymnast turned into, but not really. I wish Karen would sing "A Song For You" for her and Frankie.

Risky Behavior

Over the course of my lifetime I have often been a party to events that Sandy Kay often describes as dangerous behavior. She feels that there is a thin line between thrill seeking and utter stupidity, and is often confounded when I apparently cannot differentiate between the two. I cannot pass any opportunity to buy rides on Helicopters, and I will drive for miles out of my way to jump in a Bell Jet Ranger for the thrill of having my entire body vibrated for whatever the length of the ride.Sandy Kay only asks for the keys because she seems to have a vision of the whirly bird crashing and burning into a hillside with her husband melted into the fusilage, along with whoever else was foolhardy enough to fly. It doesn't help the cause that one of my favorite pilots crashed and burned , and was horribly disfigured. As long as she has the keys she knows she can drive home and continue with her life. I tried to get her to go para-sailing with me down at Panama City and she just held out her hands for the keys and said"Go for it!". There's something indescribable about floating 300 feet above the beach and hearing only the wind as you glide out over the Gulf of Mexico on a beautiful cloudless day. A few days later a parasailing mother and daughter were blown into a billboard as the parasail was caught in a freak burst of wind. Sandy watched the rescue squad take them away and only shook her head. A lot of people are afraid of sharks and are terrified that the boat will dip them into the waters of the Gulf right atop a hungry great white. Tim and I , on the other hand have dived with Caribbean Reef Sharks doing figure eights all around us thinking we will feed them. Now these are certainly not great whites but there were 5 or 6 of them in the school and they were 5 or 6 feet long, and have no fear of two middle aged out-of-shape men. As they glided by within a foot of us their black cat looking eyes would be turning at us and sizing us up as to our potential as a snack. It seemed as if their big toothy grins were saying,"You silly boys should have listened to Sandy Kay who's up on the bank clutching your wallets and the room keys!"Then there was the time when we elected to pay money and dived Sting Ray City in the Caymans with a gozillion Stingrays looking for squid handouts. These big monsters hear the boat engines and come flopping their black fins toward you much like birds of prey swimming under water. They are often four feet across their backs and will settle on your head like some obscene overstuffed hat that Aunt Ruby wore at Easter in the fifties. You can see their mouths on the white belly as they are sucking the squid that you have been given to keep them on site . A curious fact is that the mouths have been designed by nature to vacuum shellfish and food out of the sandy bottom , and these creatures have far more suction than David Orick ever dreamed of in his life time. The boat captain warned us of Sting Ray Hickeys and fortunately we survived. The only near danger we had was this monster barracuda somehow attached itself to Tim, often looking straight into his mask.I personally think that this multi-toothed creature sensed that Tim was the pharmacy guru and needed some recreational drug therapy. I could have told him(her?) that big old ugly fish wouldn't be given anything but ibuprofen or a rap on it's ugly killing snout by Dr. Tim.I might add that the bellies of stingrays feel like sleek white marshmellows under water as they glide across your exposed flesh, a fact that makes Sandy shudder when I tell her. I almost thought that she was going to swim with the manatees at Crystal River in Florida , but she rode on the boat and watched from above as old Tim and I snorkled out and swam amongst these gentle creatures . Nothing prepares you for how huge these things are as they graze underwater on aquatic plant life, often with a young baby at their sides. Being mammals , the manatees must surface for air often ito the props of overhead boats. Most of these creatures have horrible scars on their backs with collisions from boats. It is truly amazing that these animals can weigh 1000 pounds and are as graceful as dolphins . I was really proud of Sandy as she leaned over the edge of the boat , watching us swim with the mammals, our billfolds and keys carefully tucked in her purse. I have to admit that I'm not to squimish about danger, as I always drive too fast and like thrills, but the sight of a baby coming toward me picking his nose will cause me to overload. I cannot stand nose-picking children and I have a phobia about them rubbing Buggers on me. Sandy , on the other hand doesn't seem to have this phobia, mainly because the little devils always seem to come toward me. I also cannot bear the mechanics of diaper changing either, so I guess Sandy and I are a good team. Whenever Nose-picking kids come around I hold out my hands and she gives me the keys to guard. I can dive down in utter blackness to a lake bottom and grope around in 12 inches of slimy, cold mud, but you let a two year old bugger picker within a mile of me and I'll generally panic . It takes all kinds. "You got fins to the left and fins to the right and you're the only bait in town"

In trouble again

Well, as always I have somehow managed to alienate myself from another woman, not just any woman, but Sandy Kay, my trusty wife of thirty some years and the Queen of Helm Street and holder of my future happiness . I , in a weaker moment undiplomatically opined that you could place three women in a room with a steel railroad rail and they would somehow destroy it in a matter of hours, and without the help of tools. Well predictably enough this had somewhat of a chilling effect on the last couple of days , and the next couple of months if past transgressions are any indication of what the future holds. Any intelligent man would learn from the past , yet no person has accused me of any brains for the past decade.I have gotten in trouble as I tried to explain that vacuum cleaner bags need to be changed when full, and that dragging them at warp speed through the house by the hose and then running the cannister into the woodwork and doors is not beneficial to the house. Sometimes when I'm downstairs and the vacuum is running upstairs I keep my hand on the phone for 911 because I've heard genuine barroom brawls with less noise and banging around!When the noise dies down I will usually go up the steps to see if there's anything left, and the old Hoover will be lying on its back like a dead dog , and Sandy will say its not picking up like it used to. I seemed to have solved the vacuum dilemma by trying to tutor her in the fine art of the machine. She implied that if I knew so much that I could vacuum myself. Well that took care of that with a side benefit as I'm going to need something to do for the next couple of months anyhow.A second issue that we cannot meet in the middle on is the differing attitude toward cars. Sandy Kay drives into our driveway and little old garage at just about the speed of an F-14 Tom Cat as it lands on the carrier deck of the Kennedy.It is somewhat of a comical picture as this pretty, classy lady touches down with a roar and screeching of brakes, The Phantom Of the Opera blaring out on her cd player. I bet if old Michael Crawford knew how fast he had landed in the garage that he would have a new found falsetto in his voice. Speaking of the Cd player in her car, now that's interesting.Anytime I drive the Queen's car I always look to see the state of her radio controls. I have tried for 30 years to explain the concept of "balance" and Fader controls. She will always have Barry Manilow coming out of only one speaker up front, nothing in the back. "His name was Rico- He wore a diamond"comes out of the left side with a vengeance!She's also from the planet Krypton when it comes to hearing. She always aks me "What is that noise?". I honestly have to say"What Noise?" Inevitably it will be the brake wear- indicator on the front discs , or the beep of a weak battery on the alarm system in the house.I just can't hear high pitched noises anymore. I think my ears left me about 1970 when Steppenwulf came along, but it could honestly be the sonic booms of the hoover as it plays like a pinata with the wood work upstairs. A final difference is our attitudes towards pumping gas at the self serve stations. One cold winter day I was pumping the stuff when Sandy reached over and shut the engine off. I asked why and she pointed to the sign telling you not to run the engine, talk on the cell phone , or possibly even think because of immanent explosions.Everyone knows the sign the one right below the Bullet-headed State Trooper's Picture who officially warns you that if you you fail to pay for gasoline you will lose your license. Now everyone knows that you can't control drunken drivers in Kentucky, much less the criminal that drives off with $5 worth of gas! This all makes me want to Fillup with the motor running full blast while talking on my cell phone , and smoking a forbidden cigarette. I will only attempt this act of bravado if Sandy is not present. Has there been a rash of Service Stations blowing up because of careless men? I hadn't heard of it, but I haven't been tempted to drive off without paying because of Mr. Bullet Head Trooper. Who can forget"I fought the law and the law won" by the Bobby Fuller Four. As a final act of contrition I must admit that while I firmly believe the circumstances as true, ther is always Sandy's side of the story which does carry a great deal of weight. Other men have commiserated with me with similar stories, yet they will remain nameless. Just because I have destroyed my life does not mean they deserve the same hellish fate. On one of my past jobs there was a female Branch manager who was extremely hard to please. I made my usual overtures of helpfulness, but made the mistake of saying that I just couldn't seem to get along with women. She immediately jumped me with,"Well just stand back and look at yourself and ask'Why can't I get along with women?!'"It's taken me several years and counselling sessions with the boys at Danny Coffman's garage to work my way through the trauma. I can't find anyone that will measure up to Sandy , but I find her giving me long questioning looks when she thinks I'm not looking.I think she's hearing old Michael sing about the Phantom.

Dive boat diva

This time of year in Kentucky is always a depressive and dark, cold reminder that winter has a way to go. Instead of the snappy, sunny days of a cold New England with white snow, we all too often have damp, foggy ,and bone chilling times of depression.Times such as this remind me of past February days spent in the sunny Bahamas. The journey of a short distance by air is mind boggling to board in Lexington or Louisville in cold 30 degree weather to step out to brilliant sunshine and mid 70's in Nassau. It's quite startling to hear the pilot announce that we'll be arriving in Nassau in ten minutes to sunshine and temperatures in the seventies, even if we know this is normal and the way the world's climates work. As we get a ride to our inn, both Tim and I suddenly remember that the only ride in the world to equal a NYC cab ride to Mid town Manhatten is a Bus ride in the bahamas by a suicide bent native as he drives on the wrong side of the road in horn blowing glee, trying to scare his passengers to death. What is it with these drivers from hell as they blow these little shrill horns at every possible moment? It's almost a sexual thing with them as they screech around corners at sub light speeds , the engines belching noxious fumes at toxic levels. We hope they're diesels, but think they are probably gasoline. Along with the dive group from Louisville are three or four Louisville Metro Policemen, all under 30 years old, exuding testosterone, extreme agressive behavior, and delight at leaving wives and girlfriends in cold,snowy Louisville.There are a couple of babes along , one attached with her husband, the other a divorcee hairdresser from New Albany, where I guess it was just as cold as Louisville as only the Sherman Minton Bridge separates the two. The hair dresser talked on top of talk, she never shut up. On our first dive we embarked on a nice dive boat belonging to Nassau Divers, where we went out to some shallow reefs with some of the most beautiful coral in the western hemisphere. The water was so warm (mid 70s) that most of us wore just dive skins which is like Paradise when you're used to wearing bulky awkward ,wet suits. But then again we were in Paradise. The oranges were blooming on shore and the sky was an unimaginable blue, without a cloud in the sky. The tropical vines were loaded with vivid red flowers that were intoxicating in both color and fragrance . I think the Garden of Eden must have looked and smelled somewhat like Orange Hill where we stayed. Every night the cops would go to Nassau and come back drunk and rowdy, howling at the moon until nearly daylight.Every night Tim and I would take medicine for our pains and take stock of our sunscreen for the next day. Everyone else on the trip would be somewhere in-between. Perhaps the most memorable event of the trip was when we all converged on the Inn's pool to find Tracey( the married babe) sunbathing quite nonchalantly in the skimpiest thong ever beheld by civilized man. This was like Playboy mansion South.This woman would have placed in the top two in an Hawaiian Tropic Contest. Even the Bad Boys(you know the tune "Bad boy, bad boy what you gonna do?) were in a state of shock. We all stayed poolside until the sunscreen had boiled away and we became young and middle aged lobsters.Throughout it all the hairdresser kept talking, constantly telling us all and individually if our toe nails had fungus and how bad our hair cuts were. The cops ignored her and stayed signal nine on the thong babe.On our last dive on the final day of our charter, the dive master was over the dive site and was giving the dive instructions. Most everyone was paying attention, the cops were vivid red from the thong watch, and visibally hung over from Nassau's nightlife. The hair dresser however was as usual, yapping . The dive master asked her two times to be silent while he finished his instructions, and she ignored him. The dive captain just went over and picked her up, and threw her over the back of the boat. Everyone was silent with shock , then we see her come up and swim toward the swim platform . I think this is the perfect opportunity for old Tim to be a gentleman and help her on the boat. Did he try? No, he just watched as she struggled to get back on the slick platform. The bad boys looked like she had gotten what she deserved and turned their attention back to the lecturing dive captain. I realized if someone helped her it was to be me, since no one else was so minded. I went astern gave her a helping hand and helped pulled her aboard. She came up with fire in her eyes and said"At least there's one gentleman on board this damn boat!" All looked at me with some degree of malice in their eyes and we continued the dive. She spent the night with the guy who threw her overboard. Women???? Bad boys what you gonna do?

Real love

Being a poor person all of the past 55 years has often been an eye-opening experience, sometimes good and sometimes bad. Along with the constant companionship of poverty has been the unique experience of having a job of which most of my clientele are multimillionaires. Talk about extremes in lifestyles! I may be riding around with characters in Bentleys as we go to lunch and discuss their mansion interiors, or we may go down the Ohio River on a custom mega-yacht that needs several truck loads of rich mahogany for the lavish ocean- going interior. Nearly all of my clients have Gulf Streams, Lears, or at the least a couple of King Airs. Most of the houses that I work on are at least 35,000 square feet and larger, often with as many as three or four kitchens. All these houses have granite floors , bath rooms , and wonderful libraries. The stables for their automobiles are only the finest in the world. Mercedes is the norm and quite mundane, as one elderly couple had a 911 Porsche with a whale tail that they only used for Sunday afternoon ventures down Kingston Pike for Baskin and Robbins icecream . Most of the time the steel blue shark sat in an airconditioned garage on carpet, wall to wall ,no less. Can you imagine an automobile capable of 190 mph sitting year round except for Sunday drives observing the dogwoods?What a waste!The reason I'm telling this background is to explain that even though I'm poor I'm not braindead. I leave these wealthy star walkers with never a tinge of envy except at times a certain part of my mind lingers on their automobiles, and the sheer euphoria that a fine machine can induce on most men. I really don't care much for the Mercedes, and the average BMW won't turn my head, but let it have 911 written on its rear and I'm rapt with attention. The old 928 was a truly awesome machine, that when running , would make the wildest roller coaster seem boring. Tuned dual exhausts have the same effect as Angelina Jolie's whispering dirty promises in my ears. The only brush with automotive ecstasy that I have ever had was an old 1966 Jaguar XKE 2+2. It was red with some rust and the leather was a little ragged on the drivers seat. The thing was typically British in the fact that the electrical system was totally undependable with constant things not working today but being perfect tomorrow . The thing had a bonnet(hood) that was a mile long and tilted forward to expose this 4.2 liter in-line 6 cylinder. Three carbuerators drank 104 octane gasoline and only ran well on cold, damp mornings. It was the only time in my life that I could wake up , look out the window, and rejoice if it was a cold,dismal, foggy day. All of the above heralded" a turn the Jag loose on the world day". I think that the Hound of the Baskervilles must have had the same engine as he prowled the moors on those cold nights. Arthur Conan Doyle would have had Holmes in a Series 1 with glassed in headlights, much like mine. You could smell the leather as I would fall down into the cockpit, looking at the no-nonsense instruments about to come alive if the gods of 12 volt were smiling this day. I would turn the small key on , flip the fuel pump button and, Thunk thunk thunk , I'd hear the 104 octane coming up front to the Strombergs, ready for the next step- hitting the starter button. What happens next is only understood by someone who has owned a Brutal XKE. All hell would break loose as the engine came to life with an almost sexual thud as the fine tuned engine roared out the glasspacked up-turned dual exhaust. The engine would sit at stop lights with a snarl and a promise that it would take on any Detroit ass and chew it up, at least on a long road. The book said that any speeds over 180 mph should call for extra venting on the brakes. Man, who wanted to stop?! Jan and Dean sang about a Stingray and an XKE in Deadman's Curve, a gory song of speed and death. Well I sold the Jag because I needed money and it needed rehab. I can still hear it in my dreams nearly redlineing in 2nd as I went by the old IGA grocery. I can see it sitting in my driveway, looking like it was going 120 just sitting still. I hope someone fixed her up and in its own mechanical way, I hope it misses me every once in a while. I wish it aviation fuel and cold, damp days, and I hope it doesn't have to transport senile people for icecream on Sunday afternoons.

Old Mcdonald Had A Zoo

I was recently coming through Somerset from Monticello,and like any normal day I was ready for a convenient stop at the Golden Arches for the unbreakable cycle of all road warriors for restroom followed by a large chalice of caffeine on the rocks. Being on the road for the past 27 years has imprinted many things in my brain, but perhaps the daily consumption of Mcdonalds large cokes is my most cherished ritual. Large cokes are $1.38, and mediums are$1.06 through most of Kentucky, but Manchester is higher. I quit cigarettes 15 years ago ,but I would die before quitting caffeine. I could write a Fodor's sort of book on the Mcdonalds of Kentucky and Tennessee ,and I personally know a man who owns 14 of the things. He told me just last week that he has 900 employees. Now this man has my respect far more than that wimpy,feminine Donald Trump, or even Rick Pitino. I can tell you which Mcdonalds are new ,which are sleazy, and even what the clientele are like. I can tell you which ones are progressive and hire handicapped workers, and which are in the midst of remodelling. All of this information is to establish my qualifications as a professional Mcdonalds expert and user, and to relay this story of indescrible misery and terror. As I entered the South 27 Mcdonalds in Somerset I was nearly knocked backwards by the wall of noise and screeches that assaulted me. I thought that I had mistakenly entered the primate wing of the Louisville zoo , the noise was that bad! Then I remembered the Yellow buses in the parking lot. There were two or three 66 passenger public school busses parked outside. I had unwittingly entered some sort of reward day hell!! These were not just any public school students, but what looked like 1st or 2nd graders, all in motion from caffeine and sugar induced frenzies, all screaming and combative from excitement. Now in all my years of marriage we never had children, something I can honestly say I've not missed.But in my own defense I can truly say I believe I love most children, but in managable numbers. I looked for the teachers but for the most part they looked to be in shell shock and as miserable as I was myself . What were these educated women thinking? On the one hand they hand out copious doses of rittalin(sp.?) and then take the little apes out to overindulge on sugar and caffeine. What planet are these leaders of our youth from that they haven't heard of how many grams of fat a Big Mac has, or how many calories a large order of fries has?As I cautiously waded through the screaming masses to the men's restroom, I opened the door to another hell. God only knows what mischief 6 or 7 boys were up to in there as they looked up from the water fight they were in at me with suspicion in their eyes. The absence of male teachers had given this little primate gang their own private kingdom to wage havoc on normal customers. One of them had his watch lying on the vanity top, for what reason I don't know. It's been nearly 50 years since I was that young, how would I remember what one thought about in the First grade? This whole scene reminded me of Dante's Inferno as I hastily retreated to the quiet and calmness of the parking lot and my 4x4.m I reflected on how these little monsters will be become sweet, adorable children when they are separated from their peers, but as a group they become a surly, loud , obnoxious mass, uncontrollable by their brainless teachers. Leave the students at school where they can learn.Do not let them loose like an uncontrollable amoeba on the unsuspecting public.Unpopular as my views certainly are, I don't care. Schools need to educate,not entertain.