This picture is dying for a funny caption, but I can't think of one.

Hazel watched a portion of this movie; only a portion, enough said?

In the interest of science, the conceiving and the delivery of a baby is documented. You've been warned. The video is in documentary fashion but still parents with young children, be warned. Here is the video.

Travels with Charley There are many Steinbecks I have read, but there are many I have not, just because I can't read fast enough. This review is from a reader from Bluerectangle, a video review.

A TASTE OF THE TWENTIES

A MEDICAL TIP TO ALL YOU AGING (SEASONED) MEN AND WOMEN OUT THERE AND IT'S FREE.

This is the only clip I could find on Doc Blanchard who died today. He and Glen Davis were Mr. Inside and Mr. Outside of the undefeated Army teams of the forties. They were the idols of our sandlot football games and received the kids ultimate accolade when we played: "I wanna be blanchard or I wanna be davis." RIP Doc.

Released here first: Seamy thoughts laid bare with no censorship for those who need to know.

Famous scene of Monroe for the movie SEVEN YEAR ITCH. The scene was shot on Lexington avenue in New York and again on a sound stage in Hollywood. The man is Tom Ewell who starred in the Broadway play and also the movie.

WHEN WE ALMOST SAWETH THE YANKEES OF NEW YORK BECOME REGULAR KIND OF GUYS

T' was almost a week-end of joy and frolic when the hated gladiators of New York town came close to losing three out of four to their country brethren from the countryside of Ohio, the Cleveland bunch who came neigh to bursting their buttons when their pent up offensiveness launched Spaldings into the sky and out of the arena time after time. The royal enclosure where sitteth George the most royal of all baseballdoms royals was in peril of oral overloads from the royaldom his self when his majestic jesters and others who hold together the dominion were not forthcoming with logical oration about how all the taxes gathered from the realm's most needy could not be relied upon to discover and enlist magical launchers of the white sheres at a speed and exotic revolutions to blind the rural cousins from the land by Lake Erie.

But rightness and justice are not always served equally between the city bought for 24 dollars and some shiny beads and the land of rust and dwindling hopes. And this patch of history is like much of history past with the Indians of Ohio returning to their wigwams in the village founded by Mr. Cleveland, once again having come close to humbling the striped suited, but alas returning to a less affluent dominion to dream of what might have been. Two contests for the New Yorkers and two contests for the Clevelanders of Ohio.

A few dollars here, a few benjamin's there, and by obama I think we might have it solved.

PRETEND YOU'RE HEARING ME DO SOME BIRD IMITATIONS

Spring has sprung, the temps are rising, and we ventured into the woods. It is ideal this early because there are no bugs flying at your face, and new sprouts are everywhere. Hazel, my significant other (I'm just showing off my being current lingo; she is also my wife, and before that my girl friend) showed off her good eye by snapping this pic of newly emerging water flowers. I would tell you what they are called, but I haven't the foggiest.



Today with one more beautiful day promised, the program will turn to work. The lawn is in an after-winter mess. The grass is growing and the mower will have to try and show it who is boss. We all know that answer, nature is the ruler, but I will take a whack at it just so I can stay inside of all the city ordinances. Of course, all this is premised upon the old reliable mower starting up after a long winters sleep in the barn. I stopped at the gas station yesterday to get the gas can filled up and that caused a momentary grrr to come out of my mouth. The cost of filling my gas can used to be an insignificant cost, but now..oh well we've been over all that. Enjoy the picture and I will ready myself for the experience ahead.

Celebrity houses, always good to see extravagance in action.

"On the floor I am more at ease. I feel nearer, more a part of the painting, since this way I can walk around it, work from the four sides and literally be in the painting."

— Jackson Pollock

Carol Ohmart, model for Cooper Calhoun a comic strip character in Steve Canyon by Milton Caniff 1947

The evil spreads:

Where Have I Been. Denim (Blue Jeans) is Underfire. Do I agree?


For men, sartorial good taste can be reduced to one rule:
If Fred Astaire would not have worn it, don't wear it. For women, substitute
Grace Kelly. - George F. Will


Why Jeans Are Evil

(Newser) – Across America, men, women, and children are wearing the same pants: jeans. Not only a sartorial crime, the trend is an “obnoxious misuse of freedom,” rails George Will of the Washington Post. Levi Strauss set out to make tough pants for 49ers who spent all day in the mud, and “it is silly for Americans whose closest approximation of physical labor consists of loading their bags into golf carts to go around dressed for driving steers.”

Today’s denim is a “carefully calculated costume,” designed to look casual, indifferent, exactly as slovenly as the next guy. Actually dressing well “would be to commit the sin of lookism—of believing that appearance matters,” Will explains. “That heresy leads to denying the universal appropriateness of everything, and then to the elitist assertion that there is good and bad taste.”
Source: Washington Post

..and then there is this:

Down With Denim


By DANIEL AKST

If there is a silver lining to a financial crisis that threatens to leave the entire country dressed only in a barrel, it is this: At least we won't be wearing denim.

Never has a single fabric done so little for so many. Denim is hot, uncomfortable and uniquely unsuited to people who spend most of their waking hours punching keys instead of cows. It looks bad on almost everyone who isn't thin, yet has somehow made itself the unofficial uniform of the fattest people in the world.

It's time denim was called on the carpet, for its crimes are legion. Denim, for instance, is an essential co-conspirator in the modern trend toward undifferentiated dressing, in which we all strive to look equally shabby no matter what the occasion. Despite its air of innocence, no fabric has ever been so insidiously effective at undermining national discipline.
[strauss] Associated Press

Did Levi Strauss realize the havoc his creation would wreak on the modern world?

If hypocrisy had a flag, it would be cut from denim, for it is in denim that we invest our most nostalgic and destructive agrarian longings -- the ones that prompted all those exurban McMansions now sliding off their manicured lawns and into foreclosure, dragging down the global financial system with them. Denim is the SUV of fabrics, the wardrobe equivalent of driving a hulking Land Rover to the Whole Foods Market. Our fussily tailored blue jeans, prewashed and acid-treated to look not just old but even dirty, are really a sad disguise. They're like Mao jackets, an unusually dreary form of sartorial conformity by means of which we reassure one another of our purity and good intentions.

There was a time, of course, when not everyone wore denim. In the 1950s, Bing Crosby was even refused entry to a Los Angeles hotel because he was wearing the stuff. (Levi Strauss obligingly ran him up a custom denim tuxedo so he wouldn't have that problem again.) By then denim was a symbol of youthful defiance, embraced by Marlon Brando, James Dean and -- well, just about every self-respecting rebel without a cause. Even Elvis, who didn't often wear denim in public during the early part of his career (like many Southerners, he associated it with rural poverty), eventually succumbed. Now we're all rebels, even a billionaire CEO like Steve Jobs, who wears blue jeans and a black turtleneck whenever unveiling new Apple Computer products.

Although a powerful force for evil, denim has achieved a status that will come as no surprise to fashion historians. Like camouflage fabric, aviator sunglasses and work boots, blue jeans were probably destined for ubiquity thanks to an iron-clad rule of attire adoption. "The sort of garments that become fashionable most rapidly and most completely," Alison Lurie reminds us in "The Language of Clothes," "are those which were originally designed for warfare, dangerous work or strenuous sports."

I can only hope the Obama administration sees denim for what it is: a ghastly but potentially lucrative source of much-needed revenue. Let's waste no time in imposing a hefty sumptuary tax on the stuff. It's a great example of "soft paternalism" (especially if the pants are pre-washed). We can close the budget deficit at the same time we eradicate the fashion deficit. All we've got to do is impose a federal levy on Levi's.

Mr. Akst is a writer in New York's Hudson Valley.
Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page W11

I LIKE THIS GUY



Webb has started the ball rolling on a study that will eventually he hopes change our penal system. Ours is broken as everyone by now certainly knows. What would work? A congressional study might start to find out. Obviously the idea of rehabilitation has to be the main outcome of a new plan. Inmates come out meaner than when they went in, and more proficient in their criminal speciality.

There has to be someway to enable the felon with some form of legal occupations when they return to society. There must be a way to infuse some element of hope that there is a better way to live. Any success that is achieved is a success for the individual and for our country in so many ways.

Rush Limbaugh utterances.

Metro Goldwyn Mayer used the tag for this photo of 'More stars than in the heavens' I posted this many moons ago, but I didn't have all the names of the stars. I do now.

 

Front L-R Lionel Barrymore, June Allyson, Leon Ames, Fred Astaire, Edward Arnold, Lassie, Mary Astor, Ethyl Barrymore, Spring Byington, James Craig, Arlene Dahl
2nd. Gloria DeHaven, Tom Drake, Jimmy Durante, Vera-Ellen, Errol Flynn, Clark Gable, Ava Gardner, Judy Garland, Betty Garrett, Edmund Gween, Kathryn Grayson, Van Heflin
3rd. Kathryn Hepburn, John Hodiak, Claude Jarman Jr., Van Johnson, Jennifer Jones, Louis Jourdan, Howard Keel, Gene Kelly, Alf Kjellin, Angela Landsbury, Mario Lanza, Janet Leigh
4th. Peter Lawford, Jeanette McDonald, Ann Miller, Richardo Montalban, Jules Munshin, George Murphy, Reginald Owen, Walter Pidgeon, Jane Powell, Ginger Rogers, Frank Sinatra, Red Skelton
Back. Alexis Smith, Ann Southern, J. Carroll Naish, Dean Stockwell, Louis Stone, Clinton Sundberg, Robert Taylor, Audrey Totter, Spencer Tracy, Esther Williams, Keenan Wynn

A bigger than life drawing of Cary Grant, who in his acting life was just that. The movie that they reference is NORTH BY NORTHWEST. A movie of an innocent man being accused of doing many bad things, which of course he did not do. He is being chased here and there, and eventually on to a train where he meets EVA MARIE SAINT, where they in record time relocate to her room. It has some very sophisticated and sexy dialogue for that day. It is a really good movie and Grant hardly breaks a sweat.

 

Yeah I do have a sore back today, how'd you guess?

MILLION DOLLAR BABY, A REALLY GOOD MOVIE.

I love it when I watch a movie expecting nothing and getting back a really good, enjoyable flick. That was the case with MILLION DOLLAR BABY. I had rejected looking at the movie because I thought the premise was pretty lame. Also I'm not into boxing movies in general and women's boxing in particular. But the time was right, the president didn't need me for anything at that particular moment and I had just gotten comfortably seated, and the choices boiled down to the 'baby' or watching another discussion about the bad economy. A no brainer as they say.

I should have known with a cast that includes EASTWOOD, FREEMAN, AND SWANK, it had to be good. It was. The talent of those three award winning actors flew out of the little screen and lit up my room. Eastwood was Eastwood. I thought, when the picture was coming to an end how old he is and I am going to really miss his acting, directing, and his continued vitality and contributions to show business in general. Morgan Freeman is multi-talented and can't seem to make a bad choice these days. He too is getting up there a bit in age and I put him along with Eastwood in the enjoy them now while you can category.

Aging aside, these actors are brilliant in this movie, along with an actor Hillary Swank that I think is in the Meryl Streep can't miss category. She is like Streep an extraordinary talent that can take any role and make it her own. She is so young compared to her fellow cast members and one can only imagine the awards she will continue to pile up. I knew she was good, but was late coming to the realization she is great. I won't be late from now on, I will be expecting a great performance, which is the responsibility of a star, to excel. I have no doubt she will. She has earned a seat beside Streep at the head table.

Watch the movie, it's all over the tv these days. It is a good one.

Tom Braden, the founder and co-host of crossfire with one of his co-hosts Robert Novak many years ago. Braden died this week, and Novak is terminally ill with brain cancer. Braden was also the writer of the book that spawned the television series Eight is Enough, about his real family.

READING:A SWEET PASTIME (a passing thought)

I find reading about as sweet a pastime a person could indulge in. Reading really is a sweet pleasure. It gins up your imagination and you can be taken out of yourself and into the mountains as I was last week when I read a paperback novel about mountain men. It was light, it was good. You have hero's and villains to root for and to hiss at.

1942 was a momentous year, and we all know what happened at Pearl Harbor, but through this new novel by Robert Conroy I am taken back there and am imagining what it might have been like had the Japanese made another air attack after the blow against our battleships. What would it be like if they had come back and destroyed the oil resources? It would have crippled the U.S. Navy's capabilities to keep what ships we had left, in the water. Japan conquers Hawaii, what next?

Good stuff, the mind reels with the possibilities before the author even gets us there.

Re-reading a favorite book I find is always a pleasure. I usually pick up a new or different insight on a character or the authors plot. Reading a book that you have liked well enough to give it another go is like returning home after a long trip away, comfortable and friendly.

Maybe a little digression here. I am thinking I could relieve some of my book overcrowding by donating some to my local library to be sold at their monthly book sale. It seems appropriate that as much as I enjoy my library, perhaps knowing someone else may enjoy the books at a next to nothing price seems right. Books are great travelers; as Ernest Hemingway said, a movable feast.

I love books, I have too many of them. As you can see these two bookcases are overcrowded and have turned into sloppy messes. I'll get to that soon, I say to myself.

I know that this is the start of a television series, I know it's the seventies, I know it's make believe, but look at the clothes the actors are wearing. Is it being unrealistic or did they really dress like that. Everyone is preppy, certainly nothing wrong with that, I liked preppy. I don't want to beat on our current kids but our kids seem to embrace salvation army and prison garb. Economics aside, and our egalitarian tendencies, I present another side. Since high school is the first step in the success ladder, should it not also not be the first step psychologically by trying to look your best, instead of trying to look as grungy as you can get by with.

I know that I'm old and am forgetting that rebellion for rebellion's sake is the norm for kids of that age. But I think that striving for a better life, which includes being better dressed is part of that, and I also know that being happy with targeting the worst instead of the best is a tad perverted and topsy turvy.

He was so good when he was so bad. Richard Widmark died last year at age 93.

A BOOK WILL NEVER LET YOU DOWN.....OOPS.

FROM THE BLOG-SCOUTING NEW YORK. Sculptures and story are very moving. Clicking on the title Lost at Sea will take you to his blog.

LOST AT SEA

One of my favorite public art pieces in New York City is probably familiar to anyone who has ever waited in line for the Liberty Island Ferry. Located on the west side of Battery Park, the American Merchant Mariners’ Memorial is a haunting tribute to commercial seamen who lost their lives, for whatever reason, on the water.

The memorial, designed by artist Marisol, was based on a true event during World War II, in which a Nazi U-boat attacked an American merchant marine vessel. While the marines held on to their sinking vessel, the Nazis photographed the victims, then left. The memorial is directly inspired by one of those photographs.

As you can see above, two men are desperately crying for help while a third tries to pull a victim from the water. I can’t tell you how moving this is at high tide, when the water laps at the man.

There is an unbelievable desperation in the piece, as the man struggles, veins practically bursting out of his arm, to grab hold of the seaman above and salvation as the merciless ocean tries to drag him down.

It’s all the more disturbing when you read the final line of the memorial’s plaque: “Left to the perils of the sea, the survivors later perished.” Despite their valiant efforts, they were dead from the start.

The caption on the picture is a little small. Here is what it says:

Phyllis Brown and Gerald Ford posed for illustrator Bradshaw Crandall, Cosmopolitan, April 1942

Jerry played football for Michigan, was a Navy officer, married a top model Betty, became a congressman and our 38th President. Good resume, good man. RIP Mr. President.

Today is the start of the new baseball season for most of baseball. The princeliest realm in all the baseball world will be once again in the spotlight. A new baseball castle paid for by the serfs of the realm will be opened for all to inspect and gush over. The anointed princes shall enter the field of combat adorned in their pinstriped working clothes, leaving their fully packed wallets in their personal safes located next to their room size lockers. A team comprised of the best money can buy will proudly enter the arena that is not the house that Ruth built but the jewel of the Bronx to be sure.

But the world of baseball is not always respectful of pomp and splendor. Denizens of the baseball world know the uncertainties that may befall even the mighty. The season is long and danger lurks around all the base paths. So when the days become cooler and shorter, whomever stands atop the baseball world is not always the richest of the rich.

All of which instills in all the rest of us the hope that the Gods of baseball sometimes grant all the laurels to a valiant lot, who caught all the breaks and all it's combatants stayed healthy to the end to stand tall and alone, the champions.

I, of course, know who that lot is, but in order not to spoil it for all of you I shall remain mute and smile knowingly to myself as the intricate game of baseball plays on.

Let the games begin.

re: Bones

I wrote Bones, obviously for young children, or for a parent to read to them would be best. I am going to add a few more sound effects which kids seem to like, heck so do I. The sound effects are hyperlinks with a line under a word. It was written as pure fun for me and I hope for your children.


BONES

By Jim Kittelberger-A hands on story

After finishing off the last chicken leg and last dab of potato , Grandpa said he was raring to go. He and Grandma, hand in hand with their grandchildren, headed for an area they called `the nature walk'.

Their son and daughter-in-laws' recently purchased house was located at the end of a lane, next to a small, very old cemetery, and it was very private. Since they bought the house in the winter, the `nature walk' was not discovered until springtime. It sat at the foot of the west lawn. The long sloping west lawn ran downward from the house until it leveled out, and changed from well-manicured lawn to thick overgrown brush and reeds.

It was so thick it was impossible to push the growth aside and look in. When you entered, through a barely noticeable footpath, you entered a completely natural world. It was the size of four football fields squared, and was kept in its natural state by its owner who the neighborhood kids called the hermit. In the early days in our state he would have been known as a solitary, a person comfortable around things of nature but not people. The rumors about the hermit were many. Some believed he kept the preserve as a home for various species of wild birds and small animals. Some say it was a natural habitat for plant life. That's what most people thought, but the neighborhood children thought much differently. The list of what they thought included, a home for a creature he had created in his basement, a secret burial ground for his one untrue love, who maybe, had threatened to leave him, or a place to grow a secret elixir that kept him young forever. The estimated guesses of the age of the hermit ranged from sixty, an age considered ancient by the very young, to one hundred and fifty.

Today the sun was shining brightly and the temperature was hovering around seventy, as nice a day as you could hope for. The two boys, Jack age five and his brother Paul, three, were, as usual, chattering like playful squirrels. Even though there were two years separating them, they got along uncommonly well. The third child, Caitlin, the first-born, possessed a private personality. She could be open and sociable one moment, then in the blink of an eye retreat into her private world. Her mood swings were sometimes confusing even to herself during this last year of 'childhood', before she entered into the world of the teen-ager, a time when children begin to get feelings of loneliness, even around family members. A time when they want to be with their friends, instead of their parents. That difficult time of maturing.

With Caitlyn leading the way, the five entered the preserve.

Waving grass as high as their shoulders immediately encircled them. As they pushed through, the grasses finally gave way to a path created by previous explorers. Finally they got through the high grasses and it's suffocating heat. A cooling breeze dried some of the perspiration that ran down their faces. WOW, that was some kind of breeze. Suddenly, they heard a screeching sound that caused all of them to stop in their tracks. Right in front of them, from out of the sky, appeared a large blue heron, landing not twenty feet in front of them in a marsh dead ahead. The boy's, Jack and Paul, grabbed their grandparent's hand and wrapped themselves up against their legs.

"Jeeze, that scared me", Jack said. "What the heck was that?"

Grandpa, who really didn't know much about birds, guessed correctly that it was a Blue Heron, taking a rest before flying on.
Luckily, a kind of path was visible and they decided that it made good sense to stay on it for a while, or they could easily get lost and probably walk right into the marsh. Marsh grasses and reeds replaced the tall wavy grass they had just walked through; Long stemmed teasels along the banks of the marsh seemed to dare you to come closer. If you dared, the sharp spines could cause a painful scratch, so we steered clear of them. Caitlyn walking ahead of us, and serving as our guide and scout, discovered another path angling off the straight path. She decided to go off on her own and explore, but stopped every few yards to sample some blackberries she discovered growing wild, but ripe and ready to eat.

After continuing on for about twenty yards she came to a clearing. After taking two steps into the clearing, she stopped, and felt her stomach turn over. Lying at the edge of the clearing was what remained of a deer, at least she thought it was, but now it was only some ribs and a little bit of fur. It appeared that the deer had been dead for long time. In the center of the clearing were the remains of a campfire. The ground was littered with bleached bones. There were jawbones, leg bones, and other bones that she could not identify. She screamed for us to hurry up and see what she had found. We caught up with her and the five of us stood there with our mouths open, not knowing exactly what we were looking at.

"I think I'm going to be sick," Caitlyn said, looking a little green around the gills.

"Oh Grandma, that really scares me." little Paul said. "Are you scared Grandma?" he asked, not leaving her side.

"No, Paulie," she said. "Bones don't scare Grandma," hoping that was the right thing to say.

"No, it doesn't scare me either Grandma," shot back Paulie, but hanging close.

"What should we do about this Grandpa?" they all asked at the same time.

"Please, one at a time," said Grandpa

"We'll have to make sure we tell your parents about this," he added, not really sure what had occurred here.

Just then, to add to the scariness and mystery of the find, the sky turned dark and the heavens let out a loud clap of thunder.


Then before they could even start for home, the rains came.

They were soaked to the skin before they had gone ten feet. At least it took their minds off what they had just seen. Now all they wanted to do was get home where it was dry.

That night in bed Caitlyn could not keep her mind from the bones they had seen that day. "Why were so many bones strewn all around the campfire site?" she thought.

Was it some homeless people that cooked the deer and ate it? Maybe devil worshippers? Maybe they used animals as sacrifices? Maybe they weren't all animal bones.

All these thoughts and more were flying around in her mind, until finally she became exhausted thinking about it and fell into a troubled sleep. When morning came, she awakened feeling tired. She descended the stairs deep in thought. As she was eating a bowl of cereal the phone rang.
It was her girl friend, Hillary. "Hi Cate, what do you want to do today?" she asked.

"Hill, I'm glad you called. The most neat-o thing has happened."

Later that day Cate explained to Hill what she had seen, and they hatched a plan. That night they each told their respective parents that they were staying at the others house overnight so they could be free to investigate the clearing at night and maybe see what was really happening.

The girls found out that the preserve was a much different place in the dark of night. They sat very close together under a large tree wondering aloud if this was such a good idea. Cate waited for Hill to make the first move, but Hill had no intention of moving from where she sat. Every sound was magnified and they seemed surrounded by whatever scary thing lived in here.

The sound of the high grass in the breeze seemed to be talking to them. It seemed to be saying, "BeeeWare, BeeeWare."

A bug landed on Cates face and she almost screamed, but knew she couldn't make a sound. She looked around about her, but could see nobody but Hill and she wasn't moving. Just then something scampered across the ground in front of them, and an owl from a nearby tree made a sound that sounded like, 'you, you." Was it telling them something?
Deciding that someone had to lead or there was no use to be here, Cate stood up, "O.K. let's go", she whispered. They started off down the path by the marsh. Their nerves were really on edge, so when a frog sitting on the path in front of them jumped into the marsh, they almost took off running.

"Now we have to calm down", Cate said.

"Yeah sure", whispered Hill. "I'm thinking this was a really bad idea, and I'm not certain I care what's happening down here. I'm thinking maybe we should just leave whatever is happening, just happen, and we should go home, take a bath and listen to some music."

"Come on Hill", said Cate, "we're here and we might as well stick it out."

"Well O.K.", Hill said, "but being down here in the dark is darn spooky."

Just as they got their courage back, they heard flapping. Looking up they saw a tree filled with bats that were spooked by all the noise the girls were making and flew off into the air. Bats fly erratically and they were going in all directions.

Several decided to swoop down towards the ground and the girls. They could no longer stay quiet as the bats flew at their faces, and they started to scream.

"EEEEEEEEEEEK"

Both girls were flailing their arms trying to keep the bats away from them, as their courage broke, and turning around they raced each other to see who could get out of there the quickest. As they ran, branches slapped at their faces. They didn't notice the pain at all until they got out of there, and were sitting down, catching their breaths.
They looked at each other and saw the red welts on their faces and their hair going every which way. Even though they were tired and hurt, they started giggling because they knew they were safe. They couldn't stop giggling until finally they were rolling on the ground.

After they calmed down, they sat up and decided that their investigation would have to wait for another time, or at least until it was daylight. Right now, a bath and maybe a midnight snack sounded real good.

(C) Copyright 2001 Jim Kittelberger. All Rights Reserved.

3D IN THE PALM OF YOUR HAND

Following the everyday something new technology market is kind of a fun thing to do. I'm not really a techie, or a geek, or a nerd, or whatever the current terms to know are. But some of this stuff sounds really kind of fun. I would not be able to afford many of the apps (a inside term I just had to throw in) that come available, but I can visualize what it might be like to own some of them. This one that I discovered today sounds very good. I was growing up when the first 3D films came out in the theaters, I was un-thrilled about the experience, but today I am old and the thought of watching 3D in the palm of my hand via my Ipod sounds, how should I say it, cool. Do you agree? Well how could you say without looking at the news release first. Look here.

NYT's NEW HARD TIMES

Could we possibly really be on the path to another 'great depression'? The New York Times is chronicling people who lived through the first and who fear we may be on the verge of another. In fairness there are two conversations, one with a man, the other a woman.

Today in 1860 the pony express was inaugurated with its first mail delivery from St. Joseph, Missouri to Sacramento, California.

Today a stamp costs $.42 to send a letter, or e-mail for zip. Well considering the costs of the computer, etc. etc. I'm not sure what it might end up costing.

LIGHTEN UP MS. COULTER

In her April 1 column, Ann Coulter fell for a fake April Fools' Day article by Car and Driver magazine that claimed that President Obama has ordered General Motors and Chrysler to cease their participation in NASCAR because it is an "unnecessary expenditure." Coulter wrote, "If Obama can tell GM and Chrysler that their participation in NASCAR is an 'unnecessary expenditure,' isn't having public schools force students to follow Muslim rituals, recite Islamic prayers and plan 'jihads' also an 'unnecessary expenditure'?" Car and Driver originally posted an April 1 story online -- since removed -- with the headline, "Obama Orders Chevrolet and Dodge Out Of NASCAR," and the text, "With their racing budgets deemed 'unnecessary expenditures,' GM and Chrysler are ordered to cease racing operations at the end of the season." However, Car and Driver later clarified that the story was an April Fools' Day joke, then removed the story from its website.

"We crucify ourselves between two thieves: regret for yesterday and fear of tomorrow."-Fulton Oursler, American journalist and author 1893-1952 wrote this and as you age and have more history behind you then you have ahead of you what he says is right on target.

If we have lived a fairly decent life as most of us have tried to do, what we regret from all our yesterdays is probably pumped up by time and our imaginings. People we have wronged, and we regret doing it, most likely don't remember the incident or us for that matter. If you remember those times as I do, then you and I are putting ourselves through unnecessary turmoil. What say we forgive ourselves. Good! As for the fear of the future, what is it we fear? Is it eternity or the door we have to go through to get there? I don't know either, so I am going to try hard to not dwell on it and enjoy the rest of the journey only using the calender to make notes of appointments and fun things to fill my days.

The boys of the senate, grassley and conrad, getting down and a tad dirty. Sounds like a couple of us regular guys snapping jokes over a couple beers.

THOUGHT FOR TODAY,from my daily newspaper. (I'm not sure if it's suppose to be funny, I'm not into Spanish humor but here it is:

Si mi abuela tuviera ruedas seria una bicicleta." (If my grandmother had wheels, she's be a bicycle.)-Spanish proverb.

Detail of Number 8 1949 by JACKSON POLLOCK

The stuff that dreams are made of.

A SHORT THOUGHT

The stuff that dreams are made of, describes exactly what the Maltese Falcon is, as described by Sam Spade at the end of the famous, if somewhat, or more than somewhat, very confusing movie.

It also might describe our ambitions, or describe what we were going to be when we grow up. Some people I know were certain of what they wanted to be, and never veered from the path to get there. Others like me never had a clue what they wanted to be, much less how to get there even if they did.

I suspect that my 'lack of a plan' plan is the most prevalent amongst us. We live a sort of pinball kind of occupational life, not one I would recommend, but that's the way it went.

Looking back on it now from that place in life where we fill out the line on the form with the word none, or retired I have to consider myself lucky, and that is a very appropriate word, because my occupational life was certainly a crap shoot. I never planned one step along the way. This is not the way to do it. But I was never inspired by a doctor, or lawyer, or cop, or businessman, or scientist, or soldier. My parents never tried to inspire me one way or the other, it probably would not have worked, but on the other hand they never stood in my way, in fact they asked me what I was thinking about and would have financed schooling if I could decide.

But no I never could decide. I believed in the Huckleberry Finn school of academic and occupational achievement. I preferred to float down the river and take whatever came.

A risky way to deal with one of life's most important decisions, that choice that will provide the financing for that stuff that dreams are made of, but human nature is what it is. In my life I was given a strange sort of logic, the feeling inside me of knowing that jobs are just jobs and without short changing an employer, a way to make money. It was not a religious experience, at least not with me.

This is certainly not a primer on HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS, that would be an ironic joke. The only thought I wish to leave in this small slice of life piece is don't deny your human nature and reject the Huckleberry Finn school of academic and occupational achievement out of hand, because while you're lazily floating down that river you just might understand what dreams are really made of.

Loving, forgiving, talking, don't always insist you are right, sometimes being wrong and admitting it is good. It can't hurt you and increasing 'your friend for life's' self esteem is more important in the long run. Always talk, establish a team of us against the world if need be. Remembering good things is enjoyable for the both of you. Forget the bad times, reliving them over and over serves no good purpose. Always remember this woman or man you married long ago was once young, but not now. Be kind to each other, kind, loving words will help heal a little those aches and pains we've picked up from somewhere along the way. Remember to say in deed as well as in words that you're sure glad we made this trip together.



Assumed authority for above words? Married fifty-three years and hoping for fifteen more.

Mitch Albom on the Charlie Rose show lamenting about his dying town of Detroit and the automobile industry. We here in Ohio feel or will feel their pain with industry shutting or moving. Cleveland has very little downtown now. Here in my hometown, we have a General Motors plant that is losing people, and is on the endangered list for sometime this year of closing completely. What this will do to my town which is already distressed from industry disappearing over the years and our tax base dwindling, causing our infrastructure to decay along with empty houses and the rest of the rust belt nation syndrome of despair? It is a question with a dim prognoses as an answer.

A NEW WORD

I work crosswords, my wife works crosswords. That said, you have to guess that I like words and the occasional discovering of new words. It is a great discovery when the new word is a word that I may use again. When the newly, great discovered word, is a word that describes me or my surroundings, it is better yet. What is this great new word that I discovered?

Well, now that I have gone to a new paragraph, as if in anticipation of great revelations with accompanying ruffles and flourishes from the computer room orchestra, you're going to be disappointed. Well maybe I go too far. I feel an anticlimax right about here.

I must describe my physical condition at this moment so you can see how my new word fits in. I am old.

My new word is: SENESCENCE, which means growing older, aging. Now I certainly am going to find ample opportunities to throw that new baby in somewhere in some conversation in the future. O.K. so it's not that great, but I'm in a state of senescence, so give me a break.

A SHORT FILM. WILL IT BE TIME WELL SPENT, OR WASTED?

Signs
Uploaded by mg02

received this comment from sondra about the corruption of our English language, and the seeming unwillingness on our part, to address it's importance:

Loved the article about "seen". I agree that it is getting worse and worse and even among educated people.

We have several new doctors at our hospital and in my job as a medical transcriptionist I hear these capable and highly educated physicians absolutely destroy our English language. Trust me it is not the foreign ones, but our own sons and daughters. As an example:

"knowing the imponderances and risks of surgery, these risks were discussed with the patient including death, and other comorbidities".

After I gained my composure with the word "imponderances", I quickly got hit again with "including death and other comorbidites". After death what other comorbidities can there be?

I could go on and on, but the fact that I need all the English skills I ever learned in my everyday job, and will be reprimanded if I don't use them correctly, to have to transcribe this crappy language is more than this old lady can handle on some days. Growing up, doing well in English class by speaking and writing correctly was mandatory. I even liked diagramming sentences. I could go on and on about the horrors I hear everyday by accomplished people, but then I wouldn't get any sleep tonight.

America we are losing pride in our country, let's not lose the language also.

When did the elusive verb saw, the past tense of see, go missing? I think it has been several years since I last saw it. In its place, the verb seen has taken over. Now seen is a perfectly good word, I like it, but it should know its place. It's been a few years since I was in school, but I was taught to conjugate verbs. It was standard instruction in grade schools in the forties and fifties. It went like this. I see. I saw. I have seen. Seen needed a helper, it is not one of those words that stand-alone. But today, now you listen, how many times do you hear, I seen it. That is not right.


Now the English language may not be as melodious as French, but it is the language used by the majority of the world, and as such, a little care should be taken to speak it properly. I have talked to some teachers about this corruption of the language and they are aware of it. Why then I ask, is it not being corrected? I think, perhaps, some of the younger teachers use the same bad grammar. If that is not so, why then do I read books that are supposed to be edited by educated people, being printed with incorrect grammar? I think maybe some editors don't know incorrect grammar when they see it.


Perhaps you are saying, so what. Who cares? I, for one. I cannot stand the corrupting of our language and it's substitution of mongrelized words. Slang is fun when we know it's slang, but I think more people than I care to guess, don't know the slang from the correct word.


I suppose it is more of the, in your face, if you don't like it, so what, attitudes of today. It is egalitarianism gone too far, when the young people aim down instead of up, in their use of the English language. The French love their language, we perhaps, should learn to love ours maybe just a little bit more.

BAD OLD DAYS REVISITED?

How goes the cliche 'So many of us are but one paycheck away from life on the streets'. In this land of plenty it doesn't seem possible in the 21st century, but evidence seems to be springing up around the country in these small (so far) Hoovervilles. See this slideshow. One of the slides, slides #6 of 13 show a picture of one of two men living in a tool shed the replica of one which I have in my back yard for tools and seasonal equipment.

I was born in the last depression, and I never thought seriously that I would come any closer to those times again than watching THE GRAPES OF WRATH. but darn if it doesn't, day by day, show evidence that Tom Joad's ghost is walking our land again.

The impression I get from Washington is that President Obama and his army of economists on the government payroll are starting to implement patches here and there that seem to be taking hold, we can only hope and pray that is so. My evidence which really may be more hope than fact is based on the stock markets stabilization. It hasn't regained it's loses, but at least it is back to it's normal win some, lose some up and down days. I'll take that on a wishful scale as good news. The classic depression and classic depression movies documenting it are far in the past and I for one hope it stays right there. I am buoyed by optimism that Obama and his steady demeanor will prevail and kill the beast before it re-emerges too much further out of it's 'been there, don't want to revisit,' place in the past.

Slideshow courtesy of the New York Times.

I find this picture from shorpy.com fascinating. This was the caption provided by the site: Washington, D.C., circa 1917. A Victrola talking machine on the delivery wagon at the Woodward & Lothrop department store. Harris & Ewing.

1917? I am enthralled by the power of the picture to send my tiny brain reeling. It's going into Woody's? Do they have an electronics department? I wonder what the price was?

If you have never gone to shorpy.com I would recommend that you do now, if for nothing else to watch the comments that might come in.

From: S.


You win some, you lose some.

The Public Reader always mindful of it's readership, and aware that finances are in short supply with our economic crisis getting worse, and knowing that an inexpensive vacation adventure would be just the ticket, we offer this:

For the adventurous spirit on a severely limited vacation budget:

"Go Club Iceberg".

Does history really go in cycles?

Sometimes it seems that way. If our source for the fact of the matter is Frank Sinatra we'd be talking about our love life, but this old New Yorker cover dated 1933 could be redated to today and be recycled. The pain it reflects is, or will be if all our crack economists can't get a handle on it, growing deeper and wider. History sometimes sucks doesn't it.

I was doing a little twittering (trying to figure out what that's all about) and found this at one of my stops. It's a little late since February is Washington and Lincoln's birthdays, but I still want to post it. Some of these guys get very little face time.

George Carlin on Aging (attributed to Carlin, but now questionable, but who cares?)

GEORGE CARLIN'S VIEWS ON AGING

---

Do you realize that the only time in our lives when we like to get old is when we're kids?

If you're less than 10 years old, you're so excited about aging that you think in fractions. "How old are you?" "I'm four and a half!" You're never thirty-six and a half. You're four and a half, going on five!

That's the key. You get into your teens, now they can't hold you back.

You jump to the next number, or even a few ahead. "How old are you?" "I'm gonna be 16!" You could be 13, but hey, you're gonna be 16!

And then the greatest day of your life . . . you become 21. Even the words sound like a ceremony . . . YOU BECOME 21. . . YEAS!!!

But then you turn 30. Oooohh, what happened there? Makes you sound like bad milk. He TURNED, we had to throw him out. There's no fun now, you're just a sour-dumpling. What's wrong? What's changed?

You BECOME 21, you TURN 30, then you're PUSHING 40. Whoa! Put on the brakes, it's all slipping away. Before you know it, you REACH 50 . . . and your dreams are gone.

But wait!!! You MAKE it to 60. You didn't think you would!

So you BECOME 21, TURN 30, PUSH 40, REACH 50 and MAKE it to 60. You've built up so much speed that you HIT 70!

After that it's a day-by-day thing; you HIT Wednesday! You get into your 80s and every day is a complete cycle; you HIT lunch; you TURN 4:30; you REACH bedtime.

And it doesn't end there. Into the 90s, you start going backwards; "I was JUST 92."

Then a strange thing happens. If you make it over 100, you become a little kid again. "I'm 100 and a half!"

May you all make it to a healthy 100 and a half!!



HOW TO STAY YOUNG

1. Throw out nonessential numbers. This includes age, weight and height. Let the doctor worry about them. That is why you pay him/her.

2. Keep only cheerful friends. The grouches pull you down.

3. Keep learning. Learn more about the computer, crafts, gardening, whatever. Never let the brain idle. " An idle mind is the devil's workshop." And the devil's name is Alzheimer's.

4. Enjoy the simple things.

5. Laugh often, long and loud. Laugh until you gasp for breath.

6. The tears happen. Endure, grieve, and move on. The only person who is with us our entire life, is ourselves. Be ALIVE while you are alive.

7. Surround yourself with what you love, whether it's family, pets, keepsakes, music, plants, hobbies, whatever. Your home is your refuge. 8 Cherish your health: If it is good, preserve it. If it is unstable, improve it. If it is beyond what you can improve, get help.

9. Don't take guilt trips. Take a trip to the mall, to the next county, to a foreign country, but NOT to where the guilt is.

10. Tell the people you love that you love them, at every opportunity.

AND ALWAYS REMEMBER:

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.

Welcome fellow survivor to the vernal equinox.

WHEN I DAYDREAM



When I daydream,
I oft times dream in black and white.
Of sitting in a dining car on a speeding train,
smoking, and listening to the different conversations all around me.


Have you heard the latest Miller tune?
Jeepers, it's keen.


My son is in the Pacific somewhere,
I worry about him so.


Mrs. Roosevelt says in the Saturday Evening Post that many things will be different when this is all over.


Please marry me
I may not come back.


I used all my ration stamps
and bought a big steak.


Make sure you read part of my letters to the kids so they don't forget me.


Did you see the picture in Photoplay
of Gable in his uniform? He's so dreamy.


I hardly have enough gas to go anywhere,
darn war.


I understand there's no more sleeping space available, we'll just have to sit here and talk all night.


My dad got killed at Guadalcanal.
Gosh, I miss him.

Scrabble is fun, but maybe there might be a limit....or not.

I have been wanting to post this with some up to the moment edgy political comment, but alas I can't think of anything. So I will post it because I just think it's funny and I like cats so it's not anti-cat.