A seeker of wisdom 'n truth....

"I grow old, I shall wear my trousers rolled..."

T’is the season when magazines are full of summertime living articles......the perfect cool drink (mixed carefully, of course, with exotic flavors that most people have never heard of)...the perfect barbeque with coals of really rare and hard to find hardwoods from a distant mountain valley on the other side of the world (whichever side you happen t’be on, it’s on the other side)...the perfect burger, ground beef from handfed steers raised only in a secluded glen 'n gently, oh so gently, sacrificed by the light of a blue moon......
I just read an article on the perfect ‘burger (sighh)...
I just want’a say that Dagwood Bumsteads perfect sandwich is the perfect gastronomic nightmare for anywhere normal people and the perfect burger is whatever satisfies your p’tick’lar palate...no more, no less and one man’s garnishment is apt t’be another man’s poison......
S’funny, when I was a boy we never had barbeques in our neck of the woods....what we had was ‘weenie roasts’... that’s where you put a weenie (weiner for absolutists) on a stick, hold it in the flames as long as you dare ‘til it’s charred black on the outside ‘n relatively untouched on the inside, put it in the cheapest hot dog buns that y’could buy, scrape on some mustard (ketchup for the weak of heart) ‘n devour it while standing back from the bonfire.....ah well, golden youth flies ‘n it’s prob’ly a good thing for our stomachs.....

Ah Johnny, we hardly knew ye....

The Kennedy's have been in the news constantly since 1960...I'm as fed up with them as I am with Michael Jackson (last report: he's still dead)....Old Joe Kennedy was a bootlegger like Al Capone only where Capone tried to buy the police 'n the courts, the Irish were the police 'n the courts....that's why Capone died in prison 'n Joe Kennedy went to the Court of Saint James...jeez....John Kennedy was a womanizer and a liar who cheated on his wife with darn near anything that wore skirts (no reports on those who wore pants)....His book, Profiles in Courage, was ghost-written (as was likely his entire education) People who damn George Custer for being a fool and look up to John Kennedy have their heads stuck where the sun never shines...
Robert Kennedy (who I inexplicably liked) had no qualms as Attorney General in breaking the law to achieve the results that he wanted to get, namely; to take down the organized crime Lords who had helped put brother John into the White House...sssIronically achieving the same result as brother John....
Jackie Bouvier Kennedy, that icon of American womanhood, married for money, ignored her husbands affairs while racking up some of her own and when the Kennedy money was taken away (at least, the bulk of it) by the death of John, she sold herself off to Aristotle Onnassis who was dumb enough to marry her but too savvy to not figure out that he'd bought the proverbial 'pig in a poke'...(nothing quite like paying a king's ransom to poke a pig in a poke)...The son, John-John, a wealthy, good-looking chip off the old blockhead distinguished himself by...ummm, failing the bar exam a number of time and killing himself in a light plane crash (pilot error)...Caroline, y'know, can't string y'know more than y'know two words y'know at a time....ah hell, you get the idea....
Teddy as we all know is a drunken womanizer and bellicose liar who, under t'days standards, would be, should be in jail for murder for having caused the death of Mary Jo Kopechne...
The list goes on 'n on 'n on.....there seems no end to the Kennedy dynasty and the Kennedy tradition of being block-headed drunks with nary an original thought amongst them....
Oh, this rant was brought to you courtesy of Kathleen Kennedy Freeman (Bobby's daughter) who evidently belives as a good catholic that the Pope should bow down to Obama......

Ahhh.....politics....

The late Tip O'Neill use'ta say, "all politics is local politics!"
Wasn't original with him....he didn't 'zackly plagirize it, he was after all a politician 'n we all know politicians don't plagirize, they just forget (or don't know) who to attribute....(tip: when in doubt, give the credit to Will Rogers, Mark Twain or Willy Shakespeare)
Politicians are like actors (or jocks)...it ain't that they can't be bright, it's just that they are so self-absorbed as to seem stupid.... OK! Maybe some of 'em are really stupid...c'd be that we need to elect these kind of people so that those of us that are just of average smarts c'n feel superior....
What set this p'tick'lar rant in motion this morning was an item in 'The Bee' stating that the budget meeting scheduled for yesterday had been cancelled because the Democratic Speaker of the Assembly had not been able to figure out the flight schedule from LA to Sac....I have pre-teenage grandchildren that can read an airline schedule...they're probably more qualified to work on the state budget than Karen Bass....and ain't she a fine example of, dare I say, affirmative action....
Of course, I'm just an old white man (unfortunately not a rich one) 'n we've evidently screwed up not only this country but the entire world....ahhhh well, it's all just politics, ain't it?

perfect burger....

T’is the season when magazines are full of summertime living articles......the perfect cool drink (mixed carefully, of course, with exotic flavors that most people have never heard of)...the perfect barbeque with coals of really rare and hard to find hardwoods from a distant mountain valley on the other side of the world (whichever side you happen t’be on, it’s on the other side)...
I just read an article on the perfect ‘burger (sighh)...
I just want’a say that Dagwood Bumsteads perfect sandwich is the perfect gastronomic nightmare for anywhere normal people and the perfect burger is whatever satisfies your p’tick’lar palate...no more, no less and one man’s garnishment is apt t’be another man’s poison......
S’funny, when I was a boy we never had barbeques in our neck of the woods....what we had was ‘weenie roasts’... that’s where you put a weenie (weiner for absolutists) on a stick, hold it in the flames as long as you dare ‘til it’s charred black on the outside ‘n relatively untouched on the inside, put it in the cheapest hot dog buns that y’could buy, scrape on some mustard (ketchup for the weak of heart) ‘n devour it while standing back from the bonfire.....ah well, golden youth flies ‘n it’s prob’ly a good thing for our stomachs.....

Quiet Sat'iday....

Just a quiet Sat’iday morning...

I was trying to sleep in...I wanted to sleep in...I was determined to sleep in....but the dogs were getting impatient ‘n the darn chickens were telling each other (‘n the rest of the world) that it was time to go out ‘n find the worm.....
S’funny how them dogs c’n get up so early in the morning ‘n be so anxious to go out ‘n then they come back in ‘n curl up ‘n go back t’sleep...I wonder if I ‘uz to put some coffee in their waterbowls if they’d get wired ‘n stay awake...’course, that ain’t something to wonder about very long before you figure out that is a situation to be avoided however possible...
Dragged m’self off to the gym for my morning workout...
y’know how the ubiquitous ‘they’ always say how much better you’ll feel after a workout..t’ain’t true...after a workout, all I want’a do is take a nap..not happening tho’...
got chores t’do...dogs t’walk...little things but they do keep a body from napping.....
Going to Music Circus this afternoon..courtesy of Gina...‘Thoroughly Modern Millie’....
I find as I’m aging (courtesy of good genes ‘n good luck) that I prefer afternoon delites ‘stead of evening ones...the evening ones interfere with my napping in front of the teevee....’n one must get one’s nap before going to bed...mustn’t one?
ah well, it’s all a question of priorities anyways...

"His'try.....

ignore it at your peril.” Justin Other Smith

“I’m a Yankee Doodle Dandy.....’’ George M. Cohan

I was born less’n half a mile south of the Mason-Dixon Line so by the grace of God ‘n geography, I’m a son of the South...
In that great uncivil war between the States, Kentucky did not secede......it split, friend against friend, family against family...even the churches split..it was a bitter time for the whole country but especially bitter in the border states...Kentucky ‘n Missouri....
Y’should remember that in 1860 we were less than a hundred years from declaring our independence from Great Britain ‘n there were men still living who remembered that famous day ‘n year ‘n the midnite ride of Paul Revere....
Most of modern day America believes (indeed, has been taught) that our Civil War was fought to end the vile practice of slavery. T’ain’t true tho’ slavery played a big part in the schism.
The war was about ‘Economics ‘n States Rights’...’n I bring all this up on this ‘OUR’ day of Independence simply to point out the inherent danger of ideologicalreasoning.
Nothing is always black ‘n white, it’s always shades of grey. Successful gamblers know that ‘all or nothing’ is a dangerous ‘n impractical strategy that eventually ends in disaster.
‘Course you sh’d remember that not every lemming jumps...’n maybe some of ‘em can swim...
Happy Independence Day

Over the hill...

‘n deep in the valley....

Once upon a time in that long ago place that I generally refer to as my ‘way back when time’..actually a lot more than once ‘cuz I was ever a dreamer, I use’ta climb the hill to the top of the ridge that overlooked Beattyville ‘n the river ‘n had a pretty good view of Portsmouth, Ohio too....There were three outcroppings along the path to the top of the ridge ‘n I would sit down on the highest one ‘n let my legs dangle into space while I stared off into the blue distance....I still do that t’day only without sitting on the ridge looking out over the river....mostly I call it (if pressed) lost in reverie...’n when you get lost in your mind like that, you c’n, like the Pooka, Harvey, go anywhere you want ‘n stay as long as you like ‘n when you get back, only a few minutes will have passed....you c’n give it any name you like, meditation or dreaming or magic...it doesn’t matter, a rose by any name...etc...
Ernest Hemingway wrote a book called, “Across the river and into the trees”....he got the title from what are supposed to be the last words of Stonewall Jackson...
Famous people seem to be dying at a record pace the last few weeks ‘n I find myself reading the obits of my hometown newspapers more ‘n more frequently ‘n more ‘n more frequently, I find the names of people I know (or use’ta know at any rate)....’n in statistical terminology, they’re all members of the same fraternity as m’self...all part of the over the hill gang ‘n in a conversation with a neighbor (a member of that same fraternity) he used the phrase ‘over the hill’......I told him I had crossed that ridge ‘n was deep in the valley but I was planning on taking my time along the way....
Anyways I was surprised to learn that there are a number of Americans who don’t know that we celebrate the signing of the Declaration of Independence on the Fourth of July....so from an over the hill, deep in the valley guy...Happy Independence Day y’all!