Basic rule on falling down:

Don't do it!

“Pop a top again.....”
I just gotta say it...don’t want t’be a hypocrite about it, a cold beer tastes pretty good sometimes....Once upon a time, a long, long time ago (a very long, long time ago) a cold beer made for a relatively satisfying breakfast.... but, that was once upon a time, etcetera ‘n such....as I grew older ‘n wiser (‘n fatter) I switched to coffee ‘n cigarettes ‘n the SF Chronicle ‘n such, but then (sighhh) I grew older ‘n wiser (‘n even fatter) ‘n I gave up the cigarettes ‘n the Chronicle (wot the hell, Caen, McCabe ‘n even Delaplane were gone)....Life is a brief moment ‘n the immortality of youth is even briefer....As I grew older ‘n fatter ‘n just wise enuff to know how awfully dumb we mortals c’n be, I refused to give up my coffee.. I argued with the dieticians over coffee ‘n butter ‘n chock’lit-covered p-nutz, (okay, I might’a got the chock’lit-covered p-nuts a little wrong) but not the coffee ‘n butter.....it’s the quantities that’ll do you in, not the substance itself.....Back in the day, I used to think that anything worth doing was worth doing to excess but I was wrong...It’s the excesses that are dangerous....too many cigarettes, too much booze, too much butter or coffee or chocolate cake or spaghetti ‘n meatballs...it don’t matter....too much of a ‘good’ thing turns it into a bad thing.....same with religion ‘n politics.....if you get unbalanced with durn near anything, you’re probably gonna take a fall ‘n the older you get, the more falling hurts....remember when you were a kid ‘n your dad urged you to try harder, climb higher ‘n your mom wrung her hands ‘n said, “Don’t fall. Don’t fall.”....Well, your mom knew whereof she spoke.......
So my recipe for a long (comparatively speaking) life is to avoid falling down....

Neither here nor there......

but somewhere, I'm almost sure....

Random tho’ts in idle moments ‘n idle tho’ts in random moments......sometimes it’s really hard to tell the difference.....sort’a like the weather in a transition season....of course, all seasons are transition seasons...
time ‘n tide wait for no man....seasons come ‘n go ‘n mankind....well, humankind as a nod to womanhood, really has nothing to say about it. We just think we do.....
As humans, we tend to think a lot, mostly about ourselves....when we think about the world around us, it’s always how it relates to us....we’re a very narcissistic lot, we humans....the world (our world, the only one we have) revolves around us....Our reality is all that we have ‘n we tend to question that in many ‘n sundry ways....How did we get here? Where did we come from? What is the purpose of life? Is there a God? We are cast in the image of God, they tell us.....the ‘they’ being those who have gone before...or did we invent God? Is God cast in our image? And if there is no God, why isn’t there? There ought’a be a God!
We’ve been talking to God for a long time, we humans, in our conceit. All the billions of people that came before the billions that are here now talked to God. And all the billions that are to come will talk to God. Even the atheists among us that deny the very existence of God spend an inordinate amount of time and effort in that denial.
Agnostics fret over the possibility that there is no God. Or maybe, there is. It is an age-old conundrum, an unprovable riddle that keeps us awake at night.....well, something keeps us awake at night and pondering deep thoughts is more socially acceptable than computer Solitaire.....or for that matter, pondering what may or may not be socially acceptable.
I once had a teacher whose name I have long since forgot though I can picture him in my mind. The picture I have in my mind may or may not be accurate...memories get twisted over the years, bent by innumerable stories, movies and television shows. I recall a tall, angular, narrow-shouldered, dark visaged man in his early 30’s. A man of effete mannerisms who fairly dripped disdain as he lectured what he prbably saw as a parade of intellectually inferior Neanderthalians. We viewed each other from diametrically opposed positions thus quite possibly clouding each others judgments, although it’s not only possible but highly probable that I’m the only one who misjudged the whole experience.
Age is a wondrous thing, allowing as it does, the opportunity to look back over your life and guage the depth of your early ignorance by comparing it to the infinite vastness of a horizonless ocean of ignorance in which we swim.
So my idle ‘n random tho’ts have meandered on for almost 500 words, give or take, ‘n if you’ve read all this, you really need to get a grip....”Say goodnight, Gracie”

In the meantime.....

Monday, Monday.....
Out walking them dogs under a low’ring sky...I think, ah hell, I know there’s a storm brewing...
it’s grey ‘n overcast with windy gusts keeping the chickens unsettled....Willie tried to chase two big ol’ roosters but they just ignored him...
He barked ‘n growled ‘n made like he was gonna lunge at them but they just ignored him...I wouldn’t call him heartbroken but he didn’t cheer up until I found another chicken that ran from him...fortunately, it don’t take a lot to amuse him....unfortunately, what it usually takes is to get my attention so that he can go chase something....Meanwhile Rusty appears t’be pretty much bemused by the ‘hull thang...Once in a while, Rusty’ll bark ‘n run a few feet at something that has turned Willie into a whirling dervish, but then he stops ‘n looks at me as if to shake his head ‘n say, “will wonders never cease?”.....
Ah well, in the meantime, t’is a wondrous world we inhabit ..... ‘n all too often, we forget that for all our great plans ‘n aspirations, all we really have is ‘in the meantime’....

Chopping weeds on a Sunday morn.....

Sunday.....a warm, quiet, almost lazy Spring day with the constant buzz of the traffic on Sunrise Boulevard reminding me of the camp on the Snake River in Wyoming in June of '91.....the Spring runoff then reminded Millyrose 'n me of the traffic on Sunrise Boulevard minus of course, the sirens, the squeal of brakes 'n the sound of occasional crashes as the never-ending Great California Road Race roars on 'n on 'n on....
Errol Flynn died at age 50 after a young life spent in the pursuit of excess....there is nothing inherently wrong with excess, unless of course, it's done to excess as Flynn proved by dying at an age that only children think is old...I remember those golden days when if a thing was worth doing, it was worth doing excessively...that was when hangovers faded with the golden glow of soft afternoons fading into magnificent evenings....back before the hacking cough of too many cigarettes, the love handles 'n soft bellies of too much beer. Back when you could eat anything 'n never gain a pound....Ah, Eden....'n then that durn snake showed up 'n whispered of the joys t'be found outside the garden of youth....
Willie loves to chase anything that moves be it a live chicken or a dead leaf...Rusty is older 'n he only occasionally acts like he might want to chase something..that is, until he remembers 'n then he stops 'n looks around 'n decides that he'd rather walk...either that or maybe just lie in the sun.....Ah well, it's Sunday!

RE: Whack a weed Satiday.....

'n the weeds are winning!

Hey, it’s whack-a-weed Sat’iday...

let us all go outside ‘n play....
I used to hate mowing the lawn when I was a boy. There was no such thing as a power mower, at least back in Beattyville, Ky...there was just a heavy old push mower ‘n tuff grass that grew inches overnite ‘n really needed t’be cut ‘bout twice a week...’specially in the Springtime when it rained once or twice a day ‘n you c’d see the grass grow inbetween....it wasn’t so bad later in the summer when it would often go two or three weeks without a rain ‘n people would scratch their heads over the drought ‘n the fact that their gardens were dying ‘n that they’d never seen such a dry summer....
My dad got a power mower, hmmm lemme see, I think it was after I left home which meant that my brothers got to struggle with it...it was a big, heavy thing that was supposed to be self-propelled but it still took a lot of muscle to handle it....it was sold for pennies on the dollar when mom ‘n dad moved to northern LaLa Land where the sun shone from mid-February to mid-November....fortunately, science by that time had developed the lite-weight rotary mower than any 90 lb weakling could handle....for a little more money, you c’d buy a self-propelled lite-weight rotary mower that you c’d handle with your fingertips...’Course, for a little more money, you c’d hire a ‘lawn service’ that would cut your grass, edge the sidewalk ‘n take the clipping away t’be dumped in someone else’s landfill...
Nowadays, what with the water shortage ‘n all, lawns are disappearing here in northern LaLa Land....not down south, of course....El Lay is a desert but they have more water than they know what t’do with so they run it down the streets...they tell me that it just runs into the ocean ‘n gets recycled so that makes it alright but y’gotta remember that SoCal is a world apart from ev’rywhere else....I like t’make fun of SoCal ‘n hate t’go there, mainly ‘cause of the traffic...
there’s just too many people ‘n too many cars but to be truthful, there’s a reason so many people gravitate there....’n there’s a reason people there live with the earthquakes, wildfires, mudslides, etcetera...I haven’t ever figured out exactly what that reason is but, I’m sure there is one....sort’a like God, y’know...if there wasn’t one, people ‘ud just have to invent one.....
And that’ enuff ‘cause the yard is waiting ‘n the

Hope 'n change......

This is a sad and embarrasing period in American history right up there with the internment of Japanese American citizens during WWII.
In my opinion, the Obama presidency is an unmitigated disaster although I believe that Obama himself might think he is a success. His performance as President has been less successful than the governorship of Arnold Schwartzenegger and definitely without the saving grace of Arnold. The Obama presidency is more pathetic than that of Jimmy Carter whom many think was the worst President in our history.
I will not, cannot blame those people who voted for Obama for believing in his message of ‘hope and change’ since the man seems to be a master of deceit and obsfucation; he is, after all is said and done, an accomplished Chicago politician.
I do however blame those who still support Obama and his policies. They should hang their heads in shame and embarrasment.
As for me, I did not vote for Obama but I felt that it was a watershed moment in American history that we could at long last put an end to the racial divide that has plagued this country for so long. I thought that George Bush was a decent man caught in a predicament not of his own making but that his leadership had helped to bring about a division in this country not seen since Abraham Lincoln.
I felt that Barack Obama would close that gap and help to bring a healing that would bridge that divide.
It seems that I was wrong as the country is more divided than ever. Still, Obama may be the catalyst that tears off the scab of those old wounds and exposes them to the sunlight of reason and in that regard, perhaps his presidency will be a pivotal point.
The only constant in life is change and hope springs eternal.