STONE AGAIN

In my previous post about Tahquitz (rhymes with pockets) Canyon, I extolled minerality—my brother the boulder, and all. Excellent post, I recommend it.

It occurred to me that some sculptures by San Francisco’s beloved Benny Bufano (wikilink), illustrate my point very well, per the three below photos.

I love Benny’s animals with their round curves and minimally formed features, like babies. They're cute and sympathetic. "Yeah," Pud agrees, "screw the critics."

Because so much of the surface is non-feature-filled, we are struck as much by their rock-ness as by their animal-ness. Classical sculpture asks us to forget we are viewing rock, and gives us the illusion of viewing, say, Apollo, or Aphrodite.



These Bufanos don’t try to hide the fact that they are rock. They are sort of halfway between a rock and the subject animal. Boulder, or animal? Both, just like us. At least just like me and Pud.

So I pictured Bufano taking a hunk of marble and doing the least possible removal to reveal the animal form.




But no. My crack fact checkers tell me these works are cast-marble, or other cast-stone. This totally bummed me. Cast stone (little link) is something I wish I didn’t have to know about.

Anyway, IF Bufano had carved these things from solid rock, they would have brilliantly illustrated my point. But, hey, I still love those cuddly critters.

My friend Michael did a Bufano related photo essay (highly recommended) in his pre-blog days.

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Blueberry Hill

BLUEBERRY ISLAND

Pud says the polar ice caps are history.

“Trying to maintain a steady state, for instance keeping sea level where it is now, is futile. We should know by now that the only certainty is change. We try to foresee these changes but even our predictions are subject to change.

“The change now in progress is the disappearance of natural ice. Icecaps gone. Glaciers kaput. Snow-capped peaks hatless.

“We hear about an historical period called the ‘Ice Age,’ and supposedly there was a ‘little ice age’ in there somewhere.

“But now we are witnessing the end of the real ice age, defined as the period of time when there was naturally occurring frozen water on earth.

“The question is how long the ‘water age’ will last—how long before we enter the ‘steam age’.

“Entrepeneurs and other forward thinkers are already planning for the new exigencies.

“For instance, people will still be seeking thrills on Blueberry Hill, but it won’t be a hill anymore, it’ll be an island, and people will be arriving by watercraft.

“Personal solar-powered watercraft will be big. We’ll all be scooting around like a bunch of goddamn jesus-bugs.”

“We’ll be dead by then,” I reminded Pud.

“None too soon,” Pud said.

----- o -----

PUD MAINTENANCE

1) Sometimes I go little overboard and Pud has to pull me back. Pud is the kinder, gentler of us. He says I had no right to refer to Falun Gong members a “fucks.”

On a denotative level, I say that we all result from fucks, so, essentially we all ARE “fucks.” But I understand how some people could take this the wrong way. So, whenever I refer to someone as a “fuck” just think “nice person.”

2) Pud thinks he should be up in the top box along with Heraclitus, Diogenes and sfwillie. He points out that he is the only “Pudinhand Wilson” in googledom, whereas, as he so charmingly puts it, “half the drunks in the history of Ireland were named either “Willie” or “Morrissey.”

“Or both,” I added. Pud has a point, and I’ll consider his request.

3) Pud thinks I’ve been intercepting his fan mail, and my denials don’t impress him. He’s insisting on having his own email address, so we’ve changed the Who is Pud link to read "Who is Pud?—contact" for his kajillion fans.

Pud's new email address is sfpud@comcast.net.

4) Pud is pissed that I used “Pud’s an asshole” as a label on a recent post. “I don’t mind for myself,” he said, “but what if my mother sees it—she’ll expect me to kill you.”

I told Pud that the label has been removed, and that he can assure his entire family that such a clerical error will never happen again.

----- o -----

Colours

WELL MADE SONGS

To be “well made” a song needs either a chorus, or a bridge, or both. The words need some sort of unity, whether of diction, imagery, or domain. The words need to seem to “work with” the music. And there needs to be some sort of “hook.”

The Donovan song above, sweet as it is, has no chorus or bridge, it’s just three or four verses. Describing the beautiful woman you wake up with is a strong enough hook. The words work well with the music, but there’s no perspective or commentary, which would be provided by choruses and bridges.

Poor Donovan, all that sweetness wasted. The second clip is another song that almost makes it, Catch the Wind has a timid little musical bridge that doesn’t really help. But the sentiment is sweet.

There’s a YouTube clip of Donovan talking with Pete Seeger about, then playing, Colours, with an extra verse. Donovan was wise not to include the extra verse in the official version, it was terrible.

Anyway, Pete passed up his chance to tell Donovan that Colours needed not an extra verse but a damn bridge.

By contrast, Desperado is a very well made song. I found this version by Ken Hirai. Never heard of Ken, but what a nice voice! Check his site.

Written in 1973—Watergate was breaking, Vietnam was broken, inflation was high, and gas lines were long—this song is an enduring standard that will be jerking tears from willing listeners for many years to come.

I’m a total softy for this stuff.

----- o -----

Donovan - Catch The Wind

Desperado

GOING, GOING, GONG!

When we see a struggle between two opponents, it’s quite natural to look for a rooting interest.

We tend to favor underdogs, the mouse vs the cat, David over Goliath, good guys over bad guys. Sometimes the side we root for is arbitrary, or based on personal, unarguable preferences.

For instance, when my life is nadir-ing and I find myself actually watching college football, I apply a toilet training distinction—I root for the team with the more anal-emissive offense, and against the anal-retentive.

I’ve come to love Sylvester and Tweety and the Road Runner cartoons, but I didn't used to. The rooting interest was too obvious: Tweety and Road Runner were the good guys, Sylvester and Wile E. Coyote were the bad guys. The thwartings of Syl & Wile just seemed gratuitously sadistic.

Then, as I got older, I was amused to find myself rooting for Sylvester and Wile. E. Coyote. I suspect most grownups do. No matter how numerous and painful his failures, I want Wile E. to keep trying until he kills that annoying, worthless bird. Nonetheless, I'm going to hang on to my Acme stock.

And Sylvester, when you catch Tweety, don't mess around with bibs and salt shakers, bite the damn bird's head off immediately. It's the lesson of James Bond movies.

Anyway, when stories were told of persecution by the Chinese government of a small religious group, I naturally assumed that the Chinese government were the bad guys and Falun Gong were the good guys.

Then I forgot about it--until I saw pictures, on sfmike’s blog, of a Falun Gong “performance.” [Warning: these pictures are disturbing.]

Now, I hate to say it, but, based on the sfmike’s pictures, I sort of sympathize with the Chinese government. This is a terrible point to reach in my life.

Even the most repressive regimes are expected to perform some basic functions, such as locking the doors of the damn insane asylum.

Maybe this Mose Allison classic will "cleanse the palate."

Then we'll have to investigate how these fucks slipped through Homeland Security.

----- o -----

YOUR MIND IS ON VACATION

Resource Alert: DEVIL'S DICTIONARY

Ambrose Bierce (wikilink) was an odd duck who thrived on and enhanced the odd-duckiness of San Francisco. I never saw the movie, Old Gringo, but I knew that the nature and occasion of his demise remains a matter of mystery, which is both amusing and befitting.

Many of us had to read “Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” in high school, which makes him, I guess, an exemplary short story writer. He was a newspaper guy, and cynical as hell.

His great work, the Devil’s Dictionary (link) is out of copyright and available on line. Not only are there some very funny gems, but the way he bends elegant Victorian prose into the roughest satire is really fun to watch.

Here are two entries:

RELIGION, n.
A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable.

RICHES, n.
-A gift from Heaven signifying, "This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased."
…John D. Rockefeller
-The reward of toil and virtue.
…J.P. Morgan
-The savings of many in the hands of one.
…Eugene Debs
To these excellent definitions the inspired lexicographer feels that he can add nothing of value.


Ambrose Bierce is a major inspiration to me and Pud.

----- o -----

Motors - Airport

JET SET

One of the geists of my youth's zeit was “The Shrinking Planet.”

Historically, distance of space meant distance of time.

People conducted inter-personal communications through first class mail. There was something called “penmanship.”

Long distance telephony was expensive and used sparingly. “I’m on long distance,” would get anyone to stop bugging you.

My home didn’t have a TV until I was five years old. In my teens I saw the first trans-atlantic live TV show.

And travel demanded significant time investment. In 1958 my folks went to Europe for the first time on a Constellation, the biggest commercial passengerairplane at that time. It was the first generation of planes that could go from the west coast (we were in L.A.) to Europe non-stop. Still, it was many hours in the air..

When my parents were born, the only way to cross the Atlantic was by boat.

In the early 1960’s, jet engines were introduced to commercial aviation, which was a major shrinkage of the earth. Travel, the locomotion part, ceased to be a major investment of time.

You could board a plane in New York, have a drink, take a nap, and deplane in Puerto Vallarta, or on the Riviera. We’d read marveling reports of breakfast on this continent, lunch on that, and dinner on yet a third.

The first prominent users of jet travel were the rich and the rootless, the Jet Set. I think of Liz and Dick.

Mine was the first generation for whom the cost in money and time was a not very significant factor in travel planning. A lot of kids spent some of there extended, idle adolescence hanging out in Europe, interacting with each other.

Not so rich, even more rootless, they were Eurotrash, deformed offspring of the Jet Set.

The new technology was extolled in pop music. There was a popular instrumental called “Telstar,” about a damn satellite. The ‘60’s car songs, GTO, 409, Little Deuce Coupe were still celebrating automobility—great stuff!

This greater mobility became a theme of love songs, too. Today’s guilty pleasures are two of my faves.

BTW: I'm amused by the use of the word "set" to mean a social grouping. My favorite graffito appeared in a large demented scrawl on a blank wall near a prominent "punk" cafe in the late '70s:

The Psychosurgery Set

----- o -----

Please Come to Boston

MORE DRAG

Some Protestants think that the Biblical “whore of Babylon” refers to the Roman Catholic Church. Looking at these two queens I have to agree.

They’re not turning many tricks these days, but they still like to pull out the rouge and the fine, if somewhat out of date, fashions, and reminisce about the old days when a good whore could get a little respect.

The guy on the left, Stanislaw Wielgus was promoted to be the head priest of Poland. The Pope, a former Hitler Youth himself, thought this old fuck was just the right guy for the job.

NYT gives an entertaining account.

Then reports circulated that Father Wielgus had been a secret collaborator with the former communist regime’s hated secret police, a whore/pimp relationship. He was spying on his fellow Catholics, including priests, and turning them in to be tortured and murdered, or something.

Like any corrupt corporate executive he denied the reports, thinking that all documentary evidence had been destroyed.

When documents did surface that clearly showed he had been working for the communist secret police, he had to admit to the collaboration, but claimed that his actions had somehow been non-harmful.

He’ll stick with that story until additional documents, if any, emerge.

Simpler than changing the policy on married priests, the church should outlaw all but cotton and wool garments for its clergy. By removing silk as a perk of promotion, a lot of priest-pervs will go elsewhere for their jollies.

Recently SFWILLIE’S BLOG, in the classic post Silly Goose, poked some gentle fun at gay uniform fetishists. Clothingwise they are pikers compared to the Catholic hierarchy, but morally so much more wholesome. As Pud says, "which would you want to take care of your kids?"

It’s long been my theory that people aren’t put in positions of power unless they have deep dark secrets that can be used to blackmail them out of any idea of independence.

Pedophilia has long served that purpose for Catholics. Now that the press and the victims have queered that deal, so to speak, past political crime seems to be the new cudgel.

Supporters of Bishop Wielgus blame ”the Jews” for his ouster.

----- o -----

STONE

Pud gets annoyed when I refer to his “seventy-five acid trips.”

“Seventy-five is just a ballpark number,” he reminds me, “And it wasn’t all acid. There was lots of mescaline and psilocybin in there.”

“That stuff was so cheap! Two or three bucks a pop, for a twelve hour trip! And you couldn’t do it more than once or twice a week.

“Not everyone can afford to winter at Krishnamurti’s institute in Ojai. But even the groundskeepers there could afford a few square mms of windowpane on a Friday night.”

Pud and I agree that the ultimate insight to be obtained, either from years of meditation or from a few hours on LSD, is minerality.

We are taught there are three existences: animal, vegetable and mineral.

This is false.

It’s all mineral.

I refer to my own enlightenment on this topic as “my brother the streetcar.”

It was the day after an acid trip, and I had to take the streetcar downtown on some errand. The joint I smoked before leaving started my visual plane swirling again.

Swinging around a turn I realized that the molecules that made up the streetcar I was on and the molecules that made up me were completely identical as to global position and directionality. We bonded, the streetcar and I.

Life, whether animal or vegetable, is a particular, temporary configuration of molecules, all of which are mineral, which makes it so amazing.

When you see expert ballet dancers on stage doing a pas de deux, the choreography might be more or less aesthetically pleasing, but the awesomeness that underlies the event is that we are watching boulders that somehow got up and started moving around.

Sfmike sent some photos of our hike up Tahquitz (rhymes with "pockets") canyon. (See his post here.) In the photo below we see Palm-Springs-Tony in the foreground. (To say that Tony is sfmike’s better half grossly understates the math.) Of the boulders we see behind Tony, one has a special name. It’s “sfwillie.” Can you pick it out? (Hint: white cap.)

Death is the loss of the particular organization of minerals called “life.” And it's the loss of the illusion of non-minerality.

Our delectation of beautiful human bodies seems unexceptional. “From fairest creatures we desire increase…”

Less clear to me is why we delight in beautiful landscapes and vistas. Why, especially, do we ever enjoy looking at rocks? Why did I so enjoy the hike up Tahquitz Canyon?

I contend it’s a “my brother the boulder” thing. Just as we are drawn to another human body with becoming-oneness as a goal, so we are drawn to beautiful earth-forms.

In Tahquitz where the strata of sheered cliffs show the twists and groans of geologic time, I feel contained. My spirit, when I die, won’t go flying off into nowhere. It will be welcomed, as when lovers unite at the end of Act III, by the mineral world, and held tight and secure.

This all comforts me. I won’t be nothing when I die.

"Yeah," Pud says, "you'll be a goddamn rock!

Pud is often misunderstood. Sometimes you think he’s saying, “I’m stoned.”

What he’s actually saying is, “I’m stone.”

----- o -----

FATS FEELS YOUR PAIN

Does the prospect of starting another work week not completely thrill you?

Does your “song of self” sound like a scratchy old vinyl 45?

Mr Domino understands completely. He’s right here with you.

----- o -----

Fats Domino Imperial 45: BLUE MONDAY

CHAMPAGNE, CAVIAR

A drawback to longevity is that one sees the same battles re-fought repeatedly. It gets boring after awhile.

Take, “Support Our Troops,” please.

Like an old comic’s material that never changes, but gets “discovered” by successive generations, this support-our-troops crap just won’t go away.

Basic to a soldier’s mission is to die if necessary, and to endure injury and discomfort in defense of the country. The most important support we can give our troops is to expend their lives and limbs wisely.

When an adventure is unwinnable because it’s unjust, we must bring our troops home.

Back in Vietnam war days Pete Seeger was so pissed off by the support-our-troops bullshit that he performed this really sub-par song to try to get his message across. That’s a weird kind of artistic compromise.

Pud wants to support our troops with champagne and caviar “on their flights home.”

Immediate, complete, unconditional. Caviar and champagne (and milk and sodas) on the flight home right now, today, or tomorrow at the latest.

“And free meals in high class restaurants when they get back,” Pud says, “I’m sure the American Restaurant Association would be happy to reserve their best tables and their best wines for our returned troops, as a way of showing their support.”

The first video is included as illustration. SF WILLIE’S BLOG does not endorse it as a well made song.

You know, I’ve always felt a little creepy about the fake folksiness of Pete Seeger. He sort of talks down to his audience, and he tries to be way too nice, usually.

Pud says Pete Seeger reminds him of guys who wear Greek fisherman’s caps. “Like, even Greek fishermen look dorky in Greek fisherman’s caps.”

Don’t get me wrong, the world is a better place, and my own life is richer, for having had Pete Seeger in it.

The second video provides a contrast to what I call fake-folksiness. The song isn’t well made either, there’s no bridge, but the folkness seems genuine, and the guitar picking is great. BTW: I think Mississippi John Hurt is responsible for the subversive classic., Candyman.

The third video is a guilty pleasure. It IS a well made song. And it contains one of the great couplets of bubblegumdom:

The roller coaster ride we took is nearly at an end.
I bought my ticket with my tears, that’s all I’m gonna spend.

Don’t be ashamed if you enjoy it, you’re in good company (Pud).

----- o -----

Bring 'Em Home: Pete Seeger

Mississippi John Hurt - Lonesome Valley Blues

Red Rubber Ball

Eric Andersen's THIRSTY BOOTS

THIRSTY BOOTS

I’m really touched that such a young man even knows about this song.

The words might sound all sentimental and folksy, but the context was way scary.

This was a time when it was a big deal for black and white folk to ride a goddamn bus through the South together. Pud says, “Black or white, there ain’t no pride when you’re riding the dog.”

Let’s just say the Freedom Riders met with some opposition. (Story here.)

These nice looking men were arrested for trying to purchase a bite to eat along the way. They look like the kind of folks who would make great neighbors.

Not just arrested, they and their black and white colleagues got their asses seriously kicked in more than one town.

The lyrics “dirty words and muddy cells,” weren’t metaphors. They were, if anything, an understatement.

These kids got murdered for helping black people register to vote. (Story here.)

It was really bad.

But the song, seemingly starry-eyed and idealistic, was correct, the dirty words and muddy cells HAVE been judged insane.

At least those dirty words, and those muddy cells.

----- o -----

SILLY GOOSE

Katie Wolf’s favorite schoolgirl riddle involves an important zoological discrimination:

Q. What’s the difference between a snake and a goose?

A. A snake is an asp in the grass, a goose is a grasp in the ass.

But really, whose fucked up idea was it to have an army march goose-step? Maybe it’s just historical prejudice, but, let’s face it, when we Americans see a bunch of soldiers goose-stepping along, we’re NOT thinking, “Hey, here come the good guys."

Pud speculates, “Maybe goose-steppers have tighter buns.”

The two armies I think of as goose-stepping, Germans and Greeks, have way different uniforms, I mean, just the footware. Germans wear those tall black boots, Greeks soldiers wear these little pumps with a floppy pompon on each toe.

The Greek army uniform is the closest that military fashion gets to negligee.

Over the years I’ve been slightly aware of a subset of gay people who are uniform fetishists.

One time a first baseman on my team gave me the gruesome details of a bitch fight he was having with another guy over a particular rare belt buckle needed to complete a Marine uniform of a particular vintage. A tedious boring account indeed.

A couple of early evenings in Eureka Valley (“the Castro”) I saw guys in spit and polish uniforms of many genres, parking their cars and moseying all toward what must have been a uniform gala. These photos are from the Phoenix Uniform Club of San Francisco.

But, can you imagine… A gay wedding in which the groom-guy is wearing the full black SS get-up, with the bride-guy tritzing down the aisle in a Greek army uniform?

Parents, cousins, coworkers, favorite teachers, are all there at the reception to go “ahh” as the two guys feed each other wedding cake, and maybe mist up a little as the happy couple goose-steps off into their new life together.

On the other hand, some guys just look good in uniforms.

----- o -----

SIGNING STATEMENTS

Pud says the Sanskrit root of “theory” means something close to “mental spasm.” At any rate, Pud had one.

“You know,” Pud began slowly, “most kids who go to school in the USA have to take some civics courses. Right?

“And civics is complicated and most grownups are a little embarrassed about all they don’t know about civics.

“So, when President George Asshole Bush issues a ‘signing statement’, people think—Oh, I must have been absent when they taught about signing statements.

“They’re thinking—Ok, right, yeah, a signing statement.

“Hello America,” Pud was rolling, “there’s no such thing as a signing statement!

“Let’s say I, Pudinhand Wilson go into the DMV and apply for a new license. On the application they make me sign some statement like—I promise to obey all the laws of the State of California, and all that.

“So let’s say, on the application, I put an asterisk next to the ‘all’ in all laws, and, at the bottom of the page write ‘*except speed laws’.

“Well the clerk sees this and doesn’t give a shit. But what effect does my ‘signing statement’ have? None, except it could be used against me in some future legal action—let’s say I was in a crash where somebody died—to prove my intent to break the law.

“It’s not like I’m gonna tell some cop who pulls me over that I never agreed to obey speeding laws.

“So too Bush’s signing statements, they are just gratuitous statements of intent to violate or ignore the law. That Bush issues these statements at the same time he signs the laws he intends to violate might be ironic, but it gives the statements no more force than my asterisk on the license application.

“He may as well issue a signing statement saying black is white, day is night, war is peace... you know.”

----- o -----

NINA SIMONE

I was eleven years old in the damp of an SF winter looking forward to a sale at a downtown record store, ten 45’s for a dollar. As the weekend neared I came down with a cold or flu or something and a huge storm arrived from the Aleutians. It looked like I would miss the sale and I was way bummed.

So I prevailed on my older brother to go in my stead and pick out the ten best singles available. I guess he didn’t have anything better to do. And I parted with my dollar.

Of the ten records he bought only four were by artists whose names I recognized and they weren’t bad. Of the other’s the song that caught my ear was a very straightforward version of Nina Simone singing Little Girl Blue.

At that age I had no idea of Miss Simone’s place in the firmament. I was fascinated with the admixture of Good King Wenceslas. I played it over and over.

The next time I thought about her was 1977, I was age thirty going on a vacation to NYC. It would coincide with the jazz festival which, the big buzz was, would feature Nina Simone’s first US performance in exty-scratch years.

She’d been, I gathered, self-exiled in France.

Then, the news, she’d actually arrived in New York, but it made her too nervous. So she returned to Paris.

The word “diva” has been cheapened lately. Miss Simone (“official” fan site) was the real deal.

----- o -----

Nina Simone: Here Comes the Sun

Pud Rants: "SO THEY KILLED THE MF"

Pud is upset with all the hand wringing about the timing and manner of Saddam’s execution. BTW: the infamous video is available on YouTube.

“These pussies are upset that Saddam’s death wasn’t pretty enough. They’re upset that a video got out. One or the other, or both.

“They say we should have waited, or the execution should have been more ‘dignified.’

“We’ve killed tens of thousands of Iraqis under conditions a lot less dignified than Saddam’s execution. At least Saddam’s body remained intact, unlike the targets of 500lb bombs.

“These TV pundits are the same assholes who’ve used the phrase, ‘Hunt down and kill…’ so boldly, not they themselves doing the killing, someone else’s kids can take care of that.

“I praise the people who killed Saddam, I guess you could call them the Iraqi Government. They have learned the lesson of James Bond movies—when you get the drop on James Bond, kill him, don’t wait, don’t fuck around.

“So they killed his ass. And the talking heads are shocked.

“Puling, squeamish, hypocrites!”

I guess Pud’s pissed.

----- o -----

LEGAL UPDATE

Last night we had our quarterly review with the head of SF WILLIE’S BLOG’s legal department. Actually my old friend, Bill, IS our legal department. He assures me, however, that he has access to an “A-Team” of negotiators and litigators ready to pounce at any hint of trouble.

Bill isn’t licensed to practice law in California (or anywhere else for that matter) so he’s asked that I not use his last name. This conspicuous prudence is wasted on me.

“Don’t worry,” I tell him, “with a retainer from SF WILLIE’S BLOG that consists of four meals a year in a moderately priced (but clean) Chinese restaurant, no one’s going to accuse you of ‘practicing law’.”

Because he’s big, with a big voice, and a hearty laugh, which contrasts with his staunch anti-heroic lifestyle, you could call him Falstaffian. (I can’t call him Falstaffian because I’ve never read or seen a play in which Falstaff was a character. Shakespeare could certainly turn a phrase, but, let’s face it, his plays are boring. The plots are so swaddled, so buried, in verbiage, that after a couple of acts it’s like, ok, run on your sword already, or like, take the poison now!)

What qualifies a person to be the legal department for SF WILLIE’S BLOG? A rare combination of erudition and dissolution. Bill is perhaps the most erudite and dissolute person I know.

Growing up non-Mormon in Utah, Bill got his B.A. at Amherst College. Then he studied law at the University of Chicago, where he was articles editor of their law review, earning a J.D.

From there he went to Wall Street where he worked for a big firm specializing in anti-trust law (“actually pro-trust” he quips). Bill was saying last night that while on Wall Street he discovered an inability to dissimulate. He couldn’t keep a straight face while grossly misleading people.

So he went to the University of Virginia law school to be a full professor. This worked well for a while, then it gradually became clear that he preferred the company of beautiful male students to that, say, of his fellow faculty. In those primitive days, mid-1960s, this would have been a tenure issue.

So he chucked it all and drove cross county to San Francisco, where he devoted himself to sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Actually, it was sex, a few drugs, and classical music.

For the following twenty-five years he worked out of his home editing law books, classifying and synopsizing new cases. This gave him a very broad view of developments in many areas of the law.

Bill is retired and lives in a Buddhist Dharma Center, located on the Panhandle of Golden Gate Park, about as close as you can get to the site of hippiedom’s big bang. I kid him unmercifully about the religious thing. The term “rice-bowl Buddhist” comes up.

Gee, when you put together Bill’s resume with Pud’s, then you look at our fact-checkers and the rest of our crack staff, a theme starts to emerge, “abject.”

It’s a good thing we’re so darn insouciant.

[They video below is dedicated to Bill and all the wonderful people who make SF WILLIE’S BLOG possible.]

----- o -----

FMA Thats Life

Heartbreak Hotel [1956]

DANGER: CHILDHOOD

One of the downer stories of the past year was the movement to ban the playing of tag and other active games during school recess. I believe there was one school that tried to ban running on the playground altogether.

The logic of such a ban is easy enough to understand—we can trade spes (the supposed benefit of letting kids run around at recess) for res (measurable reduction of injuries and related expenses).

The obvious refutation is that the benefits of letting kids run around far outweigh the costs of the predictable accidents and even deaths.

But forget the analytical level. On a purely aesthetic basis, what kind of human being would propose a ban on kids playing tag. Might as well wear a sign that says, I’M A STUPID ASSHOLE, or I’M FROM ANOTHER PLANET.

When I think of the incredibly dangerous things we boys did, and survived, I wonder what overly supervised kids do these days to test physical limits.

A couple of brothers on our block would build rudimentary soap box racers, plywood, 2x4s, skate wheels, or wheels from red wagons, broomstick and rope for steering, and when they were finished, they’d “test” the cars.

Testing a new car meant driving it halfway down a hill directly into a telephone pole. As there were a number of poles on that downhill block one could intensify the “test” by choosing a telephone pole nearer the bottom of the hill, so that the car had more time to pick up speed.

The whole idea was that the car would eventually crumple and be thrown away. It’s not like they were good for anything. I think this was before the term “crash test dummy” entered our parlance.

Here’s another amusement I now cringe to think back on. We had lots of what we called “plane” trees down by the zoo and Fort Funston, their branches spread out in horizontal planes. I think of the branch formation, similar to but thicker than Monterey cypress, as affected by the steady winds off the Pacific Ocean.

We discovered that it was impossible to fall through the outspread arms of these trees. So, we’d climb to the top, balance on the top nub, and dive out into the branches. Then we’d sort of swim through the branches back to the tree’s trunk and repeat. None of us got seriously injured.

Heck, the first time I hitchhiked I was eight years old. Our parents didn’t mind.

Now it seems you have to be fairly poor to have a normal childhood. Middle class kids are scheduled and supervised and picked up and driven. When do they have time to get in trouble?

And when do they ever have to invent their own fun?

[The tree picture was taken from the superb Civic Center Blog, a link is in the right column.]

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SMOKIN' VIOLIN

I find the reverence and solemnity associated with high art to be incredibly stupid. It drives away the more down-to-earth people. Maybe that’s the intent.

The whole idea of “meaning” is very off-putting. What is the “meaning” of Beethoven’s Fifth, or of Michelangelo’s Pieta?

I think it was TS Eliot who described a poem’s promise of “meaning” as a trick to get the audience to enjoy the sensual pleasure (the music of the poetry).

One of the evils of the illusion of “meaning” in art is that people sit through all sorts of boring, painful music and poetry because they want to understand the meaning, or worse, they pretend that they actually do understand the meaning, and the meaning is enough.

In the clip below, Heifetz is wearing white tie and it’s all very noble, but the music has all the nobility of a juggling act. Paganini would do anything to show off his virtuosity. It’s world class acrobatics. It's fireworks. It’s just for fun. It don’t mean shit.

Pud especially likes "the plucking stuff."

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Paganini #24 Caprice by Heifetz

THE MIDDLE VIRTUE

The middle virtue correlates negatively with the middle finger.
P. Wilson

We all sort of understand what is meant by “Faith,” and by “Charity.” But, of the Christian trio, Faith, Hope, and Charity, what the heck is “Hope”?

In religion class we were always taught that “hope” means “trust,” that one really trusts that he or she will go to heaven and experience eternal bliss.

The way that I explain it to myself is that “hope” means acting as if what you believe is really true. So for instance, Mother Theresa’s mad pursuit of extraordinary medical means to preserve her own life demonstrates that she really didn’t believe all the crap she spewed about a blessed death.

The synonym I come up with is “cheerfulness.” If you really believe Christ’s message, you will be constantly cheerful.

I was the 1958 Boy of the Year of the Toluca Lake Optimist Club. I was on the Little League team they sponsored. It seemed like any other fraternal organization or service club. So I looked at the website of Optimists International.

Here is their creed. Are you an optimist?

The Optimist Creed

Promise Yourself-
To be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind.
To talk health, happiness and prosperity to every person you meet.
To make all your friends feel that there is something in them.
To look at the sunny side of everything and make your optimism come true.
To think only of the best, to work only for the best, and to expect only the best.
To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.
To forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future.
To wear a cheerful countenance at all times and give every living creature you meet a smile.
To give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have no time to criticize others.
To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear, and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.

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Vivaldi Winter II

PERSON OF THE YEAR

Don’t worry, it’s not you.

SFWILLIE’S BLOG’s first annual Person of the Year awardee doesn’t have a name or face. But he or she does have a number. Our Person of the Year for 2006 is American #300,000,000.

He or she was born in or immigrated to the United States in 2006.

The roundness of the number is a story in itself, like an odometer turning 100,000. You say, “Wow!” Then you think about lunch.

What makes this the story of the year and hence American #300,000,000 our Person of the Year is the alarm sounded about population growth. [The Census Bureau has a neat website. ]

The U.S. Population reached 100,000,000 in 1915.

It reached 200,000,000 in 1965.

It reached 300,000,000 just a few months ago in 2006.

A person born in 1915 would be about 90 or 91 years old today, so it’s not impossible that we could gather all in one place, Americans #100,000,000, #200,000,000, and #300,000,000.

This explains why I’m so damn cranky. Things REALLY ARE more crowded. Life TRULY IS shittier.

According to Census Bureau projections, U.S. population will reach 400,000,000 in approximately 2043.

I guess we all have to scrunch over.

So American #300,000,000 reminds us of a non-transient, non-horse-race global political issue. As population increases and resources are used up, ecological disruption and political struggle will render human life on earth if not extinct, certainly way less fun.

Some of our best scientific minds recommend colonization of space. Pud points out that we can’t even afford to deport our illegal aliens across a shared border, “I’m sure we’re gonna like, send them to Mars!”

Face it, our species is earthbound, at least for all practical purposes. Efforts to peacefully and voluntarily control the earth’s human population are pretty much futile. Resources are finite, especially our atmosphere’s ability to deal with heat and other byproducts of consumption.

Hopeless? No. Miniaturization is the solution. What’s important is a species’ total biomass, which equals total population times average size per individual. The consumption of resources is a factor of biomass, not of numerical population.

Take seagulls and staph aureus (bacterium). There are probably billions of staph aureus bacteria in any given city, and they go unnoticed. Put billions of seagulls in even the largest city and people are going to say “We have too many seagulls.”

Since we can’t control the number of humans, let’s control their size. “Nano” used to be hot, now it’s necessary.

If bioengineering can reduce the average size of humans to that of, say, ants, there will be plenty of food, water, and fresh air for many centuries to come right here on earth. There is no reason to think that the experience of being human can’t be just as good if not way better at that reduced size.

Sci-fi? Pud says all sci was once fi. Pud asks, “Can you say 'annihilation'?”

This needs to happen in just a few generations. Time’s a-wasting.

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James Brown memorial service

HIGH BROW ORGASM

It’s supposed to be all high art and everything, but even this commoner's ear can tell an orgasm when it hears one. Religious music? Yeah, right.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

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Bach - Magnificat - 07 - Fecit potentiam

SWIMSUITS THEN AND NOW

A friend of my youth, Katie Wolf, said something about beauty pageants that I still find amusing. I guess Donald Trump’s recent issues with his Miss Whatever made me think of it.

Katie said that when she and her schoolgirl friends would watch Miss America or Miss USA on TV, they would become concerned about the talent competition. What would be their “talents.”

They’d hate to get out on the stage and look stupid, like the contestants whose talent is singing but who really can’t sing.

What I find so charming is the assumption among the young girls that their beauty, when it got to that point, would easily qualify them for the finals. It was the talent part that concerned them.

When I was a nightwatchman at a college dorm, I got to know a girl resident who was the reigning Miss Omaha. Tight little body with big boobs, blond hair, and the clearest, most consistent complexion I have ever seen.

She'd sit at the front door with me sometimes as I checked IDs of kids coming in. She wasn’t really part of any clique, I think she was sort of to herself. She was very level headed. Her attitude was that beauty titles and all were just something that happened to people with looks like hers, no biggie.

What impressed me most was she said she was already a certified gemologist, something about part time jobs, or relatives in the business got her started.

She tried to explain some of the details about precious and semi-precious but I was too left wing to care about jewels. Now I’m a sucker for beautiful stones. The dancing slaves in my new musical will be clad only in strands of rice pearls, and diamond toe and finger rings.

And I tell Pud that if he really wants me to forgive him for saving my life, he’ll give my something nice from Van Cleef & Arpels, neat web site. Rubies are always appropriate.

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BRYAN TUVERA, HERO

A San Francisco Police Officer was buried today with full honors. He had been shot to death while apprehending an escaped convict.

Special to me is that he was killed just a few blocks from my house and from SFWILLIE’S BLOG’s operations center.

The escaped convict had been committing burglaries and robberies in our neighborhood. When he realized he’d been spotted, the perp ran into the garage of a nearby house by kicking down the door. Officer Bryan Tuvera followed the guy into the garage and got shot. The perp was then killed by Officer Tuvera’s partner.

Officer Tuvera died later at S.F. General.

The escaped convict was a bad guy doing bad things, and I or Pud or any of our staff could have been the next victim. Officer Tuvera was very brave and took his job of protecting us seriously. He remains a good example to us all. He was just a young guy.

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BOY SOPRANOS

In western history women and girls have been restricted from the professions of singing and acting. Soprano voices came from boys and castrati.

The idea that the ruling class could castrate boys to enhance their (the ruling class’) musical experience is abhorrent to us civilized people. According to this article, a successful castrato was nobody’s slave.

Now that women and girls can participate equally, what use is there for boy sopranos? Probably none. The differences in singing skills between boys and grownup female sopranos are chasmatic.

Given today’s child protective laws there is not enough time between when a boy becomes trainable and when his voice changes, to teach a boy to sing arias. Intonation is iffy. Phrasing tends to be rote. They can’t support low notes. All this evidenced in the video below, and this kid is one of the best. According to the blurb, he was in his last few months of sopranohood. (First we hear how a trained female sings the aria.)

Boy sopranos are appropriate for talent shows, not for high ticket concert halls, as evidenced by lack of audience demand. Today, frequently, we find female sopranos performing boy’s roles.

Boy choirs, however, seem to remain useful.

The skills needed for choral work are considerably less. A well trained boy choir can hold it’s own technically. And the sound is distinctive.

There are differences between boys and girls in the development of the vocal apparatus that accounts for the different sound.

A boy’s voice is like a calliope, wild, inaccurate, shrill, and thrillingly optimistic. A good director can smooth over the wild, inaccurate, and shrill, leaving only the heart lifting optimism.

Here’s an internet radio station where you can get your fill of trebbies.

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Edita Gruberova - Der Hölle Rache (Queen of the Night)

Robin Schlotz aria

Tölzer Knabenchor

botynotes: ISLAND IN THE SUN

Looking for some tropical music to warm this dark day I found the nice Harry Belafonte clip.

Pud says I should "turn up the fucking thermostat."

It brings back memories from my BOTY (boy of the year) phase when I was eight and nine years old and my family lived in North Hollywood.

Almost every weekend my brother and I were dumped at the El Portal for a double-bill matinee. Admission was 25 cents each, and we each received 25 cents for candy. So for $1.00 my folks got an afternoon alone. My brother and I thought it was a great deal. We loved the movies.

Some of the pictures were kid-oriented, but some weren’t.

I especially remember seeing Island in the Sun and thinking it was probably for grownups. There was still the concept of “miscegenation” in those days. Here’s the plot summary from IMDb.

Island in the Sun (1957)
Set on a fictitious island in the Caribbean during colonial British rule. It focuses on the life of a young charismatic and handsome black male with political aspirations. He finds himself confused on returning home when his romantic liaison with a white female tends to conflict with his political views. As rumor has it an interracial screen kiss caused quite a commotion in the U.S. when the film was released. The plot is further strengthened by a look at the lives of a white ex-pat family also living on the island. The family has to deal with problems of infidelity, racism and murder.
Summary written by Warren D. Mottley {trident@toj.com}

Even scarier, the cast included Joan Collins.


Still, it's a nice song.

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Harry Belafonte

COFFINS TRANSIENT

The earthly remains of Gerald Ford are going on tour. Likewise those of James Brown.

The most famous venue scheduled for Ford’s corpse is the U.S. Capitol Rotunda, for James Brown’s it’s the Apollo Theater.

I told Pud to draw the two routes on a US map so we could see them crisscross. Pud told me to paint a word picture instead. At least that’s what Pud meant, what he said was something about kissing his ass. He's totally in this "I'm a Yanomami" mode lately. So I had to do it myself.

The first figure shows the itineraries of the two coffins, Ford’s in red, Brown’s in blue.

The second figure shows the path taken by JFK’s coffin, which we see being loaded in Dallas and unloaded in Washington. Note that the final resting place of this coffin is somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean off the continental shelf.

It is impossible to conceive a rational and innocent reason for deepsixing this important piece of evidence in a still unsolved murder. We must conclude that the motive was sinister.

There is much dispute about multiple coffins and multiple bodies being autopsied. Who knows how much if any of JFK’s actual remains are buried at Arlington. It is a matter of record that JFK’s brain is NOT buried at Arlington, it just went missing some time after the autopsy.

I think they buried JFK in Arlington in order to make any exhumation effort a federal case.

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COVER UP

They aren’t telling us the cause of death of former U.S. president Gerald Ford.

I don’t think there’s anything nefarious, but the whole issue of death on the desert is kind of murky.

In the dry heat of the Coachella Valley (Palm Springs, Rancho Mirage etc.) the process of dieing is different. It’s more like a slow mummification in which the exact moment of death is impossible to determine.

Whether or not an old Rancho Miragian is dead is strictly a judgment call. In fact, what the doctors call “deeming a person dead,” is a gentle cousin of euthanasia.

Anyway, Gerald Ford has been deemed dead.

His major accomplishment as president is that he didn’t start any wars.

Otherwise, the man was a disgrace.

Investigators claim that when Gerald Ford was on the Warren Commission he acted as J. Edgar Hoover’s eyes and ears. To his dieing day he defended a report which 80% of Americans do not believe.

The people who killed JFK got away with it, partly due to Gerald Ford’s efforts. He was clearly an accessory after the fact in a presidential assassination.

His next significant act was to pardon Richard Nixon, not for any particular crime, but for any crime he may have committed. Only a stooge like Jerry could sign such a document. Again, accessory after the fact.

Just like playing center in football, big, affable Gerry Ford was willing to get down and get dirty for the team, and he always came up smiling. So all his crook politician friends loved him.

He was a good soldier in the army of evil.

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NO DEATH DEARTH

James Brown made it to 73, amazing!

Whenever I think of James Brown I remember the story of an inspection of his prison cell (I think it was his second stretch) turning up $35,000.00 in cash.

Pud thinks it makes perfect sense. “They don’t take credit cards in prison,” he explained as if I was dense.

A couple of neighborhood girls, maybe nine and eleven, black and wiry with tons of energy, would visit our flat in the Haight Ashbury when I was a student hippy, maybe 1970. They sort of came with the place.

They dropped by because we let them smoke cigarettes (byo), and they regaled us with stories of their adventures, Deirdre and Cici.

One time I asked them who was their favorite singer, without hesitation they said James Brown.

Hillary Clinton, as far as I can tell from googling around, supports the death penalty. Her only claim to fame is that she so thoroughly fucked up single payer healthcare reform that the issue’s been dead for fifteen years.

Way to go, Hillary.



Presumably Hillary supports the death sentence imposed on Saddam Hussein.

Autocrats who commit mass murder are the toughest case for anti-death penalty folks to argue against. Like the B-movie man-eating tiger for whom once having tasted human blood nothing else will do, so deposed autocrats want nothing except to regain power.



The only way to assure that Saddam will NOT regain power in Iraq is to kill him. Opponents of capital punishment calculate it’s worth the risk.

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CEASE FIRE

We hear the inevitable stories about battlefield cessation of hostilities on Christmas Day. Armies that had been trying to annihilate each other, stop for twenty-four hours so they can celebrate the birthday of the Prince of Peace.

Next day they resume the slaughter.

Let us remember that an important victory in America’s War of Independence came in 1776 from a sneak attack launched by George Washington ON CHRISTMAS DAY!!!

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MERRY CHRISTMAS

Christmas is about kids—trying to get the grownups to stop fighting, at least in this SP video.

Best wishes from SFWILLIE’S BLOG.

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South Park - The Spirit of Christmas

O Holy Night - Aled Jones

GAY: NO LONGER COOL

The GLTF (Gay/Lesbian Tennis Federation) has a bylaw that prohibits the use of phone numbers and/or email addresses from its 300-member roster for commercial purposes.

I received a phone call years ago from a member I knew only slightly. He wasn’t very direct, so I feared he was going to ask for a date. Turns out he was starting a new career as an investment broker and he wanted to handle my portfolio.

When I explained that my portfolio consisted mainly of unused postage stamps, he quickly got off the phone.

Regardless of any civil law, or club bylaw, it’s basic bad manners to use clubmates’ contact information that way.

It happened again yesterday, almost Christmas Eve. This time it’s spam email disguised as a Christmas card from a couple of GLTF members. I know it’s spam and not a personal greeting because I’ve never actually met either half of the couple.

Also I think it must be spam because they include logos of their businesses, and, at the bottom of the page there's a copyright line. There's even an Opt-Out link at the very bottom. Come on! What kind of Christmas card includes an opt-out link?

This is annoying enough. But the content of the message is what really disturbed me. It is so unflattering. Art-historically it's a cross between Grant Wood and Diane Arbus.

And it hammers us once again with the bittersweet message, that Gay Is No Longer Cool.

----- o -----

PUD RANTIOUS: POY

“Forget the insipidity of their choice,” Pud said, “it’s absolutely outrageous that Time Magazine should have named it’s Person of the Year already. The year isn’t over yet!

“Like, say, I announce the cure for cancer tomorrow,” Pud proposes reasonably, “would Time re-think their choice? What, would they make me wait to be POY for 2007?

“It’s like we may as well hibernate for the rest of the year,” Pud waved in disgust.

SFWILLIE’S BLOG will not announce it’s own choice for Person of the Year until the year is complete. So those of you who can find the cure for cancer, or who can broker a mid-east peace, don’t wait till after the first of the year. Do it now. SFWILLIE’S BLOG will recognize your achievement timely.

“Screw Time Magazine,” Pud eloquented.

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PUD'S BIO

A biography of Pud in now available. Click the Who Is Pud link in the right column.

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Y B Gd

To and from my Palm Springs (mid-week) Weekend, I had fly-by visits with my three cousins in L.A, two to and one from. My first-cousins are the kindest, friendliest, most honest people in the world. One cousin had grandkids, teenage boys, visiting from Alaska for Christmas and I was curious to meet them, but the timing didn’t work out. They were out miniature golfing.

I would have quizzed them on the Bong-hits-for-Jesus free speech controversy in their state, so maybe it’s just as well I missed them.

I did a little thought experiment—what advice, assuming we’d never meet again, could I give them? Here’s the result.

Why Be Good

Being good is a necessary condition for happiness here on earth. It doesn’t matter whether or not there is an afterlife. Happiness here on earth, and in the afterlife are the same thing.

Any advice to be unhappy here on earth in order to achieve happiness in the afterlife is totally bogus. Happiness is happiness is happiness.

St Finbar's, County Cork.

When St Finbar died, the sun didn't set for three weeks.

Pud says find something more comfortable than this to sit on.

So, why does being good bring happiness here on earth?

-It reduces shame and remorse.

-It allows you to associate with other good people.

You’ll find that good people tend to associate with each other and to avoid the company of non-good people.

The opportunity to associate with good people is the primary feature of heaven.

The restriction of associating only with non-good people is the primary feature of hell.

Q. What is “being good”?

A. The golden rule. Everyone knows that.

The golden rule is repeated in the second of Christ’s two great commandments.

Overlooked is Christ’s first great commandment: Love God with your whole heart, whole soul, etc. What the heck does that mean?

It means we should

-Accept the physical world as we see it and not reject it in favor of some promise or story about some unseen “better world.”

-Explore all resources and exploit them to create good feeling. People who try to create good feeling tend to associate with each other, etc.

So, morality isn’t all that bad. Usually morality is seen as a burden or fetter. That’s because usual morality is promulgated by rich assholes who don’t want us stealing their shit.

True morality, be good and try your best to have fun and create good feeling, is meant to be a formula for happiness, real happiness, with lots of sex, and rock and roll, and plenty of bong hits for Jesus.

----- o -----

Example: People Having Fun

WHAT A FRIEND I HAVE IN PUD

“Were we ever that cute?” I asked, after showing Pud the video below.

“Tough question,” Pud said, “but, if we’d had mousse, definitely!

“These kids look a lot smarter than us. It would have taken us a week to put this video together. It looks like they did it during a break from their calculus homework.

“And we weren’t nearly as relaxed.”

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dazo and cammy you've got a friend

AWAY IN PS

I’m checking out Palm Springs for a couple of days. Take a look.

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LOVE . . . SAND

A short life in a tanktop beats a long life in a parka.
P. Wilson

--

I was probably six years old when I started listening to pop music on the radio.

My first favorite song was Love Letters in the Sand, sung by Pat Boone.

Hey, I was just a little kid!

It was 1955. Pat hadn’t gone politico-religious yet and, considering that this recording marked the apex of his career, my choice was almost even astute. Also, the heavy reverb is irresistible to a boy that age.

Anyway, it’s been so mf cold and damp around here, as the northern hemisphere heads toward the darkest of days, I needed a reminder of a better time.

Heartbreak’s not so bad, if you can go around in shorts and flipflops.

That dikey Canadian gal has a contemporary xmas song that uses the word Christmas as a verb, as in “I’ll be Christmasing with you.” Fingernails/blackboard. What does it mean, “to Christmas” with someone? Kinky?

Curt Hall, of The Authorities, used to say, “San Francisco has the worst weather in the world.” It’s obvious untruth was always encouraging.

Nonetheless, I’ve decided to solstice in Palm Springs. I hope I can remember how to act gay.

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Pat Boone - Love Letters In The Sand

DO NOT JUMPSTART

Notwithstanding the reverence and false dignity we’re supposed to apply to the situation, death is a messy biological process. Those who have watched an elderly person slowly shut down will enjoy today’s article in the Washington Post about pacemakers that refuse to let a patient’s heart stop.

The whole DNR thing is heavy enough, ordering medical staff not to resuscitate a patient who has stopped breathing. Apparently, if a patient has a pacemaker, the family has to take positive action to get the pacemaker turned off.

With advances in medicine and in litigeousness, patients will soon need permission to die. The science of saving lives becomes the science of extended torture.

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BOM(B)

I found another clip of South Park’s Origins of Mormonism number. Two days later it was no longer available. There are still plenty of South Park clips available, but not that one. I wonder why.

The clip tells us what the Book of Mormon isn’t, i.e. inspired by God.

This neat website, whatismormonism.com, critiques the Book of Mormon from an historical, scientific, logical point of view. The long list of anachronisms are hysterically funny. This website contends that the basic story of the BOM was ripped off from a novel written in 1812.

Pud wants me to tell you that the most honest, reliable pot dealer he’s ever known was a Mormon. “Good people,” Pud says. Also, Pud wants you all to notice the hand on the hip.

I asked myself why I delight in ridiculing new religions such as Scientology and Mormonism. I think it’s because they take on the trappings of traditional, tribally based religions. The Xenu cosmology for instance. Or the angel Maroni? It seems to me if you’re want fairy tales you should go with those that have stood the test of time.

The Bible is like Mother Goose and the Brothers Grimm. These new religions are like Barney and Friends.

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White Men CAN Jump

FATHERHOOD

For an average, nothing-too-special, salt of the earth kind of straight male, probably his highest vocation is going to be fatherhood. Raising a kid is a complex task that baffles many men, geniuses and sub-geniuses alike, moguls and minions alike.

Not only is fatherhood our guy’s highest vocation, but it’s pretty much expected and desired by parents and others in the straight oriented world. For many men, fatherhood is sort of optional, but sort of not.

Now here come these fancy gay men who want to get married to each other and become fathers if they wish. For them, becoming a father is a lifestyle choice, something that fits into a fulfilling life.

For our average guy, fatherhood doesn’t fit into his life, his life fits into fatherhood.

So I sympathize some with our average guy who may not be all that enthusiastic about gay marriage and all

Also, the process of regular fertilization means that each of us could be the product of a really great fuck, as in “Dad, where did I come from?”

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PARALLELOGRAM

An easy shape, but what a word for L-swallowers like me and Tom Brokaw!

Even squares can get a little tipsy.

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AN AFFORDABLE ADVENTURE

Recently I was taken to the races. A friend had bid on Turf Club tickets in a silent auction, and won.

I had been to the races only once since my childhood. I have no interest in gambling so it never crosses my mind.
My dad loved to go to the track. Partly it’s an Irish thing. A first cousin of mine is so rabid she plans here vacations around major horse races. She been to all the famous American tracks, seen the triple crown races.

When my family lived in LA we went to Santa Anita and Hollywood Park maybe a couple dozen times. It was fairly boring for us kids, but, for something that had to be endured, it wasn’t so bad.

During the years we were going, 1956-1959, we got to see one of the most beloved race horses in American history, Silky Sullivan, whose spine tingling, mad dash, come from behind victories were legend. I was there when he came from 26 lengths behind to win the Santa Anita Derby.

Those days, especially on Sundays at Santa Anita, it could be a dress up affair. As I recall, my brother and I wore our church clothes with little clip-on bow ties.

So the trip to Bay Meadows last week brought back a lot of memories.

I was surprised to see how cheap it is. Parking is $4.00, general admission is $3.00 per person. The program costs $2.25, but the same information is available on the internet for free. And the feeding opportunities are numerous and moderately priced. And, you can place a bet for as little as $1.00.

Thoroughbreds are beautiful animals. The Thoroughbred Racing Association has a great looking website.

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