One year ago today: April 7, 2017, 1500 calories, sigh.
Five years ago today: April 7, 2013, the musicianship was great . . .
Nine years ago today: April 7, 2009, Wilmington waterfront.
Random years ago today: April 7, 2010, Cowboy Mike made this.
He’s back. Or maybe it’s a she. The genderless red scooter, and already I’m feeling better about saving gas. Every week I was averaging 95 miles around town. Well, then again, I would never take the scooter to Winter Haven seven times per month. The shop broke my signal light, cracked my side panel, and for some reason the muffler is loud again. But they fixed other little things they didn’t have to so it’s all good.
My life’s mission should have been to outlaw advertising. Not all advertising, but certainly broadcast and intrusive advertising. It would be confined to trade magazines, or sources where people who wanted to see advertising would voluntarily go. But road signs? Television commercials? One repeat of a commercial per day only. Massive rewards for citizens who turn in violators, either the client or the advertiser.
Another four hours getting the scooter back into driveable condition. It sat for seven months, which didn’t do it any good. Here’s a shot of the broken signal light, plus I had better take all the lenses off for a good cleaning on the inside. If I didn’t know better, I’d say that the red cardinal was following me around today, front yard to back. It’s not my imagination because I walked completely around the house twice and he was there. Probably the association with food, but the feeder was already topped off.
Any ornithologists out there, let me know. I asked around about those two little birds and nobody can identify them. Remember Petunia, the blonde that glommed on to me first week I was in town? The one I would have introduced to JZ if she’s stuck around? She knew a birdwatcher who had been seeking some particular red and yellow bird for twenty years. Turns out Agt. R’s back yard had a family of them and never said a word until a year after they disappeared.
I downloaded “Stripes” by Brandy Clark. And being a specialist with bass scales to minor chords, I wrote a dynamite accompaniment in less than an hour. I could solo it but its got a slow tempo than most things I’ll play alone. Listen to the song and hear the drum beat carrying the verses, then the choruses revert to a straight root-fifth. Got it, all the bass notes and drum beats combined. And it looks neat, which, by the way, I get regular compliments on. It was one of the first things Lady Nik said, that what I play doesn’t even look like what most bass players do.
Scene from “My Winnipeg”.
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Make no mistake, I am an American patriot. America for Americans. I am not part of the liberals who want to bankrupt the country. I am not with the politicians who send Americans to foreign wars. I am not part of the military establishment that demands offensive weapons. And I do not support anybody who does those things. That behavior is not the will of the American people. If it was up to me, America would pull out of all other countries and convert the military to a defense force. So anyone who wants to call me a redneck, fine. It only makes me wonder what their agenda is.
Ha, so Trump is boycotting the media’s little “correspondent’s dinner”. They deserve it, as if they have some appointed almighty special privilege to have such a meeting. Up yours, you bunch of lowlifes. I believe in freedom of the press, but as far as I’m concerned fake news has been a feature of American life since day one. Freedom of speech and the press was never meant for giant media corporations to have the right to report their opinions as fact. The press has always behaved as if they had more rights than any other citizen and could force the president to cater to them. Well, they just fell another notch and I’m glad for it.
Instead they come here, find out they can’t get jobs because they can’t read or write either language, and wind up on welfare, in gangs, or in jails. True, a few rise to the top, but last I heard, Mexico is short of doctors and skilled laborers. (Like the saying goes, if they are good for America, why are they not good for the countries they came from?) Not only have I been an isolationist my entire life, I would cut off all immigration until every American citizen who wants a job has one and those that do not want a job are kicked off welfare, then thrown into prison camps in Alaska the minute they try to get any money without working. You know, like they do in countries with people who criticize me on that one. The American taxpayer is losing $140 billion per year raising, educating, and inoculating Mexicans who have no business here.
I would also end the special rules for Cuba. Enough is enough. None of the boats and floats are carrying anybody who was born when Castro came to power, so that whole liberation movement is a crock of hooey. Like him or not, the Donald is acting for the majority of Americans who have had it with these immigrants. They should be running to other Latino countries, not here. And Congress should be disbanded and replaced. Their mandate is to represent the voice of the people. They are blatantly not doing so. They are resisting the wall that 70% of Americans have wanted for thirty years.
ADDENDUM
Has anyone seen this DVD “Cloverfield”? I could not finish it. What do they call that, a concept film? It’s made to look like it was recovered from a camcorder from some people having a party when the lizard monster attacks New York. But it is too contrived and full of constant panic scenes. They have some lice monsters the size of german shepherds that could have made for a thrilling movie if they’d keep the camera still.
My shoulder decided to act up so I threw on another DVD. These are all new to me, even some of the oldest of what’s out there. Raised without electricity until 13, discover music and women before that, starving student until 24, world traveler by 28, by the time most people had watched every movie in existence, I had grown out of most of it. I really do know people who can tell you who acted or produced all the movies they’ve seen. I recognize only the most recognizable of actors at best.
And the second movie was great. “To Catch A Thief”. With Leonardo, and since I’ve heard the movie title before, this was probably a remake. I must say it was well done, indeed. Based on a true story, they say. I was kind of rooting for the bad guy, I guess if I had been a bad guy, I’d have been rich. I wonder how true it was that he crammed for two weeks and passed a bar exam. Because, I’ve, er done things like that myself, but never on that scale. I call it giving myself two months to get five years experience. It certainly is possible because most people can go through five years without learning a damn thing. They make it easy to catch up and sail right past.
There is also the Robin Hood aspect of robbing the banks by cheating them at their own game. Forget giving money to the poor. They can’t do anything with it, that’s why they are poor. But I’ll root for you if you just rob the banks but not with a gun. Since you are going to get caught, live it up. And I’m not above cheering for the guy who makes the cops look like fools. The reasoning is that the cops, instead of focusing their entire energies catching bad guys, instead turn their techniques on the masses of innocent people. If they would stick to doing their jobs, I’d be on their side.
If you’ve read this far, I’ll tell you a repeat tale from the trailer court. When I was in my twenties, I had a summer job at a garage door factory. There was a prick there named Lane, some old coot who’d been there all his life and he was a total asshole. What he’d do is four minutes before punch in time, he’d grab all the punch cards out of the bin. So anybody coming in would have to go get a replacement card from the office, which took slightly more than four minutes to get there and back. So they’d get docked 15 minutes of pay for being late.
When it happened to me, I complained and the foreman, who was also a shit and friend of Lane told me, “You’ll just have to use all your brains and figure out some way to get your card punched on time.” That sounds like permission to me. Of the entire factory with 80 some employees, I was the only one who knew that the punch cards were really Holleriths. I visited the local university and picked up a few hundred cards, stopping at the teletype machines to print my name and employee number on each.
Then, over to the flea market to buy an identical punch clock. If I recall, it set me back $45, or about six times that in today’s money. But I was never late again. On paper, anyway. Just punch in before leaving home in the morning. That’s the closest I ever came to “counterfeiting”. And it was fun. I was only following orders. Lane was far too stupid to ever figure it out because he’d stand watching but I knew he had to get back to his machine and I’d wait him out. I hope he worked there until he was 65, I really do.
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