Here’s a tale of a couple of older Ukrainian brothers in one of the nine different towns I grew up in, average population around 400 each. (I mean older than me, they were around 30.) In those days when you wanted a pair of skates, you went to the hardware store and hoped they had your size in black. These two guys opened a sporting goods store* in the middle of nowhere, next to the old post office on the wrong end of main street. It took off, and how. People would drive out from the city to shop there. I remember them because everyone began to tout these brothers as role models. The fact is, you rarely met people with less intelligence or personality. How it worked was they were good old boys who were thus easily able to borrow $250,000 against the family farm, a sum which, as a startup hurdle, practically guaranteed success back in 1980. Yes, yes, I'm fully aware that having a farm which one can mortgage for a quarter million bucks is hardly making it on your own.*
Anyway, I didn’t like them. I was probably a little envious, but not much. I was a radical and they represented the hated “system”. They played everything by the book, with brush cuts, fake manners and exaggerated respect for the building inspector. They were everything I was not, and their instant hit further embedded the unfairness of the world. Of course, these days I realize part of being rich is to deprive others of the same opportunities. You get this history lesson for lack of anything else much today.
Maybe I spoke too soon, lot's happened today. A variety of tasks came in this afternoon to keep us hopping, but between them, we managed to build a set of shelves for the soles. In a time-honored situation, a lady came in without a ticket. She was just gonna die if we lost her shoes, despite our assurances such things don’t happen. When she said they were black and white, they were grey. The database will soon solve these problems. She was one damn sexy woman, let me tell you.
So, Michael Jackson died. He was 50, if you believe the ages as given on the old Ed Sullivan show. (The Jackson family lied heavily to make it appear the singers were much younger.) The two worst MJ jokes of the day come from Texas: When he died he had so much plastic in him, he was melted down for Legos and now for a change the kids play with him. Or, he died of food poisoning from eating a 12 year old weenie. [Author's note: I have seen no evidence that Jackson was a molester, but he was certainly weird. The jokes are included because of blog rules, and because I think they are funny. I never cared for Jackson, his style or his music, so I'll take the laugh.]
Millie joins the army tomorrow, she gets the buzz cut. When I got home, Wallace showed me the skin rash on Millie. We held her down and applied the lotion, which she accepted. There is an option to keep her in the house all the time, but that is unrealistic for a part Lab. That heavy fur coat has to go. The plan is to shave her with my barber clippers in the morning. Millie, this is going to hurt Wallace more than you....
Here’s a little inside information. I’ve always wanted to sit down and learn the exact bass riff to Janis Joplin’s “Bobby McGee”. It has not happened because I can crank out ten other lines for the same time and effort. I learned bass by tapping out the notes on a piano, then finding them on the fretboard. The significance of that came out while playing through the new midi files y’day. I’m in the other room when I hear an incredible rendition. When I walk over to highlight that version, there is the on-screen piano playing the notes for me. All I do is slow it down to quarter speed until I catch every note, as can be done with any midi files. How about that?
*[Author's note 2015-06-25: this "sports store" had an interesting (to me) outcome. It was an idea whose time had come but the success went to the brother's heads. They convinced themselves that the reason for success was not how they stumbled upon a unique circumstances, but their own financial genius. So they did what any fat-head people would do at that time--they opened a consulting firm. Yep, they were going to come by and tell others how to succeed.
The problem was, very few others had farms to mortgage. The brothers lost their asses. But not before they became the laughing stock of the country forever. Still, I was one of the few that did not laugh too hard. After all, when times were good, they did make millions.
And the experience showed me the extreme loyalty to the system caused by people who have rich parents. Those same two brothers, who never gave a hoot about politics, converted overnight to staunch supporters of the entrenched system. I watched very closely and learned that unless you are born rich enough (as opposed to merely born rich), you stood no chance when others can make the rules.]
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