DECK US ALL WITH BOSTON CHARLIE

You often hear me sing the beginning of this little ditty.
Thank you, Walt Kelly.

Deck us all with Boston Charlie,
Walla Walla, Wash., an' Kalamazoo!
Nora's freezin' on the trolley,
Swaller dollar cauliflower alley-garoo!

Don't we know archaic barrel
Lullaby Lilla Boy, Louisville Lou?
Trolley Molly don't love Harold,
Boola boola Pensacoola hullabaloo!

Bark us all bow-wows of folly,
Polly wolly cracker 'n' too-da-loo!
Donkey Bonny brays a carol,
Antelope Cantaloupe, 'lope with you!

Hunky Dory's pop is lolly gaggin' on the wagon,
Willy, folly go through!
Chollie's collie barks at Barrow,
Harum scarum five alarm bung-a-loo!

Dunk us all in bowls of barley,
Hinky dinky dink an' polly voo!
Chilly Filly's name is Chollie,
Chollie Filly's jolly chilly view halloo!

Bark us all bow-wows of folly,
Double-bubble, toyland trouble!  Woof, woof, woof!
Tizzy seas on melon collie!
Dibble-dabble, scribble-scrabble!  Goof, goof, goof!

I miss you, POGO! - MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!

VOLUNTEERING & THE TEN PRINCIPLES

I've spent the last couple of days volunteering again at the Neighborhood Center, the Camden non-profit that gives the homeless a daily lunch and provides child care and an after-school safe-place for teens. I basically do odd jobs to help out, and I also use my junk-business contacts to find stuff they need from time to time. It's a great deal more satisfying than I ever imagined it would be when I stumbled on the place while looking to occupy myself last Thanksgiving. They're almost embarrassingly appreciative. I suppose it's tough for them in this poor economy.

Some of you may know I've been exploring joining the community of individuals who every year go into the Nevada wastes and create Burning Man City. I believe my efforts for the Neighborhood Center mesh well with at least some of the 10 Principles of Burning Man:

Radical Inclusion
Anyone may be a part of Burning Man. We welcome and respect the stranger. No prerequisites exist for participation in our community.

Gifting
Burning Man is devoted to acts of gift giving. The value of a gift is unconditional. Gifting does not contemplate a return or an exchange for something of equal value.

Decommodification
In order to preserve the spirit of gifting, our community seeks to create social environments that are unmediated by commercial sponsorships, transactions, or advertising. We stand ready to protect our culture from such exploitation. We resist the substitution of consumption for participatory experience.

Radical Self-reliance
Burning Man encourages the individual to discover, exercise and rely on his or her inner resources.

Radical Self-expression
Radical self-expression arises from the unique gifts of the individual. No one other than the individual or a collaborating group can determine its content. It is offered as a gift to others. In this spirit, the giver should respect the rights and liberties of the recipient.

Communal Effort
Our community values creative cooperation and collaboration. We strive to produce, promote and protect social networks, public spaces, works of art, and methods of communication that support such interaction.

Civic Responsibility
We value civil society. Community members who organize events should assume responsibility for public welfare and endeavor to communicate civic responsibilities to participants. They must also assume responsibility for conducting events in accordance with local, state and federal laws.

Leaving No Trace
Our community respects the environment. We are committed to leaving no physical trace of our activities wherever we gather. We clean up after ourselves and endeavor, whenever possible, to leave such places in a better state than when we found them.

Participation
Our community is committed to a radically participatory ethic. We believe that transformative change, whether in the individual or in society, can occur only through the medium of deeply personal participation. We achieve being through doing. Everyone is invited to work. Everyone is invited to play. We make the world real through actions that open the heart.

Immediacy
Immediate experience is, in many ways, the most important touchstone of value in our culture. We seek to overcome barriers that stand between us and a recognition of our inner selves, the reality of those around us, participation in society, and contact with a natural world exceeding human powers. No idea can substitute for this experience.

I should say that I attended a meet-up of some of the NJ Burners Sunday, and was delighted to be very warmly received. I also learned that there are regional Burning Man events, and will probably attend one of those before committing to the big trip. But one of the first things to come out of my attendance is that I've finally joined Facebook, since that's where the Burners communicate.

VIRGINIA

I took a road trip this week into Virginia to pick up some items I bought for the Neighborhood Center, the Camden non-profit where I volunteer from time to time.  Those of you who think I live in the country should have been with me to see where the real wilderness holds sway.  You sometimes need to go quite a distance between signs of human habitation.  But this is very pretty country.

I was worried about the weather, since a storm blew by on Sunday, but the roads were really clear.  I took a train to DC and picked up a truck from there.  On the trip west on I66 it was clear from the trees that there had been an extensive ice storm.  The trees were really pretty, but even if I still had my little digital cameral there wasn't much of a picture since it was cloudy, even a little foggy.  Further south on I81 there were even fewer signs of the storm.  The only real road issues I had during the whole trip were in my home town of Willingboro, which hadn't been cleared properly as late as Tuesday night.

The last 40 or so miles were on I64, which is by far and away the loneliest interstate highway I've ever seen.  For much of the trip (at around 6PM) I was the only vehicle on the road.  In either direction.  During the day, the next day, it was less crowded than the NJ Turnpike would have been at 3AM on a Sunday morning.  Mind you, it's not like it's a primary artery.  It goes to Beckly, WV.  (I know, where?)

Some things I discovered (or rediscovered) about Virginia.  The people are as pleasant as I remember them from my time in the Navy.  Of course, people everywhere are pleasant to one degree or another (Manhattan being an exception, of course), but the soft southern accent makes Virginians seem nicer, I guess.  One thing I wasn't prepared for is that people were smoking in the bar.  Although there's an anti-smoking law that looks like New Jersey's on paper, the general southern cussedness means that they look for any loophole.  So althoug the restaurant is smoke-free, they isolate the bar in a separate room and declare it exempt from the restriction.  I can't remember the last time I was in a smoke-filled bar.  But there actually was effective ventilation, so it wasn't so bad.  Another thing is that the speed limit for large stretches of highway is 70mph (although a fully loaded truck sometimes can't take full advantage in those hills).

The other thing I experienced was pumping my own gas.  Apparently NJ and one other state in the entire country are alone in mandating that an attendant pump your gas.&nbsp: Everywhere else you do it yourself (or pay extra for attendant service).

NIKKI & TEMPERANCE

I've written before about the enjoyment I've gotten from the Nikki Heat novels, written by the writers of the Castle TV show.  I can't get over my bemusement at the layers they've generated.  This picture is a good example.

This is Laura Prepon, as the actress Natalie Rhodes, in character as Detective Nikki Heat (L), a character in a set of real books written by a fictional writer, Richard Castle, based on the life of Detective Kate Beckett (R) played by Stana Katic.  Natalie is preparing for her role as Nikki in a new (fictional) movie and is shadowing Det. Beckett.  The complexity is just fascinating.

I've downloaded and read two of the Nikki Heat novels, and will probably get the whole series eventually.  I've now discovered another set of books that I might need to get into.

I've noticed before that the TV show Bones has a starting credit that says the show is based on the life of Kathy Reich.  Now here are the wrinkles.  Kathy Reich is a real, and very well-respected forensic anthropologist who has written (among other things) fifteen novels about a fictional version of herself named Temperance Brennan.  Although an executive producer and occasional writer for the TV show, she has maintained that the show's plot is not based on her books.  She views TV's Temperance as a sort of prequel to her book series.  Just to complete the circle, the TV Brennan has written several best-selling novels about a fictional forensic anthropologist named (wait for it) Kathy Reich.

So anyway, now that I've finally finished The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Steig Larsson, I think I'll get started on the Reich books, beginning with Deja Dead.

By the way, NBC hasn't pick up on these tie-in possibilities.  Timothy McGee's novels based on his NCIS teammates, Deep Six and Deep Six: Rock Hollow, have not been published.

SO THIS IS THE LIVING ROOM

I'm writing this from a place in the house that has seen very little use over the years - one of the recliner sections on the big white couch.  This imposing monster has been a hulking presence in our living room for over thirty years.  In fact, it's one of the reasons we had to move from the ranch on Expert Lane; there was too much furniture for that small space (plus Cynthia wanted an upstairs bedroom).

In any event, since we had few visitors, it has sat in glorious isolation as the centerpiece of her formal living room - more of an exhibition piece than furniture, really.  By the way, although I'm relaxing in it today (after a strenuous visit to NY over Friday and Saturday), there are no snacks or sodas.  I might be rebellious, but I'm not stupid.  If I had to clean one section, I'd have to do them all.

I'm hoping to not have the opportunity to express myself this way much longer; I've listed it on Craigslist.

By the way, for those of you that didn't catch the reference, the title paraphrases a commercial from some years ago where the tag line is 'so this is the dining room', another little-used room in many American houses.  Oddly enough, when I googled for the reference, all the items returned pointed to commercials for a play called 'The Dining Room'.  If anyone remembers what was actually being advertised in the original commercial, please share.

THANKSGIVING

I'm thankful it's stopped raining, and that the windstorm didn't cause me any damage.

I'm thankful to be in reasonably good health, all things considered, and that I have my faculties (although my memory largely resides in my computer these days).

I'm thankful for my friends and family, near and far.

I'm thankful for the genius on the TV show Castle who decided to have someone actually write the Nikki Heat novels.

I'm thankful I don't have to eat turkey, but that I was able over the past couple of days to help the Neighborhood Center provide over four hundred Camden families with the opportunity.

And finally, I'm thankful for the thirty-seven years Cynthia and I had together, and I hope her Heaven has a big flower garden.

THE NEIGHBORHOOD CENTER - CAMDEN

Last Thanksgiving, casting about for something to do with myself, I decided I should do a volunteer stint.  Not belonging to any church or service organization, I wasn't sure where to go, so I asked my trusty Google, and noticed this place in Camden serving meals. 

I imagine there may be similar places closer to home, but Camden is really the neediest spot in south Jersey.  Anyway, it appears there were others who shared my urge, and they had more of us volunteers than they really needed.  I guess everyone figures that Thanksgiving is the day to show up, but this place's mission is broader than the one day. 

So this year, I'm working the Monday and Tuesday before Thanksgiving in their 'grocery store'.

Some food banks pre-package the shopping bags for folks, but the Neighborhood Center sets up more like a real store and allows folks to pick and choose in various categories.  Families have to sign up in advance, so they know how many will be expected (around 450 this year) and can group stuff so everyone gets a pretty even chance at the kind of meal they want.  Shoppers even have their choice of turkey or ham.  It's more work for us, but there's a little more dignity involved for the patrons.

By the way, it irks me that people seem to use a giving opportunity like this just to clean out their cupboards with no thought as to what might actually be needed.  I mean, who eats sauerkraut for Thanksgiving?  Oh, well.  Anything for a tax deduction.  And you can tell that most of the givers are not from the community - there was no okra, for example.  But the generosity was otherwise heartwarming. 

There was an orientation and lunch for volunteers on Saturday, and a student jazz group from the Center's after-school program provided some very good entertainment.

The Neighborhood Center is a hundred-year-old community organization that provides nutrition support, daycare services, a safe after-school location, and a preschool.  It's not a church, but is supported in one way or another by local churches.  The main building even looks something like a church, but it was purpose-built in 1925.

Here's the link to their website.

http://www.ncicamden.org/about-us/mission-and-history/

Give 'em a little cash, if you feel the urge.

IT'S ONLY THE WIND

During the wind storm I alluded to the other night, I heard a loud thump from the back of the house.  I was afraid the wind had ripped off some of the plastic roof panels from the back porch, as had happened in Sandy.  But when I checked, they were all secure.  The next morning, however, the source of the noise was revealed.  The wind had managed to blow my canoe off its resting place on the end of my deck.  This beast is all aluminum and weighs 85 pounds, so this was quite a feat.  Since smaller items had not been blown away, I surmise that the wind got under the canoe and lifted it off.  I'll have to come up with a way to tie it down, I suppose.  Here are before & after pictures.

WINTER - FINALLY

It has been an unusually long time in coming, but Mother Nature has finally brought winter to the East coast.  The temperatures which once hovered in the 60's have fled, and we're down to much more seasonal 40's for daytime highs.  And we've finally started dipping below freezing at night.

Outside tonight the wind is howling, and the ground is white, although with some mini-hail or sleet, not snow.

This is my kind of weather, and I've been able to break out the heavy coat at last.  In the summer I just look fat, but bundled up in my winter duds I am a much more imposing figure.

Still, as I sit here listening to the wind, I must admit it is the sort of night where I'm glad I'm tucked indoors with my Jamison-laced decaf.

NEW GUILTY PLEASURE - NIKKI HEAT

I've been a fan of the TV show Castle for some time now, and I've finally broken down and bought my first Nikki Heat novel.  For those of you who are not fans, here's a guide.  'Castle' is about a writer who gets a gig following a female NYC homicide detective around to gather material for a series of novels he will base on her.  The series is as much about the evolving dynamic between Rick Castle (Nathan Fillion) and Detective Kate Beckett (Stana Katic) as it is about the murders they solve.  New episodes air on ABC on Monday night, with reruns on TNT.  In any event, the fake writer (or the show's writer(s), anyway) has now written five real novels starring Detective Heat, and I have just finished my first - 'Heat Wave'  (It was also my first e-book, by the way.) 

One thing I'm puzzling over is whether the book would be as much fun without the images of the characters from the TV show.  It appears to be pretty well written, but I'm hardly a literary critic.  I would expect good writing, of course, from a show that features guest appearances by James Patterson and the late Stephen J. Cannell as Castle's poker buddies.  But the book was a hoot.

One of the images I had to choose in my head was who to visualize as Nikki Heat.  Let me explain.  In season 3 it develops that Hollywood is going to make Heat Wave into a movie, and the precinct is visited by the actress who will play Nikki, Natalie Rhodes (Laura Prepon).  During the course of the episode, Natalie gets progressively further into the character of Nikki, and into Beckett's head as well.  Here is a shot of the two of them.  That's Natalie as Nikki on the left, and Det. Beckett on the right.  Now as much as I love Beckett's character, I try to see Natalie when reading the book.

 
Did I say this was a hoot!

Plus the both of them are seriously hot!

AUCTIONS ARE ODD

I've always known that the business of buying and selling what I call 'stuff'', whether it be antiques, collectibles, or everyday junk, is subject to the whims of buyers and sellers.  I remember a Tiffany lamp I had one time that dozens of people told me was over-priced, until the day someone bought it and thanked me for giving him such a bargain. 

Today at an estate auction in Freehold I got another couple of samples.  They sold a very nice small fiberglass sailboat, about 16-18 feet, in excellent condition, with a trailer, for $275!!!  The trailer's worth that much.  This thing was pristine, having obviously been kept under cover in a barn.  It was all I could do not to bid on it at that ridiculous price, but I'm an indifferent sailor, and my canoe is perfectly capable of dunking me, thank you very much.

On the other end of the scale, they sold a polished rectangular block of some heavy wood, about 12"x6"x3", obviously a doorstop, for $45!!!

All day long, things went for too much or too little.  I got a couple of box lots for $15 each, on the too little end of the scale.  What a business.

AWFUL MOMENTS

I’ve essentially turned off my television for the next week.  The new Time Magazine showed up in my mailbox today with the all-too-familiar picture of a Dallas motorcade on the cover.  It will be everywhere for the next seven days.  There are two such searing events in the lives of most of us, three for those of our parents’ generation, and each is burned into us in such a way as to become part of who we are.  This post appears in both my personal and my political blogs because of this duality, a national experience personally shared and experienced.

I first began to feel old when a group of co-workers and I were exchanging reminiscences of where we were that November day when the news came, and a bright young thing piped up: “I hadn’t been born yet”.  And in my mind I thought: ‘really, it’s been that long?’  I do, of course, remember that day with some embarrassment since I made some smart-assed remark to the first kid to stick his head in the 10^th grade geometry class window to say: “the president’s been shot”.  In my defense, none of us could believe the news at first, but I, always quick with the least appropriate statement, said something like: “who, Lincoln?”

Anyway, I still cannot view that Dallas footage, and so I’m giving up TV for a week, just as I do for the week after Labor Day each year, and as our parents do around the first week of December.  I can’t even look at the weather channel since I’m sure they’re planning a special on why good weather led to Kennedy’s shooting.  Even one of my favorite escapist TV shows – Bones – did an episode on the assassination once.

One of the main reasons I can’t watch is that I can’t take the barrage of ‘experts’, each claiming they’ve proven some conspiracy theory: there were two assassins; Roosevelt knew the Japanese were coming; the CIA/mob/Cubans killed Kennedy; Bush and Condoleezza Rice knew what the hijackers were planning, and so on.  In my mind, these wild-eyed fame-chasers are just a subset of our polarized, screaming society, where tables are being pounded and spittle is flying on every channel, from all sides of the political spectrum, on TV or You-Tube, and each has a more horrible allegation regarding his opponent than the next.

So now, especially now, by all the Gods you profess to believe in, can you all please just SHUT UP!

POMPEII EXHIBIT

My sister and I went to the new Pompeii exhibit at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, and while it was nice enough, I’m afraid I was disappointed.  The exhibit does give a very clear picture of life in and around 79CE, mostly as enjoyed by wealthier Roman citizens.  There is a wide range of everyday items, like pots and fishing gear, as well as some astonishingly intricate gold and silver jewelry.  All of this is instructive and interesting, but all related to life.  What the exhibit fails to convey is the awful death these people suffered. 

Those who know me well know that I wear a silver ring containing a black piece of Vesuvius rock.  I bought this some 40 years ago when I visited Pompeii for real.  The ancient city and its attendant volcano were only a short bus-ride from the naval base at Naples, where my ship was home-ported.  I have tried and failed many times to convey how absolutely eerie it was to walk around in those deathly quiet streets.  Such tourists as there were spoke in hushed tones, partly because voices spoken aloud would echo through the empty streets and shops.  You could really feel the ghosts of the departed population.

The Franklin Institute tries to convey the destruction and terror, and largely fails.  A short film compressing an eruption lasting a day and a half into a few minutes was not very convincing, although the animated pyroclastic flow at the end was quite dramatic.  People actually coughed on the stage mist as though it were really dust.  But it was inadequate.  I also think that four were too few of the casts of the dead to really convey any scale.  Many thousands died.

The exhibit’s worth the price of admission, partly because you also get general admission to the Franklin Institute itself, and can play with the toys.  But if you get the chance, go and see the real thing.  Here are four pictures I took in my visit all those years ago.

This is the mosaic tile floor of the entryway to a residence, undoubtedly belonging to one of the wealthier residents.

This is how people crossed the streets, which for the most part were muddy sewers.  The breaks in the pathway were for wagons and chariots.

This is a sign painted on the wall.  It might be a street name or the business name.

Finally, here is a shot down one of the streets.  Dozens of similar street have been excavated, all in about the same state of destruction.  The silence was palpable.

AUTUMN WALK

As I often do on Sunday, I took my walk in Mill Creek park, where Cynthia and I would regularly go.  It's a 178-acre green space, which is a lot of area to take up in a township that's only 7.8 square miles, and about half of it is wooded.  It's also home to the deer herd that ravage our gardens from time to time.  It's a little late to see much color, and we've had an odd fall; it's been so warm.  But it's a beautiful walk, and I thought I'd share some pictures of this favorite spot.  The 25-foot hill on the right side of the picture is where I can get additional exercise.  After all, there are no hills in South Jersey to match the Palisades.

Here's the view from that little height, back over the pond.

There's a memorial garden near the entrance, and Cynthia has a tree here.  It's still small since the original, planted last fall, didn't survive Superstorm Sandy.

Not all markers are in the garden.  The gravel path around the pond is the Ben Levi walk, and at the high point of the walking path (which is along the tree line in the first picture) is this marker:

I never met Phil Goldin that I knew of, unfortunately, but I'm sure we passed one another on this path.  This is the view back towards the exercise hill.

It's a beautiful spot, and a great way to get a couple of miles under my belt (and there's a Dunkin' Donuts in the little shopping center outside the park, so I could reward myself with some coffee, because it was nippy today).

THE SECRET

While out walking today, I stopped to talk with one of my neighbors. He was struggling with the annual leaf dump in his yard, and looked as if he could use the interruption.  He was a delightful octogenarian, and we had a good visit.  As I was leaving, he asked my age, and when I told him, he said he was 83, and wanted to know if I wanted the secret of living to the age of 83.  Well, of course I did.  After looking around carefully, he leaned in and told me the secret, and if you scroll down, I'll repeat it for you.













































You're almost there, keep scrolling.










































The secret of living to age 83?


































DON'T DIE WHEN YOU'RE 82!

FLEA MARKET BUSINESS

I've been sort of easing myself into the business of buying and selling 'stuff''.  Understand that we're not talking about antiques, here.  Just everyday odds and ends that people both discard and collect.  I've been in this business since my teens when I had a store-front operation in Trenton (my father owned the building).

I actually got the bug at an estate sale when I was about twelve.  I had bid on a tray of stuff and got it for 50 cents.  I had wanted (and still own) some miniature books that were included.  On my way back to my seat a guy offered me $5 for a brass scale that was also on the tray.  I was flustered and didn't sell (I still have the scale, also), but I knew it was a good business.

After we returned to New Jersey in 1980, Cynthia and I used to sell at the Berlin market from time to time, and I kept a small inventory on a rack in the garage.  Over the past year I have been to three sales, most recently the Collingswood Book Fair, which I attended with the help of my sister, Sharon.  Although not normally a bookseller (I'm more of a book buyer, some would say hoarder), with Sharon's contributions we were able to set up a modest couple of tables and had a pretty fair day.

Now that I've been accustoming myself to the flea market world once again, I have ventured out in search of some inventory.  I have been using two online auction sites - RCI Auctions, which specializes in restaurant and bar liquidations and for me is a source of wall art, vases, etc., and GovDeals.com, which is a clearinghouse for many Federal, state and local jurisdictions offering everything from confiscated Bentleys to lost items like wallets.  In fact, I was in Edison the other day picking up a lot of 40 used men's and ladies' wallets I had bought for $26.  Since some of them are brand name items like Coach and Fossil, I expect a reasonable turnaround on these.  In any event, since I was already in North Jersey, I got a schedule of nearby storage unit auctions and attended thee of those.  Now these are much like the auctions you see on the show Storage Wars, without the cameras, drama, and drawn-out post mortems, but certainly with a cast of regular bidders with distinctive, sometimes odd, personalities.  Oh, and I sold a wallet.  I was sorting the box while waiting for one of the auctions to start and sold one to another bidder for $3.

Most lockers were heavy with furniture, which is not my business, but I did buy a small locker for $5 that everyone else turned up their noses at, and I have at least $25 in saleable stuff to show for it, without even going through everything yet.  The reason people passed was largely because the space included a rather nasty-looking mattress set, which I took to the dump for an $8 fee.  It was a large Tempurpedic mattress, which probably retailed for several grand.  But it looked like it had mold and I have no idea how it could be cleaned, and had no room to store it anyway, so into the dumpster it went, with a great lightening of spirit.  (Among other things - that mattress was heavy.)

And today I attended the holy of holies when it comes to auctions - the estate auction.  This is where the contents of a home are laid out on the lawn and a lot of the stuff is sold rapid-fire in box lots for only a few dollars each.  Nicer pieces, jewelry, toys, Lionel trains, and the like are sold by the piece, of course, as is the furniture.  I had to get up at the ungodly hour of 4:30 to get to this place in outer hicktown, PA, but it was worth it.  These are pretty rare, as most auctions are at fixed auction houses where the prices are normally rather higher.  This is what I brought home for $24.

It was so much fun I could hardly stand it, but I had run out of room (plus it was cold under those trees), so I came back in time to spend an hour at my local library's quarterly used book sale, which is where I feed my own demons as well as gather some inventory.

Over the next few days I will catalog, price and repack this stuff, and we'll see how well I really did.  More on this later.

XFINITY - LATIN FOR INCOMPETENT

Speaking of commercials, I find that I have astonishing amount of slack-jawed admiration for the depth of Xfinity’s (Comcast’s) corporate chutzpah!  They actually run commercials attempting to convince us that they are qualified to provide our home telephone service, or even more astonishingly, our home security systems.  Their announcers actually manage to do this with perfectly straight faces.  Now, that’s acting!  These offerings from a company that cannot reliably provide a television picture.  To say that the situation is ridiculous is too weak, the language simply hasn’t the words to express how disgusted this makes me feel.

It is, after all, a rare week that passes without having a program interrupted with Xfinity’s version of the old Microsoft ‘blue screen of death’, although Xfinity words theirs much more pleasantly – “Your service will be restored momentarily”.  Sometime yes, sometimes no. 

And now they have a new trick.  They kill the sound but not the picture.  They never do this during a commercial, of course, but at the critical moment near the end of a program when critical dialog is occurring.  The sound goes out just on that one show; just on that one station.  This seems to be more than incompetence; it feels like active sabotage.  If you call their ‘customer service’, they will offer to send a technician to your home in a day or two, when the error will of course no longer being occurring.  Just once I wish they would offer instead to investigate the issue where it obviously occurs, at their transmission station on Beverly-Rancocas Road.   

And what would we get if we are foolish enough to sign up for these Xfinity services?  I can just envision trying to make a 911 call when they pull the sound trick on the ‘phone service, or having my house robbed while their home security service is ‘temporarily interrupted’. 

Anyone ever fall for these pitches?  If so I have a can’t-lose investment strategy I’d like to sell you on.

COMMERCIALS

A number of the television shows I enjoy, like NCIS, Castle, and Rizzoli & Isles, run on the USA and TNT networks, which means I see a fairly large number of commercials.  I’m not sure if it’s my imagination, but the rhetoric employed seems to be getting a progressively weaker grasp on reality and truth.  One of my pet peeves is when a meaningless phrase is used to fool the listener into thinking something meaningful has been said.  My pet example is “real ingredients”.  As opposed to unreal ingredients?  What the advertiser wants you to think you heard, of course, is “real good ingredients”, but with the deniability that comes from having said nothing at all.

And, of course, I really love the commercials with fine print messages on the screen, where they give truth of the special car deal or the side effects of a drug.  Somehow, probably with liberal applications of money, the FCC has been conned into believing that these unreadable, and often unnoticed, flashes on the screen really satisfy the advertisers’ disclosure obligations.

Oh, and a note to the Lincoln concierge – a hole in the roof of a car, no matter how large, cannot be a “panoramic opening”.  A panorama is what we see out of the windows.  Panorama is Greek for ‘see all around’.  That hole in the roof is typically called a 'moon roof'.

DOWN THE SHORE

That's how we say it in NJ.  Not 'at the shore', but 'down the shore'.  I have no idea why, of course.  Just one of those odd regionalisms. 

Thursday I needed to go to Ocean City to pick up some goods I bought through an online government surplus auction, and I decided to make a day of it.  I started by checking out the OC boardwalk, which looked like most others except for one thing.  Ocean City is one of those silly puritanical dry towns scattered throughout New Jersey.  Needless to say I didn't hang out there for long but slipped north to Atlantic City, where the beach is free and beer can be had with your lunch.

It was an excellent day for a shore visit - not too windy and in the mid-70's, and I had lunch on the outside deck at Margaritaville.  I wasn't impressed with their beer selection (I guess they focus on margariras, duh) and the Cuban sandwich was dry, so be warned if you go.  I did try to walk lunch off with a long walk.  The boardwalk is about 5.5  miles long (1.5 miles of it are actually in Ventnor City) so I didn't make much of a dent, but I gave it my best shot.

A couple sat near me on one of the thoughtfully-placed benches, and I heard the woman ask if the little birds were pigeons and the big ones were seagulls!  Rightly guessing that they were not 'from around here', I struck up a conversation.  Turns out they were from a town near Denver, but had escaped any damage from the floods.  They were surprised that the story had been broadcast nationally.  We talked about the terrors of driving in Manhattan, where they had been on the previous day, and they quizzed be about the Jersey Devil.  The husband was a hockey fan, I guess, and had heard that there was a story behind the name of New Jersey's hockey team.  I did suggest they stop in at Bill's Gyros, which is a favorite of mine in AC.  I've no idea how long they've been there, but they serve the best gyros you'll ever have this side of the Atlantic in the oddest dive imaginable.  Nearly every surface is covered with currency, most of it dollar bills, and nearly all with some good luck wishes written on it.  They are open 24/7/365, so you can get beer and a meal at 3AM if need be.

I did go into the casino for a bit.  I've never been much of a casino gambler.  I don't like the mindlessness of the slots, and am not good enough at Blackjack to survive long at the tables (I cannot play poker).  But I did spend a short while at one of the electronic blackjack machines.  Showboat has only a few, but I know where they're hidden.  Played until I won ten bucks and found I had lost interest, so I left.

IRISH COFFEE

I will often drink what I call the Irish working man's Irish coffee, which consists of two things - coffee and Irish whiskey.  This normally entails some discussion with the bartender in order to not get anything fancier.

The modern drink most bartenders know as Irish Coffee was invented in the '50's by a man named Stanton Delaplane at the Buena Vista bar in San Francisco.  It was a mixture of sugar, coffee, and Irish whiskey, with a layer of aged heavy cream floated on top.  Most bars today are ill-equipped to do the cream floating trick, so they use whipped cream instead and mix Bailey's Irish Cream into the drink.  The most outlandish variation has green Crème de Menthe drizzled on top of the whipped cream.  Now I'm not saying that such a concoction isn't tasty, but it isn't anything like the one done up by Delaplane, who was actually trying to reproduce the drink he was served in a bar at Shannon airport.

I have actually seen the ceremony the Buena Vista made out of preparing their signature drink, when I was stationed at Treasure Island in 1968, and later when I returned to the Bay area in the '70's to live for a time.  The bartender would stand out a row of their special Irish Coffee glasses and then go up and down the row, tossing in the sugar cubes, then pouring the whiskey, then the coffee, going back to each glass for a stir, then finally floating the cream over the back of a spoon onto each serving.  Quite impressive theater. 

My reason for preferring my 'working man's' version is simple.  I like the taste of coffee, and prefer it unadulterated with cream.  And I think the whiskey is sweet enough and requires no sugar.  I even have a version for hot weather, made with iced coffee, which I call a 'chilly Irishman'.

By the way, I have tried this with Scotch (the fancy version is known as a Highland Coffee) but it doesn't work as well for me; the marriage with the coffee doesn't seem to work as well.

On a final note, I remember that what my father liked to put in his coffee was Anisette.  I don't know what Jackie Gleason put in his.  Here's an excerpt from a review of his old show.

Much of the comedy on the Jackie Gleason show revolved around alcohol, as apparently did much of Gleason’s adult life. He once insisted to his biographer James Bacon, “I am not an alcoholic. I’m a drunkard”. a difference possibly only understood by heavy drinkers. The show often began with Gleason sitting on a chair and talking to the audience while drinking a cup of “coffee”, which, judging from his rolling eyes after he took a sip, was apparently a lot stronger than your average cup. More alcohol was featured in another comedy bit which featured Jackie as the outrageous showman and bon vivant Reginald Van Gleason. His always flamboyant and elaborate entrance on-stage came in top hat, tails and white gloves, with his hair slicked backwards. Despite his sartorial splendor, Reginald usually kept a bottle of liquor in his pocket, occasionally dropping the whole bottle into a water cooler. When he would then take a drink, Gleason would not only roll his eyes, but would be accompanied by a loud bang on a drum.

The most famous bit on the Jackie Gleason show took place in a bar itself, with Gleason playing Joe the bartender. After a few jokes, Joe would be joined by a character known as Crazy Guggenheim, played by Frank Fontaine. Guggenheim, usually just called “Craze” by Joe, was apparently inebriated himself, finishing most of his sentences with a whining laugh. But the segment in the bar would always end with Guggenheim singing.

Read the whole review here:

http://www.helium.com/items/2138513-tv-show-review-the-jackie-gleason-show

ALONE

I realized something the other day.  For the first time (practically) in my entire life I am living alone.

I don't mean I feel alone.  I have family and friends to call or visit if I wish; I don't feel alone in that sense.  And I can, and do, go out and interact with people.  I sell at flea markets, I go to bars, and I go to festivals.  So I have no lack of human contact.

But I live alone.

In my entire life I can remember only a few months here and there when I had a place all to myself.  Before I was married I lived in apartments with roommates, it made it easier to get by on my small salary at Radio Shack.  And before that I was in the Navy, and before that I was at home going to school.

Now I was alone when I travelled to California in my little trailer, but that seems different somehow.  I was on a journey then and had, if not a set schedule, at least an overall plan of travel taking me from place to place.  So while I was alone, it was different.

Mind you, I'm not writing this piece to complain.  There is an odd freedom to my life where the only schedule is that which I decide on for myself.  And that is largely done moment by moment.  There are chores, of course, I have a big house to manage, but life is definitely more stream-of-consciousness now.

It is an interesting kind of freedom.

Solar Eclipse - from MARS!

I am giving a link here to one of the most AWESOME videos I've seen in a long time.  It was taken from the surface of Mars by the Curiosity Rover, and is an eclipse of the sun by Mars' larger moon Phobos.

http://t.now.msn.com/mars-solar-eclipse-video-shows-moon-phobos-eclipse-the-sun

Until human history finally catches up with the promises made by science fiction writers from Verne to Heinlein, this is the closest I'll ever come to seeing a sight like this in person.

I would, by the way, give everything I own to go to the moon, let alone Mars.

BICYCLES

This morning as I ducked out of the way of yet another cyclist cruising down the sidewalk, I couldn’t help but wonder whatever happened to the instructions one used to receive on the proper and safe operation of this vehicle.  And they are vehicles, subject to the same road rules as their motorized cousins, including the rule that vehicles do not belong on the sidewalk.  I do understand that some roads do not have paved shoulders, to say nothing of a bike lane, yet that hardly justifies a cyclist from leaving the road and endangering pedestrians.

I remember learning the rules in elementary school: ride on the right, with traffic; obey traffic signals; signal your turns; etc.  Why, there was even a Disney song to help you remember.  Here’s a link to a little trip down memory lane: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y86r2_svyZE.  The picture quality’s not the best (how good will you look at 60?), but I’ll wager you be humming “I’m no fool, no siree . . .” the rest of the day.  Now if we could just get it on every cyclist’s iPod.

WASHINGTON DC – INTEGRATION AND SEGREGATION 50 YEARS LATER

I cannot tell you where I was on that day late in August, fifty years ago, when the March on Washington occurred; when Dr. King gave his most famous speech.  I have heard it many times since, of course, always feeling the same thrill as the power of his cadence rings out.  Later that year I was in a math class on the first floor of Trenton High when word came of Kennedy’s assassination; that day I remember.  August 28^th, however, was probably just another in a dwindling string of days counting down to the end of summer and the start of school.

I didn’t think much about the issue.  My schools were pretty well mixed and I knew people of varying shades of brown.  One of my girlfriends at the time even had a skin that was the most lovely shade of chocolate.  Dark-skinned co-workers of my father occasionally came to dinner.  I imagine I knew that there were difficulties elsewhere in the country, but they didn’t seem to affect my life.

Once Cynthia came into my life I got many lessons on the kinds of difficulties people faced based solely on their dark skins.  Those who know me well have heard, from my perspective at least, about my parent’s reaction to our marriage, and I won’t go into that here, but this was by no means the last time problems arose.  Sometimes there were subtle snubs in banks and restaurants; other times she reported being followed around in a store to make sure she didn’t shoplift anything.  Some members of her family made it clear they were no happier than mine over our relationship.  Occasionally, but thankfully rarely, there were overt slurs and insults.  I can tell you that over the years things did improve a bit, but never to the point where we could ever completely relax.  It has gotten slightly better in the society as a whole as well, and there are some role models in the ranks of the powerful: Obama, of course, but also Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell, the late Thurgood Marshall and even New Jersey’s own Corey Booker.  I also saw a recent Cheerios commercial featuring a mixed family (and the cutest little curly-haired actress since Shirley Temple) which was so matter-of-fact about the relationship that I really didn’t notice it at first.  But I have taken it as another sign that, oh so slowly and with very small steps, things are changing.  But there is such a long way to go.

In any event, I took the train to Washington for the closing ceremonies of the 50^th anniversary celebrations, where presidents Obama, Clinton, and Carter, to their credit, didn’t try to prove they could speak with the fire and power of Dr. King.  The actual event in front of the Lincoln Memorial was nearly impossible to get into, so I opted for visiting the King memorial, where you could hear the speeches nearly as well but the crowds were sparse.

I have always disliked this statue.  Dr. King had a higher forehead, was not that fat, and was rarely that stern.  I know that the King family approved the design, but that doesn’t stop me from feeling that the artist made a poor choice regarding how to portray Dr. King.

There were a few news organizations over here: NBC had a camera giving an all-network feed of the statue, and there were teams talking to the crowd from the local Fox affiliate and a new cable news channel called One America, which owner Charles Herring has described as a conservative alternative to FOX.  (You can make your own joke on that.  The bare fact is hilarious enough for me). 

 

Back to the reasons for the original march and this week’s commemorations.  There are strong anti-discrimination and voting rights laws on the books, despite conservative efforts to chip away at them, and affirmative action policies have made some headway against the forces of bigotry in the business world.  But some are now saying that the laws and policies are themselves discriminatory, being in favor of one group over another.  And it has been fifty years; why is bigotry still so prevalent?  Oddly enough, I think the core of the problem is as simple as what we call one another.

You’ll notice in the discussion above that I try not to refer to the word ‘race’ or ‘black and white’.  When I am asked my race, I respond ‘human’, because there is only one species of thinking primate on this planet: the human race.  We are not divided into different human species; that distinction was pushed in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries by bigots seeking to prove that dark skins somehow equated with lower intelligence.  But the bigots were subtle.  They knew if they referred to the Negro species, the scientific community would have come down on them, so they referred instead to the Negro ‘race’ and managed to create the notion of separateness by the use of this scientifically meaningless word.

Here’s another point on this subject.  I have never met a person whose skin was actually black, nor one truly white (not even a true albino – they’re pink), and neither have any of you.  And I have known some truly dark-skinned people.  The melanin pigment in our skins is all really different shades of brown.  Some of us are a light beige, others are coffee with cream, and some are that old Crayola color ‘burnt umber’, but our skins are always some shade of brown.  The labels ‘black’ and ‘white’ were pasted on us, this time from the other side of the bigotry fence, in yet another attempt to emphasize what is a non-existing difference.

So the problem is complex.  There is a deep-seated us/them dynamic at work, and bigots have gotten more subtle over the years, and these together have worked to create in our modern world places that are more segregated than they were 50 years ago.  Newark is an excellent example.  Go into churches and schools all over the country and you will see areas that are clearly segregated, and often this happens by people choosing to be with others they perceive of as ‘same’ and avoiding people who are ‘different’.  We will never get this problem under control until we drop the labels and start seeing one another as just people.

By the way, my understanding of the genetics of skin color is that there are as many as five different genes involved.  And they interact in such a way that, in general, children of parents of different tones will come out shaded somewhere in between the parents.  Over enough generations, the earth may eventually, finally, have only one color of human.

Here’s a joke on the subject.  There is a species of chimp with a somewhat human-looking face called the bonobo (‘old man’ in Bantu), and Africans tell a story as to why the bonobo does not speak.   They say if he did the Europeans would put him to work.

I have only been to three plays on Broadway, and oddly enough two of them were musicals about South African apartheid.  One was Sarafina, which in my entire life was the only time I have ever felt uncomfortable being nearly the only pale face in the crowd.  Emotions run very high at points during that play.  But where I'm going with this is that the other was more than forty years earlier and was called Wait a Minum, which tried unsuccessfully to shake the apartheid system by poking fun at it.  It contains one of my all-time favorite songs, to which I’ve provided both a link and the lyrics.

http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=wait+a+minim&FORM=VIRE5#view=detail&mid=8EE70956C0ECBF59EF788EE70956C0ECBF59EF78

The other day reading Drum magazine
I’ll tell you some of the things I seen (repeat)
Advertisements for special cream in every section
Give you a soft and pale complexion
Make your black skin lighter, creamier and whiter
But when I look in the Star what do I find
But advertisements of a different kind
Because it seems that the white people have a notion
To make themselves black with the Sun Tan Lotion

CHORUS – Tell me, tell me, tell me why - I want to know the fact
Why all the black people want to go white and the white people want to go black.

Turning the pages of Zonk I see
A special tonic, which guarantee (repeat)
To make your curly hair straight
And bring you success on every date
Misfortune in love is attributed there
To having such coal black curly hair
But when I pass by the Rosebank Beauty Parlour
I see the women sitting there hour after hour
With a great big thing on their head trying to make their straight hair curly instead
Ain’t it ridiculous!

Tell me, tell me…CHORUS -

Now the other day the native girl she say to me
Au! Master, your madam she is very skinny
She say she also is much too thin
She must have some fattening vitamin
She say that it’s a fact that
All the men like her bottom to be fat
But in the northern suburbs the women are used
To living on lettuce and orange juice
To be slim is their preoccupation
My god, what a crazy nation – this is so

Tell me, tell me…CHORUS -

I have a simple remedy
For all this frustrated energy (repeat)
If you blacks have too much of this pigment stuff
And the white people say you’ve not got enough
Don’t waste your time buying creams and jellies
Trying to change the colour of your bellies
but follow the example of my brother
He married a black girl, they love each other
And she gives him a little bit of black in the night
And he gives her a little bit of white

That’s the solution!

Now I, now I, I know why I can tell you the fact
Why all the black people want to go white and the white people want to go black.

(Words & Music Jeremy Taylor © 1961 MPA)

Anyway, enough time on the soap box.

I had meals at two disparate DC landmarks.  Bens Chili Bowl is a bare ten years younger than me (their 55^th is on the 29^th, actually).  A favorite of Bill Cosby, this bare-bones short-order place is very famous for its chili (which you can buy by the gallon) and its sausage sandwiches.

http://benschilibowl.com/about/

After the ceremonies I had sushi and Sapporo at a place Washington’s Chinatown called Wok & Roll at 604 H St. NW and while the food was satisfactory, it is the location itself which makes the place famous.  The restaurant is in the building which was once the site of Mary Surratt’s boarding house, where it is said that John Wilkes Booth’s plot to assassinate President Lincoln was hatched.

Finally, let me give you a picture from the inside of one of the most fabulous train stations in the country - Union Station.

 

CHICAGO - GIORDANO'S

I forgot to mention that some of Pina's relatives have a pizza chain in Chicago.  They have a deep-dish variety they call the stuffed pizza.

They say their small stuffed normally serves two.  In fact, a couple of guys near me had one and didn't quite finish it.

Me, I had no trouble with mine, along with three pints of beer, a salad appetizer, and ice cream for dessert.  To someone experienced in real cheesesteak hoagies, it wasn't much of a stretch.  But very tasty.

BAY AREA

My stay in the Bay Area was primarily to spend a few days with my friend Deanna and her family, who Cynthia and I knew when we lived in California in the 70’s.  For those who don’t know the story, I met my wife when she walked into the Radio Shack I was managing in Oakland and bought a stereo (which I actually still own).  Deanna was actually her buddy.

We didn’t do much in the way of sightseeing, preferring to spend our time reminiscing or dancing at some of her favorite clubs.  She was constantly asking me if I remembered this or that, to which I could answer truthfully – no.  It’s been more than three decades, and I normally can’t remember last week.  One thing I was interested in was seeing if my first house still existed, which it did.  It really wasn’t much changed.  We paid $24.5 thousand for it in 1978, and sold it two years later for double that.  Our next door neighbors had always turned their noses up at us, being as prejudiced as my parents regarding interracial marriage, but we got the last laugh.  We sold it to a homosexual couple.

From 1979

 

And 2013

I did manage to get a parking ticket.  We had been out at a club and I was driving her to the airport at 4AM Thursday morning (she was going to a family reunion in Niagara Falls), so I crashed at her place for a couple of hours.  I didn’t see the sign that said no parking from 3AM to 6AM, so my rental car cost me an extra $66.  My only consolation was that there were a number of other cars with tickets, so maybe the meter maid had also been out clubbing and was getting a little work in before bedtime.

I did get over to San Francisco on one of the days of my trip.  I wanted to see the headquarters of M5, where Mythbusters is filmed.  When I got there I met a couple of very young fans who had actually met Adam Savage by chance, and were given signed pictures.  Nobody will ever mistake me for a little boy, so I only got this picture.  They don’t give tours, out of self-defense, otherwise they’d never get any filming done.  I actually had to fight my way through Giants traffic to reach their building, and there are many one-way streets which make getting around challenging for the novice.

I also went out to the Pacific to sort of put a coast-to-coast stamp on the journey.  At their rather prosaically named Ocean Beach, I got a few sunset shots of the bird rocks, but had an accident with my small digital camera.  I cracked the view-screen.  It can still take a picture, but you can’t see it.

And then I headed for the Zephyr to start the trip back home.

SEATTLE

What can I say about Seattle?  I was actually there only on the nights before and after the cruise, so I didn't really have too much time to do a lot of sightseeing.  I did go to the principal attraction.

 

but there was a line to get tickets in order to stand in line to go up in the tower, so I passed.  After all, having been on the top of the Willis tower I figured that the Needle would be a bit anticlimactic.  I did go with my niece on the Ferris Wheel they have on the waterfront, and there was a nice view.

That's Coors Field with Mt. Rainier in the background.

The place is apparently named after an American Indian chief, and here's his statue to prove it. 

This is my landmark to a good little bar and café named the 5 Points.  Stop by if you get there.

Of course the other reason I didn't get much sightseeing is that I did a bit of partying on one of the nights.  I was at an active little bar called the Rendezvous, where I was literally the only person without either a tat or piercing.

I was also undoubtedly the oldest patron.  But it was fun to close a place; it's been a very long time.

But the lasting impression I have taken from Seattle is the sheer number of homeless people on the streets.  I have never seen as many in any other city, not Chicago, NYC, Phila, Oakland or even Camden.  And they're aggressive, and literally in every public space I visited.  Maybe they're just concentrated because Seattle isn't that large.  I don't have an answer.

And finally, for my lawyer friends, I offer this real advertisement from the Seattle train system.

You can write your own punch-line.