Wednesday, November 4, 2009
The Plaka, Athens, 1965
…the streets of my early sorrows where I once lived, loved, wrote, read, painted, first smoked dope…there we were - high above the city on The Acropolis @ sunrise – me and Linda, the light & love of my ever-loving past life!
Now this young love – so real then, so thrilling, so filled with promise, is a distant memory and a, let’s face it, tacky literary device…some people write what they believe others would like to read, hear; others – me for instance, write and make people believe what they are reading, or so I hope.
…a Bach orchestral suite interrupts my reveries…Bach’s 2nd orchestral suite for a flute and, Dude, this guy Ransom Wilson is blowin’ his brains out through his pennywhistle, it is just great and plunges me into a state of introspective lachrymosa, the only place for a melancholy man to be; I tried being happy once, I didn’t like it…I was young, thought there was actually something to it all, that somewhere an uncommon, if lugubrious, destiny awaited me…
Now this young love – so real then, so thrilling, so filled with promise, is a distant memory and a, let’s face it, tacky literary device…some people write what they believe others would like to read, hear; others – me for instance, write and make people believe what they are reading, or so I hope.
…a Bach orchestral suite interrupts my reveries…Bach’s 2nd orchestral suite for a flute and, Dude, this guy Ransom Wilson is blowin’ his brains out through his pennywhistle, it is just great and plunges me into a state of introspective lachrymosa, the only place for a melancholy man to be; I tried being happy once, I didn’t like it…I was young, thought there was actually something to it all, that somewhere an uncommon, if lugubrious, destiny awaited me…
Sunday, September 27, 2009
More Random "...NOTES..." From Wrinkled Scraps...
…the way things are going I expect a stroke will likely cut me down mate and shiver my timbers right into the grave, there to repose ad infinitum…
…I didn’t realize my house was such a sty until someone cleaned it for me and I saw the enormous difference. Who knew? For months dust and dust mites have had free rein…
…I never was a big fan of the Three Stooges but I always loved the word stooge, it is so descriptive; even without looking up the definition you know what it means…hmmm, but do I…okay so I look it up: stooge, well there’s the definition we know but alternately ‘an underling’ or ‘an associate’…I don’t know many stooges but it’s another vaudeville term originally…
…lungs like one of those flattened latex party balloons two days later, an apt analogy after having ruined my air bags and life through a variety of what in a polite society might be called missteps but really were far worse, smoking until I could barely draw a breath, strangling myself, gasping, can barely make it up in the morning or down at night, breathless, terrified, alone and in a psychological, physiological, philosophical, fiscal and physical meltdown, hell on earth!
…other than that everything’s pretty good…
…if it ever comes to it the tobacco industry won’t have to do too much to retool for dope. Instead of drying the leaf, dry the bud; shred and package like Camels and – bingo – off with your head…
…too much reality is not good for you which is where NFTD comes in handy…NFTD – Much ado about nothing since 1986…
…what happens when you crack your knuckles is, as I understand it, little sacs of senovial fluid are exploding which is cute and/or annoying in youth and sometimes beyond but that exploding senovial fluid was a lubricant like WD40 and now at nearly 66, having cracked my knuckles every which way known to man, twist, yank, bend, snap fingers practically off until the shit all dried up and now, an aging fool, merely bending a thumb and a forefinger around a pen is friggin’ agony…
…like a heart attack I once had I can assure you dying is not that much fun either, way not fun…I’m no visionary but everyday many times a day through each unbearable spell of barely breathing I envision death and dying, a grave deep in Mother Earth, pitch black (it’s the one thing I own I fear, having outlived all my other fears) not darkness while you wait for your eyes to adjust but true dark, black, no light, no getting used to, no in no out no up no down no escape…eternal darkness…then my air bags (so far) finally refill and life is back, o hey I didn’t buck the kicket yet, wheeew, that was close…now, where was I…
…my DgD (Darling Granddaughter) had the great good fortune of going to Van’s Warped Tour this summer down to Hartford and there was treated to a number of fine bands including this one, Flogging Molly, singing among other tunes this fine 21st Century Irish ballad, ‘Drunken Lullabies’
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDwlGbEcJ6Y
Here’s three books will make your life more full:
Steaming to Bamboola – (Can’t remember who wrote it…)
The Ginger Man – J. P. Donleavy
A Fan’s Notes – Frederick Exley
…I didn’t realize my house was such a sty until someone cleaned it for me and I saw the enormous difference. Who knew? For months dust and dust mites have had free rein…
…I never was a big fan of the Three Stooges but I always loved the word stooge, it is so descriptive; even without looking up the definition you know what it means…hmmm, but do I…okay so I look it up: stooge, well there’s the definition we know but alternately ‘an underling’ or ‘an associate’…I don’t know many stooges but it’s another vaudeville term originally…
…lungs like one of those flattened latex party balloons two days later, an apt analogy after having ruined my air bags and life through a variety of what in a polite society might be called missteps but really were far worse, smoking until I could barely draw a breath, strangling myself, gasping, can barely make it up in the morning or down at night, breathless, terrified, alone and in a psychological, physiological, philosophical, fiscal and physical meltdown, hell on earth!
…other than that everything’s pretty good…
…if it ever comes to it the tobacco industry won’t have to do too much to retool for dope. Instead of drying the leaf, dry the bud; shred and package like Camels and – bingo – off with your head…
…too much reality is not good for you which is where NFTD comes in handy…NFTD – Much ado about nothing since 1986…
…what happens when you crack your knuckles is, as I understand it, little sacs of senovial fluid are exploding which is cute and/or annoying in youth and sometimes beyond but that exploding senovial fluid was a lubricant like WD40 and now at nearly 66, having cracked my knuckles every which way known to man, twist, yank, bend, snap fingers practically off until the shit all dried up and now, an aging fool, merely bending a thumb and a forefinger around a pen is friggin’ agony…
…like a heart attack I once had I can assure you dying is not that much fun either, way not fun…I’m no visionary but everyday many times a day through each unbearable spell of barely breathing I envision death and dying, a grave deep in Mother Earth, pitch black (it’s the one thing I own I fear, having outlived all my other fears) not darkness while you wait for your eyes to adjust but true dark, black, no light, no getting used to, no in no out no up no down no escape…eternal darkness…then my air bags (so far) finally refill and life is back, o hey I didn’t buck the kicket yet, wheeew, that was close…now, where was I…
…my DgD (Darling Granddaughter) had the great good fortune of going to Van’s Warped Tour this summer down to Hartford and there was treated to a number of fine bands including this one, Flogging Molly, singing among other tunes this fine 21st Century Irish ballad, ‘Drunken Lullabies’
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDwlGbEcJ6Y
Here’s three books will make your life more full:
Steaming to Bamboola – (Can’t remember who wrote it…)
The Ginger Man – J. P. Donleavy
A Fan’s Notes – Frederick Exley
Thursday, August 20, 2009
I hate telling you this...
...in a way because it pokes yet another hole in the worn fabric which is my shredded character, but it goes like this and you can do with it what you might:
Later...
Whatever I had in mind to divulge to you has fled and so...you didn't want to know anyway...drunker. Stoned. All manner of the so-called real world blotting out - or trying to blot out anyway - the REAL world.
The REAL world, as I see it is an infinite variety of things one would never have thought possible. Isn't the real world starving children? In this latter-day Athens, Rome or Bamboola, isn't the real world a kick in the ass?
Shouldn't we pass out at night after busting our asses all day to help the afflicted? Should we be so complacent with our meager achievements while somewhere in this world our fellow Brothers and Sisters are dying like flies because they have nothing to eat? The white world-at-large doesn't seem to care much that blacks are starving to death. Maybe I'm wrong; the media could be painting an unclear picture, but it seems to me that if a half-million Limeys were starving in London they'd have whatever food they needed tomorrow.
Or sick with no cure in sight? I think, if I may speak my mind, that if AIDS were striking the middle-class and upper echelons of society instead of the poor, a bunch of junkies and homosexuals, that the cure would have been found about 50,000 deaths ago. The real world is a throbbing abscessed molar bringing tears to your eyes as you painfully, slowly - masticate your Gerber's.
It is a drive-by killing in LA, NY, SF - pick a city.
I realize the real world is also azaleas on Mineola Boulevard in the early spring and the real world is a kiss from your sweetheart at just the right moment in just the right place, so of course the life is somewhat improved by these things, and there are other reasons why the world isn't all that bad a place, things being relative.
A tooth is killing me (hyperbole, but it hurts like hell) so I drop a couple Rugby's a friend laid on me and a half hour or so later I'm feelin' alright, better. In fact, good but it'll pass and it'll be back to the real world again, pain and all. Whatta ya gonna do?
Later...
Whatever I had in mind to divulge to you has fled and so...you didn't want to know anyway...drunker. Stoned. All manner of the so-called real world blotting out - or trying to blot out anyway - the REAL world.
The REAL world, as I see it is an infinite variety of things one would never have thought possible. Isn't the real world starving children? In this latter-day Athens, Rome or Bamboola, isn't the real world a kick in the ass?
Shouldn't we pass out at night after busting our asses all day to help the afflicted? Should we be so complacent with our meager achievements while somewhere in this world our fellow Brothers and Sisters are dying like flies because they have nothing to eat? The white world-at-large doesn't seem to care much that blacks are starving to death. Maybe I'm wrong; the media could be painting an unclear picture, but it seems to me that if a half-million Limeys were starving in London they'd have whatever food they needed tomorrow.
Or sick with no cure in sight? I think, if I may speak my mind, that if AIDS were striking the middle-class and upper echelons of society instead of the poor, a bunch of junkies and homosexuals, that the cure would have been found about 50,000 deaths ago. The real world is a throbbing abscessed molar bringing tears to your eyes as you painfully, slowly - masticate your Gerber's.
It is a drive-by killing in LA, NY, SF - pick a city.
I realize the real world is also azaleas on Mineola Boulevard in the early spring and the real world is a kiss from your sweetheart at just the right moment in just the right place, so of course the life is somewhat improved by these things, and there are other reasons why the world isn't all that bad a place, things being relative.
A tooth is killing me (hyperbole, but it hurts like hell) so I drop a couple Rugby's a friend laid on me and a half hour or so later I'm feelin' alright, better. In fact, good but it'll pass and it'll be back to the real world again, pain and all. Whatta ya gonna do?
Sunday, July 5, 2009
ONE TIME WHEN I WAS A KID…
…and knew a lot more then than I know now I was boosting some Midnight Auto Supply ground effects from a new car dealer, prying eight hubcaps and four fender skirts off two very fine 1957 Black Chevy Bel-Air convertibles, I shoulda took a whole car but I was more petty then and noisily pried the hubs off with the thought in mind that I could sell them at The Green Door in the morning – they’d be worth quite a few pitchers and cheeseburgers for the day, but as I start to gather them up and sneak away I am interrupted by a basso profundo growl; from the top porch of a three-story walkup, I hear – ‘We got your license number, is there anything else you want?!’ - and Dude I tell you for a split second it rained hubcaps and there was an incredible cacophony of metal clattering to the pavement as I scrambled to that idling old Studebaker and sped away into the waiting arms of the law…I fought the law and the law won…
THIS IS A LONG OVERDUE, SORT OF SOTTO VOCE DISCUSSION WE NEED(?) TO HAVE…
…who gives a shit? See what I mean? This is not just some festering scatological detritus we are dealing with…shit can save us…(WHAT IS this fool banging on about?! You may well ask…) I put it to you thusly…the shit you took this morning (or wish you could have) is on its way down the drain and into the system; depending on where you live it will be gotten rid of in any number of venues in a variety of ways, about half of them illegal and none of them good, when what should be done with the shit is to burn it in furnaces – there’s no end to the shit in this world so there’d always be plenty; shit happens yes, but shit burns too and puts out some pretty steep BTUs…well, enough of this shit, I’m just saying it’s reusable and a good source of energy…doesn’t mean you have to toddle over to the specialized dumpster every couple of days with a blivet in your hand…instead of flushing the shit down the drain send it straight to hell, to the furnace, be done with it…into the furnace…toilet to furnace, and a blivet in case you’ve been living under a rock is ten pounds of shit in a five pound bag…enough of this…where was I…o yeah…
…and knew a lot more then than I know now I was boosting some Midnight Auto Supply ground effects from a new car dealer, prying eight hubcaps and four fender skirts off two very fine 1957 Black Chevy Bel-Air convertibles, I shoulda took a whole car but I was more petty then and noisily pried the hubs off with the thought in mind that I could sell them at The Green Door in the morning – they’d be worth quite a few pitchers and cheeseburgers for the day, but as I start to gather them up and sneak away I am interrupted by a basso profundo growl; from the top porch of a three-story walkup, I hear – ‘We got your license number, is there anything else you want?!’ - and Dude I tell you for a split second it rained hubcaps and there was an incredible cacophony of metal clattering to the pavement as I scrambled to that idling old Studebaker and sped away into the waiting arms of the law…I fought the law and the law won…
THIS IS A LONG OVERDUE, SORT OF SOTTO VOCE DISCUSSION WE NEED(?) TO HAVE…
…who gives a shit? See what I mean? This is not just some festering scatological detritus we are dealing with…shit can save us…(WHAT IS this fool banging on about?! You may well ask…) I put it to you thusly…the shit you took this morning (or wish you could have) is on its way down the drain and into the system; depending on where you live it will be gotten rid of in any number of venues in a variety of ways, about half of them illegal and none of them good, when what should be done with the shit is to burn it in furnaces – there’s no end to the shit in this world so there’d always be plenty; shit happens yes, but shit burns too and puts out some pretty steep BTUs…well, enough of this shit, I’m just saying it’s reusable and a good source of energy…doesn’t mean you have to toddle over to the specialized dumpster every couple of days with a blivet in your hand…instead of flushing the shit down the drain send it straight to hell, to the furnace, be done with it…into the furnace…toilet to furnace, and a blivet in case you’ve been living under a rock is ten pounds of shit in a five pound bag…enough of this…where was I…o yeah…
Thursday, May 28, 2009
I'm in Oakwood again...
…I CALL IT A PRACTICE SESSION…
…Oakwood is a cemetery here in East Eden, a place to hang out in solitude and quiet, or not; on a number of occasions I’ve had to crank it up so I could be sure Alexander Cushing (who took a minnie ball in the head at Antietam) and Ginny Allbee (my Friend who drowned in the Connecticut River) heard it wherever they are…not to mention the Follets, the Duttons, Chamberlins, Stebbins, Youngs and Stowells…from Antonio Vivaldi to Killer Kane to ZZ Top, Oakwood’s heard it all, but in the main the appeal is its stillness which I find cathartic, for exhilaration is brief and silence eternal; in life I’ve spent a 1000 hours in this wonderful old boneyard and after life I expect I’ll spend eternity here, for here it ends, I think. Here in Oakwood when I roll snake eyes is where I wish to lie.
…but because I think, I wonder, is that it? A box of bony ash? No Beyond? No blinding flash of eternal life-giving white light? No Hell, No Heaven, just a very small pile of dust in a very big universe…that’s it? Why bother? What was/is the point? Is there a point? To be sure I am clueless; after 65 years I have no idea, well I have ideas about what lies ahead – nothing – is my flippant and probably blasphemous guess but I’m a survived Catholic and so that Heaven and Hell schtick was deeply ingrained and I (un)consciously sweat the latter…I’m desperate for diversion…
I crank up Telemann’s Tafelmusik and the gossamer wraiths of a 1000 dead twirl ecstatically in their habiliments of death through the flower-strewn paths of Oakwood…
…Oakwood is a cemetery here in East Eden, a place to hang out in solitude and quiet, or not; on a number of occasions I’ve had to crank it up so I could be sure Alexander Cushing (who took a minnie ball in the head at Antietam) and Ginny Allbee (my Friend who drowned in the Connecticut River) heard it wherever they are…not to mention the Follets, the Duttons, Chamberlins, Stebbins, Youngs and Stowells…from Antonio Vivaldi to Killer Kane to ZZ Top, Oakwood’s heard it all, but in the main the appeal is its stillness which I find cathartic, for exhilaration is brief and silence eternal; in life I’ve spent a 1000 hours in this wonderful old boneyard and after life I expect I’ll spend eternity here, for here it ends, I think. Here in Oakwood when I roll snake eyes is where I wish to lie.
…but because I think, I wonder, is that it? A box of bony ash? No Beyond? No blinding flash of eternal life-giving white light? No Hell, No Heaven, just a very small pile of dust in a very big universe…that’s it? Why bother? What was/is the point? Is there a point? To be sure I am clueless; after 65 years I have no idea, well I have ideas about what lies ahead – nothing – is my flippant and probably blasphemous guess but I’m a survived Catholic and so that Heaven and Hell schtick was deeply ingrained and I (un)consciously sweat the latter…I’m desperate for diversion…
I crank up Telemann’s Tafelmusik and the gossamer wraiths of a 1000 dead twirl ecstatically in their habiliments of death through the flower-strewn paths of Oakwood…
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Random NOTES From Wrinkled Scraps...
IT’S A GOOD THING MARIJUANA IS…
…not habit-forming because after nearly 50 years of it, it’s time to give it up, should be a piece of cake…hah!
…don’t ever let anybody tell you it’s not a habit, it’s a habit, first it grew from getting high as a youth when life was fun and full of promise, all through the intervening years (which put the lie to those two early promises; Golden Boy disappeared in a rush…) until now when it’s practically a mind-set, is a mind-set, okay…frantic when there’s no bone at-hand; to a large degree I’ve got to lay off on weed for the condition of my ruined lungs, for the fact I am a lunger about to croak…in tandem with Jameson’s and Guinness, why, Reefer Madness and they were An Item, were the yin and yang of a symbiotic relationship wrestling kindred spirits, and of course in concert with them I’ve squandered a fortune, largely not mine, and ruined a number of great relationships…other than that it’s been fun…irony is a specialty of mine…
…it’s late in the game, too late, too late, too late to rectify the wrongs…brain cells disappearing, cut down by a lethal sickle in half-circle swaths, a life of indolence, insouciance and neglect is coming to an end…hopefully not today though, Dude, I mean Man I got plans You dig? I got me another bottle of Korbel champagne to introduce to my Florida orange juice and we goin’ to party ok Big Fellow, Y’all come back another time…
ONE OF MY TWO, LOVING SISTERS…
…is named Gay, Gay Ann Ward originally. As I write it is her birthday. When we were kids – the 1940s and ‘50s – gay meant happy, fun loving, cheerful, and so she was; over the years the meaning of gay has changed, although it still means cheerful, happy and fun loving it also means, well, gay…okay that’s that part of this…
…if you smoke and/or drink and go to bars or visit other friends’ homes and smoke and have a pop here and there those Bic lighters are forever getting left behind, lost, mistaken by someone else for theirs (that’s a good one)…pretty much Bic is ubiquitous…(What I wouldn’t give if only there were a –c- in ubicquitous! Anyway, where was I…o yes…)
…on one holiday occasion or another my darling sister Gay’s husband Lenny gave her a dozen white Bic lighters with lettering embossed on them which read ‘I’m Gay!’ She told me they never mysteriously disappeared off the bar and if you left one behind So and So would call next day and say so…I haffta laff…you don’t get your Harley-Davidson lighters back…
…not habit-forming because after nearly 50 years of it, it’s time to give it up, should be a piece of cake…hah!
…don’t ever let anybody tell you it’s not a habit, it’s a habit, first it grew from getting high as a youth when life was fun and full of promise, all through the intervening years (which put the lie to those two early promises; Golden Boy disappeared in a rush…) until now when it’s practically a mind-set, is a mind-set, okay…frantic when there’s no bone at-hand; to a large degree I’ve got to lay off on weed for the condition of my ruined lungs, for the fact I am a lunger about to croak…in tandem with Jameson’s and Guinness, why, Reefer Madness and they were An Item, were the yin and yang of a symbiotic relationship wrestling kindred spirits, and of course in concert with them I’ve squandered a fortune, largely not mine, and ruined a number of great relationships…other than that it’s been fun…irony is a specialty of mine…
…it’s late in the game, too late, too late, too late to rectify the wrongs…brain cells disappearing, cut down by a lethal sickle in half-circle swaths, a life of indolence, insouciance and neglect is coming to an end…hopefully not today though, Dude, I mean Man I got plans You dig? I got me another bottle of Korbel champagne to introduce to my Florida orange juice and we goin’ to party ok Big Fellow, Y’all come back another time…
ONE OF MY TWO, LOVING SISTERS…
…is named Gay, Gay Ann Ward originally. As I write it is her birthday. When we were kids – the 1940s and ‘50s – gay meant happy, fun loving, cheerful, and so she was; over the years the meaning of gay has changed, although it still means cheerful, happy and fun loving it also means, well, gay…okay that’s that part of this…
…if you smoke and/or drink and go to bars or visit other friends’ homes and smoke and have a pop here and there those Bic lighters are forever getting left behind, lost, mistaken by someone else for theirs (that’s a good one)…pretty much Bic is ubiquitous…(What I wouldn’t give if only there were a –c- in ubicquitous! Anyway, where was I…o yes…)
…on one holiday occasion or another my darling sister Gay’s husband Lenny gave her a dozen white Bic lighters with lettering embossed on them which read ‘I’m Gay!’ She told me they never mysteriously disappeared off the bar and if you left one behind So and So would call next day and say so…I haffta laff…you don’t get your Harley-Davidson lighters back…
Friday, April 3, 2009
“NOBODY LOOKS GOOD IN SPANDEX…” (from NFTD Archives)
…I exclaim to the silvered glass, “…don’t think you’re the exception, you’re not, your wattles show, your jiggly adipose tissue flounces around behind all that rubber like silly putty and the tire wound round your plus-40 waist is stretched so taut your blue varicose veins are translucent…” I peel the shorts off like they were cosmolene and decide not to go jogging after all, nor ride the mountain bike nor for all that, nothing exerting I am bound for today, but rather another sedentary day of letting the muscles atrophy and flatten against this chair seat. Yawwwn…
Spandex, bicycles, jogging…what a nightmare!
Now roller blading, that’s something I’m hip to; it’s a spectator sport only, at least for me, but how supple the human form rippling down the byways on roller blades, don’t you think? Well, here again, unfortunately at that I suppose, this sporting observation is predicated on looks, appearances. Does she/he have the pecs, the abs, the boobs, the ass? I doubt that I, weighing in at a cool 1/8th of a ton, would attract much more than a little tittering attention as I thundered past on painfully-bended ankles, rippling the sidewalk as I rumbled over it like a train pressing down the tracks; no, I probably would not cause quite the stir a 19-year-old hardbelly – male or female – would cause as they flashed by.
I was never blessed with your basic beautiful body nor handsome face, if blessed is the word I want; I’ve had to settle for keen intellect, clever wit and charm, plus my natural animal magnetism, erudition and disarming modesty to get me by.
Who needs spandex?
Spandex, bicycles, jogging…what a nightmare!
Now roller blading, that’s something I’m hip to; it’s a spectator sport only, at least for me, but how supple the human form rippling down the byways on roller blades, don’t you think? Well, here again, unfortunately at that I suppose, this sporting observation is predicated on looks, appearances. Does she/he have the pecs, the abs, the boobs, the ass? I doubt that I, weighing in at a cool 1/8th of a ton, would attract much more than a little tittering attention as I thundered past on painfully-bended ankles, rippling the sidewalk as I rumbled over it like a train pressing down the tracks; no, I probably would not cause quite the stir a 19-year-old hardbelly – male or female – would cause as they flashed by.
I was never blessed with your basic beautiful body nor handsome face, if blessed is the word I want; I’ve had to settle for keen intellect, clever wit and charm, plus my natural animal magnetism, erudition and disarming modesty to get me by.
Who needs spandex?
…tormented by my ills and aging (since I have them to deal with anyway) into creations of unsurpassed genius – painting paintings the likes of which have never been seen, writing my literary self into the literal history books, there to repose as a national treasure, ah yes, if life is to be an abbreviated trial then let it produce works transcending time; alas, unlike Beethoven, no genius I; plus I’m burned out, can’t hold any interest in holding a paintbrush but for a few unremarkable moments, dabs and splatters on a dusty canvas; and as for writing, ah me, the torrent of pithy remarks, of incisive wit and ever the clever, timeless commentary so much a part of my deathless (until now) prose and a certified trademark of NFTD, has become a dry wash dusted with alkali.
Friday, March 13, 2009
THE FAÇADE, WHEN IT FINALLY BEGINS TO CRUMBLE…
…then comes down in a hurry, leaving bare the bleeding, bleating heart of the matter…visions of a terrifying death dance in my head with every breath I can’t take…a vacuum, nothing within, nothing without…to quote Kurt Vonnegut, ‘I knew growing old was going to be hard but I didn’t know it was going to be this hard…’
…I had figured I’d Rock n’ Roll my way through it – life – all the way up to the brink of the grave I would be rockin’, and I am, but only in my head am I able to do so…YouTube is very handy - for all manner of Rockers, C & W, Baroque, Blues and all other forms of music are there for you, all you have to do is turn up the volume and you’re in Boston with Keith Richard and X Pensive Winos, like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEb3WcYv-Ss&feature=related
…or heralding Handel’s Arrival of the Queen of Sheba, like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SSaymaY8mw&NR=1
…speaking of Keith Richards, the quintessential rocker – 18 days separate us in age, me the older…everything about the man defines Rock and Roll; if I were going to be anybody but me it’d be him, made for the stage, indeed has for half a century done nothing but Rock and Roll…I went to Mick Jagger’s semi-private 30th birthday party many years ago, a little intimate gathering of a small cadre of Rolling Stones freaks at Madison Square Garden, about 20,000 of us packed to the rafters…I didn’t realize then how great and enduring Keith was going to be…the video of him above was at his peak…I saw the corpse-like version the other day, real time, and he and me both now look our age…time has not been kind to us…he’s the best though.
…I had figured I’d Rock n’ Roll my way through it – life – all the way up to the brink of the grave I would be rockin’, and I am, but only in my head am I able to do so…YouTube is very handy - for all manner of Rockers, C & W, Baroque, Blues and all other forms of music are there for you, all you have to do is turn up the volume and you’re in Boston with Keith Richard and X Pensive Winos, like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEb3WcYv-Ss&feature=related
…or heralding Handel’s Arrival of the Queen of Sheba, like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SSaymaY8mw&NR=1
…speaking of Keith Richards, the quintessential rocker – 18 days separate us in age, me the older…everything about the man defines Rock and Roll; if I were going to be anybody but me it’d be him, made for the stage, indeed has for half a century done nothing but Rock and Roll…I went to Mick Jagger’s semi-private 30th birthday party many years ago, a little intimate gathering of a small cadre of Rolling Stones freaks at Madison Square Garden, about 20,000 of us packed to the rafters…I didn’t realize then how great and enduring Keith was going to be…the video of him above was at his peak…I saw the corpse-like version the other day, real time, and he and me both now look our age…time has not been kind to us…he’s the best though.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Random "...NOTES..." From Wrinkled Scraps...
PERSONALS:
‘Companion Wanted’: Aging, balding, fat, penniless, (nearly) toothless reprobate looking for rich widow, need not be much to look at, prefer that you should be considerably older than me, 80-85 a good place to start, weight of no consequence, failing health a plus; interested responders should include notarized portfolio and cash-on-hand stats…dopers okay, drunks too (…bring enough for two, no basket cases need apply, one is plenty, no collect calls from pay phones where your shopping cart is parked…)
SPEAKING OF DOPERS…
…I was once the Vermont State junior diving champion back about 1957 – svelte, graceful and agile I swam & swan-dived my way to victory lane and even though I didn’t win any gold medals I had fun; the hoopla was great, with dinner at the state house and meeting the pols of the day…fast forward about 15 years and I am busted in New York for a marijuana rap and sent off to cool my heels in jail for a bit, an offense which cost me $600 in fines, $1800 for a mouthpiece and added to my rap sheet…fast forward 35 more years and we have this kid Michael Phelps…he’s lost quite a bit more money than me and got lots more publicity and notoriety than I have received but Michael, Dude – guys like me paved the road for guys like you…and I am here to tell you – in the aggregate it’s been The Highway To Hell!
‘Companion Wanted’: Aging, balding, fat, penniless, (nearly) toothless reprobate looking for rich widow, need not be much to look at, prefer that you should be considerably older than me, 80-85 a good place to start, weight of no consequence, failing health a plus; interested responders should include notarized portfolio and cash-on-hand stats…dopers okay, drunks too (…bring enough for two, no basket cases need apply, one is plenty, no collect calls from pay phones where your shopping cart is parked…)
SPEAKING OF DOPERS…
…I was once the Vermont State junior diving champion back about 1957 – svelte, graceful and agile I swam & swan-dived my way to victory lane and even though I didn’t win any gold medals I had fun; the hoopla was great, with dinner at the state house and meeting the pols of the day…fast forward about 15 years and I am busted in New York for a marijuana rap and sent off to cool my heels in jail for a bit, an offense which cost me $600 in fines, $1800 for a mouthpiece and added to my rap sheet…fast forward 35 more years and we have this kid Michael Phelps…he’s lost quite a bit more money than me and got lots more publicity and notoriety than I have received but Michael, Dude – guys like me paved the road for guys like you…and I am here to tell you – in the aggregate it’s been The Highway To Hell!
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
In the interest of maximum diversion..
…of a quick nature I hastily tap off a few e-mails inquiring of a trio of Friends/Family what a mimosa was, other than a plant, for I had heard it was of an alcoholic nature and thrilled to the idea…diminished capacity on the cheap…
Here are their suggestions:
“Let's simplify this, take the champagne and take the container of orange juice and put them on the table take two straws and put one in each container, drink from them both at the same time, thus a mimosa of sorts…” Love, Chip Tooth
Dear "f. i." (editer’s note, “f. i.” = former inebriate) add a good splash of an orange liqueur - triple sec, grand marnier, there are others. Upscale brunch places use fresh-squeezed so I'd get the pulpy variety of OJ that comes in a carton…there's a good & relatively inexpensive Spanish champagne "Freineix", something like that - but may not need to use such a good one since you are mixing…bottoms up! Love Allison
Below is what we are (were) talking about…
Here are their suggestions:
“Let's simplify this, take the champagne and take the container of orange juice and put them on the table take two straws and put one in each container, drink from them both at the same time, thus a mimosa of sorts…” Love, Chip Tooth
Dear "f. i." (editer’s note, “f. i.” = former inebriate) add a good splash of an orange liqueur - triple sec, grand marnier, there are others. Upscale brunch places use fresh-squeezed so I'd get the pulpy variety of OJ that comes in a carton…there's a good & relatively inexpensive Spanish champagne "Freineix", something like that - but may not need to use such a good one since you are mixing…bottoms up! Love Allison
Below is what we are (were) talking about…
“This is so funny, I can't remember if it’s 3/4 of a glass of OJ with a quarter of champs or the other way around! Experiment!!!” Ann
Well, I don’t mean to sound or read like a spokesman for California champagne and Florida orange juice but I dutifully got out my best champagne flute and mixed and matched till sense and sorrow both were drowned, $25 is a cheap date…
Well, I don’t mean to sound or read like a spokesman for California champagne and Florida orange juice but I dutifully got out my best champagne flute and mixed and matched till sense and sorrow both were drowned, $25 is a cheap date…
Sunday, February 1, 2009
AS I CONTINUE TO FALL APART…
…I can’t help but laugh at the irony of everything. In my head capillaries are about to explode like a string of lady fingers, my lungs are failing, metamorphic body is about to topple over wobbly pegs, having reached tipping point…cancer, copd, emphysema – all after me, trying to rend me dead, each in its turn waiting to minister the final blow, the last breath, the death rattle, but like Dennis the Cowardly Lion (below) sez of me, “…you’re a tricky bastard…”
…I can’t help but laugh at the irony of everything. In my head capillaries are about to explode like a string of lady fingers, my lungs are failing, metamorphic body is about to topple over wobbly pegs, having reached tipping point…cancer, copd, emphysema – all after me, trying to rend me dead, each in its turn waiting to minister the final blow, the last breath, the death rattle, but like Dennis the Cowardly Lion (below) sez of me, “…you’re a tricky bastard…”
…Dennis (above) was talking about cribbage but metaphorically in life it amounts to the same thing, you just keep bobbing and weaving and hoping you can cut a Jack...you see how easily NFTD segues from the mundane – one’s whimpering ailments – to the serious – cribbage, at which Dennis is very good, but so am I…alas, he wins more than I do but he often has his hands full.
…one time I played Larry who is also a very good cribbage player and he ended up beating me, but it was a struggle and his high praise to me, as Dennis’ above, was “You lose hard,”…which cracked me up, so I have to say of the cribbage players I have played in my life, the best is the Cowardly Lion even though he’s not as good as he thinks he is, followed by Larry, ditto not as good as et cetera, followed by me ditto ditto…it’s not just a game, it’s a way of life.
…one time I played Larry who is also a very good cribbage player and he ended up beating me, but it was a struggle and his high praise to me, as Dennis’ above, was “You lose hard,”…which cracked me up, so I have to say of the cribbage players I have played in my life, the best is the Cowardly Lion even though he’s not as good as he thinks he is, followed by Larry, ditto not as good as et cetera, followed by me ditto ditto…it’s not just a game, it’s a way of life.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Mayday! Mayday!
…The Thrift Shop in Townshend – seen above and below, the one near Mary Myers and The Stuffed Bun, not the used clothing store uptown, no, we mean The Thrift Shop – 802/365-7234, open M-W-F-S from 10 – 4 and Sunday from 10 – 1 (wheeew, long windy sentence, where was I), oh yeah, The Thrift Shop, whose hard-working volunteers are unpaid, The Thrift Shop where used clothing is clean and quality, where prices are as low as you can get anywhere – just try us, we’ll undersell ANYbody – is in dire need of your help!
…where else can you outfit your entire family for 20 bucks - we don’t care if you got ten kids...bring ‘em in, no in-laws, but outlaws are okay…well, we need your help or we’re going to go belly up…
…where else can you outfit your entire family for 20 bucks - we don’t care if you got ten kids...bring ‘em in, no in-laws, but outlaws are okay…well, we need your help or we’re going to go belly up…
…we’re practically broke, busted and disgusted…here’s how you can help: donate money or ANYthing quality, and/or buy something.
…ALL proceeds go to those in need, all of it after expenses like rent, lights heat…the rest goes to anyone needs some help. Now we need some help and would appreciate your donations of money or goods, any amount, a dollar, ten dollars whatever you can afford. Clothes, furniture, whatever – no junk, trash or soiled goods need apply…
…there are lots of people who don’t have a very big piece of the pie. I don’t know if you’ll be rewarded in heaven for your efforts but you’ll feel good about it here on earth. Thank you for thinking of others…
…ALL proceeds go to those in need, all of it after expenses like rent, lights heat…the rest goes to anyone needs some help. Now we need some help and would appreciate your donations of money or goods, any amount, a dollar, ten dollars whatever you can afford. Clothes, furniture, whatever – no junk, trash or soiled goods need apply…
…there are lots of people who don’t have a very big piece of the pie. I don’t know if you’ll be rewarded in heaven for your efforts but you’ll feel good about it here on earth. Thank you for thinking of others…
Friday, January 16, 2009
Looking for a secluded oceanside retreat...
...in case you should happen to have one available for next to nothing in which I might enjoy the recuperative salt air and warm breezes of the Carribean for a while or two (prior to my Netherlands campaign I should take respite in a hammock for a fortnight perhaps, pina colada at the ready, reggae music coming at me on all sides) or even I might stoop to a visit in yon Florida Keys midst mangoes and pelicans, why not?
Wherever is warmth is my heart and soul. I've had 66 winters in New England more or less and the novelty has worn off. I don't care if I ever see snow or ice again, which I may regret saying someday as I languish in the tropics with nothing to do but paint and read and write and eat and drink and smoke and...
But meanwhile...
We're in the midst of what is known as a silver thaw where all the
branches and roadways and everything is encased in gleaming shimmering ice
- o yes it's very beautiful - beneath an ice-blue sky peppered with huge white clouds driven by an occluded front which translates down here to a bone-chilling ten degrees as I tramp across the tundra arms loaded with ice-caked wood...wood so green it needs a blowtorch to get it going.
Who needs it!?
The hell with this mountain man/cabin in the woods bullshit, I want a hammock in the jungle about 50 easy yards from the azure sea, breeze wafting my sarong to and fro...buds of resin-soaked ganje at my beck and call, buckets of fruit, bottles of Red Stripe, the sun bursting forth in a shower of glorious color in the morning and folding at night into ink-blue darkness - all the while I've barely stirred save to turn the page, light a splif, take a swallow, maybe even kiss your pretty plum-colored lips if you should show up. (Please be a girl...)
Don't stay though; I do my fantasizing alone.
Not to worry I tell myself; nobody stays very long. `You're better on paper than you are in real life' is a regular refrain in my memory, and still true for which I offer no apology.
Wherever is warmth is my heart and soul. I've had 66 winters in New England more or less and the novelty has worn off. I don't care if I ever see snow or ice again, which I may regret saying someday as I languish in the tropics with nothing to do but paint and read and write and eat and drink and smoke and...
But meanwhile...
We're in the midst of what is known as a silver thaw where all the
branches and roadways and everything is encased in gleaming shimmering ice
- o yes it's very beautiful - beneath an ice-blue sky peppered with huge white clouds driven by an occluded front which translates down here to a bone-chilling ten degrees as I tramp across the tundra arms loaded with ice-caked wood...wood so green it needs a blowtorch to get it going.
Who needs it!?
The hell with this mountain man/cabin in the woods bullshit, I want a hammock in the jungle about 50 easy yards from the azure sea, breeze wafting my sarong to and fro...buds of resin-soaked ganje at my beck and call, buckets of fruit, bottles of Red Stripe, the sun bursting forth in a shower of glorious color in the morning and folding at night into ink-blue darkness - all the while I've barely stirred save to turn the page, light a splif, take a swallow, maybe even kiss your pretty plum-colored lips if you should show up. (Please be a girl...)
Don't stay though; I do my fantasizing alone.
Not to worry I tell myself; nobody stays very long. `You're better on paper than you are in real life' is a regular refrain in my memory, and still true for which I offer no apology.
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
THE FIRST THING I’M GONNA DO…
“…is stand up, but that’s as far ahead as I’ve planned…enuff of this sophomoric sophistry…”, I mutter aloud to no one and, upright now even if listing to port, head for the fridge to decap a stout, returning from which arduous chore (psychologically speaking the love-hate relationship is always there) I wonder did I mean that literally…sophomoric sophistry…hmmm…again Merriam-Webster to the rescue, I leave it to Noah’s wisdom and hope he delivers big time, because in the realm of the pure idea where NFTD is from - sophomoric reigns, Dude! It is like the foundation on which this sophistry is built!
…leave it to the lexicographers, just look at the synonyms for sophomoric: bombastic, foolish, immature, inexperienced, infantile, inflated, naive, pretentious, reckless, brash, young - except for young every word is me incarnate…and a sophist? How’s this, sophistry: specious, inconsistent, ah, be still my heart – NFTD is about as deft a hand of casuistry as you’re ever gonna see…we’re kindred spirits.
I STARTED LIFE WITH MONEY…
…for awhile I had some, then life began in earnest and the free ride was over; for the next forty years I had no money, then I hit a lottery, couple of them actually and, as happens in a life which isn’t fair, I had lots of fun and pretty much did what I wanted for a couple years then when it was gone reverted to type and continued life broke but not broken; about poor I know, and wealth too, the yin and yang of Galbraithian/Keynesian economic theory.
…everything you do is predicated on ‘can I afford it’…I have no stats to back me up but it seems to me that many, I will say even most, relationships and families which break up are grounded in the one common denominator of not enough money. Occasionally there’s a cuckolding interloper but usually it’s cash flow…
…look here Dude – I had $36,000 cash in my hand and I am here to tell you that people who go on and on about money can’t buy happiness don’t know what they’re talking about…for the duration of that 36Gs I was deliriously happy and, sad to say too because I abused some of it, sometimes just delirious…well, that is one of the deleterious side effects of having too much…but I was much younger and more foolish then than I am now; I’d like to get another windfall, this time you could color me frugal. Parenthetically, I could never understand why to husband means to save, to parse it out, whereas husbands are not noted for thrift…and speaking of thrift:
…It’s high time to hie thee to…
The Thrift Shop
Route 30, Townshend VT
Next to Mary Myers & Stuffed Bun
Open 10-4 M-W-F-S
Sun 10-1
You can outfit your entire family in clean, quality clothing for 20 bucks!
(Try THAT at Wal-Mart)
“…is stand up, but that’s as far ahead as I’ve planned…enuff of this sophomoric sophistry…”, I mutter aloud to no one and, upright now even if listing to port, head for the fridge to decap a stout, returning from which arduous chore (psychologically speaking the love-hate relationship is always there) I wonder did I mean that literally…sophomoric sophistry…hmmm…again Merriam-Webster to the rescue, I leave it to Noah’s wisdom and hope he delivers big time, because in the realm of the pure idea where NFTD is from - sophomoric reigns, Dude! It is like the foundation on which this sophistry is built!
…leave it to the lexicographers, just look at the synonyms for sophomoric: bombastic, foolish, immature, inexperienced, infantile, inflated, naive, pretentious, reckless, brash, young - except for young every word is me incarnate…and a sophist? How’s this, sophistry: specious, inconsistent, ah, be still my heart – NFTD is about as deft a hand of casuistry as you’re ever gonna see…we’re kindred spirits.
I STARTED LIFE WITH MONEY…
…for awhile I had some, then life began in earnest and the free ride was over; for the next forty years I had no money, then I hit a lottery, couple of them actually and, as happens in a life which isn’t fair, I had lots of fun and pretty much did what I wanted for a couple years then when it was gone reverted to type and continued life broke but not broken; about poor I know, and wealth too, the yin and yang of Galbraithian/Keynesian economic theory.
…everything you do is predicated on ‘can I afford it’…I have no stats to back me up but it seems to me that many, I will say even most, relationships and families which break up are grounded in the one common denominator of not enough money. Occasionally there’s a cuckolding interloper but usually it’s cash flow…
…look here Dude – I had $36,000 cash in my hand and I am here to tell you that people who go on and on about money can’t buy happiness don’t know what they’re talking about…for the duration of that 36Gs I was deliriously happy and, sad to say too because I abused some of it, sometimes just delirious…well, that is one of the deleterious side effects of having too much…but I was much younger and more foolish then than I am now; I’d like to get another windfall, this time you could color me frugal. Parenthetically, I could never understand why to husband means to save, to parse it out, whereas husbands are not noted for thrift…and speaking of thrift:
…It’s high time to hie thee to…
The Thrift Shop
Route 30, Townshend VT
Next to Mary Myers & Stuffed Bun
Open 10-4 M-W-F-S
Sun 10-1
You can outfit your entire family in clean, quality clothing for 20 bucks!
(Try THAT at Wal-Mart)
Thursday, January 1, 2009
So right away I bury myself in Rousseau...
Jean Jacques Rousseau and his `Confessions' about which I've heard so much over the years but never until now had any truck with...why am I compared to him I ask myself and before long I see why with a quote like this: "My passions are extremely strong, and while I am under their sway nothing can equal my impetuosity. I am amenable to no restraint, respect, fear or decorum. I am cynical, bold, violent, and daring. No shame can stop me, no fear of danger alarm me. Except for the one object in my mind, the universe for me is non-existent. But all this lasts only a moment; and the next moment plunges me into complete annihilation. Catch me in a calm mood, I am all indolence and timidity. Everything alarms me, everything discourages me. I am frightened by a buzzing fly. I am too lazy to speak a word or make a gesture. So much am I a slave to fears and shames that I long to vanish from mortal sight. If action is necessary I do not know what to do; if I must speak I do not know what to say; if anyone looks at me I drop my eyes. When roused by passion, I can sometimes find the right words to say, but in ordinary conversation I can find none, none at all. I find conversation unbearable owing to the very fact that I am obliged to speak..."
I burst out laughing…a man after my own heart I must say but I'll have to read on further to see if his life's confessions and mine are compatible beyond these rather dubious distinctions...
I burst out laughing…a man after my own heart I must say but I'll have to read on further to see if his life's confessions and mine are compatible beyond these rather dubious distinctions...
Business and pleasure may not mix...
…but pleasure and pleasure do...does…so in concelebrating this not-so-ballyhooed non-event, the 24th birthday of “…NOTES…” I salute us, me and you Dear Reader, by burning evidence with a bone which is the herbal equivalent of an all-day sucker and a jeroboam of Moet which, alas Dear Reader, because you are not here, I had to drink it myself lest it go bad; you would have liked it…I think I did, I don’t quite remember, about half-way down the label things got a little lightheaded which is what champagne is all about so I let it take over and drifted off into the ether, into the distant universe, lost in space, adrift in the Sea of Tranquility and never left the chair. That is a sum and substance synopsis of that inauspicious moment.
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