November 27, 2016

Yesteryear
One year ago today: November 27, 2015, “drunken cowboy” style.
Five years ago today: November 27, 2011, 4,999.0 miles.
Nine years ago today: November 27, 2007, Google begins blocking video posts.
Random years ago today: November 27, 1984, 11 chapters advance reading . . .

MORNING
           This is the Constellation, the standard in trans-Atlantic air travel right up to the jet age. I don’t think I’ve ever flown on one of these. Because I’d remember. I spent part of the morning touring the aircraft museum in Polk City. I drove to the south end to make a deposit this morning to discover the ATM won’t accept checks from banks it doesn’t “recognize”. This check was from Germany. So, rather that waste the trip, I zipped into the Terrace Café for biscuits and gravy and decided I should make a tour of Dade City.

           Not so fast. I headed north but the road kept veering east. Finally I resigned that I was going east like it or not. I’m getting more and more miffed at this credit union the more I do business with them. Niw this business with the checks, it just spits them back out and give you no options. So I took a drive to cool off.
           The trail goes through that area were JZ and I figured it must flood, that area to the north-northwest of Lakeland. We guessed right, it is resting along the edge of a swamp. I drove twenty minutes into that area, so not a little swamp either. I determined from the road names I must be gradually nearing Polk City.

           The Terrace is the kind of place I’d take a gal next morning—if I had one. Dammit. The staff is cheerful and I chatted with one gal who liked the batbike. About half my age, but sharp and left me alone to work the crossword. See photo, don’t you hate it when you get it all except one square? Neither clue made sense even when I stepped through the who alphabet. Was it one of these: based, cased, eased, tased, but not lased or mased.
           Of note was the weather, so agreeable that for the first time in years, you can just see in the corner that I’m wearing a long-sleeved shirt. Le me say something about the young lady serving me.
           Sigh, losing out (to age) with nice women like that is the worst downside of getting old. I found her attractive for the simplest reason in my book—she did not remind me of any other woman I’ve ever met. That, peeps, is not easy to do. Also, make certain you are hungry before dining at the Terrace; portions tend to be large.

Picture of the day.
The Empty Quarter.
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NOON
           The flight museum is only part of the complex. There are huge hangars of planes being restored and plenty of sheds with planes awaiting restoral. But neither of those are open to the public. The neat part of this museum, for me anyway, was recognizing some of the airplanes. The museum has original aircraft that still fly, including a B-26. Not restored, but flyable. The star of the show is this amphibian. It is fabric covered, so here is the dope. (Ha-ha.)

           The plane was built by Sikorsky, the helicopter guy. He built only two, the other was a twin engine model. Note the zany design. The story is it is patterned after a specific species of giraffe. This aircraft was used by two 1920’s nature photographers, an unmarried couple, who flew it around Africa. Must be nice. The color scheme was chosen so as to not scare the natives. It is easier to convince them it is a flying giraffe than a great silver bird. The rear compartment is the size of a double bed.

           The fine print says the pattern is from one of seven distinct sub-species of giraffe. The crew had to take pictures on film, then project the pattern onto the airplane to get the required authenticity. I was enthralled by this airplane, yet other people on the tour were indifferent, preferring to look at an old Helldiver.
           Mind you, back then it was possible to meet a gal who could drop everything and go with you to take pictures in Africa. These days, she’d refuse to leave her cats behind. And her tattoos would scare the native more than any wild animals. She’d have to decide if you were age appropriate and you’d have to wait until she got off shift. Type of thing.

           This aircraft is also fabric covered, as were all planes before the mid-1930s. They stretched canvas over a wooden frame like a pillowcase, then sprayed it. The cotton would shrink to a nice fit and they’d dope it, a compound similar to fingernail polish. I wonder if that explains why so many of the first airplanes were built in Florida. This plane spent 25 years being restored and it is posh. The interior is like a fine cabin on a sailing ship. It would still probably represent a viable way to get around Africa even today. Nomsayn?
           Beyond that, there is not much to see in Polk City. Like many of the remaining small towns, it is too far away to be absorbed a suburb and too close to keep the kids on the farm. I didn’t really tour the area. What I saw from the roadways were a lot of feed lots and cattle supply stores. There are lakes everywhere in the area. The land is hilly, so it is not part of the swamp just mentioned. The town is a tangle of old roadways. This photo is an abandoned soft ice cream stand on the south edge of town. On the road to Auburndale as seen past the tire of my sidecar. There’s the long-sleeve shirt and a tie, too.

           I drove back down the Old Eagle Lake Road, but kept it under 55. That slight piston misfire is annoying but it could just be bad gasoline. Anything with ethanol in it is bad by definition. I see the museum offers flights in a biplane. Remind me of that next month. I’ve never been in a biplane. I was once going to build one, but that was some forty years ago and the carpenter moved away. The museum had an old de Havilland without the fabric, and you know, I didn’t guess too badly when I build that robot shell of a model airplane a couple years ago, was it? Where did I pack that that thing, I know it’s here?
           See, this is why I need that work shed. To free up storage space for more stuff. For the first time in my life, I have stuff that needs more space than my other stuff. The cycle of life.

NIGHT
           The museum had a hand build Fokker tri-plane, the machine associated with the Red Baron. The hand-built aircraft were the more fascinating if you ask me. The quality of the woodwork is, to a clumsy robot type like me, unimaginably fine. The spars were hand planed but they look like they are factory precise. Here is a head-on view of the de Havilland fuselage being worked on.

           First, I walked the entire museum (one large hangar) myself, then later went on the guided tour. The information on the engines and technical parts was good, but the use of these planes in battle, well, the tour guide probably had no idea he was dishing out the John Wayne version.

           He told of the glowing work of the American squadron, what was that, the Escadrille(?). The oft-told tale of the difference the Americans made on the Western Front. The reality was, the American attack preparations at Belleau Wood were so incompetent the Germans suspected it was a feint.
           But, but, what about the great American advance that first day? Didn’t they push back the German lines for miles? Bullshit, pure New York Times grade bullshit. The Germans had begun pulling out a few days earlier to better prepared positions in the rear. The doughboys walked over trenches that contained only rear guard sentries and a some surprised work parties. But even those few Germans gave them a bloody nose. While it’s true the victors write the history books, you don’t have to be the one who believes everything you read.

ADDENDUM
           I’ve finally made it through my entire pile of unwatched DVDs. The final movie was “Road To Perdition”, a gangland story about a kid who’s father is a hitman for a bootlegger. They wind up on the run, Perdition being the name of the town where the father plans to drop the kid off, but instead, they wind up on a crime spree. Well done, but every scene is too glossy to be taken seriously. I’d rather work on the shed. I’ve got it planned out as a small workshop. That’s only planned, not committed. Who knows what I’ll put in there?

           While all this is going on, I made quiche. Real men eat as much quiche as they want, and they know how to bake it right, too. This recipe has a slight Tex-Mex flavor, a hint of added salsa. For no reason earlier I was thinking of the first time I had quiche. I was roughly thirty years old and was looking for a coffee house to patronize.

           I found one in the east end of town, but it was upscale yuppie for the time and the hours were too restrictive. They called their tea “Chia” and way back then the quiche had a hefty $8.00 price tag. The name sounded French. It was nice and I’d gone back there a few times only to find they closed randomly. It was too far a drive to take the chance and I settled on a roadside diner near Tukwila where the waitresses gave me free refills when the boss wasn’t looking.
           The quiche in this picture is hot out of the oven, ingredients are eggs, milk, onion, diced ham, cheese, crust and seasonings. By mid-evening, I’d eaten half of it. Oh, and a tablespoon of mild salsa while sautéing the onions in olive oil. See, gals. You don’t come over, you get nuttin’. Between Zeke and I, we finally ate all the turkey that can be picked from the bones. There’s still lots in the freezer. Help yourself.

           I’m slowly training Zeke to wait by the back door by playing “Long Long Ago” on the flutophone. That could work either way. I’ve also worked out a better bass riff to that tune, “The Last Thing On My Mind”. But it is “backwards” to logic so I can’t sing it and play it at the same time. Yet that is a prime signal for me to keep at it, because if I have that much difficulty, it usually means a laff down the line when a guitarist thinks he’ll show me how easy it is.
           For you music buffs, I’ll describe the riff. I combine the classic Freddy Fender bass line, where he plays only the open E and A an octave lower than you’d expect for the rest of the notes. To this I combine the Chet Atkins style of hammering on, but move it up the neck so there is no clash of two bass notes. The challenge is, the riff demands two down picks that are opposite to the technique most bass players invest a lot of time learning to avoid. It gets darn hard to play it “wrong”, but I’ll do it, you watch.
           Later, I can do it, very slowly, but it is too complicated to play standing up on stage. Bass cannot be picked as easily as the guitar and while I hear the riff in my mind, there’s a physical limit to speed picking.


Last Laugh
At the Cat Museum.

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