the winter of our discontent

this originally appeared on 10/1/08 under the title, ‘the summer of our discontent’.  it has been re-worked a bit and there is still plenty of discontent to go around.  i may even toss in the original just because i can.

yes, i’m still using the steinbeck title.  this time even more blatantly so.  it’s an out right steal.  be that as it may.

christmas eve morning and the senate tools in DC have passed the health care fiasco.  it might help some folks but for the most part the rest of us are screwed.  penalties.  higher health premiums.  more taxes.  yeah, i know.  we are promised it will reduce the deficit.  just how i haven’t a clue other than your tax bill is going to look donald trump’s bank statement.  i don’t see it any other way.

we were also once promised medicare would never cost as much as it has.  now the ass holes want to cut it in some sort of new deal ponzi scheme in order to pay for it.  god, the mind reels at their madness.  utter chaotic gobbly goop that we the people are supposed to suck up like it’s manna from heaven.  the gall of those fools.

the disdain for what we the people want is nothing more than a slap in the face.  when the majority of the people in this country wanted nothing to do with the current 1,000 page plus secret filled and pork laden health bill it didn’t matter to the anointed elite.  they can’t feel our pain anymore.  not that it ever really mattered to them in the first place. 

our pain has nothing to do with them.  they play by their own set of rules.  their own health care system in place and it will remain in place.  god forbid they have to scramble or stand or sit and wait for care.  no, they are special. 

we’ve come a long way from, we the people and a government by and for the people.  those sentiments are long gone.  meaningless phrases the elite say didn’t mean that in the first place.  they KNOW.  they KNOW everything.  they know jack shit is what it amounts to.  and we get to eat shit.

i’m probably on a few lists already.  especially after my last email the other day to one of my senators.  the funny thing is she sent me an email and i answered it.  sucker punched i’m sure.  at any rate, i may as well solidify my standing on those lists. 

we have been led down the primrose path by the tools in DC.  from the very top to the bottom.  they buy select caches of votes and you get enough of those caches you are guaranteed a lifetime of thumbing your nose at the great unwashed.  us.  they suck up to the money for nothing and your chicks for free folks like they are the only people out here.  deal here.  pander there.

the anointed elite’s current take on a government by and for the people is nothing more than the choice between slavery and freedom.  simple as that.  they chip away every day at freedom and have been at it for years.  enslaving us in their convoluted mish mash of politically correct communist swill gobbly goop.  and we are here to help you lies because you are to stupid to help yourselves.

yeah, this is a rant and i should in theory feel better after said rant.  i don’t.  i feel even worse.  and afraid for this once great nation, amerika.  those of us old enough to remember a time in school when typing was taught on the old manual typewriters, there was a phrase we were all taught and used to sorta hone our skills. 

Now is the time for every good boy to come to the aid of your country.  no truer words were ever typed.  slavery or freedom.  it’s our choice.

jmh

the summer of our discontent (from the vault) 
 
yes, once again i steal one or sorta steal one from steinbeck.  what can i say?  other than it fits here and there in the so calif summer that just refuses to die.  as to whether or not this blog makes any sense remains to be seen.  

seems like every year this time i’ve just about had it with summer and the fucking triple digit temps lolly gagging around and over so calif or the mojave desert or sonora desert of the southwest.  sure, it’s more or less normal for this time of year but the older i get the more i wish it would just get the hell out of the way of more tepid temps and tons of cold rainfall for my native state.  the last is always a hope of mine for this time of year, as well.  remember, i grew up here when agriculture was still the cash cow in socal.

drought remains king here in the land of california.  if things don’t change and change soon the state motto should be changed from: eureka!; to: you don’t miss your water till the well runs dry.  yeah, it’s a line from an old blues song.  my favorite version is an old one by taj mahal.  i’m sure you can find a version of the tune on youtube if you are so inclined.

summertime and discontent.  discontent with summer and the stuff happening this summer.  a double sorta whammy.  first off we have tweeledee and tweedledum running for office.  the tweedle is interchangeable in either case.  to paraphrase my canadian friend john’s latest blog, canada and the us of a are about to elect idiots to the highest office of each land.  a sad state of affairs if there ever was one.

to make matters worse we are in the middle of the banker, politician created financial mess.  greed heads abound.  greed is bi-partisan.  when the whip comes down you won’t see any of them in the soup line with you.  oh, they may show up to ladle you your bowl of gruel to show you that they feel your pain and really really do give a fuck about you.  deal is they rolled up in a hummer or a town car with a driver/bodyguard.  you on the other hand, will have rolled up some newspaper and stuck it in your shoe so you could walk a few miles to the nearest soup line.

they will go home after the ladling to some compound surrounded by a nice wall with broken glass and razor wire cemented into its top.  plus a platoon of mercs to insure no riff raff gets within shooting range.  yeah, the ones that want to ban guns will be using them on anyone who gets with in range of one.  count on it.  yes, i’m a pessimist.  big deal.  your point? 

i suppose my biggest fear in this continuing summer of my discontent would be something like what really did happen in one of my long ago lifetimes.

i was in south vietnam during that fracas.  we, in the military, were paid in mpc or military payment currency or some sorta gobbly goop.  i forget exactly but that’s not the point.  at some point or another the politicians decided that the current mpc being used was getting into too many of the locals hands.  i suppose even charlie got his mitts on some as well.  though i doubt you could buy many arms with the stuff in poland.  greenbacks on the other hand were another story or blog.  and i’m drifting like a banshee here but i may reel it in.  maybe. 

so.  we were told that the deal was gonna go down on a certain day or maybe not.  like i said it was a lifetime ago.  at any rate, we sorta knew it was gonna happen. 

the day the deal went down our small macv compound was locked down.  as was every other military camp in south vietnam.  we all lined up and handed over our old mpc and were in turn given new mpc.  the old stuff was then totally fucking useless. 

we had some local vietnamese as workers on the compound.  they, of course, stood outside the wire watched and waited with sad looks on their faces.  a few tears as well.  they had just become penny less or much much poorer.  sure they still had a job but nothing in the bank, as it were.

perhaps some of you see where this is going.  point is, we at some point are gonna be those hapless vietnamese if the greed heads and politicians don’t stop being self serving greedy ass holes.  count on it.

today’s pessimism was brought to you by dow chemical co and their subsidiaries the makers of agent orange. 

jmh

a ‘country music’ christmas

for whatever reason, the brown eyed girl gave me an early christmas present this year.  even though she doesn’t share my love for country, make that old and real country music, i do on occasion catch her tapping a foot or two in the car when i have some hank sr or III or spade or bob or gram blasting on the car stereo.  and she does do stuff like buying me country cd’s she knows i’ll enjoy or like…

the gift in question, the book, ‘country music–the people, places, and moments that shaped the country sound’, by richard carlin, with photography by raeanne rubenstein, 2006.  the book is a nice history of country music.  any country fan would be or should be proud to own the book.  though it doesn’t delve into the minutia of the genre but it does hits most of the high notes with a nice page or two with lots of photos i haven’t seen before.

a hefty tome on nice glossy paper and the perfect book for that coffee table or tv tray.  easy reading and well worth the price.  originally $35.  but you can find it on amazon from $8.99 to $14.  a steal of a deal and i would recommend hitting them up before they are all gone.  the brown eyed girl found mine in a discount store here in so calif for $9.99.

‘country music’ covers just about everybody from the beginnings to plastic fantastically now-a-days lame nashville.  though the nashville of today stuff is minimal and is at the end of the 330 page book.  for my money, any book that devotes a page or so with photos of spade cooley and a two page spread on gram parsons and the byrds is alright by me.  if you enjoy history and country music all rolled up into one sweet package then you really ought to find this book and put it in your book self or give it to someone who will give it a good home.  this is a good book that deserves better than discount store book selves and amazon clearance sales.  though you sure can’t beat the current prices.

since i’m already here.  VHI, not generally one of my favorite tv channels, has been running the 2 hour (with commercials) 1982 concert movie of the rolling stones, ‘let’s spend the night together’.  it’s worth a look and a tivo.  though the first half has sound problems, the second half sorta sorts that out and kicks things up a notch or two.  not country music?  ‘never under estimate the influence of country music on rock ‘n’ roll.’– keith richards.  nuff said.

jmh

what’s the point of the bowl games?

this was originally written 2 years ago.  it’s still a valid post.  jmh

yeah, exactly, what’s the point of so many useless bowl games with teams that only had a marginal season at best?  you go 6-6 and have some sort of fan base that is willing to truck on down the road to pretty much anywhere in the country to see ‘their’ school play.  well, then by golly, you get a useless bowl bid to some city where the chamber of commerce and the local pols are all salivating over the amount of coin you are going to drop into their pockets or local economy or more than likely both.

that scenario covers it along with all the tv money that’s doled out to god knows who.  not me, sadly.  i don’t see a dime.  espn and fox.  ok, so espn gets some props for all the games on saturday.  fox cable, as well, though not as many.  then there’s the week night games on espn.  fine, i’m all for them, you get to see teams you probably wouldn’t get to see other wise.  speaking of which, if it wasn’t for, fox cable, most of the pac 10 games wouldn’t even be on tv.  period.

yes, i know.  college football, the love of my life is all about the money anymore.  it probably always was or maybe not.  i’m old enough to remember pre-ncaa days.  yeah, the aau, amature ahtletic union.  god, what a bunch of blowhards they were.  so that flawed system begot, the ncaa, who are now the reigning blowhards on the block.   second only to the pac 10 commissioner and his, tutti di capo tutti, the big ten commissioner.  yeah, ok, and the sec, big 12, acc, wac, ad naseum.  plus the deans of all the div 1 schools, who are so stupid, they think that anything other than what goes down now will result in total chaos in every hall of higher learning from here to martha’s vineyard.  do they really think we are all that stupid?

see, it must be all that money.  why else would normal, or sorta normal, educated men be so backed up?  oh sure, one of my friends is fond of the, it all boils down to the sex or money theory.  he has a point.  a good one.  but somehow i don’t see any of those guys i’ve mentioned getting, well, getting all stupid behind sex anymore or maybe i’m missing something.

so see? it has to be the money.  there must be bales of the stuff passed around in board rooms and parking garages on every div 1 college campus on a daily basis.  oh, mr commissioner, your bag man, tommy, is here with your dump truck load of untraceable and perfectly clean money.  he’s in parking garage 4 on the upper level.  shall i call for your driver and your gold plated golf cart?  some canapes, and perhaps, a perfectly chilled bottle of 1939, eu di snooty, vino?

the mind roils at all the weird and seemingly just plain stupid stuff those folks deal out every year at this time.  the main culprits being, the pac 10 hack and his equal hack, the big ten hack.  the other hacks blame them for everything.  pure and simple.  well, sure, we could do that but ya know the pac 10 ain’t gonna go for it.  wink wink.  yes, of course, the rose bowl.  the grand pops of em all.  i love the damn game.  it’s the game where i fell in love with the ducks, way back when i was just a kid.  the love affair still flourishes to this day.  but if the rose bowl went away in favor of some sort of system that gave us college football fans a true national champion, i’d be all for it.

oh, i’m sure the hue and cry from the moneyed rose bowl committee would leave a trail of tears and crumpled old twenties right up to the pac 10’s front door.  so what?  times change and they needed to be changed in this regard long ago.  playoffs in some way, shape, or form.  it’s been said before and bears repeating, every major college sport has a playoff system except college football.  even women’s softball has a playoff and i’m right there glued to it on the tv.  they miss more school than i ever did when i was young and missing school.  i mean they play at least 60 games.  half of which are on the road.  then they end up in oklahoma for what could be a week or more depending on the weather.  same for the men’s baseball program.  not to mention both of the basketball programs.  those kids miss more school than anyone and no one says squat about it.  then there’s the soccer programs and golf and track, wrestling and volleyball and tiddly winks, for crying out loud. but those morons in charge say we can’t have a football play off because it will disrupt the schooling of all those fine young men.  my god, it’s just pure balderdash.  we are spoken to like we are unwanted red headed step children with an IQ of 30.

i’ve had enough.  i hope all of you have had enough as well.  in the immortal words of roberto duran, no mas.  pure and simple.  the time has come to not only boycott the crappy bowl games but every other stinking one of them.  until the boys with the power and the money realize their power and money is going the way of the dodo.  then and only then will things change.  i’m not saying let’s blow off college football.  even i’m not that crazy.  hmmm, well, not yet.  just stop watching the bowl games.  period.  all of them.  it’s easy.  play with your kids, dog, wife or girlfriend instead.  go out and eat or go to the mall or park or bowling alley or take a walk or nap or play scrabble.  see?  there’s lots of other stuff to do.  just do it.

jmh

our lady of mount carmel church, rancho cucamonga, ca w/photos

the old catholic church still stands where it has for as long as i can remember and was there even before i was born.  one of the oldest catholic churches in the area.  the church sits just steps away from the old padre winery.  while i was visiting padre winery the other day i stopped by the church as well.  the church was my grandparents back in the day.  they could walk there very easily and did several times a week.

our lady hasn’t held up as well as padre winery.  plenty of parishioners but not the well to do types of other parishes in cucamonga.  just your average work a day joes go to this church these days.  the salt of the earth types.  not unlike in the old days.  the old days, when the street that fronts it was smaller.  the intersection was also the home to some old stately eucalyptus trees.  long gone due to street widening projects and the addition of curb and gutters.

since the church stands so close to padre winery i’ve been by it many many times over the years.  though i hadn’t been inside of the church since june of 1968 or 1969.  the day of my grandfather’s funeral.  you would think i could remember the exact date but i was in a wisdom tooth extraction haze and all i really remember about the day was the huge cloud of incense drifting about my grandfather’s coffin.

i made it back inside the church the other day.  it was an odd experience at best.  there have been some changes and the floor is now carpeted.  i guess carpet is easier to maintain than the old hardwood floors.  the simple beauty of a very very old and small catholic church that served old italians and mexicans remains.

i miss, nona and nono, italian for grandmother and grandfather.  the little house they used to live is gone.  but the little church they worshiped in still stands.  stands like a memory of a long ago past.

our lady of mount carmel catholic church.

 

jmh

 

padre winery, rancho cucamonga, ca w/photos

the other day i finally got around to making a trip back to my childhood.  specifically, i had been wanting to take some photos of the old padre winery just down the road in rancho cucamonga, ca.  i’ve mentioned the winery in a few blogs and a fiction piece here but there were no photos in any of them.  so, what i thought i’d do was take some photos and stick them up here then sorta run the deal down one more time.

padre winery has been around since the late 1800’s.  and it was the first winery in california bonded by the feds allowing them to sell wine and brandy.  the original building is still standing.  amazingly enough even after all the semi sorta large earthquakes that have rumbled through the area.  i guess it gives testament to some thing or another.  over the years the winery has been owned and operated by a few different folks.  it has had a few other names as well.  but to us long time cucmongaites it was and always shall be, padre winery.  sadly, it no longer produces wine.  those days are long gone.

my mother’s parents lived in a house a few hundred yards west of the winery.  that old wonderful house with the root cellar, in which my grandfather made wine and vinegar, no longer stands.  my grandfather worked at padre winery up until the time he retired.  he’d been there for many years.  i spent a lot of time with my grandparents when i was a kid.  soaking up old world italy and wineries.  that is up until the time my folks thought i was old enough to manage on my own during the summer.  though soaking up stuff never ended.   

when my grandfather worked at padre it was owned by the vai brothers.  i loved walking over to the winery and wandering around looking at stuff.  perhaps more importantly smelling the wonderful smells that can only come from a winery.

these days the winery is owned by a local family that has long roots in the area.  wine roots.  they gave it a go trying to make it a producing winery over the years but money being what it is things never panned out.  padre winery is for sale.  there are a few businesses where the old redwood wine vats used to be and it’s kind of sad.  especially to me.  i worked at padre winery myself for a year or so back in the early to mid 70’s.  i’ve recounted that tale as here as well. 

i’d been by the winery a number of times over the years.  once even stopping with the brown eyed girl so she could see the place.  old padre winery.  at any rate, i was alone the other day as i wandered about taking these photos.  alone with my thoughts and my youth. 

as you will see there is still a beauty to the winery.  an elegance and charm not seen these days in much of any kind of architecture.  there was something else as well as i walked around.  something mystical and wonderful.  or maybe it was just the fact that padre winery has been around for years and years and saw a huge amount of wine in various stages pass through the grounds.  it was a smell.  the smell.  that wine smell.  a sour tart vinegary musty smell now.  but still a wine smell.  the old girl still has it.  a complete package other than the fact the wine itself is long gone.  the elegance and the smell have stuck to her and she wears them well.

i hope the old lady remains standing.  standing as a monument to old california and old cucamonga.  not swept into some re-development black hole and razed.  re-development.  the good old boy deal where the pols and hucksters make money hand over fist and we the people lose our history and magic that comes with the old things.  old wonderful places like padre winery.

padre winery and the old tasting room.

 

the old cellars.

the still where the lees and muck were processed into 180 proof alcohol.

the old girl still looking good.

jmh

stuff i don’t watch on tv anymore part 2

there’s plenty of stuff i don’t watch on tv anymore.  mostly it’s sports stuff but then of course there are plenty of other things on tv that are just beyond the pale bad as well.  however, i’m probably going to stick to sport stuff or semi sorta sports stuff for this.  just like in part 1.  for those that missed it.  you may want to take a look.  or maybe not.

as i said the last time, this is my list.  not necessarily your list.  or likes and dis-likes.  ok?  good.  so in no particular order.  onward.

my friend, triggerman brought up a couple in a comment he made in my other place.  two venues or sports i was going to bring up any the ways.  the first being, the X games.  ok.  yeah, i’m an old guy.  so what?  since when has skateboarding become a sport other than an annoying venal sin?  or jumping over stuff on a motorcycle?  or doing loopty loops on same said motorcycle?  trying to kill yourself while also trying to impress babes is pretty lame.  keep it off tv, please.  it’s stupid.

the olympics.  or as dfr and i call em, the old limp dicks.  i find it amazing that anyone watches the stuff anymore.  in particular stuff where you win or lose on some dumb ass paid off judges decision.  yes, there was a time years ago i would watch this lame tv presentation.  hours upon hours of the stuff.  no more.  the insipid up close and personal stuff sent me over the edge years ago.  why anyone would want to host this turkey is beyond me.  unless of course, it would be for the sole purpose of ripping off the rubes who actually show up to watch the insanity.  all that being said, i do enjoy watching curling and i eagerly await the winter festivities in vancouver so i can get my fix.  i’m serious.

bowling.  i’m not even sure if anybody even bothers to show this game anymore on tv.  they probably do and if they do i’m not watching it because earl anthony and dick weber are dead or are too old to make a decent score if they can still even play.  buy a wii game and bowl in your living room.  it’s fun and good exercise.  plus, no stinky used rental bowling shoes are required.  a plus if there ever was one.

poker.  ok.  i can sorta see skateboarding as a sport.  but a world series of poker?  world series implies sport.  poker is not a sport but a game and, well, why in god’s good name are you people watching other people play this game on tv?  barnum was right.  you are a sucker and you and many others are being born every minute.  then there’s the fact they are playing bleeding texas hold em.  a girls game for crying out loud.  wyatt earp didn’t play texas hold em.  count on it.  wild bill hickok wasn’t playing texas hold em when he was dealt that famous dead mans hand of aces and eights.  no sirree he was playing five card draw.  a man’s game.  a man’s game like five card stud or seven card stud.  simple.  if you watch poker on tv you need to find a life someplace and fast.

the tour de france.  there was a time a number of years ago i watched this turkey on the tube.  all the little girl crap about lance and his blood samples just wore me out.  i don’t watch anymore.  lance can run the table for the rest of his life for all i care.  big deal.  i don’t care.  the tv nonevent has spawned any number of lance wanna bees with their nasty ass biking costumes out clogging up road space all over this once great nation.  please, just get the hell out of my way and go ride your bike someplace else or i swear i’m liable to run over forty or fifty of you at one pop.  just kidding.  maybe.  but they are a menace and it’s because of the tour being on tv.  you dumb asses, would be much cooler if you put some playing cards or baseball cards on your spokes with a wooden clothes pin.  i would respect you more.  and take off that damn bike suit.

drag racing.  ah, another speed sport.  one i used to love to watch unlike nascar or formula one.  pure speed.  peddle.  metal.  woo hoo.  trouble is try and find a real car drag racing these days.  what you’ll find, for the most part are plastic fantastic sleds that resemble a car but really aren’t a car.  what happened to real 55 chevy’s?  real bored and stroked 51 merc’s?  real chopped and channeled anything?  see my point?  it is a damn shame.  no, not my point.  sheesh.

last but certainly not least, would be any sort of a state of the union message from any politician of any party.  or any other political party message.  well, unless it’s the party animal party which might be a hoot of sorts if only for a short while.  i gave up on those messages long long ago.  nothing but lame propaganda by lame stooges who want only to fuck with us and steal our money.  screw em.

jmh

stuff i don’t watch on tv anymore

ah, make that sports stuff.  tv is annoying at best.  sure, i can waste away a day or days watching the damn thing but, hey, there’s a bunch of stuff i can’t watch anymore.  so, let’s get started and see just where this ends up.  there’s no particular order or rhyme or reason to the list.  it is what it is.  pure and simple.  you may agree or disagree.  it’s a semi free country, for the time being, and you’re entitled to your own opinion.  fine.  but this is my list.  it may piss you off but that isn’t my intention.  figure it out.  do your own list. 

the first thing that comes to mind is the, NBA.  god, i hate watching those guys.  i used to like watching pro basketball but i lost interest in it during it’s thug era and i’m not going back.  plus, it’s kinda fun being one of the few folks here in so calif that can’t stand kobe and/or the lakers.  elgin baylor, kareem, jerry.  fine.

MLB would be next on the list.  another of those deals where i used to enjoy watching their games.  i lost interest in them after the last strike for more money so they can play a kids game.  um, you could toss the NBA back in this area as well.  at any rate, who can enjoy a world series that is gonna drag on to maybe the second week of november?  the first week being bad enough.  or how about a bunch of steroid pumpers, period.  no way.  no thanks.  plus the fact bud selig is an idiot.  although had the angels gone to the series i may have watched an inning or two if only for the old cowboy, gene autry.

the NFL is next.  another of those days gone by thingys.  more steroid pumpers and a greedy bunch of owners with no real love for their fan base or the cities where they play.  show me the money.  some big mogul is going to build a new stadium out in these parts if he can con some team into leaving their sorta home.  any number of teams have been mentioned,  even one of yours.  i don’t care.  screw em.  the only thing the stadium will do is make an already totally screwed up freeway interchange even worse.  the players?  yeah, they are the best and can come up with some amazing plays but i just don’t care anymore about them or their league.

the Super Bowl.  sure, this is a part of the last one but even non fans watch this turkey every year.  hours and days of non stop hype.  a blizzard of supposedly new improved funny ass commercials that the mad men pay primo dollars to place strategically in the game.  a big yawn, for the ads and the game.

tennis.  not that i ever watched it much but i don’t ever anymore.  oofa.  useless and stupid.

soccer.  ok.  so like just what the eff is up with soccer?  totally off the tv radar.  or more importantly, my radar.  dumber than tennis.  yeah, it is.  i don’t want to hear about it.  say nothing.  it is. 

the NHL.  as a so calif native i guess that could be a reason for my aversion to the game.  but when i was a kiddie, i tried watching the likes of gordy howe and bobby orr on the saturday morning games.  i never understood the rules and it was pretty boring even with the fights.  no thanks.  not even the great one could change that.

the WWE WWF or whatever it is they are calling it now a days.  more steroid monsters with the same act since gorgeous george and freddie blassie.  an act that was pretty cool back in the 50’s and early 60’s.  and ok even for a few years in the early 80’s.  but an act that just grew so wearisome and lame that no sane person over the age of 12 can possibly watch it anymore.  yeah, fine, the sorta hot babes wandering around in the ring.  lame as well and just masturbatory imps for the porn challenged among us.  speaking of which, if i were 12 i wouldn’t waste my time on them.  no sirree.  i’d be TIVOing ‘dancing with the stars’ and watching those lovely ladies frame by frame.  count on it.  but i digress.

boxing.  i used to love watching boxing.  i grew up watching it every friday night.  the friday night fights brought to us by gillette razors.  then of course there was sugar ray robinson, jake lamotta, rocky marciano, sonny liston, george foreman, floyd patterson, joe frazier, sugar ray leonard, danny lopez, alexis arguello, and larry holmes, god bless him.   then of course, the greatest of them all, mohammad ali.  i could go on but if you weren’t there you missed it.  totally.  the current crop?  no thanks.

nascar or formula one.  i get the speed but i just don’t get much else about it.  never one of my favorites and i avoid them like the plague these days.

then there’s the most insidious non sports related show of them all.  the view.  a total piece of crap and a waste of time and electricity.  a propaganda show worthy of chairman mao or joe stalin.  i was never a fan or a watcher but i do get a glimpse of it now and again.  oh oh, i’m gonna hurl and/or shoot the tv ala elvis.

yes, the last one wasn’t sports related but i couldn’t resist tossing it in as a sorta grand finale to this messy epistle.  after all, this is my list.  i may have forgotten a few things but i think i covered stuff pretty well for now.  there’s always the possibility of a part 2 somewhere down the road.  i’ve been talkin’ to my oldest friend, dfr.  and yeah, count on it.  there will be a part 2.

on a tangent, today is gram parsons birthday.  happy birthday, my cosmic country brother.  wild horses.  we’ll ride them someday.

jmh

in search of the miraculous

that’s the title of an old book that was a semi sort of hippy required reading deal back in the late 60’s and early 70’s.  i had a copy of the book for many years.  the book in question first appeared in 1947 and was written by p. d. ouspensky.  lots of interesting stuff in it but that book isn’t why i’m here.  i’m just borrowing the title for a bit because i’m searching for a miracle or the miraculous myself. 

long time readers know i bought a trailer here in the brittney spears memorial trailer parkin the early summer last year.  well, it’s not really that bad.  the trailer or the park.  at any rate, i’m trying to sell the place.  i wouldn’t be selling it if i hadn’t met and married the brown eyed girl, who with her arthritis problems, can’t manage the stairs here very easily.  trying to sell the place in this economy hasn’t been easy either.  some lookie loos who expect you to give stuff away.  no chance and no thanks.  and no offers.  it’s become obvious that it’s time to go in search of the miraculous.

it’s not that either of us don’t like this place.  we do.  as a matter of fact, it’s a very nice place and we do some of our entertaining here in the mobile home.  there’s easier parking than our other place and a much more spacious kitchen for us to whip stuff up and move about.  plus, it’s a good 500 square feet bigger than our other place and much newer.  but that’s just realtor mumbo jumbo and i’m drifting.

many years ago in santa fe, new mexico, the nuns of the lorreto chapel had a dilemma.  they needed a staircase in order for them to get up into the choir loft of the church.  when the church was built a staircase wasn’t included for some reason or another up into the loft.  one of those early builder oversight thingys i suppose.  ah, what can we say, mother superior, other than…oops.

the nuns had no other recourse than to pray a lot and hope for somebody or another and perhaps a miracle to come along and get the staircase built.  well, after many prayers, one afternoon this guy showed up and said he would build them their staircase.  very cool.  the nuns were very happy.  they went to bed that night with dreams of a staircase dancing in their heads.

depending upon who you are reading, when the nuns got up in the morning they had their staircase and the man was gone.  plus, the gentleman who had built the staircase hadn’t used any nails.  nary a one.  some stories recount that it took several days to build the stairs.  however, they all claim that the builder was, st joseph, and there were no nails used in it’s construction.

yeah, the dude in question was none other than the father of jesus and apparently a pretty good carpenter to boot.  ok, so not THE father but well, you know what i mean.  the nun’s prayers had been answered.  a miracle had been performed.  the staircase had been built. 

the church still stands today as well as the staircase.  the original staircase didn’t have a handrail or newel posts.  they were added later and no nails were used in their making as well.  just wood dowels.

some of you have seen these photos before but they are worth repeating here.  the lorreto chapel and the staircase. 

ok, so just what does all this mean?  in regards to my search for the miraculous?  i suppose, ever since st joseph built that staircase for the nuns he acquired the reputation for getting stuff done, building or house wise.  or maybe it came about sometime even earlier in his saintdom.  i really don’t know.  but it’s not something others and myself haven’t overlooked down through the years.  um, say what?

it seems that st joseph comes in very handy when you are trying to sell a piece of property or your house.  all that needs to be done is to bury a statue of him in the front yard and viola he works his miracle and the place sells.  something i’m indeed going to try.  and hopefully i get a minor miracle of sorts and the mobile home sells.

of course, i figure it would probably border on the sacrilegious if i were to bury the statue.  so with that in mind, the brown eyed girl’s older sister has come into play.  she’s a very religious catholic lady.  a fine thing indeed.  i gave her some money and she found us a very nice pewter statue of st joseph holding the baby jesus.  she’s coming here on monday and the three of us are going to plant the statue in the front yard under the for sale sign.

years ago one of my aunts went on a pilgrimage to lourdes, france.  as a gift, she bought me a small bottle of lourdes holy water.  the statue of st joseph will be anointed with some of that holy water before it’s buried.  a few prayers will be offered up as well. 

it’s too bad my sister-in-law can’t make it here on sunday, as it’s all saints day.  logistically for her it isn’t possible.  she’s busy with church stuff all day plus she lives way over on the west side of l.a.  all that being said, perhaps it won’t matter when the deal goes down on monday.

if st joseph comes through my sister-in-law’s church will get a very nice donation for their poor box.  as will a local catholic church’s feeding the hungry program.  at any rate, both places have already been given something this pre-thanksgiving season.  i’m by no means trying to blackmail st joseph in any way shape of form.  but, well, things are things and stuff as well.  we hope.  we pray.  we give. 

i hope my search for the miraculous comes to fruition.  hopefully, wonders will never cease.

thank you, st joseph.

jmh

the saga of denny paine, the short version

it’s been a few years but i used to work with an ex hollywood stuntman. actually, i was his boss for a time.  and for our purposes here he will be known as, denny paine.  denny paine was the name a certain government alphabet group wanted to give him way back when.  he declined their offer.  at any rate, denny is a southern california native.  though these days he’s living in arizona.  over the years i’d lost track of him. 

a few weeks ago, jwfh, and myself along with someone else were chatting away a hot afternoon in the claremont village.  the lone ranger came up in the conversation of old tv/movie cowboy stuff.  i thought of denny paine, and told the guys he was clayton moore’s double in the color movie, ‘the lone ranger’, circa 1956.  clayton’s real name was, jack.  denny paine told me that.  denny paine told me lots of stuff.

denny paine had quite a career in the movies.  he doubled for buster crabbe and lash larue, among others.  have you ever seen the movie, ‘vanishing point’?  well, he did all the stunt driving for barry newman in that great oldie.  remember the beginning of the old tv show, ‘then came bronson’?  that was him on the motorcycle.  how about, ‘chips’?  yeah, he did all the riding for larry wilcox, or john.  that is when the bike wasn’t hooked up to a trailer for close-ups.  he also did location searches for the studios when he wasn’t doing stunt work.  denny found the old virginia dare winery around these parts that was used for an old ‘combat’ tv episode.  a place i’ve written about in the past.

during korea, denny, was in the army and a member of the 25th or 26th regimental combat team, a fore runner to the green berets.  he was out front gathering intel.  while doing so he received a purple heart and bronze star.  president harry truman pinned the purple heart on him while he was in a hospital bed in tokyo.

after korea he went back to work in the hollywood industry.  i met him years after those days.  he was retired from two jobs plus the movies and was working on his third retirement check.  yeah, god bless him, he’s one of those triple dippers.  we always had a good time working together.  he was always full of great stories.  a time or two he even let me wear the buckskin jacket, guy madison or wild bill hickok of tv fame, wore in the rose parade one year.  or maybe fool around with a gold plated 100th anniversary winchester 30-30 he owned.  ah, sweet.  

i lost track of denny.  probably because he was a crazy old coot.  for example, we played a lot of golf together in those days and he ALWAYS cared a loaded pistol in his golf bag.  or on his person.  ‘you never know when you’ll need it, hombre.’  is what he used to tell me.  that in itself wasn’t so bad.  trouble was he was liable to whip it out and fire off a few rounds anytime anywhere just for the fuck of it.  yeah, denny paine. 

that hot afternoon conversation of a few weeks ago got me thinking about him.  once again.  with the help of the brown eyed girl and the internet we found him or more to the point his long time companion, miss penny.  since then i’ve spoken to him on the phone a few times.  he even sent me a photo of himself taken in 2006 in knabe, utah.  the photo was taken to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the long ago lone ranger movie shot there in 1956. 

that’s denny paine in the picture.  i’ve missed you, hombre.  i hope you still have the buckskin jacket and the 30-30.  see you soon.

jmh

arizona and new mexico road trip w/ photos – october 2009

our trip to the southwest went very well.  fine scenery and company plus  some great food and drink along the way.  what could be better?  as a matter of fact, we’re already planning our next sojourn into northern arizona and southern new mexico.  long lazy stays in both places with none of the 400 mile drives and associated moving every few days.  the long drives were the killer.  trust me, 400 plus mile drives every few days are not something we want to tackle again any time soon.

all and all a fantastic trip.  great scenery leading the way.  i could boor you with the details of daily stuff with some days much better than others.  i won’t do that.  i’ll just let the photos tell the story.  we think there’s magic in a few of them.  hmm, yeah, sedona can do that.  a magical place if there ever was one.

the grand canyon has a bit of magic as well.  we saw it on one of it’s hazier days.  although it was still stunning if not exhausting.  elephant butte, new mexico.  the place where an old dam makes a lake of the rio grande. 

yes, the road still holds some magic.  we found that magic in the southwest. 

a room with a view in sedona, az.

approaching sunset sedona. az.

sunrise and another sunset in sedona, az.

the grand canyon on a hazy windy cold day.

grand canyon sunset.

manny’s buckhorn in san antonio, new mexico.  voted one of the best burger joints in the usa.  fabulous green chile cheeseburgers. 

elephant butte, new mexico.

the harvest moon over elephant, butte.

the old plaza in santa fe, new mexico.

yours truly waiting for a table at the plaza cafe santa fe, new mexico.  one of the best meals on the adventure.

 

the lorreto chapel in santa fe.  and the staircase.  a story worth looking up.

hasta la vista, sedona.  we will be back.

all photos copyrighted 2009 john hauge.

jmh