“Old age is like everything else. To make a success of it, you’ve got to start young.” T. Roosevelt

“Hello Silence, my old friend…..”

It’s four in the morning ’n I’m sitting in front of the durn computer again…tired of Solitaire…..My mother taught me to play Solitaire, don’t remember my age at the time, but I’m pretty sure that she was afflicted with the same whatever that causes my eyes to pop wide open in the middle of the night…

I c’n see her now, well, in my mind’s eye anyway…the mind’s eye is an old country term for imagination 'n seems to fit better at this time of night...

She’s been gone for fifteen years now ’n the picture in my mind is from sixty years ago…Mom sitting at the kitchen table in that little house in Beattyville, wearing a dark red robe, smoking ’n playing Solitare…

Seems we always had a deck of cards in the house back then…I learned to play Solitare ’n Gin Rummy…prob’ly some other games too but I’ve forgotten those…

William D. Wells ’n m’self got stuck at Yamada Air Station outside Tokyo for a month or six weeks back in ’56…we each got a $20 dollar partial payment, an advance on wages owed, that lasted about fifteen minutes or so as our expectations were that we’d be there only a few days…that’s when we truly learned that the wheels of bureaucracy move slowly…we whiled away the time playing 500 Rummy ’n concocting signals so that we could ‘win’ money from those who passed thru more quickly….we justified our actions by explaining to each other that coke ’n cigarettes were a necessity for those caught in limbo…

When I wuz a student at Morehead, we played a somewhat endless game of Hearts…I no longer recall how to play that game at all…we also played a little poker, especially on Sunday evenings…I wuz, ’n remained, a very cautious poker player, having learned early in life the futility of drawing to an inside straight…even so, I managed to supplement my meager income of the time (coffee ’n cigarettes being, at the time, a life necessity for a college student)…

There have been other card games in my life…in northern Ohio, I learned to play Euchre (gone from my mem’ry banks now)…North Highlands, I played Backgammon with Big Bob Baxter (somewhere in the attic is, I suspect, a Backgammon board)…

There were other card games that have come ’n gone over the years ’n I doubt if there is a real deck of cards in the house although, to be frank, I’m not sure what is hidden upstairs…no matter, the computer hides many things, among which are multiple games of Solitaire…’n on cards that a click of the mouse will change the back of the card…at the present time, there is a picture of Millyrose…..

Whatever, I have my mother’s insomnia…I don’t which side of the family she got it from ’n I don’t know if any of my children have it…if they do, I wish them well however they may cope with it…I gave up fighting it years ago ’n just try to get along now…of course, being in my dotage helps with that as society tends to see a daily nap as an acceptable thing for an old greybeard…..

“I don’t feel old. I don’t feel anything ’til noon. That’s when it’s time for my nap.”  Bob Hope

Hump Day deja vu...

"If you don't know where you're going, any road will get you there." L. Carroll





I didn’t get up with the chickens, I could've, but I didn't…Rusty got me up before them…but I made the decision to go back to bed on my own....

Howsumever, that being said, as I sit here musing at/over the vagaries of life ’n such over a cup of coffee, I c’n hear the darn things crowing out in the south forty…(Durn that fool Chicken Lady anyhow)... T’other day she brought a hen ’n seven chicks ’n turned ‘em loose at the house next door which is 'way too close for comfort 'n yes, they decided they liked my south forty better than my neighbors…

Yestiday, there wuz only five chicks left, thank the good Lord ’n Mother Nature….I don’t mean to be hard-hearted about the chickens but in the liberal world, that’s called ‘Natural Selection’….’less’n, of course, you’re a liberal blaming George Bush for all the ‘ILLEGAL’ immigrants streaming across what use’ta be our southern border which is being sold by the liberal press as a humanitarian problem and our problem because in the minds of the elite powers that be, the good ole US of A is basically responsible for all the ills of this old world...

Normally, I kind’a like Kirsten Powers, she’s cute ’n seems sincere ’n once, I heard her admit that an Obama policy wuz just plain wrong…for all that, she seems to have bought into the premise that American workers (soon t’be placed on the endangered species list) shouldn’t have any problem paying for the upkeep of a huge percentage of South American children after they come to America seeking citizenship under the Obama Dream Act…”After all, what’s fifty thousand children…or a hundred thousand…or more…”

I don’t think Obama intended for all these children to flood the USA…I don't believe he really tho't out the consequences of his action when he executive ordered the Dream Act...

I do believe his intent was 'n is to bankrupt the USA, sort’a like bulldozing an old house to make way for a new one.  That has been a staple plan for revolutionaries since the whole rigmarole began….

Quiet little ramble ‘round ’n about the Village this morning…didn’t meet ’n greet with any other of the canine species, only a few chickens wand’ring the Park…a most uneventful stroll but, then, Hump Day mornings are often like that in Olde Fair Oakes….

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "It means what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less."  B. Obama...oops, check that, Lewis Carroll

Hump Day Again....

"Who in the world am I? Ah, that's the great puzzle." L.Carroll

Boy O boy, it’s the middle of the week again….right on schedule…but, it’s cool, thank the Lord for the Delta breeze….

Da boyz got me up earlier than I ackshully wanted but, sumtimes a body just has to give in for the sake of harmony….

I’m finishing up the last of my coffee ’n they’re waiting patiently for me to put on my feet so’s we can all go ‘round the village on the morning sniff ’n pee tour….(we shall return)…

In a mild way ’n only then by stretching my imagination, Fair Oaks reminds me just a little bit of South Shore…it’s a quiet little village by about any standard you might wish to apply ’n I understand why my kids ’n, truth be told, most kids ‘ud prefer the hustle ’n bustle of Sackamenna….well, for want of ackshully being in….say, San Francisco…or anywhere that there is ‘real’ hustle ’n bustle…felt like that, m’self, when I wuz a callow youth…cudn’t wait to get out’a the backwater that wuz South Shore, Ky…

Now, in my dotage, it’s the backwaters that appeal t’me most…the quiet, calm waters with only a hint of a current somewhere at the edges….

Fair Oaks ain’t so awf’ly small that dogs c’n sleep in the middle of the street…well, not anymore anyway even tho’ there are periods where if you wuz to fire a cannon down the middle of the street, you might, ’n I emphasize ‘might’, get the attention of the reg’lars at Stockmans, the quiet little den of iniquity where my cuzzin, Charles, Charley, Chuck, Richard, Rich, Rick Dameron spent his final years polishing the bar top ’n pontificating on whatever crossed his mind…

Cuz ’n I grew up in Beattyville, more like brothers in a way, roaming the hills ’n the riverbank…in our later years, we both ended up here in Olde Fair Oaks, where the feral chickens roam the streets ’n turista’s stop ’n blow their horns in their vain attempts to get them to move out’a the way…foolish people…chickens don’t pay attention to automobiles unless they’re rolling under their wheels…

Now that I come to think on it, that seems t’be a pretty human trait as well…we humans don’t pay a lot of attention to what’s going on around us ’til the movers ’n shakers among us get so damned egregiously greedy that we see the effect in our pocketbooks…’n then, we shake our heads, roll our eyes ’n wonder aloud how it is that find ourselves in another fine mess….Ah yesssss, my fine feathered friends, where is Stan ’n Ollie when we need ‘em?

"Everything in the world has a moral; the trick is in finding it."

A good day to talk about the weather.....or not!

Paraphrasing the estimable Mr. Clemens, there’s hot, too hot ’n  too damn hot ’n t’day is lookin’ t’be one ‘a those too damn hot days…..

Quiet in the village this morn…not too many people out ’n about, Heck, not even many chickens roaming around cuz dumb as they may be, they’re smart enuff to seek out a cool place on days like t’day…

We no sooner got home than da boyz drained their water dishes ’n now I got to go ’n fill ‘em up again…I sw’an, sumtimes it seems like a body’s work ain’t never done…that, of course, is meant t’be humorous ’n on a day that sees the temp at 100o before noon, that’s liable t’be par for the course….

We stopped, as usual, t’see Jon the Hairstylist (code word for expensive barber) ‘cuz da boyz expect to get treats from him ’n run ahead of me to stop ’n paw at his door…

They were complaining about the heat as it wuz already 75o inside their establishment (outside wuz 98o)…

I told them how when I wuz a boy ’n we walked to town to go to the movie, we’d stop at the big barbershop down on 2nd street, the one with the black ’n white tiles on the floor ’n the enormous big old floor fan going full speed…

The  barbers (they never had hairstylists then outside of maybe, Hollywood) never seemed to mind when we’d go in ’n stand for a minute or so in front of that fan, at least I don’t recall any of them ever objecting…

Jon said he didn’t know how we managed back in those long ago daze before air conditioning…

I tho’t about telling him that we were just tougher then but that ain’t the truth…what it is, is that people just cope, no matter what….

Anyhow, it’s a beautiful day here in norCal, sunshine, blue sky ’n I’m just thankful that I c’n sit back, sip my ice water (or beverage of choice, as people are wont t’say) ’n complain about the weather…

And another from Mr. Clemens: “Everyone complains about the weather but nobody does anything about it.”

On reading writing 'n stuff.....

“But I was thinking of a way to multiply by ten,

And always, in the answer, get the question back again.” L. Carroll

The Sacramento Bee has become a mere shadow of its former lackluster self so what I do first is scan…’n whatever catches my eye, I go back ’n read at least part of the article…sumtimes, I’ll go so far as to read all the article but truthfully, not much of the time….I must confess here, that on most days, the most interesting part of our only daily paper is the comics ’n our ‘forward thinking’ newspaper staff either has a love affair with old comics or they’re just too cheap to buy the new stuff that must be on the market…as much as I liked Chas Schultz, his stuff belongs in the Remember When segment….oh, wait, we don’t have one of those for real…. with the possible exception of the editorial page...

And speaking of that p’tick’lar page, I understand that the Bee is a liberal newspaper…I get it…I often wish for those good old days when we also had a conservative newspaper in Sacramento, something to add just a little balance but the rain falls on the just ’n the unjust alike, time marches on, the pendulum swings…I get all that…’n I get that the liberal press feels some sort of moral obligation to support their affirmative action president ~ personally, I feel that the press has a moral obligation to remain non-partisan ’n a failure to do so is a failure at their jobs…I have to wonder about a man like Brian Williams of NBC…he spent years waiting patiently for Tom Brokaw to get the hell out of his way so he could have his time in the limelight…and when he got it, he pissed his credibility away by shilling for Obama…I can’t figure out why he would do that…In those days of old, nobody knew whether Cronkite was liberal or conservative (for the record, he was liberal)…likewise with Chet Huntley and David Brinkley…they reported the news as it was not as they might have wanted it to be….Today, you never can tell what comes out of Brian Williams mouth except that he’s pro-Democrat and anti-Republican…and just when you think they can’t get any more egregious,  their devotion to their president causes them to defend terrorists, ie; The Taliban Five….one can only assume that they have suffered the loss of all their collective marbles…..

Anyway, on a happier note, I got my copy of G. Sam Piatt’s ‘That Summer of ’45’….Thanks Sammy…. 

"In the beginning, there wuz a void..."

I've had a few comments lately as to when 'n why I began writing this blog so I went back to the beginning 'n read the first three of 'em 'n tho't I'd just re-run them for anybody that might be innarested...

Sunday, August 26, 2007

Random musings approaching 'the wall'..........

My eldest informed me that some of her friends were asking when I was going to write something interesting again....and she suggested that I do a blog......

O well, I don't know how interesting this will be but wot the heck, if Rosie can do it, I can also....

So they tell me there's a wall that everybody hits when they reach a certain age.....

I never really believed that but I didn't disbelieve it either....

Gotta be truthful...never tho't about it....I think I just felt like age was just a number and a relatively meaningless one at that.....ANYWAY....it appears that I may have encountered that mystical wall.....HOO-AH! I would never use a term like that for real...that's something that they do in 3rd rate movies and 2nd rate teevee shows.....howsomever I was surprised to learn that I have lymphatic cancer.....not really frightened, mind you, but surprised and confused....

I've heard that nothing quite focuses the mind as an intimate moment with your own mortality.......not true, at least for me....

I've been magnificently confused and pretty much unable to get my coherent ducks in any sort of row for most of my life... 

So this is me trying to get my ducks in a row....

O...and Justin Other Smith is a nom de plume that I tho't was really cool when I adopted it back in the halycon fifties......kind'a corny now but then, I s'poze, so'm I......David

Here I sit, all broken-hearted.......Nah!

That's a whole 'nother thing entirely. Fact is, I can't sleep. I think it must be the insulin. I've had insomnia ever since I started on the stuff. I'm tired and can't stop yawning but when I lie down in bed, the eyes pop open and I toss and turn 'til I get up. I'm bored with Solitaire. 

I don't know if I'm stressing over my upcoming operation to clean out a carotid artery or the chemo that will follow it. I'm not sure I'm even stressing over it at all but something is keeping me awake. And I'm tired...

Still working on my tan by swimming an hour a day (George Hamilton, look out!).....

Son David scored a 95 on SSA test for the State. Pretty damn good. I don't think I could've come close to that. Come to think of it, all my children are out-performing me in almost every way and that's a good thing.

Friday, August 31, 2007

Sound of my own wheels..........

title stolen from J. Browne & the eagles............

Can't sleep again.....and it's hot...'n still.......not a breath of air outside or in.....well, that's not quite true as I have the a/c going in the bedroom

My oncologist is cheerleader perky. The day she told me that I had Hodgkins Lymphoma was like the happiest I'd ever seen her.....

Of course, I only just met her that day so I really didn't have much to go on....

She asked me if I'd always marched to a different drummer, always done stuff just a little different than everyone else?......

I just looked at her while Millyrose answered for me in the affirmative......then she told me that I had a very rare form of Hodgkins Lymphoma, one that less than four percent of lymphoma victims had......I don't think she said victim but that was her general drift.. 

She seemed thrilled about it.....

I told her that I was happy for her but that like Abe Lincoln, I could have passed on the honor......

She's a great audience.....laughs at the slightest joke....

'Course, I suspect that when someone is told they have cancer, their jokes would tend to be slight.....I prob'ly don't stand out from the herd there........

Anyway, I''ve been fighting diabetes for a long time.....

I never tho't I'd actually win, y'understand, but I figured to come as close to a draw as I could. 

Now I seem to have a two-front war on my hands.....

On the one hand....diabetes and on the other....cancer.......

Better not be anything else, I don't have any more hands....

Well, I'm yawning. I think I'll try sleeping again.......g'nite

Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Oh, yes, those were the dayz.....

“Those were the days, my friend,

we tho’t they’d never end…”  Gene Raskin (sung by Mary Hopkins)

A few years ago…well, historically speaking anyway, I had a co-worker on the old SP who wuz celebrating his birthday but just happened t’be a little shy about which birthday it wuz…..when I pressed him, he declared that he wuz ‘older than dirt.’

When I pressed him a little more, he finally confessed his age then asked me how old I wuz to which I replied that I wuz ‘three years older than dirt.’

One of the ‘little columns’ in the SacBee is a birthday column that names celebrities which is a trivial thing, I know, but nevertheless interesting, ‘specially to those of us on a downhill slope…..

That’s how I came to read that Pat Boone, he of the clean-cut, boy next door, white buck shoes image, the yang to Elvis Presley’s yin (or vice versa) is 80 years old, my Gawd, eight decades…as I wuz ‘splainin’ to a young(er) friend t’other day, I wuz born in the first half of the last century ’n stated like that, it seems so long ago…’course, on that proverbial other hand, in my mem’ry, it’s like only day before yesterday, give or take a week or so…..

Rusty, the old poodle-dogger is sleeping more ’n more these dayz ’n come to think on it, so’m I…Willie goes to bed early ’n likes to rise ’n shine ’n go ‘round the block t’see what’s happened in the neighborhood overnite…he’s running hither ’n yon while Rusty mostly ambles hither once’t in a while ’n often turns up his old nose altogether at yon…

I, being somewhat decrepit, merely follow along behind…some dogs are leaders by nature ’n other dogs are just followers…in the end, I s’poze, to quote Dr. Pangloss, it all works out for the best...

Anyway now, back to Pat Boone, I m’self, wuz never what’cha might call a big fan tho’ he did have one song that I liked but I can’t remember what it wuz…this mem’ry loss I blame on Old-timers ’n not the other, nasty one…

Anyhow, Boone wuz extremely popular for a day or two back in those halycon ‘fifties…Hollywood tried to make him a star, made a few movies around him (much as they did for Elvis) and then, like so many in his vocation, the spotlight moved on…but, Hey, he had his day in the sun ’n he’s made it to his eighth decade so Happy Birthday to Pat Boone….

It seems the mind rambles whether I pay any attention or not ’n I could go on in this vein but I s’pect since I’m getting bored with it, ever’one else quit reading some time back…hope your day is going as pleasantly as mine seems t’be….

“for my friends, we’re older but no wiser

’n in our hearts, the dreams remain the same.”