A story about.. something

A long time ago, when I was young and foolish (as opposed to being old and foolish now) I went on an impromptu camping expedition one night with my friend Bryan Carnett. My dad had passed away the year before and I’d inherited his 1968 Dodge Pick-em-up truck, which I drove all over the country (the country being the county I lived in and occasionally down to Sacramento).

Bryan, because he spelled his name with a “Y”, was every bit as impetuous and free spirited as I, so we’d often go on these overnight excursions and not wonder in the least what our parents thought about it. In my case it was just my poor, beleaguered mom who’d lost her beloved husband scantly a year before and was dealing with a wild, out of control teen son who wasn’t dealing with losing his dad very well at all.

Bryan had a full set of parents, both of whom were terrific people but a bit lax in the department of discipline.

We’d thrown a couple of sleeping bags into the back of the truck which was the extent of our “camping gear” and made our way up to Stumpy Meadows above Lake Edsen, a very isolated and lonely place, wherein we found an old logging road and made our way back into the woods, surrounded by towering pine trees for miles around.

We pulled over into a little clearing out in the middle of nothingness and climbed into our sleeping bags in the truck bed. There we laid on our backs, staring up at the stars and contemplating all kinds of deep, philosophical things such as which one of us was going to get up the nerve to make a move on Traci Bordges (“Gorgeous Bordges”) and what kind of beer goes best with Kentucky Fried Chicken.

We managed to fall asleep somewhere in the middle of all that excitement and much later, I was awakened by the feeling that someone was staring at me – it was some kind of person nearly five feet tall who had 5-8 friends, all standing around the truck.

It was a moonlit night but the pine trees filtered out most of it, so it took me a few moments to realize that the majority of light illuminating our visitors was coming from some source on ground level behind a grove of trees to our right, which definitely hadn’t been there when we’d parked in the clearing hours earlier.

I nudged Bryan, who awoke and glanced around before reacting in the only way that a sensible, intelligent young man would..

He screamed.

This broke my seconds long pattern of stunned silence by causing me to scream too, and as we both screamed they scattered, heading off toward the soft pulsating glow of light coming through the trees, making a sound like startled deer tramping through the brush.

In the midst of our panic laden, piercing yells we managed to get out of the back of the truck and into the cab, where I faltered for my keys and somehow got them into the ignition despite how badly I was shaking. As the engine roared to life, I slammed it into DRIVE, and we drove out of there at a high rate of speed, narrowly missing trees and not looking back to see if the glow of light rose up and flew away or anything like that – we didn’t care what it did, we just wanted to leave very, very badly.

Neither of us had been this scared before and it hadn’t occurred to us that they might have been frightened too – I think we were convinced that they had run back to their whatever-it-was to obtain weapons and rope.

I must have been doing about 50 mph, which is pretty fast for a logging road, and it wasn’t until about 15 minutes later, when we’d gotten out onto the two-lane highway, that I slowed down and both of us had calmed down enough to speak of it.

Bryan summed it up for both of us quite nicely with a simple question, “What in the hell was THAT?” I told him I didn’t know, which probably would have gone without saying but we had to say something. We talked about it for maybe a half an hour as we made our way back to town, speculating as to whom they might be and where they’d come from.

We ruled out someone playing a joke on us, because that far out in the woods it’s a good way to get shot, which would have happened, had we been armed.

As we got back into town, we vowed not to tell anyone about it and I held onto that for years. I found later that Bryan had told his girlfriend, which elicited the reaction we’d suspected – she thought we were nuts, or better yet, stoned.

We were neither.

I finally told someone about ten years after the fact and they seemed to believe it, so that loosened up my inhibitions enough to tell a few more people whenever the subject came up. One person several years ago was so receptive of my account that he urged me to check myself for implants. Others have just simply stated, “Well that explains a lot” (knowing me).

These days I don’t care if anyone believes it or not, or what they think of me, so that makes it blog-worthy.

I’ve long since lost touch with Bryan so I have no idea if he even remembers it, let alone has told anyone else.

It happened though, and I know several things beyond a doubt – we weren’t drunk, stoned or hallucinating in any way and whoever was standing around the truck looking at us that night.. they were strange. Not a one was over five feet tall, so they were peering over the edge of the truck bed and their heads were abnormally large with eyes to match.

I remember long, spindly fingers grasping the edge of the truck and movements that seemed graceful beyond anything I’d seen before. The light from the trees was so soft and minimal it was impossible to make out details, leaving most of what we saw to be in shadows and silhouette.

The movie ET came out a few years later and, as my friends sat in the theater with amused looks on their faces, enjoying the film for the supposed science fiction that it is, I couldn’t help but feel a little creepy – some of the effects were all too familiar, especially.. THE HANDS.

I don’t know if there’s anything out there in those stars we see in this desert sky at night, but I suspect there might be. I don’t know who or what we encountered during that summer night in the seventies out in those woods, but I don’t think they were hikers from Sacramento who were up for a weekend jaunt.

I find a certain arrogance in people who state as a matter of fact that the human race is alone in this universe. How do they know that? I certainly don’t, which I guess makes me a cosmic agnostic.

A friend recently asked me if I made this up. I think she was really, REALLY hoping I did.

Sorry.. nope.

UPDATE - Bryan has since tracked me down, having found this post online via a name-search his son did on him. He remembers the event and CONFIRMS THE STORY.

So there.. I’m not crazy after all!

I once made a living as a mime.

This was a long time ago – 20 years and 20 pounds, I tell people – but I haven’t had a job since that’s been as challenging, memorable and fun.

SeaWorld of San Diego has this ongoing Seal & Otter show that’s been around in one form or another since the sixties. The show changes story and format every few years, but I’m not going to talk about the show today.

Maybe some other post, because today I’m going to tell you about Michael and Saj. Those are two guys who met each other one day long ago, but I’m the only one who finds it ironic.

Until now, because you will too when I’m done.

Michael was a former Ringling Bros circus clown who’d been hired as a Mime but then promoted to show producer. He was a funny guy, and by that I mean HYSTERICAL. He still took the stage once in a while to fill-in when someone wanted a day off and when he did, he’d hand the audience their balls on a platter.

One day I only had a few people show up. The stadium held 1200, so when you only have 12 people sitting there watching you perform that’s one percent, and that’s enough to be a downer. I went out and did some of my funnier bits for them but it basically sucked and they applauded politely as if to say, “HAHA, very nice. Now get the hell out of the way and bring on the dancing otters.”

I left the show feeling kind of drained and ran right into Michael behind the scenes. He was carrying his clipboard while wearing a tie and showing appropriate concern that I seemed blue, and not the bouncy, happy mime I was supposed to be. He asked how the show went and when I told him about the 12 people he told me about an audience he had only a week earlier when filling in for someone else.

He said it was cold and drizzling rain, and he knew it’d be slow, so he hoped nobody would show up and he’d not have to do a show. But there they were, two teenage boys and a girl who climbed to the very last row at the top of the 1200 seat stadium, sitting in the drizzle and waiting to be entertained.

So he entertained them.

He pretended to be a mountain climber when he first came out, swinging an invisible pick and pulling on an imaginary rope to make his way up to them. That ate up the first five minutes of his routine so once he got up there he stood on the empty bench in front of them and offered up a silent yet panic-stricken prayer to his muse for ten minutes of inspiration.

It came.

He said he didn’t know how it came or from where, but dammit.. he was funny. Those kids laughed and clapped and had a great time, as Michael stood on that bench and did silly shit that he couldn’t recall when telling me about all of this a few days later.

His point was that if I’d just trust in my inspiration and let it flow through me, I’d be able to do it for one, one hundred, one thousand or a million people.. just let it be. Obviously, I’ve always remembered the story because it had an impact on me.

That was in 1988.

Fast forward to 1998 – coffeesister and I lived in Ashland Oregon. I was doing sound design for a local theater group and a young guy named Saj was doing lighting. After we’d finished our show set-up one evening, Saj came over to our place and we sat around drinking beer and swapping stories.

Turns out he was from California. Turns out he visited SeaWorld once with some friends.

Turns out it was while on spring break in 1988.

I’d told Saj I used to perform at the Seal & Otter Show as a mime, so he was telling me about the mime he saw.

He said it was a drizzling Monday and the place was virtually empty. After he and his two friends made their way to the top of the stadium the mime came out and did some kind of mountain climber bit to get up to them, followed by ten minutes of delightful comedy on the bench directly in front.

Saj, his buddy and his buddy’s girlfriend all thought it was hysterical.

After he told me this I asked, “Did you guys see the mime in another part of the park later and go up to thank him for doing a whole routine just for you?”

Yes, they did.

Michael had told me about that part too.. how the three kids came up to him later and said they really appreciated him doing the entire bit just for them.

I told Saj about Michael and his inspirational story ten years earlier. Here we were, a decade later and 500 miles further North, sitting in stunned silence for a few minutes until coffeesister finally laughed and suggested that perhaps now would be a good time to go buy a lottery ticket.

I did, but I didn’t win.

Steven Wright once said, “It’s a small world, but I’d hate to have to paint it.”

Me too.

I have decided to take immediate action and do something about my visitor count.

This is because I’m still only getting like 20 hits a day, most of  which are from my wife, coffeesister, and my cat, shadow. They love me so they artificially inflate my visitor count when I’m in the bathroom after they’ve hidden the razor blades.

Therefore I’ve decided to model this blog after the ones out there that get the big hits, starting today.  I’m quite  serious about it and so as to not miss anything, I’ve decided not to just zero in on one tactic, but rather to use them all.

Here we go..

HOW TO INCREASE YOUR TRAFFIC THROUGH AD REVENUE WIDGETS

We all want more traffic, don’t we?  I mean the kind that visits your blog, not the kind you get stuck in on the way home.  AD REVENUE WIDGETS can help you get more traffic.  GOOGLE the term “AD REVENUE WIDGETS” and read what comes up – you’ll find all kinds of helpful advice on how to INCREASE YOUR TRAFFIC!

How, you ask?

Simple!  By using AD REVENUE WIDGETS!

Google the term and read what comes up and then USE THEM.  This will INCREASE YOUR TRAFFIC! Put them in your sidebar, and monetize your blog TODAY! That’s what AD REVENUE WIDGETS do!  They will monetize your sidebar by categorizing the fluctuation rhythm of the feedback loop, driving unprecedented amounts of traffic to your blog while at the same time MONETIZING IT!

It’s simple.. and safe.  So what are you waiting for?

Do it TODAY!

A SIMPLE TIP TO INCREASE PRODUCTIVITY IN COMPOSITIONAL
ANALYSIS OF THE FORMS ON THE LEFT SIDE BY THE MENU

The form is simple in itself.  THAT’S the key to remembering how to increase productivity.  Because, if you’re stuck in traffic under a bridge and your cell phone rings, and it’s the wife wondering where you are, well.. I don’t blame her.

Where ARE you?

DRIVING IN TRAFFIC TO NOWHERE.. if you’re not simplifying the compositional analysis!

So get out there and get it done.  It’s simple!

DON’T BE SLOW TO SEO

Have you gotten your SEO done yet?

SEO stands for Search Engine Orgasms, which every blog needs and every blog should have.

Keywords like “SEXY,” “COEDS” and “FRENCH” should be worked into posts about cooking oil and summers spent at that house down by the lake, where the loons are a’cryin.  If you haven’t gotten it done by now you just may never get to it and, as a result, you’ll never see your blog blossom into the mega-blog it’s meant to be!

So get to it.  NOW!

HOW TO COOK ON CAMP STOVES IN THE RAIN

Let’s say you’re camping, and it’s raining.

You’d be ill-advised to cook on any kind of apparatus OUTSIDE!

But let’s just say, for the sake of argument, that bears have snuck into your camping unit – be it a tent, RV or whatever – and they’ve locked you out so that they can consume all of the bacon inside.

Well, it looks as though you are NOT going to have bacon for dinner, my friend!

But that’s okay – you can still have trout, or baked beans – as long as you brought it outside before the bears came – and so it looks as though you’ll be cooking in the rain.

It’s simple!

1. Get a tarp.
2. Cover the fire pit.
3. Wait until it dries off.
4. Start a fire.
5. Cook your trout and/or baked beans.
6. If the bears finish the bacon and come back out..
7. ..run like hell.

photo by Kevin McShane on Flickr

HOW TO PLANT A BEAUTIFUL ROOFTOP GARDEN WHEN YOU
LIVE ON THE FIRST FLOOR OF AN APARTMENT BUILDING

Everyone loves gardens.

BEAUTIFUL gardens, on rooftops!

But we all have mean building superintendents and/or managers who won’t let us go up there and PLANT beautiful rooftop gardens.

Oh, what to DO?

First, it’s helpful if your building superintendent and/or manager is male – doesn’t matter if he’s married or not – just go out and get him the the best damn looking hooker you can find – spare no expense. Pay for about a day’s worth of action, because that’s how long it’s going to take you to get this done.

Send the hooker up to the building superintendent and/or manager’s office and once you hear the appropriate sounds, get to work.  Presumably, you did a little preliminary planning by visiting a nursery before scouting Craigslist for the right girl?

GOOD!

Now get up there and PLANT THAT GARDEN!

Petunias are best in high altitudes – say, over ten stories – and you’ll want to use a high grade topsoil for the roses and radishes (might as well make this as functional as it is beautiful.)

Most importantly, when you hear screaming noises coming from below, your building superintendent and/or manager is just finishing up.

CALL THE COPS!

Give them the apartment number where the action is taking place.  This will assure that your building superintendent and/or manager will go away for a spell, so your newly planted rooftop garden won’t be discovered and ripped out.

CONGRATULATIONS! Enjoy the beauty and the breath taking view of the roofs across the street from your very own Garden of Eden!

BRAD AND ANGELINA CALL IT QUITS!

Brangelina call it quits!

Film star BRAD PITT and his lovely film star wife ANGELINA JOLIE called it quits today on the set of their latest action film, “ASSASSIN IN THE RAIN.”

Confidential sources close to the elusive couple cited the reason for “calling it quits” was that every scene scheduled to be shot that day had been completed and the director of the film, Ron Sheldon, was overheard telling the couple, “See you both back here at six AM sharp.”

“BRANGELINA“, as they have been affectionately dubbed by the press, then “called it quits” and went home for the evening or perhaps out to rendezvous with another Hollywood mega-star couple, “TOMKAT“.

Ooooh, hey LOOK!  BEAUTIFUL, SEXY ACTRESSES AND MODELS!

Jessica Alba nearly NUDE at the beach!

Beautiful model with almost NOTHING ON!

Oooooh, and GEORGE CLOONEY!

George Clooney excited and erect!

Okay, that should do it..
Now I’ll just kick back and watch the bucks roll in.

While waiting for a bus this morning, I visited with a lady and her little CockAPoo.

I didn’t know this, but “CockAPoo” is an old Indian word for “happy little ball of fluff,” which exactly summed up the entire being of this tiny little dog.

Whenever someone would walk by, the little CockAPoo would get way more excited than should be legal, and would bounce up and down yelling, “Hey! Hey! Hey!  Look at ME!  Hey! Hey! Hey! Look at ME!”

The people would not only look, but they’d stop and pet and coo and tell the lady what a cute little dog she had, which she already knew, but she seemed to like hearing it again and again.  Then the CockAPoo would lick their faces off.

This reminded me of a story, which I told the lady, and I’ll tell you now.

Years ago I remember being in a similar situation, only it was a different town, and I wasn’t waiting for a bus, I was waiting for coffeesister to be done with her shopping, and the dog wasn’t a CockAPoo, it was a German Shepherd and the lady was a man.. but other than those details the situation was exactly the same.

The man’s German Shepherd was young – not much more than a pup – and the man had it sit on the sidewalk as he walked away from it.  It wasn’t tied to a fence or anything – it wasn’t wearing a leash at all – and it just sat there and eyed the man intently as he strolled away.

The man got about 30 feet down, then he stopped and just stood there.  The dog didn’t make a sound, but just kept its eyes on him the whole time.  People walked by and they’d say something to it or snap their fingers at it, yet the dog didn’t take its eyes off the man for a second.  Suddenly, he made a gesture and said something, at which time the dog bounded happily to him and received a treat.

The man explained that this was a police dog in training, and what he was doing was working on the dog’s ability to focus entirely on the handler when in a crowd and not be distracted.  He said that this particular one was one of his advanced students who’d be graduating soon, and then joining a police department shortly thereafter.

The lady thanked me for the story and said it was “interesting,” just as a few more people walked by and the CockAPoo went nuts.

Then the bus came and I got on, so I didn’t get to talk to her after that.  But I did reflect on the CockAPoo versus the German Shepherd, and it occurred to me that were I to draw some kind of analogy from this, I guess I’d have to compare my attitude in life more to the CockAPoo than the German Shepherd, and to carry it a little further, I’d say that I probably have to admit that I’ve been trying to hang out with German Shepherds for a long time now, when I really belong with the CockAPoos.

The conclusion I’d have to come to, then, is that I don’t focus very well – which is why I never wanted to be a cop or a banker or a real estate agent or an astronaut or anything like that.

Being more of a CockAPoo, I’m more interested in what’s going on around me – all the time – and I want to greet it, yap at it, lick it, and maybe even pee on it if I can get it to hold still long enough.

I don’t want to invest in it and wait for the long-term dividends, like the police-dog-in-training does while standing there waiting and focusing, with the hope of getting that treat when all’s said and done.

I want to play with it.  NOW.

I’m definitely a CockAPoo, because they seem so much happier and they live life to the fullest no matter who’s walking by.  They love everyone, and if the German Shepherds of the world have a hard time dealing with that, they can just go bury a bone and leave me be.

Note – In honor of PRIDE WEEKEND here in San Francisco, I am resurrecting this blast from the past that is possibly the best explanation of gay people that I’ve ever come up with. I can say that because it’s the only explanation of gay people that I’ve ever come up with.

Today I am going to talk about gay people and gay issues.

This is because absolutely no one else is talking about them, and you never hear anything about their wants, needs, desires and politics, so I might as well bring it up.

HA HA HA!

That’s sarcasm.

Actually, we hear about it all the time, and you can’t swing a dead cat here in San Francisco without ruffling a gay person’s ascot.  But I just want to put in my two cents.  By the way, this editorial may be slightly overpriced.

I’ll start by saying that I have some gay friends who are pretty cool people.  I’ve also met some gay people in the past who are not my friends because they’re not so cool.  It’s kind of like having a cat that plays a lot and another cat who sleeps more than cats normally do.

For some reason I’m using cats a lot in my illustrations.

I’ll try and stop.

Drag Cat by rockmixer on Flickr

The thing is, as people, we’re all different.  There are good and bad white people, good and bad black people, good and bad Asian people and good and bad American Indians, who prefer to be called “Native Americans,” but I like “Indians” because it brings me back to my childhood when I used to play “Cowboys and Indians” until supper, when Mom would call us in just before putting the cat out.

Damn.

Okay, so getting back to gay people..

There are those who think gay people are like cowboys, in that they become gay over time, just like cowboys decide at some point to start punching cows (whatever that means) and rounding ‘em up.  There are others, present company included, who think that certain people are born gay, just like the Indians.

Not that the Indians are born gay — I’m saying that Indians are born Indians — stay with me, darn it.

So NOT gay

Indians who try to be cowboys are not usually very successful at it, as you’ll see if you watch a lot of John Wayne movies.  Heck, in those movies they don’t even try.  But they can be a cowboy if they want, because a cowboy isn’t something you’re born to be, unless you’re John Wayne.

But you just don’t see a lot of Indian Cowboys.

So it’d be more like if Indians tried to be cats (damn) because you are either born an Indian or born a cat, but you can’t really be both.  However, you can be an Indian’s cat if you want.

I’ve known gay people who’ve tried to be cats.. er, I mean straight people.. but it never seems to work because all they can think about is wanting to be gay and their hearts aren’t really into being straight.

I’ve even known of a gay cowboy or two..

Technically, they were Sheepherders

But if a person who is attracted to members of the same sex tries to go out and be attracted to members of the opposite sex, they usually just end up being really good friends and go shopping together a lot.

Now, here’s the thing..

I know this Christian guy, Mike, who says that the whole gay thing is an “abomination before God,” and all of that.  I’ve known him for a lot of years and, even though he’s married now, I knew him back when he used to say that abomination thing as he was on his way to a motel to shack up for three days with some chick who he’d bone like crazy.

Actually, Mike boned a lot of chicks in his hey day.  He was quite the ladies man, in that all he had to do was walk up to them and say “HEY,” and they’d drop their pants.

Now, before you go saying that Mike is a hypocrite, let me just check my stats to make sure he’s not a reader of this blog..

Okay, he’s not.  Go ahead and say it.

The thing about Mike is that he was born liking chicks.  Well, to be technical he probably started finding titties to be tantalizing when he was around 11 or 12, but you know what I mean.  I’m bringing him up because I remember him talking about a wedding between two gay people he worked with and how he would not be going to that wedding, because of the abomination thing.

So I asked him if he had fun that past weekend when he shacked up in the motel and boned that chick for three days.

He said yes, he did.. then he thanked me very much for asking, and offered to introduce me to her sister.

Other issues aside, Mike was always polite and courteous.

gay madrid by alex castella on flickr

But you see, guys like Mike think that all gay people are cowboys and that they choose to round up members of the same sex before punching ‘em, when in reality they’re all a bunch of Indians who are just really attracted to other Indians.  They find their fellow Indians to be quite lovely, and all they want to do is be left alone to pow-wow in peace.

Now, I realize that there are Indians who say “God made me the way I am” and there are Cowboys who say “God doesn’t make mistakes,” but make no mistake.. if an Indian wants another Indian then you best just git along and leave ‘em be, or else you’ll probably get scalped, with “scalped” being a metaphor for “gay lobbyists pushing legislators to pass laws allowing them to get married and enjoy the same civil rights under the law as straight people.”

This being the case, you’re going to just be better off sitting back and enjoying that parade of pretty headdresses.  Those gorgeous, fabulous headdresses!

in costume by moriza on flickr

That’s all I have to say.. I’m done now.

I have to go feed the cat.

DAMN.

The lovely and still-living Gwyneth Paltrow

I used to work as a dispatcher at the Hollywood & Highland complex in Hollywood, which meant I was the guy (one of several, actually) who sat in the camera surveillance room all day and watched people on video monitors.

When someone would do something bad, like shoot someone else or steal a pen, I’d call the police or send a security officer to deal with it, depending on the severity of the crime.

While on a break one day, I walked by the boss’s office and he called me in. His name was Jim Chaffee, and he’s still one of the best bosses I’ve ever had. His shock of red hair set over a freckled face is a bit impish, in a Howdy Doody sort of way. I’m pretty sure Jim would shoot me if he knew I called him Howdy Doody on this blog, so I hope he doesn’t read this.

He got that a lot.

Jim Chaffee, NOT Howdy Doody

Howdy Doody, NOT Jim Chaffee

But I had great respect for him, mainly because when he introduced himself to us while the security team was first being assembled, he confessed that he used to be the head of Disney security but had to step down due to a nervous breakdown of some sort.

I don’t mean Disneyland, or Disney World, or Disney Studios.  I mean he was the head of security for the entire Disney corporation.. and Mickey Mouse drove him insane.

So here he was, candidly telling us about it, explaining why he used to be the head of security for a huge corporation like Disney but was now the head of security for what is basically a glorified mall, and I liked him instantly.

He liked me too, I think, because he always gave me cool gigs. We did a lot of overtime, working at private parties and events that were held on the property, and I was often asked to show up in the evening so I could stand around in a suit and look like a secret service agent while celebs walked the red carpet and schmoozed at the parties. You always see those guys in the background when event photos are snapped for People Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, US, etc.. and I was in all of those at one time or another.

After calling me into his office on this particular day, Jim asked if I’d like a special assignment on Wednesday, which was two days away. I said maybe. He said it was driving Gwyneth Paltrow around in a security cart and doing whatever she asked.

I said hell yeah.

He didn’t give me any specifics because he didn’t have any, beyond the fact that some production company was taping a TV show and Gwyneth was a guest and I’d be her on-camera escort.

Jim had asked me to do this on Monday, so Tuesday took about a week to go by. On Wednesday morning I arrived on time at the appointed place and, sure enough, there was Gwyneth Paltrow, getting her picture taken.

I’d arrived in uniform and an observant assistant figured out that I was probably the security guy who’d been assigned to her so he approached me, asking, “Are you the security guy assigned to her?” He pointed at Gwyneth.

“Yes I am,” I said, and then I pointed at Gwyneth.

“Good,” he said, “Go down into the fifth level of the parking garage and get one of your security carts.. when we finish this segment, we’ll all be down there to meet you.”

He actually pointed at the elevator door, like I didn’t know where it was, just like he’d pointed at Gwyneth Paltrow as if I didn’t know who SHE was.. real high opinion of security people, this guy.

Alan Cumming, in need of a comb

I got one of our carts and fired it up, which sounds more impressive than it really is, since it was an electric golf cart. About ten minutes later the elevator doors whooshed open and the whole crew came in, including Gwyneth and a particular British actor who I didn’t know would be a part of this whole thing, Alan Cumming.

The Director of the TV show came over to me and asked, “Are you the guy who’ll be taking Gwyneth and Alan around the parking garage?”

Well, I didn’t know until that moment that it’d be Gwyneth and Alan, and I didn’t know we’d be staying in the parking garage, but yeah.. I was the guy.

The Director took all of three seconds to give me my directions.. “Just take them around like they can’t find their car. They’ll tell you where to go. Got it?”

Gwyneth jumped in beside me and extended her hand. “Hi, I’m Gwyneth,” she said. I think it’s cool when well-known celebrities do that when they know perfectly well that you know who they are. It’s courteous, and trust me, not all of them are like that.  Martin Sheen is just about the nicest guy in the biz.. he does it, and then he pays your utility bills for you.

Martin Sheen, looking kind and gentle

Alan jumped on the back of the cart while the Director got onto another cart with a driver and cameraman and away we went, off to look for Gwyneth and Alan’s alleged lost vehicle.

The Director’s cart paced us while the camera stayed on us as we zoomed through the parking garage, up and down levels, left and right, cutting through rows of vehicles while the two of them shouted at me, “This way! Now here! Turn LEFT! Turn RIGHT!”

It was thoroughly zany.

At one point I must have gotten too excited or something, because I took a ramp a little too fast and put the cart up on the two right wheels, which almost pitched Gwyneth out onto her butt. Alan and I grabbed her and pulled her back in, all the while with the camera rolling. This is where I almost killed her. It wasn’t much really, but it makes for a good post headline, does it not?

Shortly thereafter I had to stop for a car backing out of a stall, so Gwyneth looked over at the lady driver and said, “We’ve lost our car.. we’re so retarded!” I could tell that the lady recognized her, but it was unclear as to whether or not she approved of the use of such a non-politically correct phrase being uttered by one of America’s sweethearts.

We eventually found the car and, of course, it was a black Range Rover, which I suspected they knew the location of all along. We said our goodbyes and, as they got into it and drove away, Gwyneth turned and blew me a kiss.

While on a break the next day and passing by Jim’s office, he called me in (he did that a lot) and asked what the Gwyneth Paltrow gig was all about. I told him everything except for the part about almost killing her, because he liked me and I wanted to keep it that way.

He asked if I’d found out what they were taping. I hadn’t, so he gave me the number of the production company, which I called, and a nice man on the phone explained that it was for a talk show that Alan Cumming would be hosting on the Oxygen channel and that Gwyneth was his first guest in the pilot episode.

Sadly, it never aired.

Gwyneth Paltrow, still alive today because of me

photo by by clarkk on Flickr

Tommy the homeless guy got kicked out of Starbucks.

He was never actually in Starbucks to begin with, he was on the huge patio outside, but I guess his salty language got to be too much for some people.  They complained to the management and the management ousted him faster than a trash can tumbling down the street in a gale force wind.

I’d only spoken with him once before — it was while waiting for a bus downtown and, having decided to bide the time on that particular patio on a busy Saturday afternoon, I found nowhere else to sit but at the table next to his.

I thought, “Well this guy is kind of wacky, but maybe it’ll be interesting,” so I sat down in anticipation that he’d strike up a conversation, which he did after I’d waited approximately 2.4 seconds.

“Nice fuckin’ DAY, eh?” said he.

I’ll warn you now, he got booted because of his frequent use of the F word, and when I quote someone, I quote them — I don’t hold back. It’s not my practice to write that way, but if they said it, they said it. I don’t water down anything but my Starbucks house brew because it’s so damn BITTER.

“Yeah, it’s pretty awesome,” I said. “I’m glad it’s finally cooled down.” (This happened in Palm Springs, where it’s 78 degrees on Christmas day).

“You evah eat gaytuh?”

photo by The Suss-man (Mike) on Flickr

It took me a second to recover from the abrupt conversational left turn and to figure out that “gaytuh” was “gator.” He went on to explain that he was from “Floriduh, where the gaytuhs is good eatin.”

I said, “No, I don’t think I’ve ever had gator.. unless I thought it was chicken or something and someone was playing a joke on me.”

That was a joke in itself and I admit it was lame, but I quickly found out that Tommy the homeless guy had left his sense of humor behind a dumpster somewhere, so it didn’t really matter. He didn’t laugh at anything I said during the entire conversation, which was like hanging out with my high school gym coach all over again, except Tommy didn’t smell like Old Spice.

I missed my old gym teacher.

“Oh man, if you eatin gaytuh you KNOW it! That’s some good eatin theyuh. Dey’s hard ta kill too, but if ya git um unawayus (unawares) yu kin sink dat knife in and slit em from da throat all da way down to da nuts and all dat gut spills out and dey is dead fastuh dan you can count tuh ten.”

I thought it funny that you never hear tough guys talk about bunny rabbits that way. “Dems good eatin if’n you can sneak up behind one and kill it dead.” It’s always crocs, gaytuhs or beahs.

I wanted to ask him if gators really had nuts and I was really curious how you sneak up behind one and catch it unawares, but I didn’t get a chance to ask him about that because a pretty girl walked out of the store right then.

He abruptly shut up and watched her intently as she crossed the street, latte in hand, and ducked into the art gallery on the opposite corner. This inspired another vivid description from him, but it had nothing to do with reptiles – it was a loud, brash and awfully uninhibited rant about what he’d like to do to that young lady should he ever catch her in a back alley.

photo by Stuck In Customs on Flickr

I was growing increasingly thankful that Mrs. Rhodester wasn’t with me, not that she’d be shocked or anything, but for her own safety and mine.  If he tried to harm her I’d have to try and stop him — I say try, because Tommy weighs over 300 pounds and stands about 6’4”. He’s a huge, smelly maniac with women and reptile issues.

He bragged about this “bodacious fucking hutch” he’d built over by the medical center about three miles “down yonder,” and how much he missed being able to crawl into it and just get away from civilization because he’d made it virtually invisible, being behind the dumpster the way it was.

His impromptu homestead came to a quick end one day when some staffers from the medical center tried to toss medical waste into the dumpster but missed, so it all landed on him instead. He said he stormed into the lobby and threatened to grab the little woman behind the desk and “string her up by her boobies,” which is the point where security came along and informed him that police were on the way.

He seemed to actually be surprised by this. A huge, smelly homeless guy covered in medical waste bursts into the lobby and threatens to string up the receptionist behind the counter, and he’s surprised when they call the cops on him.

I didn’t say he was bright.

Of course, this is the same guy who was describing his dumpster estate as if it were a mansion in Monte Carlo.

As I approached the Starbucks patio yesterday, he was standing on the public sidewalk just outside of the waist-high railing, gazing sadly at the plastic chair he’d formerly occupied day after day.

“How ‘bout dem gaytuhs, huh? Dem’s good eatin!” I said, as I came up behind him.

He turned and looked at me with the same expression he must have worn on his face when the cops destroyed his beloved dumpster hutch months earlier.

“Dey went and kicked me outta heah man, now wheah I’m gonna go, huh?”

He looked like he was going to cry. I was tempted to invite him to stay with us, but then I pictured what Mrs. Rhodester would look like wrapped up in plastic bags and stuffed in a freezer, and changed my mind.

“Sorry to hear that, Tommy. You can’t just hang out at that Coffee Bean patio across the street?”

“Naw man, dat bitch ovuh dere don’t like me none. Said I called her a bitch to her face one day.”

“Did you?”

“Hell ya,man.. she didn’t let me use da bathroom ta wash up in, dat bitch. But now dat I called her dat she don’t let me in dere at all and I can’t even go neah da place. Woman is stuck up if ya ask me.”

I hadn’t asked him that.

I offered to get him something from the Starbucks, because I’m just friendly like that and I don’t judge anyone and I really don’t want him to sit on me, but he declined and said he was “jist gonna move on, maybe to anuthuh town where da bitches ain’t so stuck up and shit.”

I wished him well. Then I went in and ordered an iced passion tea, which I took back out to the patio and enjoyed along with a nice, peaceful solitude.

A very quiet and peaceful solitude, free of gators.

It was lovely.

Mom in 1948

Hi mom,

How are things up there? It’s been a while since we’ve talked. What was it, late 1993? Yeah, you sure had to go all of a sudden. I know it wasn’t your idea, but still..

Well here it is again, another Mother’s Day, and here I am again, thinking about you. I wonder what our relationship would be like now, in this context, now that I’m older? I think we’d be pretty chill. HAHA, that means “cool,” or getting along well. You were never up on the latest lingo, were you. Not that I am, lol!

That means “Lots of Laughs.”

There’s this “Internet” thing that was just getting started when you left, and it’s kind of taken over the world now. Everyone is connected in some way, and there are computers not only in every home but almost in every hand, as people carry around tiny ones that are a part of their wireless phones. They send each other messages and a whole new language has sprouted off from English that would have you completely befuddled.

You’re not missing anything, really.

But just so you know, I’m putting this letter to you on the “Internet” so that anyone who wants to can see it on their computer or little phone thingy anytime they want. This is because I’ve found that it’s kind of hard to message you directly, so I figure this is the next best thing, and maybe people will get an idea of how positively awesome you were when you were down here.

Mom and her good friend Iona Volkman in 1970

I’m still with Dorian. We live in San Francisco now and next month we’ll have been married twenty years, can you believe that? She says hi, and she misses you too. The kids thing never happened for us, but we did have that one little four-legged “furkid” you left behind named Rufus. He was with us for a good ten years after you left, but I’m sure you know all about that. Did he arrive okay? He loves to be brushed, just so you know, but go with the fur and not against or he panics.

Rufus insists on being brushed WITH the fur and not against

We sent a noisy scamp named Ian to keep you and Rufus company

He probably had a companion named Ian show up shortly thereafter and even though you never knew Ian down here, no doubt you’ve become well-acquainted by now, lol!

Sorry about the barking at night, but maybe it’s okay up there. Maybe in heaven it sounds like violins or something.

Despite the noise, or music, Ian will love you unconditionally and he’ll be your best friend forever if you let him.

So how’s dad? He sure did suffer horribly way back when, just before he left back in ’76. You always said you’d be joining him again someday, so I’m hopeful that all worked out okay. The suffering’s over now, right? We had a hard time, he and I, but I miss him dearly too.

Tell him that, please?

I still remember the nurse on duty in the hospital that morning, when we arrived in response to a vague phone call, breathless and panic-stricken. She matter-of-factly handed you some of dad’s stuff and said, “I regret to inform you that Mr. Rhodes expired earlier today.”

“EXPIRED”.. like he was a carton of milk or something.

He was more than that. He was amazing.

He was a real man, tough as nails but not afraid to love and show it.

He just never “got me,” and I didn’t get him. But man, that old guy loved you! For a scant sixteen years he loved you like a man never loved a woman, and he’s a big part of how much I love Dorian as we come up on our twenty years together, because he taught me that. I’ve seen plenty of love in action since then, but he was the first.

I didn’t realize until much later that he really loved me after all, in spite of everything. I sure do miss him.

Tell dad Hi.

Mom and Dad, around 1960 in Stockton California

I still can’t believe you married old Bill down the road just a few years after dad left, but I guess you were lonely since your only son was overseas in the Navy. Bill could be a crotchety old bastard, but you patiently saw him to his grave through a long, painful illness  just as you later did with your younger brother, Les.

What was it about you and commitment? You would just never leave a person, would you! I don’t know where you got that from but I hope I got some of it from you.

I saw how you cared for and nursed them until they “expired,” and they walked into that cloud of light knowing they had been loved. Nobody around you died lonely, neglected and brokenhearted.

I hope it’s the same way for me. I don’t have very many people close to me these days except her, some of her family and a friend or two, but I hope they know I love them.

I probably don’t tell them nearly enough.

So how does it work up there, anyway? I mean with crotchety old Bill waiting for you but you always wanting to be with your true love, my dad. I’ve often wondered about that, which is what we mortals do down here. We spend an inordinate amount of time pondering such things before we just shrug and say, “Guess it all works out somehow.” We’re pretty sure it does, though.

Tell Bill Hi.

Well as I’ve said, it’s Mother’s Day again, and I want you to know that I’ve been well taken care of in the “mother” department! Do you remember meeting Dorian’s mom, Phyllis, and her grandma Peg back when we got married? They both remember you, and they liked you very much, just so you know.

Grandma Peg “adopted” me back when, so I turned to her on occasion for motherly advice. She went the same way you did just last year, so maybe you’ve met up again.

Tell Grandma Peg Hi.

Dorian visits with an angel named Grandma Peg, Christmas of 2003

Phyllis is a rockin’ mom, and probably the grooviest mother-in-law a guy could ever hope for! We’re more like pals since she’s really only a few years older than me, and we have a blast whenever she comes around for a visit. I occasionally hit her up for motherly advice too, because she’s so darned reasonable and stuff.

Phyllis says Hi.

Phyllis and Dorian have kept me pretty good company in your absence

Okay, I should wrap it up. I’m busying myself these days just writing and taking care of the other half, which I know you’d approve of. There was a lot you didn’t approve of back in days gone by, but I know we’re all past that now. But every now and then, when my dark side gets the best of me, I ask myself what you would think and the answer usually keeps my demons at bay.

Thanks for hanging in there with me all these years.

Mom in Colorado in 1974

I’m looking forward to seeing you again soon, although not terribly soon I hope! We have eternity ahead of us, while there are things down here I need to get straight and eventually wrap up.

But that will be an awesome day, when we meet again. We’ll have a lot to talk about, LOL!

Happy Mother’s Day, and keep in mind how much I keep you in my heart.

Loving you and missing you every day of my life,

Your Son, Dave

Aunt Bee got me a Starbucks card!

..well, technically she wasn’t really Aunt Bee, but the story still bears telling.

I once worked as a security dispatcher at the Hollywood & Highland complex right there on Hollywood Boulevard. I was cooped up all day in a camera surveillance room in the security office and our receptionist was a lady named Addie, who we used to call “Aunt Bee” due to her unfortunate resemblance to the character from the Andy Griffith show, played by the late Francis Bavier.

I say “unfortunate” because Addie was approximately 35 years old and it’s probably not the most desirable thing for a woman of that age to be compared to Aunt Bee, but hey – she brought it on herself with the hair-do that she wore.

Addie herself didn’t bear an exact resemblance — it was more like she was the Aunt Bee TYPE. She wore a security uniform because she was technically a security officer, but in that respect she was more like Barney Fife. She was also Latino, so picture an Aunt Bee/Barney Fife type Latino woman of about 35, and you’ve got Addie — not too many of those out there.

Even though she was a security officer, they assigned her to the reception desk because they had reservations about putting her out into the complex where she’d have to deal with the riff raff. I’m sure they thought that if she were sent to disburse a group of gang members who were loitering, that instead of approaching with her hand on her mace, she’d be carrying a picnic basket of fried chicken with sweet tater pie for dessert. She’d probably scold them for loitering and then give them a little lecture about how they should be in school. Then, after they’d finished their fried chicken and sweet tater pie, they’d slit her throat.

Addie wasn’t the shiniest bullet in Barney’s shirt pocket either, which is probably why she let us call her Aunt Bee in the first place. The real Aunt Bee could probably whip her in an IQ test — if you can imagine that — so I myself had reservations about having her assigned to the reception desk. But it was better than having her out among the thieves and gang members, and she was a nice lady.

One time she offered to get me something at the nearby Starbucks. She was going down there on her break and while asking me to cover the phones for her, she offered to buy me a coffee, which was her routine. She was always offering to do something for someone, which is another way that she was just like that beloved matronly icon of Mayberry.

I politely declined and thanked her for the offer because my own break was coming up shortly, and I was planning to head down there myself. When she returned to the office about fifteen minutes later she popped into the camera room to let me know she was back, and to give me a nice little Starbucks gift card that she’d picked up.

“David,” she said, “it’s nearing Christmas and when I saw this card I thought of you because you’re always so nice, and it’s such a pretty card, I thought you’d like the design on it.”

It WAS a nice gift card!  It was one of the holiday designs with holly and ivy on it, so I thanked her very much and tucked it into my shirt pocket for use on my upcoming break. About a half an hour later I’d placed my order for a grande cappuccino and handed the card to the young lady behind the counter, all the while thinking of how sweet it was of Addie to treat me like this.

“I’m sorry, sir, but the card is empty.”

“Huh? It can’t be.. our receptionist was just down here less than an hour ago and she got it for me.”

“I’m sorry, but there’s no money on it.. it’s an empty card.”

I paid cash for my cappuccino and stopped at the reception desk on my way back into the office.

“Addie, uh.. thanks again for the card.”

“Oh, David, you’re so welcome! It’s such a pretty card, I just knew you’d love it!”

“I do, Addie, I do! Hey did you know you can put money on those things too? Like a gift card.. did you know that?”

Her mouth fell open and she looked at me like I’d just told her that Opie had robbed a liquor store.

“NO! Really? I just saw it in a little stack by the register so I grabbed it for you. Gosh I should have done that! That would have made for an even better Christmas gift!”

I smiled and patted her arm.

“That’s okay, Addie, don’t worry about it.. maybe next time.. I’ll just keep it right here in my wallet so that it’ll always remind me of you.”

I returned to the camera room having learned a small lesson on the value of the meaning behind gifts. It’s not just a cliché that it’s the thought that counts, so I want every single one of my blog readers to head down to the nearest Starbucks and grab one of those little gift cards that you’ll find by the register.

Be sure and pick the nicest one and just slip it right into your pocket – it’s on me, and you deserve it for being such a faithful reader!

You’re welcome.

I went shopping with coffeesister recently and spent the better part of the evening in a Target store snackbar while she grabbed a cart and zipped away.

I didn’t sit down immediately though.

As is the usual case, I headed for the electronics department to peruse music, DVDs and crap like that while she headed for the clothes.

I engaged in electronic crap perusal for a good fifteen minutes or more before finally heading to the snack bar.

Only an hour and a half left!

She was still in the clothing section looking for basement bargain deals when I got there. I know this because we have cell phones and I called to let her know where I was, just in case she impulsively decided to grab the first thing she sees and then – HAHA! – check out.

But she won’t do that because we need things, and SOMEBODY in this family has to invest some time into finding them and then carefully scrutinizing one brand of product against another in a side by side comparative analysis to determine what’s going to be the best deal, before returning to the shampoo section just before checking out because we’d forgotten the conditioner.

Yes, I said we, because apparently I can forget all kinds of things as I sit there snacking on muffins, pizza, eggrolls, cookies, orange juice and coffee while judging the fat people who walk by for their lack of self-control.

I must give her props, or kudos, or whatever one must give one’s wife though, when she works so hard to get the best deals AND makes sure we have what we need AND she reads this blog.

Yes, I would certainly not be the best candidate if our two cats held an election to decide which of us was going to go to Target for kitty litter and cat treats.

If elected, I would grab the first bag of kitty litter I see and, upon zipping home so that I could go online and stream music videos, it’d be discovered that it’s made of radioactive waste material with chunks of broken beer bottles mixed in.

The cats certainly wouldn’t go near it.

On the other hand, if she was elected to go get the kitty litter, she’d spend at least a half hour determining which size to buy after first calculating the matrix of sand balance to clay integrity along with the rate of absorption factor.

Eventually she’d settle on the imported cedar chips with alabaster sand that had just arrived from Morocco at only $22.00 for a half pound bag.

The cats won’t go near that either.

After I’d been in the snack bar for a while this last trip, my cell phone rang and it was her, calling to tell me that she had everything we needed.

So  I tossed away my empty coffee cup, orange juice carton, two pizza plates, eggroll wrapper, cookie envelope and one blueberry muffin cup and waddled to the check-out stand to meet her.

The 17-year-old cashier, who REALLY enjoyed following the rules, informed us that she couldn’t sell us the box of Merlot that coffeesister had carefully picked out because she was only 17-years-old and you have to be 18 to sell alcohol to people.

I told her that we’d never really thought of wine in a box as alcohol but, being the good girl she is, she stuck to the rules. We had to wait for the old man to come and ring us up and he walks really slow, so by the time he got there the girl was 18 but he rang us up anyway to make it worth his trip.

We eventually arrived home and got the new Moroccan kitty litter poured into the pan so that the cats could sniff it before going off to pee on our bath towels.

Good thing she had shopped carefully, and bought the right kind of cat pee stain remover.

April 18th, 1906

As I put my pen to paper and write, I fear that the shaking of my hand shall render all illegible, for it will not abate. One could hardly blame me for it was less than two hours ago that I lost all, and not just myself, but many around me. The flames still leap in testament of the destruction that has ensued this Wednesday morning from the shaking of the earth under our very feet, and I expect they too shall go on unabated for days to come.

We came to this great city just over two months ago, my love and I, crossing over on a ferry and stepping foot onto the dock at exactly six in the evening.

I still hear the clock tower of the ferry building chiming a welcome to us as the brisk wind of February tugged at our coats and threatened to blow our hats into San Francisco bay. It was as if the city were playfully teasing us with a joyful ceremony in which nature herself took part. We’d arrived at last, and the wind opened its very arms to embrace us with cool, chilly kisses.

We hired a carriage upon arrival and went looking for a proper hotel. Not too expensive, but one free of miscreants and the like, or at least as free of them as can be for the price range we sought. We happened onto the Hotel Marybelle and have been ever since. That is, until this morning.

I’ve been trying to get on with the paper and working on a book in my spare time. She was helping out at the hotel with finances and expense reports, a task which lowered our rent. We didn’t expect to meet such amiable hosts as our current hotel owners and feel lucky that divinity steered us in their direction. Our savings amount to only so much and they agreed to help us by letting us help them.

It may seem silly to some that we came here with only dreams in our heads and no plans in our pockets, but what do they know? We’ve long since considered this place our home and always had intent to return, but it wasn’t until late 1905 that it even became a possibility. I was here years before, serving on a merchant vessel as a yeoman, but I gave up the seafaring life upon meeting her. We both hailed from different parts of California so it was no surprise to me to discover that she had visited the city on frequent occasion during childhood, when her mother brought her to see the ocean, and she had fallen in wide-eyed wondrous love with the essence of it.

I came as a child too, taking annual treks in with my parents to visit a great aunt and uncle who have long since walked off into the foggy mist of eternity, but who still hold a special place in my heart. It was my uncle who first took me aboard a ship in the port of San Francisco and watched with a wily grin as I peppered the crew with questions. I think he knew he had a young seaman in the making!

We love visiting this city, even though we now live here, because of its grandiosity and things yet undiscovered. We revisit places that we’ve grown fond of and seek out new things, and rather constantly at that. The diverse peoples provide an endless source of amusement and wonder, and we feel as if we’ve both traveled the world while not even stepping outside the borders.

Lately we have seen a need to watch our expenses despite the benevolence of our current landlords, but last night we went out despite our frugality. Odd for a Tuesday, but I have no work to worry me yet and she wasn’t to begin her next round of bookkeeping for the hotel owners until this coming Monday. We felt restless, as if something were stirring in the very air we breath, and it jiggled our bones to the core. We needed to be together, and not holed in a room, as nice a little room as it is, reading our respective books. We needed to be out together, somewhere to dine, and take in the sights of this city that’s of such proportions I’ve never seen the like. It’s a grand and busy city, full of light and souls and song.

Word was that Enrico Caruso, the great tenor, was in town and performing in Carmen at the Tivoli. Had we the funds to attend such a gala, we would have! But our meanderings took us to a small, inviting restaurant not far from the Marybelle and it was there we had a quiet supper and conversation. I’m now glad that’s the way it turned out.

We were back by ten and snuggled in by eleven. Our second room floor overlooks busy Mission Street, so the clip clop of horses with the occasional motorcar and conversation from inebriated passersby expertly lulled us to sleep as usual.

I awakened hours later with a need for the chamber pot. I made my way through the dark without taking the trouble to light a candle because it’s an easy trip through the door and just on the other side to the left. I’ve gotten to where I can hit the pot with my eyes closed and half asleep, so that’s what I did, unaware of the time but aware of the darkness and the silence. The drunken ones had long since laid down to sleep it off and with the horses stabled, the street was eerily quiet at that time in the morning.

I’d just finished my business with the pot and was headed back through the doorway when hell paid a visit. A tremendous roar rushed in and I was thrown against the wall with such force I imagined a thousand stampeding horses of fury had just trampled the building. The shaking was of such a violent nature I screamed out but the sound of it was immediately engulfed in the cacophony. All around me the building shook as if it were a stuffed doll in the teeth of a vicious dog, who was rendering it into little shreds. Works of art, vases and books flew past me and became debris, flashes of bright light accompanied sounds of sudden explosions all about, and the room I had been about to walk into suddenly disappeared in a swirling flash.

All I could think of was her. She was sleeping so peacefully in that room and now it was gone, seemingly in the blink of an eye but during a ferocious buffeting that seemed to go on endlessly. It eventually ceased but I couldn’t tell you if it had endured for seconds, minutes or the entire month of April.

As dust settled and parted from around me I saw that I still stood in that doorway, but it was now a precipice, with rubble below and sky above. I don’t know how it was that I was unscathed except for a few cuts and bruises, but for that I praise and thank the Lord while cursing him at the same time for taking my loved one and leaving me to grieve. I wasn’t resigned to her exit yet, though, so I grabbed some pipes that hadn’t seemed to be there moments before and slid down to the rubble to dig and dig and dig, until my hands were bleeding and nails tore from my fingertips, and then to dig some more.

It’s not that I watched the time, but in retrospect now I think it was a good half hour before I uncovered the awful truth that the Lord had taken half my life away. I used the bed sheet to wrap her for the sake of dignity and then I forced myself to the duty of attending to those who could still utter breath enough to slightly scream. It was a small hotel, this Marybelle, and the thirty rooms seemed to have yielded about four or five survivors including myself.

I saw Grace Jackson stumble out onto the street holding her little dog, and Max Sherwood was able to help me pull some rubble off Mrs. Swenson, so he’s attending to her wounds now. I ripped up another bed sheet and applied it to old Mr. Willis’ arm to stanch the bleeding, so now I’m taking a breather to gather my wits about me for the task I know lies ahead.

While digging through the rubble to find my loved one, I managed to come across my journal. I hope you can read the hastily scrawled words despite the blood smears that my hand creates. I tried to clean off as best I could, but there doesn’t seem to be water, which is unfortunate given the fires that are growing increasingly fierce all around me. I’ll soon have to finish up this journal and tuck it away for the future, then Mrs. Swenson and Mr. Willis must be moved to the street before this rubble is rendered into an inferno. I was hoping for something to be done for my love, even in this state, but I guess cremation awaits. That’s okay because I know she’s no longer there, but awaits me in heaven instead.

But first I have much to do, so I best be at it. It’s now seven in the morning and I know I’ll be tending to the injured for days if not weeks to come. God help us quench these fires that are just beginning to cause the air to reek of the stench of death.

I must not think of her. Not yet. I have much to do. So very much to do.

As an experienced consumer of fine beer, I am more than abundantly qualified to educate beginners on the merits of such, with the topic of alcoholic content being a favorite of mine.

This is due to the numerous debates I’ve been privileged to engage in with various associates while seated at the local tavern, with the subject consistently drifting to this topic whenever some innocent newcomer would wander in and place an order for an Amstel Light.

Our small yet hearty group is, for the most part, made up of Samuel Adams drinkers with the exception of Seamus, who is a Guinness man. The poor, unsuspecting rapscallion who dares to order an Amstel is bound to be the recipient of merciless teasing for assorted reasons such as the rather bland taste of the product and the lack of creativity in the labeling, but mostly for the slight alcoholic content of 3.5 for which Amstel Light is famous.

On this day, I have decided to abstain from my usual tavern session and pick up a 12-pack of Samuel Adams Boston Lager for home consumption. No sooner had I twisted the top off my first libation of the evening and logged on, did I find this chance to write on a topic that familiarity holds out in front of my face to taunt me, as one would taunt a dog with a pork chop.

This is not a chance to be passed up, as I’m in the unique position to consume the beer as I write and, having decided to do so already, I’ve taken the liberty of finishing off the first one just after completion of the first paragraph and shall now break to complete the second of many yet to come. As a personal investigation for the sake of journalistic integrity and accuracy, I shall consume one Samuel Adams per paragraph, making this a virtual measurement of the alcoholic content of beer and the effects thereof.

That is some NICE beer, that Samuel Adams! I’ve just completed the second and can hardly notice the alcoholic content of 4.8 like the label says, but it’s a smooth beer with a great finish meaning that the after taste is lingering, yet not harsh in any way. The label also says there are 160 calories per serving and, although I didn’t see any in the bottle, I’m sure I’m still going to have to run an extra 20 minutes on the treadmill tomorrow to burn that off.

Granted, I wouldn’t have to be concerned with the caloric content of the Amstel light but you’d be hard pressed to find me buying any of that stuff to bring home. I shall examine the label further now as I consume the next one.

The label says that they only use the finest of ingredients,like two row barley and german noble aroma hops. I always thought Sam Adams was an American beer and that there weren’t any germans in it or their hops, but that’s okay because we’ve made up since the war and I’m somewhat of a German expert because I dated a pretty blond Germerman girl named Inga. She was a great cook, having studied in France, which seems weird but you forget that when you dig in to her Bratwurst Crepes. Inga and I dated for a few months but broke it off when I found her in bed with Ramone.

He was that fashion photographer she met at Steve’s party and couldn’t stop talking about at which point I was sure it was over because I saw the way she looked at him. Also I see by the old grammatical structure that it’s time for another beeeer yay!.. lucky me!

The alcoholic content ofbeer is something that shouldn’t be ignored, because if you have too many of the beers and drive a car or something you could get hurt or hurt someone else so that is why I always have a designed driver or I just sit at home and drink my beers like tonight. I think there is a Seinfeld rerun on and it’s my favorite episode, where jerry and his friends see how long they can go without sex, but this topic is important so I am going to stick with this until Irun out of the beer.

I have this to say about old Sam Addams, and that’s that it’ss a heavy beer that has lot of calories and so I’m feeling a little full but I enjoy the taste so much and this topic is worth persuing. I’m just glad this isn’t Amstel light you know what I mean? Because the light is lighter and won’t have the same affect as the Adams will when you’ve finished, expecially if you’re trying to make a point or something. I don’t have a dog but a pork chop would be really good right now.

Inga was a good cook and I don’t think I’ve dated a girl since then who could cook like that especially not lately. She made an omelltte one time that had eggs and stuff in it but she didn’t tell me the rest, she said just eat it and see, and so I did! It was delicious and I think it had some real crab meat and some kind of cheese maybe french cheese like bree or somthing. I’m getting hungry talking about all this. A pork chop ommelette would not bebad at all.

I took along break that time because I had to have chips and dip with a sandwich with my last beer because all that talk about Inga cooking made me so hungry and stuff. I really miss her. I was sure she loved me because I loved her but I guess she likes fashion and photogophers better then me. Irony of all that is I was going to be a photographer at first because I was on staff of my high school yearbook so every picture in there is mostly ones I took but why would she care about that this many years later?

Beer has alcoholic comment enough so that you like drinking it and if you have more then you should then you don’t care because you don’t even know how many beers you had like after a few you had. I had about 4 I think but maybe more who is counting anyway? I think now Iwill make it 5 and themn type more comments about alcohol and Inga and pork shops.

I really really really reallyreally really miss inga and Ithink I am going togo call her now if I can find her mumber. I threw it out long time ago but I think I can find it if its not in the trash. I can gooogle it if that dosnt work or call Ramone haha! I bet he has it because he got it at that party that night.

Don’t go telling me she didn’t give it to him because shedid and later she gave him lot more than that. I think if I see him Im going to kick his you know what. I bet mister big shot fashion photogerper never had a fight in his life. I bet if I knock his teeth out he thinks twice next time before telling pretty german grls that they make good models so let him shoot them. We will see who gets shot, RAMOOOOOOOOOOOONE

Her number was still in myphone! I took it out but forgot I left in in there incase I wanted to call her sometime. I called it and she did not answer it was some stupid lady name janet who said she do not know inga and I had the wrong number STUPID LADY!!!! I think she was ingas roommate.

Now Im really sorry I quit smoking because I really really want a cigartit.

I think Iam getting rally full of the beeers and it would help if inga were here but she is not so Ithink im going to watch tv now is jerry is still on. I will finish this later if I remember it.  Ihave to find the remote but I cant remember if where it is where I had it. I cant fine it so never mind I  will have the last more beer and do another pargraph to talk about alclohic comtest of poke shops and inga cooking ombullets

I am going bed now byee thanks for riding my artclue

“I’ve found you’ve got to look back at the old things and see them in a new light.”

~ John Coltrane, 1960

The man has no recollection of the boy’s first trip into the big, shining city by the bay. It was too long ago, and the boy was too little to hang onto memories at first. It was likely a trip with mom and dad to see the great aunt and uncle who lived in the grand house on Van Ness. The three made that trip every Thanksgiving holiday during the boy’s youth until the great aunt and uncle reached the end of their life’s journey and bid all adieu. She left first because of a heart too gracious and loving to last much longer, and he followed shortly thereafter because of a heart broken with grief and loneliness after sixty years of marriage.

Several years before their departure, the boy started keeping memories. The man pulls them out now and then to blow the dust off, whenever life starts to take a toll and he needs a little smile. The oldest of these shows a long-haired gentleman in torn bell-bottoms and sandals sauntering through an intersection not far from Golden Gate park, a ratty guitar case slung over his shoulder and the proverbial flowers in his hair. The boy’s dad was a longshoreman, like Brando’s portrayal of Terry Malloy in “On The Waterfront,” so hippie-types and flower-children were not allowed to pass without enduring a bit of taunting.

“Oh, look at the little girl, with her long pretty hair and flowers!” He held a cigarette out the window with his left hand while his right gripped the steering wheel of the pick-up. The boy’s mother was easily embarrassed, and she asked her husband to keep his voice down, but to no avail.. the hippie heard the taunts and responded with a smile, flashing a peace sign at the crusty dock-worker while continuing to cross the intersection. The boy didn’t realize it then, but this was somewhere in the neighborhood of Haight and Ashbury, perhaps at the famed intersection itself, right around the time of the infamous “Summer Of Love.”  Might the sandaled gent have been Scott MacKenzie, Norman Greenbaum or even the late, great Jerry Garcia? Probably not, but it’s fun for the man to think so.

Those handful of Thanksgiving holidays at the grand mansion on Van Ness included cousins along with other assorted aunts and uncles. The boys and girls of the clan would often play on the sidewalk in front of the house and take occasional walking trips down the block to the little market on the corner, where needful provisions would be obtained along with sodas and candy. Trips would sometimes be made to local points of interest including Fisherman’s Wharf, where the most delicious clam chowder ever made would be ladled into bowls carved out of sourdough bread, to be consumed and committed to the fond memories the boy treasured as time pressed on.

The boy was still a boy as he stepped off the yellow bus with the rest of his peers. But several years had trundled by since the last of the Thanksgiving visits, leaving him taller, lankier and a bit of a smart-ass. He and his buddy ditched the group that was headed into the museum at Golden Gate park for their field trip. The two opted instead to take an unofficial tour of the park and purchase an unofficial joint from a much older black man who approached them. The high-schooler was smart.. really! He just didn’t know it yet.

They found some bushes to hide in for the purpose of toking up. Then they spent the next two hours wandering the park in a daze, watching it ebb and flow. People flung grins at them as they passed by, while the world spun with the two clinging madly to it. They laughed excessively and spat on the ground more in those two hours than they’d ever done in either of their 16 years of life. After reconnecting with the group later on, they wondered among themselves what in the hell WAS IN THAT STUFF? The teacher balled them out but he so resembled a yapping little dog wearing a suit jacket and jeans that the two couldn’t help snickering, which caused the nappy little dog to yap more, which caused their snickers to explode into guffaws. It was all quite the psychedelic cycle of craziness.

“When you get tired of walking around in San Francisco, you can always lean against it.”

~Unknown

The young man had miraculously graduated from high school and a few months later stood at the airport, waiting for his ride. He’d also managed to complete Navy basic training, but felt ill-prepared and nervous as the slightly older young man wearing navy-blue dungarees approached him at the gate and asked his name. He gave it and was whisked away in a gray truck with US NAVY stenciled on the side. He arrived in Hunters Point, this being back in the days when the US NAVY kept a few ships there, and he walked briskly up the gangway to salute and announce that he was reporting for duty.

He spent the next year and a half there with Candlestick Park on his left, the mighty Bay Bridge on his right and the city by the bay laid out before him. He wasn’t a week into it when he discovered The 711 Club, a sailor bar at 711 Market Street that was owned by an old German named Heinz, who seemed to always have plenty of Becks beer on hand. Surprisingly, sailors who were too young to legally drink, such as he was, drank freely in that establishment. It wasn’t until years later that he found out Heinz had been with the San Francisco Police Department for many years, retiring at the rank of Captain, then opened a bar to augment his pension and have some fun. Thus the local cops left him alone.

A friend once visited from the young man’s hometown, which was a mere two-hour drive into the foothills of the Sierras. The friend brought a pretty girlfriend, and the two toured the naval vessel that the young man loved showing off. The pretty girlfriend was uneasy. “Why do these guys keep staring at me?” she asked, retreating under the security of her boyfriend’s arm. “Don’t mind them, they’re sailors,” said the young man. “They don’t see girls like you that often.” The three of them later paid Heinz a visit at The 711 Club. A case of Becks was consumed and merriment was made well into the night.

The young man had an aunt who lived in nearby Daly City, so he took weekend treks down that way to visit and do a load of laundry or two. He’d since inherited the pick-up truck that dad taunted the hippie from ten years earlier. He sometimes drove but took the relatively new BART train on several occasions when the old truck was in need of a repair. His treks into Daly City were a far cry from the occasional jaunt across the bay into Oakland, where he and fellow shipmate Tim would pay a visit to a one-legged prostitute named Debbie for tokes, jokes and pokes well into the night.

He was glad for the camper shell on the back of the truck with the comfy mattress he’d purchased from a thrift store, which all came in handy on those nights he’d close down The 711 Club and stumble outside to sleep in the back. The rig stayed parked on Market all night, in a time when such a thing wasn’t the big deal it’d be now, and one wouldn’t have to fetch one’s vehicle from a city impound lot in the morning.

The day finally came when the Navy ship checked out of the Hunters Point hotel and slid gracefully under the Bay Bridge and then the Golden Gate, with the young man standing on a wind-swept deck looking fondly back on the city that had given him a seabag full of memories. Off they went to San Diego, which he would call home for the next few years.

“The Golden Gate Bridge’s daily strip tease from enveloping stoles of mist to full frontal glory is still the most provocative show in town.”

~Mary Moore Mason

The young man returned to spend a week by the bay while processing out of the Navy back in ’82, and had wandered into The 711 Club while on a 2-day pass from Treasure Island Naval Station. Heinz was glad to see him, even though he didn’t remember him. On a visit a decade later, the not-so-young man took his new wife in to meet Heinz only to discover the old German had long since retired from bar owning, and the place was now being run by Les, a bartender he remembered from the sailor bar days. They were a bit surprised to find that Les had turned it into a gay bar, while not really being surprised at all, knowing this city, and the man and wife visited with Les and reminisced until closing time.

They visited off and on over the next decade and more, always staying at a different hotel but paying frequent visits to soak in the sultry torch songs that were softly sung at the Mason Street Wine Bar on Geary. Sometime after the turn of the century, The 711 Club was replaced by a 711 store, which can be found today at 711 Market Street. A hotdog cart now occupies the space inside the store where the young man ushered in his 19th year on a bar stool, long ago.

A stroll down Van Ness one year revealed that the old mansion of the long departed great aunt and uncle wasn’t a mansion at all, but a rather plain two-bedroom dwelling with a bay window over a small garage. The memories were bigger than the house itself, and the man grew a bit misty as he stood on the sidewalk and let them flood in.

A few New Year’s Eve celebrations were rung in by the couple as they joined the madness in Union Square, and they have oft dreamed of someday calling the city home but other places needed to be tried and lived-in first to prove beyond a doubt that nothing else would do.

Finally, having had enough of not living, the man stood up one day and announced to his wife of nineteen years, “We’re going to San Francisco!” She heartily agreed and together they started winding the countdown clock that would propel them into the rest of their future.

“Somehow the great cities of America have taken their places in a mythology that shapes their destiny: Money lives in New York. Power sits in Washington. Freedom sips Cappuccino in a sidewalk cafe in San Francisco.”

~Joe Flower

It’s been a long road but the clock has finally struck, and the man finds himself sitting in the bay window of a hotel overlooking Mission Street. The building came into being in 1906, rising up out of the ashes left from the great quake and fire, and has stood on this spot for over a hundred years. Fittingly symbolic for a couple who are resurrecting their lives from the ashheap.

He takes short breaks from typing to gaze down at the street two stories below, where the Muni #14 and #49 go whooshing through every ten minutes in both directions. Crazies yell and scream, spewing their demons out into the air while the comparatively sane walk by unfazed because it’s the way things are here. The little neighborhood market does a brisk business, as does the medical marijuana clinic next to it and the Walgreens on the corner.

A subterranean train whizzes by deep underground every 15 minutes, the only indication being a whirring sound that rises from a street grating under the bay window. The couple have already had visitors — the old friend from the foothills who once brought a young, pretty girlfriend on board the old Navy ship had a wife with him this time. The two couples went for a walk and paid a visit to a certain 711 store on Market Street, where the two old married men laughed at the hotdog cart inside.

The visitors have returned to the foothills and the couple will remain surrounded by the charm of 1906 until something better is found. They don’t know where yet, but it will be somewhere in this city full of noisy light and quiet memories. A handful of favorite old things are either gone now, such as the Mason Street Wine Bar, or have yet to be revisited, like sourdough chowder bowls at the wharf, while millions of new discoveries lie in wait.

They’ve come home to stay.

“San Francisco itself is art, above all literary art. Every block is a short story, every hill a novel. Every home a poem, every dweller within immortal. That is the whole truth.”

~William Saroyan

I married a girl some time ago, and there was this whole family that came along with the deal.

My dad had drawn his final breath way back in ‘76 and, although mom and I were pretty close, I hadn’t had any kind of “real family” for years. I’d get up to see her around Christmas time but it was never a big holiday affair.

I’d drop in, bringing the girl with me, and we’d stay a day or two, usually around the holiday season but never on Christmas day itself.. that just never worked out. We’d bring her something — one year it was a puppy who ended up being with us for the next ten years — and she’d always have a little something for us.

Mom wasn’t about “fuss and bother,” as she called it. She’d do a bit of Christmas shopping and get it all sent off to distant relatives who seldom came to see her. Sometimes they’d send her something. I always brought mine in person.

In 1993, she joined my dad. We inherited the pup, Rufus, and proceeded to miss her terribly. We still do.

But I always had Camp Nelson.

The girl I married had told me about the place early on, back when we were just getting to know one another. She said she’d been raised there and that there was nothing closer to heaven-on-earth. Well, that sounded like a good place to get married, so that’s what we did. We tied the knot and vowed to be faithful before God and everyone else right there in a tiny little chapel that looked like something out of Little House on the Prairie, except there wasn’t a prairie for miles.. only gorgeous, breathtaking mountains.

A few months later, I was invited to spend the first (for me) of what would later become an annual tradition.. the Camp Nelson family Christmas trip.

You’ll find the place nestled among the Sierra-Nevada Mountains of California, in the Sequoia National Forest. You drive past the valley town of Porterville and hit the highway to the mountains, enduring an hour on a twisting, winding snake of a road that brings you into the former first world war encampment of Camp Nelson, now home to mostly retirees and mountain folk.

The town looks like Norman Rockwell and John Muir got together and designed it, after having first asked advice from Thomas Kinkade and Ansel Adams.

“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in
where nature may heal and cheer and give strength to the body and soul.”
–John Muir

I remember that first Christmas visit well. I’d been there a few times by then, but the girl was right.. there was nothing like Christmas in Camp Nelson. A silent hush emanated from the snow, broken by the crunch of our footsteps as we stepped from our car after pulling into the little driveway in front of the cabin. If you stood still for just a few seconds, you could hear the trees breathe.

Granddad Don knew a car had pulled up, so the front door flew open and there he stood, his curiosity satisfied once he saw that it was his “little brown-eyes” and her shiny new husband. He welcomed us in, and in we went.

We stayed for several days and, for that whole time, the welcome never wore out.

Others arrived and they too were ushered in with open arms. Aunts, uncles, cousins, friends.. they poured into the cabin and rendered it a sanctuary of acceptance and love. It was a place to forget the woes of the year, even though they were lightly discussed before dinner, but as if they had happened to someone else. We didn’t know worry and stress while we were there. There just wasn’t room for it.

Granddad Don would fix Grandma Peg a bit of holiday cheer in a glass, then she’d regale us with tales from the old days, about family and friends who’d long since passed. I didn’t know of those people, but that wasn’t a requisite for finding charm in her stories. Granddad would chime in and, as often happens with those who’ve been together for a lifetime, they’d spend a great deal of time discussing the finer points of things that may or may not have happened and how they happened, if they did happen at all, depending on who was doing the remembering.

Aunt Donna visited for a few of those Christmases. My girl’s maternal aunt, she was a gracious soul who’d busy herself with things to be done.. dinner preparation, dishes, a spot of cleaning, a little gift wrapping and then a nice nature walk among those majestic trees to cap it off. Her sister would occasionally accompany her on a stroll along the crunchy, snowy paths and they’d gab on endlessly as if they hadn’t seen each other in years.

It’s been years now since Donna herself was peacefully laid to rest under those majestic trees, after cancer had ferociously claimed her kind but fragile body. Her gracious, loving soul flew on and soared like an eagle. Today, as Christmas comes around once again, she patiently awaits the great reunion.

“Take your time,” she says, “there’s plenty yet for you all to do.”

I haven’t had many holiday visits up there in that mountain heaven, where John Denver, Andy Williams and Bing Crosby sang us Christmas tunes and the wispy smell of the fireplace warmed my spirit. But I’ll cherish what few I was invited to with a grateful heart. The time came when life in the mountains was proving to be too much for such hearty old souls as Don and Peg, particularly with the loss of Donna stinging so badly. Things would never be the same for them without her cheery and loving visits so they moved to the valley below, sadly leaving the glorious cabin to be an empty, lonely sentry of God’s creation. But although the memories are cherished, the place only plays a small part of it, since Christmas is really in the heart.

My girl and I have recently passed through a few tough years. A Camp Nelson Christmas has long been a thing of the past, and there have been Christmases spent solely with each other, wherever we have found ourselves. But this year some angels have seen to it that we get to do it once more, perhaps just for this Christmas or maybe a handful yet to come – only the one who wrote the book of life knows about such things.

He’s the one who called Grandma Peg home earlier this year, so Granddad returned to the lonely cabin to wait out that great reunion in solitude. But he won’t be alone this Christmas, because we and a handful of others will be on hand to stoke the fireplace and the memories, to keep both from waning as the night goes on.

I’ll be offline for a few days. It’s a break from all of this, to find my soul once again and get back in touch with what’s important and meaningful.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and
HAPPY NEW YEAR to my readers!

Cherish 2010 and each other.

Cherish the now.

Uncle Val was an Aussie with a slight speech impediment, which made him a bit hard to understand.

He called my aunt Ruby “Woobie,” which he’d shout from the kitchen whenever he needed some help.. “WOOBIE! HEP ME GIT DA PAN OUT!” She’d excuse herself from visiting and shuffle in there, leaving mom and dad with us kids to watch “Let’s make a deal!” which seemed to always be on.

This was Thanksgiving with Val and Ruby, who’s last name I never knew. Ruby was my mom’s aunt and I guess she’d be about a hundred by now, or more. Val would certainly be a hundred and twenty.

They were old when I was a kid, and although everyone seems old to a ten-year-old, Val and Ruby were ancient.. he was slightly stooped over and never left the house without his cane in one hand and pipe in the other. He always had that aromatic wisp of tobacco hanging around him that so many uncles and granddads used to have, back in the day.

Ruby was plumpish but not a lot, and she was the sweetest woman in the world. I now know where my mom got it from, since she was second sweetest and inherited the main title after Ruby passed away sometime in the late seventies.

I always thought Val was the greatest cook who’d ever lived. He lived in the kitchen on these Thanksgiving reunions and the spread he’d lay out come late afternoon was fit for a king’s buffet. I knew he worked as a chef in a fancy restaurant, so it was never a surprise that we all got the royal treatment once a year. About a decade after our last time with them, mom told me that he’d never been a “chef,” but rather a cook at a greasy-spoon in downtown San Francisco.

Another childhood illusion shot to hell.

Coffeesister and I found the old house during a visit to San Francisco a few years back. It’s on Van Ness not far from downtown, and as we sat in the car and looked over its traditional San Francisco style facade, I grew more than a little wistful and melancholy recalling those (at least) ten annual Thanksgiving day visits we enjoyed. I didn’t recall the earliest ones of course, but I knew that mom and dad had been going there since being married in 1957, so I certainly must have gone along every year starting in November of 1959.

I miss them terribly whenever this holiday rolls around, and I miss mom and dad, both of whom are long gone now. Val taught me what a boomerang was, since we all admired the fancy one he had on display in the living room. He never took if off the wall, claiming it was made of the bone of a large whale that had been slain by one of his ancestors. The wink that accompanied that story might have discredited it, but great-uncles with bushy white mustaches and funny accents always told the truth, didn’t they?

Ruby sewed things, and even though mom sewed things too, she’d take the specialty jobs to Ruby because Ruby was the sewing queen of the universe. When mom passed away I found aunt Ruby’s sewing basket tucked into a special corner of her cedar chest reserved for treasures of the past.

God rest you, Val and Woobie, I wish you were here.

I’d forgotten just how much fun it can be when everyone complains about everything in the hotel business, but I was quickly reminded when a stern lady chewed me out while wagging her finger because guests were in the hot tub late at night and she wanted me to clear them out, claiming they were making too much noise.

I did and of course, the hot tub guests complained. One young man said, “I would never, EVER come to your house and kick you out of your hot tub!”

Another lady complained that there were too many flies in Palm Springs this year, and she wanted us to compensate her room because of it. There weren’t any flies in her room unless she’d left the door open, but there were more than usual buzzing around outdoors and some had made their way into the lobby because they got whooshed in by the sliding glass doors, which really can’t be helped. I’ve noticed that there are more flies here where I live, about three miles from the hotel, and I noticed a lot more downtown. I think it’s because the economy is currently mired in shit.

We did not comp her room, but I did assure her there was no charge for the extra flies.

On a whim yesterday, I decided to look at some of the public review forums on travel sites to see if anyone complained about the hotel online. I didn’t find many negative reviews, they were mostly positive – but it’s interesting that someone can stay at the hotel at the same time as someone else, and whereas the first person “had a wonderful time,” the second thinks the place must have been built by the Marquis de Sade while Satan himself supervised and Hitler carried the bricks.

The following reviews drive that point home. This first one is about the hotel where I work – the Hilton. I’ve copy/pasted directly from the site, so this woman’s spelling and grammar problems remain. I guess she was crying so hard her vision was blurry..

This was the worse hotel stay ever! Upon our arrival to the hotel the Valet was fighting with a guest we waited over 15min to get them to acknowledge us. The pool was overcrowded, small, and very old. The people were eating in the pool, throwing trash in there, the girls on the side were ashing there cigarettes into the pool. Upon returning to our room other guests were using our patio, and the bathtub did not fucntion prperly. The room furniture was old and and smelled like wet MOLD!! The staff was rude at the front desk when tried to alert them to these downfalls…the WORSEST HILTON hotel ever! NOt worth staying ever again…for free…and I wouldnt dare spend a DIME here!

Now, this is the kind of disgruntled guest that you can’t really do anything for. I could shoot all the employees, burn the place down and mix the corpses in with the ashes, and then bury the whole mess on the vacant lot and throw salt on it so nothing could ever grow there again, and she’d complain about the smell (the worsest smell EVER!)

I was curious about who she was, so I clicked on her username. It didn’t tell me much, but it did point me to the next review she gave, which was shortly after she reviewed the Hilton. It seems she and her partner switched over to the Andreas Hotel and she gave it a rather glowing report..

Today I turned fifty.

I’m not sure how that happened. I’m not sure where the years went.

Oh, I know.. I’m not old. Not by a long shot. At least subjectively, because coffeesister’s granddad is almost ninety and he calls me a “kid.” On the other hand, real kids – as in the MySpace Generation – think I’m older than dirt. It’s an interesting dichotomy; I’m right in-between “a cute guy” and “what a cute little old man.”

Speaking of coffeesister, today she’s doting on me like an old mother hen. This happens every June 9th. Then, when October 12th rolls around – which ironically happens to also be my mother’s birthday – she can’t lift a finger.

That’s how we roll. We roll for each other.

It works really well, too.

With all of this stuff I’m not allowed to do, I have a lot of time for reflection. I think back over the years and watch as the good times dance with the bad, making for a macabre sort of waltz that lays my life out in front of me, spinning, twirling and swaying until it comes to a grinding halt at my feet as if to say, “Now what?”

Now what? I’m not sure. I’d say that’s the problem, but is it? Man is God’s comic, making all those plans just to hear him laugh. Yes, that’s a paraphrase of a really good quote – but I not only agree with it, I’ve proven it.

When I was seventeen, it was a very good year. It was a very good year for small town girls and soft summer nights. We’d hide from the lights, on the village green.. when I was seventeen.

When I was seventeen I enlisted in the Navy. College was not an option, so I hoped for at least four years of education, travel and growth. I didn’t know what I’d become, but it had to be better than small town girls and soft summer nights. I wanted adventure. I got it.

When I was twenty-one, it was a very good year. It was a very good year for city girls who lived up the stair. With all  that perfumed hair, and it came undone.. when I was twenty-one.

When I was twenty-one I could hardly wait to get out of the Navy and man, it could not come soon enough! I’d be free again, to enjoy those small-town girls and soft summer nights. How I missed them.

When I was thirty-five, it was a very good year. It was a very good year for blue-blooded girls, of independent means. We’d ride in limousines, their chauffeurs would drive.. when I was thirty-five.

When I was thirty-five I had several careers behind me.. none of which seemed to pan out. But it wasn’t about career. It wasn’t about any one thing in particular. It was slowly becoming about life, and just living it.

But now the days grow short; Im in the autumn of the year. And now I think of my life as vintage wine, from fine old kegs. From the brim to the dregs, it poured sweet and clear. It was a very good year.

I’m not in the autumn yet. I’m enjoying the waning days of summer, as the cool breezes waft in. They smell delicious, and though I sometimes think of what my life was like in the spring, I know that the seasons have changed – not for the worse or for the better – they’ve just changed, and it’s up to me to make of them what I will.

For those of you in the early spring, take it from a late-summer man; it all flows madly by like a rushing stream. Memories of long ago are only an arm’s length away, right at your grasp, because they only happened yesterday. That bike ride, that first kiss, that time you went with them to that place and you all did that thing.. it all just happened yesterday, and tomorrow you will be ready to shuffle off that mortal coil. Knowing the fickle nature of fate as I do, I may shed mine today.. or in another fifty years.

A few years ago, an old friend of mine chided me by saying that he didn’t think I was where I’m supposed to be in life. He said that I hadn’t progressed enough, and that I needed to make up for lost time. In answer to that, let me take a quick inventory..

• A woman who loves me, and I love her – check.
• A place to live, with food in the pantry – check.
• Two little kitties who also love me – check.
• True friends, who don’t care whether I’m rich or poor – check.
• I’m fairly healthy – check.
• Air to breathe – check. Music to hear – check. Beauty to see – check.
• Broadband Internet Connection – check.

I’m afraid I have to disagree with my old friend. I’m doing okay, and I can’t even begin to tell you how wonderful the air smells as summer fades and the fall colors start to shine.

It’s a very good year.

“It was a very good year” was composed by
Evin Drake and recorded by Frank Sinatra

COMMENT of the day..
Hi Davy,
I hope the Dave 5.0 build is the best yet!
Cheers, Triana

Mary Ann Kelley, Olathe Colorado

She left us all to fend for ourselves back in 1993. Geez I’m feeling old today, because I can’t believe that many years have passed.

She was only 59.

She was born in 1933, and never did grasp technology. This little blog post tribute would elude her.

I’m sure that were she still around I’d have to phone her up and tell her how to find it on her Web TV or something. She actually had a VCR but programming it was out of the question. “David,” she’d ask, “how do I rewind this so I can watch it?”

“Mom, that would be the rewind button.. right there.”

I’d show her with the hope that she’d remember for next time. Mostly she was trying to rewind while the tape was still playing. “Mom, you have to stop it first, THEN rewind.” She’d tell me how complicated that was.

Mom and Dad, about 1963

She was a good woman. She was very long-suffering, having cared for two husbands and her younger brother through excruciating terminal illnesses until they passed on.

She put up with a lot of crap from me in my youth – a lot of which I wish I could take back and do differently, but I guess somehow it’ll all be made right

She put up with greedy, arrogant relatives and con-artists who bilked her out of investments, along with two-faced neighbors who used her good graces for their own gain.

Mom and her old friend Iona Volkman, about 1974

She had her share of difficult times but always managed to keep her head up and smile.

I miss those dinners she’d make when I came around, and the occasional long talk about life and what it all means. She could be deep, and sometimes I think I was the only one who knew that. She never tried to prove anything to other people, and always met them at their level because she wanted them to be comfortable around her. They were, sometimes too much. She never let on how smart she really was.

She was the most conservative bohemian I ever knew.

I wish I could give her more than this dumb little tribute on a blog for Mother’s Day. But knowing her as I do, I think that a very public “I love you, miss you and will never forget you” will suffice. She never wanted anything more, really, than to love, be loved and be content with what she had, which was never much.

She achieved that goal, especially the parts about loving and being loved.

Happy Mother’s Day, Mary Ann Kelly

Mary Ann Kelly

I love you, miss you and will never forget you.

RIP 1933-1993

Yesterday, coffeesister and I went to downtown Palm Springs after we managed to dodge the Evil-Bank-Lady (YAY!) because they have this thing on Thursdays called a street faire, where they block off about ten blocks of the downtown area and people wander up and down looking at arts and crafts while eating really shitty food prepared in front of them by possibly not so hygienic people who are sweating in the desert heat over open grills at makeshift booths.

But we went into The Coffee Bean, partly because we really like the place, and partly because they have free wireless Internet and we love our Internet so much we just have to be online with you all even when surrounded by hordes of cool people and all those arts, crafts and sweaty food within such close proximity.

Actually, she stayed online for hours, staking out a little Coffee Bean table while I shut down my crappy laptop after a short while because it’s in such bad shape it makes you all seem fat and slow, and I know you don’t want to be like that. So I left it with her as I went outside and wandered around in the crowd. I even ate some tacos from one of those open grills and they made me sick. So yeah.

I returned to The Coffee Bean and ordered up an iced mocha to counteract the tacos, then I grabbed a chair on the outdoor patio to watch the fine young ladies endless parade of humanity shuffle by while coffeesister continued to keep you company in her dank little corner of merry isolation.

A Maltese without a Mexican

But in spite of so many fine young ladies humanities parading, I couldn’t help but notice that the old lady seated about five feet away from me had a little dog, which was a Maltese or something, and it was all fluffy and white and cute, and about the size of a fluffy white breadbox, but that’s not why I noticed it.

I noticed it because she had it all dressed up. It wasn’t all foo-foo like, with a sweater and stuff like that which would have just been animal cruelty in that heat, but instead she had.. are you ready for this? No kidding, sit down..

She had a tiny little saddle on it.

And seated on the the tiny little saddle was a tiny little Mexican in a sombrero.

But that’s not all. The fluffy white dog was wearing a matching sombrero, and.. I’m not kidding here.. sunglasses. Yeah. They were strapped around the dog’s head, and the little shit made absolutely NO EFFORT to pull off the shades, sombrero, saddle or the tiny Mexican, who I think was made out of stuffed brown socks with dinky black buttons for eyes and a mustache that had been applied with black permanent marker.

I was kind of surprised at the fluffy little dog’s easy-going ‘tude, because I used to have larger, real dogs who didn’t like me putting sunglasses on them so they’d paw them off right away. I can’t imagine what they would have done with a tiny Mexican. They’re in heaven now but that has nothing to do with me dressing them, I swear, because I never got that far. It was just a long time ago and they grew old and died.

Of course, this whole get-up on the very patient and possibly stoned little Maltese doggie was an absolute hit with anyone who walked by, particularly if they had small children with them or if they’d been drinking, and a handful of people just had to stop and get a picture. I would have gotten a picture to post here but I don’t have a camera in my cell-phone, so you’ll just have to rely on the brilliantly executed word-pictures that I paint with such flourish.

The lady kept telling everyone the dog’s name, which I’ve forgotten, so when there was a break in the humanity parade I took the opportunity to quench my curiosity and ask her the name of the little Mexican who was riding the dog. She looked at me like I must be freakin’ CRAZY, because after all.. WHAT KIND OF SANE PERSON WOULD NAME A LITTLE SOCK PUPPET, HUH?

So she just kind of shrugged and condescendingly answered, “I don’t really know, we haven’t named him” (she wanted to add, “you freakin’ TARD,” I just know she did) and, as she stooped down to adjust the dog’s sombrero I said, “Well how about Dave? That’s my name.. we could call it DAVE.”

She didn’t even look up. “Sure, Craig will be fine.. whatever you say.”

With the sombrero adjusted,  saddle pulled tight and leash all leashed up, she gathered up her things along with her precarious puppy and shuffled off to parts unknown without so much as an adios to “Craig, the mumbling maniac with the iced mocha.”

I seriously need to get a camera phone.

Free Spam!

Okay, so has anyone else who maintains a WordPress blog noticed a decided increase in the size of the average spam comments being trapped by Akismet?

WHOA THERE!

Where are you going, non-WordPress users? This will be of interest to you too! I’m sorry I said “Akismet”.. it’s not a big word, it’s just a WordPress filter that traps spammers and teases them until they cry like little school girls.

Here, let me help you out a bit so that you can understand what we’re talking about..

When a person – me, for instance -  has a blog on WordPress, they don’t need to use those little CAPTCHA things to keep spammers from commenting, like they do on Blogger.

You know.. it’s where you try to comment but you have to type in RFLYO first, or JKSTGV or NTBQP. I used to have a blog on there and I swore that if I ever had a child, which seems unlikely at this point but hey we have a black President, I was going to name it GLMGY if it was a boy or SBTRY if it was a girl.

But now that I run my blog on WordPress I can just name my child Akismet, which I believe would work for either a boy OR a girl, because that little filter is the saving grace of us all.

Here’s why..

On Blogger, when someone kindly stops by and graciously reads your blog and nicely decides to be wonderfully helpful by adding a beautiful comment, they have to work for it by typing in those previously mentioned potential children’s names, which doesn’t seem like it’d take much effort but if a person comments on, say, a whole bunch of Blogger blogs each day, well we’re talking about a whole half hour or so of extra typing that could be better spent actually making a child, if one is so inclined and equipped.

So basically you’re keeping your readers from having sex, which to me seems like a poor marketing plan.

On the other hand, readers of WordPress blogs have plenty of extra time to manufacture children because Akismet (the spam filter, not my future daughter) does all of the work for them.

It does this by actually letting the spammers leave their comments but it sort of holds them in a holding cell, like a tiny prison, until you come along and decide to either let them out to roam free across your blog (unlikely) or you strap the silver helmet on them and pull the switch, electrocuting them in an excruciatingly agonizing moment of pure joy and ecstasy (very likely, and a lot of fun).

There’s this thing you see when you log on to your WordPress account that’s called the “dashboard”, which is a lot like the dashboard in your car but instead of showing you your speed and oil temperature, it shows you how many people have visited your blog and what comments Akismet (again, the FILTER) has trapped in the tiny prison.

My whole point here is that lately these comments have gotten really big – so big that we may need to get a bigger prison – and of course, they still don’t make any sense.

Remember when spam comments that don’t make any sense were short and sweet? Actually, I still get those in my email, and I’m sure you do too. Here’s one I randomly pulled out of my email just now..

Serge lived there in smoke, that prop of the vrishni race (krishna), like that one over there. have you bought  dorothea’s whose knots made it strain and creak, a tremendous deities and pitris, the illustrious rishi narada.

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Aren’t those wonderful? That second one even mentions Christina Ricci! And Prozac!

Personally, I think any film with Christina Ricci on Prozac has some real box office potential, especially with that bit about the scandal involving her father and the mortgage on the farm brought on by the two former workers who did time in prison. So, I’m going to get right on the script adaptation here, if I can manage to get the rights from the original author.

Ah.. let’s see, the author is..  “xhilymed“.

Geez, we’re back to that again.

Okay, never mind. I’m just going to write my own novel.

It’s going to be about Canadian generic prescription meds and the race to beat the clock before clowns eat all of the banana pudding. I’ll throw in a plot twist involving terrorists from Idaho and how they use shoe horns to eradicate the simple things that make it worthwhile to shop online for daisies using previously expired coupons.

Then I’ll adapt it all to a screenplay and cast Akismet (my daughter) in the lead (because Christina Ricci is “unavailable”) and direct it myself (because nobody else will).

You just wait.. it’ll be FNNN!

Actress Christina Ricci relaxes after enjoying a case of SPAM for lunch