Heavy Fuel

I was in LaFollette and Oneida , Tennessee today, and had taken US 27 down to Oneida on the first leg of the trip from Stanford. As is inevitable, gas prices jumped nearly 40 cents a gallon over the past weekend( is there not a symbol for cents??), and I cannot find a rational reason for the sudden jump. Now nearly every little town has several gas stations and the competition is so great that they all have the same prices. If BP is selling at $2.69, then you can bet your sweet ethenol ass that Citgo and Shell have the exact signs up as well. The only variance will be from town to town or state to state. If you have enough in your tank to gamble, there may be a couple of dollars difference from one little sleepy village to the next. Sometimes I'm putting in $100 each day for two cars , and obviously the economics of price comparison is there . I personally think some little pencil headed geek on the Futures Market is manipulating the markets , and using Iran's Nuclear Crises as a starting point. Today I heard the Hurricane forecast had precipitated a price hike. Give me a break!These geeks may cause gas or pork bellies to rise if they have a pimple on their ass! We need to resolve Iran's nuclear program with one Tomahawk. Does no one remember the 400 + day captivity during Jimmy Carter's fifteen minutes of fame?It seems we have to take crap from every third world despot ! Maybe the only thing they fear are the Israelis, and with good reason. Sooner or later Israel will do our dirty work and Poof!! No more Iranean nuclear program. This has come a long way from Oneida and I fear I have become easily distracted in my declining years. As I was leaving Oneida I stopped at a Subway for a fast sandwich before heading across the mountain to LaFollette. I have started noticing a disturbing pattern as I have become a Subway customer. The restaurant is a magnet for fat people! It's pretty evident when the young girl in front of you blocks out the whole sales area as she orders her sandwich. Now this early twentyish behemoth is very serious about her sandwich, as she requests the 6 inch bread with some kind of oriental chicken heated for 10 seconds, then some exotic cheese( a little more than that please), which is also heated just so-so, then some honey mustard lavishly plied on(a little more on the end please), and then some peppers ,and would you put some meatballs on that?? This sandwich would have made Dagwood Bumstead proud, remember Blondie? I always had a crush on Blondie's legs. Anyhow by the time this weight impaired babe is ready to pay for the sandwich she has gotten flushed and short of breath at the prospect of making culinary love to this creation. I think she approaches orgasm as she nears the booth just in anticipation of her impending date with a 6 incher. Too bad that skinny assed , 0ne-time fatassed Jared isn't here for the afterglow. I just order a plain turkey on a bun and vacate the institution of orgiastic eating. I remembered a parallel when as a child we slopped the hogs in the pen at the end of the meals.. I think in hindsight the old sow hogs were more appealing. As I enter LaFollette 45 minutes later I stop at Mcdonalds and order a Coke, whereas I notice the blonde waiting on me has"White Pride" tattooed on her neck above the collar of her striped McDonald's shirt. I think she missed the part about appropriate attire when she was taking business classes in high school. I wonder what African- Americans think as they order a Sausage McMuffin?You don't see many skin heads working in McDonalds. Do you think she smiles at children when she hands out Happy Meals? I wonder what kind of toys she puts in with the fries and cheeseburger? Maybe a cute little swastika? Or maybe a miniature version of a Rub-off tattoo for the children to show their own "White Pride". Do you think that Creepy Ronald McDonald goes out and fires machine guns all weekends? I'll never turn my back on Ronald again!Again I digress. As I completed my meeting with the bankers in LaFollette and headed toward the interstate I happened to notice a cherry red, brand new H2 Hummer cruising the main drag , along with an equally new and red 911 with a whale tail. Both looked as out of place in LaFollette as they would have in Stanford. Either Doctor's wives or drug dealers. Normal people drive Expeditions and Tahoes. It would have taken Ford's new F650 for the Subway Babe. As I hit I-75 it becomes obvious that today belongs to the semi. Semis are bumper to bumper the entire 27 miles to the Kentucky line and then the 61 miles to the Mount Vernon exit. Today I was trying to determine who would be my travelling companion , either Curtiss Mayfield or Mark Knopfler. Mark seemed appropriate and it was Dire Straits all the way. A little shiny blue Pontiac with Michigan tags slippede around me at 85 and the party started! Knopfler started singing "Heavy Fuel" and the world came into focus. Suicide notes on $100 bills indeed! The Silverado was purring at 2500 rpms on level ground in the first "D" of the transmission,and that's always good for 85 mph. That's also good for about two and one half songs between exits. I came to realize that the air leakage in the tilt out windows of the extended cab becomes a lot worse as "Money for nothing" reaches the decibel level of a jet takeoff. Money for nothing and your chicks for free! Most men my age are listening to Rush Limbaugh or talk radio.But most men my age are grown up and occasionally wear neckties. All too soon Mt. Vernon approaches and the Silverado pops and shudders as it re-enters the atmosphere. I'm headed for Faluzia and the Hood. I see Sandy and her lips are moving as she greets me. My first words are"What?" as I realize that the tilt out window isn't the only thing damaged by Dire Straits and that twangy guitar of Knopfler's. I'm thinking that like Lucas Davenport , I am going to compile my own 100 greatest songs of rock and roll. Telegraph Road and Heavy Fuel are contenders. Sex and rock and roll as long as I'm able.

Cold Day in May

Today is May 14, 2006 and Mother's Day in the state of Kentucky , as well as the rest of these United States of America. Today has also been cloudy, dreary, and cold as the well digger's ass.May should be a time of blue skies and butterflies, and not feel and look like November. Coupled with Mother's Day was my nephew's graduation on Saturday from the EKU University of Partying and Drinkology. This reminds me that it was 35 years ago that I myself graduated ,or was booted out of this Monument to Intellectual Pursuits. Truthfully I remember drunken sorority girls down on Water Street as they drank beer and danced to Jimmy Stokely and the Exiles more than my academic pursuits. I remember one little red-headed girl who smelled like strawberries and made me an impossibly gross lemon pie that tasted like a combination of play doh and lemons. Her other attributes more than made up for her cooking deficiencies , and I still can't smell strawberries without a smile on my face. I don't believe she would recognize me 35 years later ,and I probably wouldn't know her either.The graduation ceremony lasted far too long and everyone seemed to have something to say that noone wanted to hear , but they told us anyway! Mitch McConnell was awarded an honorary degree and told us his life story in return. My ass became paralyzed and felt rooted to the seat; the African- American lady next to me read her Bible during the fest. I wish I could have slept like during the Phantom of The Opera, but it is difficult to fall asleep at 10:30 AM, especially when your ass is aching. Mitch didn't tell about siccing the Blood hounds on Walter "D" Huddleston nearly 16 years ago to win his seat in the US senate. I grew very,very, very tired of listening to the verboseness of EKU's Lady President, but she is an Attorney and obviously likes to hear herself talk. Next time she should talk about 45 minutes less; maybe Save a Horse and Ride A Cowboy, eh Joann?? The thing finally ended and it was like Times Square at Christmas. Lord, the college was selling refreshments, t-shirts, flowers, and momentos out in the lobby. I was disappointed that there were no alcoholic beverages as I strongly would have considered a stiff drink to wash down Mitch and Joann, much like the cowboys would have done at the end of a trailride. I still can't believe how young these graduates looked out in the lobby as they milled around for pictures. Even more unbelievable was how young their mothers looked. Here we were watching a picture taking frenzy with young mothers in mini-skirts and with tattoos on their slim brown legs! I could have been a father to these babes who had sons and daughters graduating from college. Talk about a downer , my nephew's jubilation at graduation was only matched by my depression of realizing that the past 35 years have sped by at an alarming rate. I think I am going to start visiting rest homes to feel better about my age. I truthfully don't think I ever looked as young as these graduates ,even in elementary school. I'm starting to realize why Ponce De Leon so eagerly sought the Fountain of Youth in the new world. Poor guy, all he found in Florida was sawgrass, mosquitos, and alligators, much the same as I'm finding at work these days.As I was coming from Tennessee last week I saw a bumper sticker that read"My boxer is smarter than your honor student". I probably agree.This whole week is supposed to be rainy and cold. Maybe I can talk to Sandy Kay about driving down to Destin and lying out in that white, snowy looking sand. I could get me some of those mirrored sunglasses and watch the young babes slow broil on the beach; maybe even make myself useful and apply some lotion for them . You know like Changes in Latitude?? Good times and Riches and son of a bitches; you get the picture.In 1971 the Guess Who ruled the airwaves and we were in an unjust war. Today there seems to be a lot of rap music and we are in another war . Some things just don't change . I'm proud of my nephew and thankful we still have mothers, but I'd have been happier if that EKU woman had talked less. At least my ass would have felt better.

The Green Zone

I was conversing with my friend Hazmit(www.hazmit.blogspot.com/) about his new home that was recently purchased , and I was congratulating him on the achievement of moving his young wife and son to a nice neighborhood . Like myself, Hazmit had not exactly purchased his first home in the best of neighborhoods. Unlike yours truly, his first home was very nice and comfortable, but the neighborhood was full of discontented people and malcontents. That is why I was very happy for the family when he bought the new home in one of our nicer subdivisions. During our discussion about his plans for the home it suddenly became obvious to me that like Iraq, we too have "safe zones" and combat areas. Hazmit had taken his family to the "Green Zone" if you will, and I can understand why. Having lived in the equivalent of Faluzia(sp?) for the past three decades, I have become accustomed to scowling and threatening the neighbors, and truthfully had forgotten that everyone doesn't live like that.Locking every thing up and making nightly rounds has become a way of life. I noticed the other day that someone had stuck a crude sign near an intersection advertising "Pups for sale. Half Rott and half Pitt bull". They were only asking $50 each. Only in my neighborhood, You gotta love it!! None of these little old sissy-assed dogs for the hood. Every day brings a new adventure as urban renewal takes place. Some person with vision has set fire to three derelict buildings since last fall. I have entertained fleeting thoughts of packing up and moving Sandy to the Green Zone, but I always come to reality that safety and security is not for everyone. I have to have this edge and feelings of apprehension before I can feel fulfilled. Hazmit's new neighborhood is complete with a golf course and I just can't relate to golfers. Rumor has it that the houses adjoining the course often has golfers walking through the back lawns and even hitting balls from your property! Lord save me from those pastel clad wimps swinging clubs, and save them from me if I owned one of those houses. I've lived in the hood so long that I would construct traps and deadfalls to keep these white ball chasers out of my lawn. I think that a razor sharp wire strung about neck level would keep the golf carts at bay after the first few visits to the emergency room. The real oddity is that they say those lots next to the golf course cost more money!! Obviously I think that my current zone is a lot more suitable for me, at least I wouldn't have to go out and buy me a new wardrobe of pastel yuppie clothes. Now Hazmit will do fine with the clothing because his pretty little wife always looks like the newest fashion ,and often dresses he and the little lad in the newest styles. I think he even owns some of those little old socks that don't stick up out of your shoes, and I think he keeps his tennis shoes gleaming white and spotless, something that is in the covenant of the subdivision. You know you have to have a certain amount of square footage and adhere to the building requirements, as well as wear Tommy on Monday, Ralph Lauren on Tuesday, Michael Kors on Wednesday; you get the picture. I think Hazmit is going to miss the excitement of the hood, and that sooner or later he will go to a cookout wearing a melon colored Polo shirt when everyone knew it was supposed to be ocean blue. I guess I'm staying in the hood so he can come for a while and smell the burning rubber and hear the neighbors curse and throw bottles at each other. I'm afraid he will have slum environment withdrawal if he does this thing too quick. He always has Jerry Garcia's big ass to protect and he will have to continue coming down here to Faluzia out of the green zone for continuing education and to keep his edge. At some point I know my boy will eventually quit coming to the hood, and my worse fear is that I'll find him riding around in a Golf cart with seersucker madras shorts and a pastel polo shirt with the collar turned up on his little tanned neck.Until that day arrives I will continue to welcome him back to the hood and give him moral support. Lock and load Hazmit, And good luck in the Green Zone. Everybody has to grow up someday.

Opening doors

I was thinking of how often we open a door to answer a knock or a chime. Sometimes we are pleasantly surprised and genuinely are happy to see the guest, while at other occasions the result is not so welcome. As I was driving through one of our upscale neighborhoods this past week I espied a Schwann's truck lumbering through the neatly clipped streets selling cholesterol and fats to the starving masses. For anyone who doesn't know , Schwanns has made huge profits by selling the icecreams and other culinary treats to Mom and Pop after they return from a hard day at the office. What was a jarring glimpse of reality to me was that the Schwanns trucks don't peddle their treats in my neighborhood. Why?? Simply because I have lived in the "hood" for the past 33 years. People in my neighborhood don't buy over-priced food when they can steal it in the more affluent subdivisions. With this in mind it becomes apparent that a late night knock on the door on Helm Street is not necessarily the same as say, a sophisticated Westminister Chime on Snob Knob.No sir, a knock on Helm can often be like "Let's Make A Deal". What's behind the door? Do you want door A, B, or C? I can tell you from experience that if you come to my door after dark you need to know the password or a snub-nosed .38 special might be rammed up your left nostril. People on Helm just don't like surprises. I have answered doors to supplicants wanting money for baby diapers with said hood -baby hanging on her hip as proof of the need. Somehow the need to contribute to the infant's comfort is offset that mama is chainsmoking cigarettes. I don't even bother to tell her why I'm not contributing tonight. Sometimes the smiling face belongs to a misplaced drunk, while every Saturday used to be packed with Zealous Jehovah's Witnesses, out earning their place in the after life. Sometimes it can be Salesmen wanting to clad your house in plastic siding, or wanting to sell you replacement windows. The truth of the matter is that the only salesman sure to make a sale in the hood would be a heavy arms dealer. The ring du jour are the newly- sewn crop of would-be politicians , as they have had revelations and visions of helping the misguided masses of Lincoln County and Stanford. I have Comrade Dave's sign prominently displayed in my front lawn as he is running for Magistrate of District No. 1. Daves wife had previously told him if he ran for anything else he would be running as a single man. He swore to her that his running days were over, and guess what?? Dave is running again. God love him!! Anybody that can lie to his wife and get by with it is a Natural for Politics! He's got my Vote.This beautiful month has always been the harbinger of spring with colorful blossoms and spring flowers, yet this election year has seen a bumper crop of political signs as numerous as the stars above. These yard signs have sprung up almost overnight as the candidates proudly proclaim their dreams and hopes of bureaucracy. Some are bright red, others are blue , while some are eye catching yellow. Most have stars and some hint at patriotic red, white, and blue. All speak of dedication , long hours ,and experience. What kind of experience does it take to be a politician? Nobody has profanity on their placards as this would be regarded as inappropriate for a would be office holder, and I've yet to see a political sign with large breasted Pamela Anderson's body on it. No sir these boys and girls are presenting their most moral face. They don't come to Helm Street much asking for votes. I've noticed that Eastern Kentucky takes it's elections more serious than Central Kentucky. Everybody that runs has a Nickname. In Clay County I noticed "Crawdad" is running for Judge Executive. He has black signs with a vivid, hot yellow crawdad stencilled on the left, while proudly proclaiming"Crawdad for Judge". I've seen "Goat "running for something in Estill County, while we can only come up with"What about Bob" here in Lincoln County. What about Bob indeed? My friend Dave is going to open his can of Whoop- Ass and go for the gold.Once I was in Harlan and my friends were laughing about this man who had spent $100,000 to try to win a school board race, and lost! This tells me something. I think that opening Door A in Harlan County gives something worthwhile. In our own little county there was a comely Lass that made off with nearly $300,000 from the Industrial Board where she was a part time secretary She was sent to prison and spent three months. That is $100 Grand a month for the inconvenience of staying away from home for 90 days.She always wore tight jeans.The magistrates on Fiscal Court never mentioned the theft.Some are running for reelection.The tight jeans opened Door B and won. The Industrial Board escorted her up to Door B.I'll be glad when the Primary is over so we can start again for the November General Election.I think I'll steal one of Crawdad's signs and put it in the front yard next to Dave's. Can't hurt.

Water

I guess in thinking of the past some of my most vivid memories center around water. Now water obviously is very necessary for all living creatures to survive, and it covers over 75% of the earth's surface, as well as around 75% of the human body is composed of liquid.I know some acquaintances are more than 80% alcohol, at least on weekends, but those people anomalies, and at least are mainly beer -laced h20. From my earliest childhood we would virtually live at the little creek that partially formed the headwaters of the Green River. There we would see who was wily enough to capture the fish from the deeper green pools or out from under the slate rocks in the shallows. Those slate rock adventures were like Forrest Gump's observation, as you never knew what you'd drag out with your bare hands as you groped under the black, slippery rocks. Sometimes it was a black goggle-eye fish, just fat and ripe for the frying pan. Other times the luck of the draw wasn't on your side as you could pull out an irritable, pissed- to- the- core water snake that no sense of humor, as it snapped viciously at anything in reach , sometimes our skinny scarred up youthful legs. Later on in life I would have flashbacks as we would be diving amongst reef sharks in the Bahamas, their cat eyes sizing us up as they leisurely swam amongst the pale intruders. They were shopping for lunch and we were shopping for thrills. It seemed like the sharks were calling out to me,"Hey fatass!! I'm going to get you sooner or later!" Or I've swam up to scuttled ships and come nearly eye to eye with vivid ,green moray eels as they poke their toothy heads out from their favorite lair , hoping to get a handout. Their open mouths filled with backslanted white, needle teeth. I silently pray"Oh Lord , if that thing wants to come out , Let it take a liking for Tim. I don't want to become eel food in Aruba!!"The water in the Caribbean and the southern islands is impossibly clear as you glide under the surface , maybe amongst reefs like Gulden Cay in the Bahamas, or over an incredibly deep wall in the Caymans. Either way the human mind cannot comprehend the beauty and wilderness of the ocean. The silence is only broken by your bubbles as they drift toward the surface. There is a condition called nitrogen narcosis that suddenly can overtake a diver at maybe 85 feet or so that is like an immediate euphoria and drunk. Divers have been known to think they don't need their air supply and carelessly toss their regulators aside. People have drowned this way. I was somewhat used to narcosis as I previously exhibited the same euphoria and giddiness when in the presence of well-endowed young blonds with the smell of cocoa-butter. I think Tim takes some kind of mind altering drugs to combat the condition as I've never seen him giddy unless that wild plane ride from Atlanta one night when he sat next to a mermaid and the Stewardess kept giving them free drinks. I anxiously kept looking over my shoulder , thinking I might have to help him with the tall, cool brunette, but they obviously were feeling no pain, and didn't ask for assistance. Back to reality all water is not equal. Diving in Cumberland Lake is like diving in your Uncle's Septic tank. On occasion I would dive at the dock where my old boat was moored, but that was when someone asked if I could find something they dropped overboard, or help put a prop on a boat. The water was maybe 80 degrees at the top and dropped to the 60's on the muddy bottom at 30 feet. Imagine dropping on your knees in slimy mud maybe 2 feet deep in utter pitch blackness with only your air bubbles as companionship. You then feel around in the mud for what- ever object someone has dropped from above. It's not for the claustophobic, or the easily freightened. As you feel in the darkness and slimy mud your hands run across alien and sometimes scary objects. You know rumors abound that there are man eating catfish in Cumberland, but those don't scare me. What scares me is 30 years of monofiliment fishing line and sharp hooks waiting to ensnare me before I can reach the warm ,green waters above. I fear this more than sharks or barracuda. In all the tropic waters I have ever dived in , there is one common element, and that is schools of evil ,little yellow tailed snapper fish that will sneak up behind you and painfully nip any exposed body parts. There was a monster Jew Fish named Elvis that lived in a sunken barge off Key West that startled Tim and I on a dive. A member of the grouper family, I think Elvis was bigger than both of us. Elvis looked at us through plate sized,blood-shot eyes and seemed to open his mouth occasionally to belch. A huge mouth, and once again ,"Please Lord, Here's Tim..." We lived to tell the tale.Most females don't really like or trust water at any level over pool depth or the jacuzzi. Now there are some exceptions to the rules, and I've had the pleasure of meeting some mermaids, but like their land-dwelling sisters, all mermaids are not created equal. There was one little sea nymph in the Cayman Islands that I gave my lunch on the dive boat. She was a deck hand on the dive boat and was from South Africa. Had I been single , 20 years younger, and a little smoother I would have stayed with her. Tim ate his lunch himself. This rambling is my gnashing of teeth and wailing for warm water and mermaids. I see those Corona Commercials on tv and want to cry. Every time I walk by my scuba equipment, one of the filled tanks looks up and say" Hey Fatass, We haven't been under in a long time!!". I have to agree, but any mermaid would have to be pretty chunky and slow for my old knees to kick the fins along.As it is in my own life , I'm surrounded by far more dangerous sharks than I've ever met under the deep blue. These sharks wear Gucci loafers and make swishing sounds as they swing their big berthas on the green fairways. The little Izod jackets go "Swish, Swish" as they move their arms, seeking that perfect shot, maybe toward Pebble Beach.Lord keep those capped tooth wonders at a distance . All I want is a tall ship and a star to steer her by( well maybe a mermaid sighting occasionally)

It depends on your perspective

As I was cruising through Wolf County today on the Mountain Parkway I thought of how many strange and wonderful ways we as humans have found to decorate and personalize our cars and trucks. I started thinking along these lines as I was waiting behind an old black Ford Explorer at a particularly long red light. In his back window this country gentleman had prominently displayed the number"3" with a halo above, and wings sprouting from the number. Now being the quick study that I have become, I determined the reference to be for the Dearly Departed Intimidator himself, Dale Earnhardt. It intrigues me that a whole class of people, all below the Mason-Dixon Line, have deified maybe one of the most dirty and dangerous racers in Nascar history. Dale didn't just win the name"Intimidator " on the schoolgrounds of North Carolina; he earned it every time he banged around a fast racetrack. I wonder if you asked Darrell Waldrip or Rusty Wallace about Saint Dale and what the response would be. I doubt if even Dale Junior has a sacred "3" on the back of any of his exotic fleet of automobiles.I only know that there seems to be a lot of believers in the Church of Dale in rural Kentucky. You can usually spot the blue ,oil burning smoke coming out the back of the car before you see the Sacred Three. Running a close second in popularity is the number "20" of Mr. Home Depot Tony Stewart , probably as talented a driver as any on the circuit whose skills are only surpassed by his whining and antagonistic driving. Usually Tony's fans will be young, chubby(did I say that?) females who usually drive S-10 pickups and wear size 14 jeans on size 18 bodies. They usually have feathers and roach clips hanging from their rearview mirrors. Even more annoying are those endless stupid magnetic ribbons on the trunks and sides of red- neck cars. There seems to be a huge industry in China making those things for the cause du jour. There are red ones , yellow ones, camo ones, and pink ones. I've seen cars with 5 or 6 carefully lined and placed in a row. I want to stop them and say, "Good God man, you need help!"They're always buying these stickers at the country gas stations as they are buying cigarettes and lottery tickets, speaking of which!! Did you know that most of Eastern Kentucky East of I-75 lives entirely on beer, cigarettes, and lottery tickets? I don't know the exact calorie or fat content of the average peel-off ticket but it can't be much. The average male east of Richmond consumes 3 packs of generic cigarettes a day and drinks a couple of six packs a night during the week nights; more on holidays and during the weekend. He lists lottery player as occupation on his income tax papers. If he has any change left over he will buy a Dale 3 number or a magnetic ribbon for his car , just to blend in with the others , you know?I neglected to say that you can identify this character by the fact that he weighs 85 pounds and has the body fat of a black snake. Like I said cigarettes, beer , and lottery tickets don't have much fat content. This guy looks like one of the earth dwellers that kidnapped Rip Van Winkle in the Washington Irving tale.Or more to today's standards he looks like a Keebler Elf that outgrew the tree. I work with some of these.I don't have the energy to even start on the city dwellers as they drive back and forth to work everyday, reading their papers, shaving, putting on make-up, talking on the cell, or just looking for a place to wreck.Show me a John Kerry bumper sticker and I try to keep my distance. Volvos and Beemers have "my child is an honor student at......", or I love my Golden Retriever.Or a soccer ball with a number on the back of the Grand Caravan, metallic gold if you please. You know I think I'm heading back East. Maybe the Intimidator isn't so bad after all. I'm still afraid of middle aged women with cat-eye glasses and bee hive hairdos regardless of where they might be. As for me, I'm content to just drive and observe, but I can't make myself like those Ford boys with the little boy on the back window peeing on the Chevy emblem. Maybe I need to buy some of those balls and a cowbell to hang from under my truck. Can't hurt.

Flying under the radar

Being continually on the road travelling from job to job often allows me to see sights that are sometimes different, but always entertaining. This past week was no exception as I left Stanford on a rainy spring day headed to Hazard. Now I always take 150 East through Crab Orchard on my way eventually to I-75. Crab Orchard has always been of an historic nature as it is smack dab on the Wilderness Road that the Longhunters and Daniel Boone blazed as they came across the mountains and through Cumberland Gap to Kain-tu -Wa. Over the years covered wagons would wait out the winter and stay in Crab Orchard until the wild crab trees bloomed as the signal that spring was here and the time to travel westward had arrived. The very name Crab Orchard came from these fragrant flowering trees. The famous Calloway family eventually settled near Crab Orchard from Boonesboro after the infamous capture of two Calloway sisters and Jemimiah Boone by the Shawnee Indians near the Kentucky River. All ended well as Danial Boone and the settlers hotly pursued the girls and reclaimed them from the savages. Later on Crab Orchard was a strategic settlement on a military road used by both the North and South during the four years of the Civil War. As a matter of fact John Hunt Morgan and his calvary often camped out at Crab Orchard and nearby Stanford on their frequent raids into Yankee territory. Crab Orchard then became nationally famous as the location of Springs with reputed healing powers to those who bathed in the water. A large hotel and other related business sprang up around the springs, and often elite social groups would meet ther to socialize and enjoy the therapy. All too soon however hard times fell on the pastoral little village and it just became a speed zone before the Wilderness Road headed on to Stanford and Danville. This laborious monologue only serves to give background on this quaint little hamlet as it finds itself adrift on the sea of past historical significance,and about to be washed ashore on the slippery slopes of relative obscurity. As I was passing through I recalled that the present mayor and council were working on some sort of Veterans Park, and I turned down the little lane by city hall to suddenly turn left and come face to face with Crab Orchard's vision of reclaiming the past! In front of my eyes was this honest to goodness, ass kicking Cobra helicopter gunship! Some brilliant bureaucrat had impaled a stout steel pipe into the fuselage and had suspended the whole thing above a monsterous concrete cube, much like a surreal steel and titanium popcicle!Here we are in the middle of serene little Crab Orchard and the Veterans are paying homage to a killing machine that rained death upon Mr. and Mrs. Victor Charles in the rice paddies of nearly 40 years and half across the world ago. Never mind that nearby Stanford has a gaudy red caboose that drinks gallons of bright fire engine paint every couple of years, or that other towns have artillery pieces. Crab Orchard has trumped the historic game with something so alien and bizarre to its past that it is almost comical. The Cobra, officially called the AH-1G was developed as a fast, efficient way to protect American troops in Vietnam, and really did an impressive job as it could literally turn large bodies of enemy troops into body parts. Armed with a deadly gatling gun in the nose, as well as 20mm cannon and 40mm grenade launchers, the Cobra became quite the legend among the Viet Cong and NVAs. Often painted with fearsome white fangs much like the Flying Tigers, the Cobra could readily provide support to beseiged GIs as they slugged it out in the jungles below.The Crab Orchard Cobra is a remarkable picture of streamlined sleekness as it is only wide enough for the pilot to sit up front like a jet pilot with his gunner behind and slightly above him. I think of how old Daniel Boone could have used the Cobra in his pursuit of those red skinned savage Shawnees over 200 years ago, or how John Hunt Morgan would have struck fear in the hearts of the Yankee aggressors. I can just see General Burnside's troops cowering in fear as the Cobra came screaming over Camp Nelson, its mini guns ablaze and rockets raining on the boys in blue. Realistically I guess its commendable that Crab Orchard has the thing, but it already needs painting , and I can't wait to see the color scheme that the Garden Club and the DARs will come up with! As a matter of fact those in power are already covering the concrete base with what look like brown geodes. The Cobra will perpetually hover over a pile of brown rocks, quite the stirring picture.There will be somewhat of a cultural clash as the numerous Amish use the park to hitch their horses and buggies. What a picture of contrasts!! Do you suppose the Amish, peaceniks that they are, realize the devastation and death this helicopter has rained upon the earth?? Talk about beating the swords into plowshares! I figure some of the Amish brethren are already figuring on how to turn the rotor into some kind of wind mill. I can only hope that the town drunks don't figure out how to arm the mini guns because they're aimed right at city hall and the police station . The one policeman wouldn't have a chance. I guess in conclusion that everything has dreams , even little towns, and that the Cobra gives Crab Orchard some feeling of wholeness. I just hope that Stanford's Mayor doesn't hear about the helicopter. Who knows what we could end up with here in Stanford?? Maybe a decommisioned nuclear sub on the banks of St. Asaphs Creek. Why don't we just steal the rotor from the Cobra and put it on our red, red caboose??Think about Radar Love. "I've been flyin all night with my hands on the wheel........

Blood Work

Being the typical American male, there are very few things that I dread and fear worse than routine physicals from Doctors.I have to go every six months to have my prescriptions renewed and I start dreading the ordeal on my way home from the most recent exam for the next six months. Now my medical problems at this stage of my life seems to be wrapped up in hypertension and cholesterol control;that is not to say that I don't have some mental issues, but I'm working through those myself. Freudian Psychology seems to be a walk through the park compared with the tight path of living with a woman, but I'm learning that after 32 years and I feel that my success is much like alcoholism,i.e. one step at a time.Anyway I digress,as I was discussing trips to the MD. My last visit in July of last year was wrapping up, and Johnny Clark( my personal physician) was writing out my prescription renewals and he casually mentioned that he was writing out an order for my blood work since it had been a while since I had had my blood checked. No kidding, Johnny. I feel my blood needs to stay in a sealed system without interruptions from nosy medical peoploe.However I didn't say anything to the Doc because he had already written the prescriptions and I was leaving that antiseptic, alcohol smelling place with a song in my heart!No blood work for me this time!!Well as I knew it would happen , the 6 months rolled around and I kept counting down my pills and the sense of growing dread each night as the Lipitor and Diovan steadily shrank inside my bottle. I was counting the pills with less than a week left when I dropped a Lipitor down the drain! Holy Hell !!I had just taken a day off my rapidly approaching appointment.It suddenly struck me that I was going to have to get the bloodwork done before I met with the physician. Well I hope the blood babes have a sense of humor , and afterall, 6 months isn't a long time to be behind; at least in the perspective of the historical eras. I got the blood test and saw Johnny and everything was ok. I always thing that my blood sugar will be high or that the PSA (prostate something I think)will be off the scale, or that my cholesterol will be up again. Everything was normal and I immediately thought that they had mixed mine up with someone else, but I didn't push the issue. One reason I hate the ritual is that you have to go to a crowded waiting area filled with old farts who love frequent visits for exams and bloodwork, and talk to each other about medical procedures while they waiting . Every old person in the room knew as much medicine as the Doctor and was keen to tell everyone in the room about the past medical tests. One old biddy had had every scope run up, down, in, and out of her wrinkled,mummified body , and proudly proclaimed each procedure. Another was sitting there clearly 200 pounds overweight, wedged into a chair that was threatening to collapse at any minute. The old biddy knew her and asked what was wrong with her and the behemoth said she had an ear infection. I wanted to scream"Hell lady you need some bloodwork!" But I didn't, as I only wanted white noise and peace!! Maybe some Bose headphones with Steely Dan masking out the old crone. A little Deacon Blue would cause the systolic pressure to decrease. Another thought was how nice one of those buzzers like you are given in restaurants to tell you when your table is ready would be in this waiting room hell. Every so often some shrew would open the door and nasally shout someone's name above this cacophony, and I wished I was somewhere else. A barroom brawl would have been less wearing on my nerves;at least there's usually not an octagenarian coughing and wheezing their rheummy lungs all over your space! There was one brief silver lining in this medical hell as some Pharmaceutical Rep babe came waltzing through on her way to give samples and pens with drug names to the Doctors. She was young, attractive , and wearing long ,pointed stripper shoes. Johnny Clark got to see her and I had to listen about Granny's colonoscophy.Life is sometimes not fair. So here I am dreading the next visit six months from now, a little happy the last one was ok, but a little afraid of the next one. They call Alabama the Crimson Tide, Call me Deacon Blue.

Hairspray

Having tried to attend Hairspray in NYC with no success , we settled on tickets to the play at the Kentucky Center for Performing Arts in Louisville this past Saturday Night. The play is energetic, funny, and entertaining: pretty much what it was supposed to be.It takes place in the 60's in Baltimore and is about young people wanting to be stars on the local Saturday afternoon dance show. As predicted the show has a happy ending and we had another cultural adventure under our belts. Our party spent the night at a to -be- unnamed hotel on the banks of the Ohio which like always did not disappoint us with the shabby,ugly rooms looking out onto a tarred roof and the sneak of a peek of the Ohio River Bridges. The hotel workers did their usual impecible jobs of being totally arrogant and distant from the paying guests(us).It always reminds me of why New York City or Boston can charge you $400 a night and make you keep coming back, whereas Louisville charges you $109 a day and makes you feel unwanted. I have felt more warmth from Troopers giving me tickets than the pimply faced clerks at this overrated hotel. The last time the wing that we stayed in was redecorated was about the time Lyndon Johnson was President. Oh sure they're talking about their major renovation , but even the new lobby in the East Wing is pretty amateurishly done and cheaply decorated. I know because this is partly what I do for a living. The check- in counter is cheap birch veneer with a hideous stain and applied mouldings, something I would have designed about 1978 when I first started. We wanted dessert after the play but were told the restaurant closes at 11PM. This was on a Saturday Night! We were eating dessert at 2AM at O'Neils in NYC back in December. Talk about a world apart!I guess I'm asking or expecting too much for this self-absorbed hotel that only sees glory during the week of Derby, but come on , this is 2006 and you could at least have a fake smile for your paying guests! The parking garage was empty when we checked in, aqnd empty when we checked out, and you charged us $9 for the privilege of leaving the car overnight. At least I didn't have to search for the sedan in the glaring emptiness. In conclusion, Louisville has charm, some appeal, and a wonderful cultural atmosphere. It's a shame that this over-priced, overrated hotel has not learned something about hospitality in the past forty years. Maybe next time I'll cross the river and stay at the casino in Indiana. At least I can find something to eat at 11PM.

Modern Conveniences

Well, here we are in the throes of 2006 and the start of another year.Dick Clark has come and gone in Times Square and the adventure begins. The new frontier around here with my colleagues seems to be the dread of receiving the monthly heating /natural gas bill. Anticipation runs high as dread and despair come together in the little crisp envelope with "ATMOS" written in the upper left hand corner. Now Sandy has given me the choice of dropping down the thermostat or moving in with her mother, and I very astutely tried to decrease our consumption. Imagine our surprise when we shakily opened the bill and $500.13 proudly jumped into our faces.!!! I remember the good old days when $45 was an average heating bill.I came up this morning of a plan to subsidize the gas bill with a novel approach. It's so simple that others will follow suite. I will charge an energy tax to everyone who enters our doors.For instance: should we have dinner guests each person will chip in $11 per hour for the time spent enjoying the witty conversation and Sandy's superb home-cooked meal. Should someone just be bored and want companionship, the cost is merely $6.oo an hour. It must be understood that the companionship is free: the warm chair is what will cost you.Drinks are extra. The fact may also come at a surprise that we're not exactly lackidasical in our approach to warmth. No sir! Our energy efficient thermostats in three different zones would allow us to rent our living space as meat freezers during most of a 24 hour period. Our house generally shares the temperature of Mammoth Cave which is somewhere around 52 degrees.Somewhere is a Nerd behind a keyboard who can Calculate how much extra my bill will be if we just raise the temperature one degree. It seems that all of our utilities are owned by thne people who enrich our lives with the Mercedes, Porsche, Audi, and World Wars every fifty years or so.On proper reflection it seems that maybe this will be the first Reich in modern times that is winning a major war, at least they are in my little world. It seems that we have to defeat countries for them to come back and royally whip our asses. Remember Pearl Harbor?Think Lexus and Avalon. Georgetown,Kentucky down the road makes Camry and we ship the money to Tokyo.Battle of the Bulge? Think Mercedes: 60 years ago the Marshall Plan was rebuilding Europe and Berlin; now they're selling us luxury cars. As a country we really know how to punish the aggressive losers! Davy Crockett and the Alamo ? GM has made cars in Mexico for years and what appliances not made in Taiwan are made in Mexico. We really showed those Pancho Villas, Didn't we?Petroleum and Osama Bin Laden and Saudi Arabia. Now don't the Arabians really love us?And Iraq? Where in the hell this is going is anyone's guess. This ranting started with an exorbitant natural gas bill and has gone around the world.I really want a simple life, and wish for some in-between common ground. In hindsight maybe the real villains are the health care industry and insurance companies. In the not too distant future We will be making choices for Insurance , heating and cooling, or gasoline.I didn't mention food shelter or clothing. There's no easy answer.

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.