Dance

Dance
Originally uploaded by Lantana Lad.

Hey, that worked quite well! I will be able to start illustrating blogs again.
I'm going to ride this horse yet. Three c heers for Flickr and iMac.
Any one for Ice skating?

Path to Beach

Path to Beach
Originally uploaded by Lantana Lad.

This picture has almost nothing to do with anything. Un less you want to go to the beach which is down there at the end
. I am again just testing. I could not get picture on my blogs from the iMac computer so I am trying delivery from Flickr, a wondeful
invention by two fine people ./

Reality Shows

As a kid I listened to certain radio programs faithfully. One of my favorites was Tom Mix. I sat in front of the “big” radio in the living room and imagined I was right there on the range beside Tom. My visualization of the range was a large open area. The widest space I had ever seen was a golf course near our home. So I had Tom and I galloping down a fairway and hiding in a sand trap to have a shoot out with the bad guys.

My mind couldn’t make sense of what I was told about those radio shows though. Bobby Benson, another of my hit shows, was not a real person according to my mother. He was just a man that was acting as though he was Bobby Benson. His stories were not real, while surprising, but logical since Bobby Benson wasn’t real. However, I knew Tom Mix was real. So how can you say that his adventures were not real. I used to mull this business over at night in bed. Was Errol Flynn a real person or was he really the pirate I saw in the movies. Maybe he was Blackbeard acting like he was Errol Flynn for the newspapers. He was in the newspapers a lot, but I didn’t understand those stories.

This question of what’s real and what’s not in show business has followed me at times all my life. Just recently I saw a picture of Jessica Simpson and my first reaction was, ”That CAN”T be real!”

PS. Disillusionment came into the scene when I later learned that Tom Mix was so rich that he refused to play in the Tom Mix radio show. He felt it didn’t pay enough to be worth his while. I am still wondering about Jessica.

Conspicuous Consumptiion

When I was 21, I got a real rush out of wild driving. We tore along the roads of Europe freezing our toes off in an open jeep and assuming there were no rules of the road and that jeeps never rolled over. Actually, we knew the rules and saw jeeps roll over, but I couldn't happen to us! In the Philippines we climbed up mountains and accelerated down the hills with the driver blind folded and just taking verbal instruction.

At the age of thirty, we got a Pontiac Gran Prix and proved they could exceed 100 miles per hour on the New Jersey Turnpike.

When our son was 17, we bought an old International S cout with rusted out floor boards and springs and shocks that increased it's height by more than three feet.(as a second car to go with the second home). Before the state inspectors forced us to restore its normal stance, we proved that raising the center of gravity too high is a bad idea. It turned out to be a rotten beach-buggy, it kept getting stuck in the sand.

By age 60, I had discovered the joys of "My Father's Oldsmobile". I marvelled at gas prices, but didn't really care.

At 70 I was driving a comfy Buick Park Avenue. We purred along at the speed limit (right!) without a care.

The knees were really acting up by 76, and a Buick Rendezvous made it easier on the knees than the lower sedans. Now at 80, I get that rush when I pass a cop at 3 miles over the limit.

I Think I Have Been Collected

If you happened by in the last day or so, you know that my post before this was about some horsing around I was involved with in the army 63 years ago. I posted it at about 2:30PM yesterday. Now like a lot of bloggers, I have a site meter that records the domain of everyone that tunes into my blog. It doesn't tell me who it was nor record an address, but it does tell general location - city, state and country usually. It also gives the time someone starts reading and when they quit. Oh yes, and it tells how they got there, links, search engine, and search words.

With all the talk of your telephone records being collected by the NSA, you might be interested to know that my story of Army Hi Jinks was read this morning at 7:25 by someone at the domain named "pentagon.mil". The domain was further identified as "Army Information Systems Command-Pentagon". The location given was "Falls Church, Virginia, United States, North America".

The search engine used was "search,blogger.com" and the search words were "us army".

You'all feel safer now?

Army Hi-jinks

The standard organizational chart for an infantry company in WWII called for two "messengers" (MOS 527, I believe, if my memory is still on track.) Jack Moffett and I got the two openings in our company way back when we finished basic training. We carried and cared for the company radios, we were responsible for communications, literally "ran" messages, and when otherwise not occupied acted as bodyguards for the company HQ and the company commander. In training in the States we had frequent idle times. Times when we could get in trouble.

In Louisiana we lived in "6-man huts". Their doors had basic door latches. There was an inmovable handle and a thumb latch that extended through the door and hooked on the inside. Pressing the thumb hold down, raised the latch up on the inside and unhooked the door. Everyone has seen them. They are used on gates, shed doors, etc., to this day.

Jack and I extended the bolt that held the handle through to the inside. We insulated the latch from the handle with electrician's tape. We wired together four walkie-talkie 104 volt batteries so that we had 416 volts available. Then we wired one contact to the thumb latch and the other to the handle via the bolt thru the door. Anyone trying to open the door was treated to a very substanial shock. It tossed some on their backside.

This was a fairly successful prank until an officer decided he had business inside our hut. When he recovered, he came looking for us and threatened all sorts of revenge. But he let us off on the condition that we "equip" his 2-man hut the same way. His roomie then appointed us his #1 enemies and vowed our early demise. We gave up the electrician trade.

Combat was less fun. Jack was shot in the butt and came home early. His replacement died outside Ingostadt. I got hit in the back by a tank and still hurt.

Painful Learning

Remember your first day at school, that first date, that first week of calculas, first day in the army, etc.? There was that lost, what-do-I-do-next: what is that man talking about, should I speak up kind of feeling. That feeling that you are so helplessly lost that you can't even think of a question to ask?

Now you get the sense of how I feel about the new iMac computer! And I suppose I now know how a computer neophyte feels at his first SeniorNet computer class.

My first personal computer was from Sears Roebuck and if memory serves I think the hard drive was 110KB. OK, mabe it was 110MB, but it was small. As hard drives grew bigger, I grew older, but I learned to use each bigger hard drive and its contents. Habits formed concerning finding my way. But they are no help now, in fact, they are getting in the way. I wouldn't want to go back, but I could wish that Apple would include a decent manual or at least, sponsor one.

Finally There

This is quite an adventure I have embarked on. This is being written on my new iMac...and I have no idea what I am doing. Last night I was stalled until I figured out that the batteries that came with the machine for use in the keyboard were deader than a doornail. My problem now is that I am where I want to be, but I don't know how I got here. So if you don't see me around for a few days -- send out the St. Bernards.

Momentous Announcement

Remember a few blogs ago when I wrote that I picked up my push lawn mower and threw it? Well... this time it was not quite a temper tantrum, it was slower coming than that. And I havedn't thrown anything ...yet. BUT I am about to make a major change in my lifestyle. This week I will go to the mall, proceed to the Apple Store and come home with a brand new iMac.

I have spent a good hour each day getting this Windows PC either to come on, or turn off, or go where I want to go in between, or on general "fix-its". I don't need this agrievation. I feel better already. I'll let everyone know when it happens.

The Big One, thank you very much.

Geography

I can remember a time when I was a young boy when hand kitted dresses were popular. It was the late ‘30s and early ‘40s, I think. My mother was quite a knitter and she had knitted several dresses for herself. They were very attractive and she was admired for her skill...and for her figure which the knit did not detract from. Our seventh grade home room teacher also wore a knitted dress, but she wore the same one every day and her figure was a bit too ample to be flattered by anything tight. But Mrs. Murphy was a dear. She tried to be strict, but a twinkle in her eye took the edge off her discipline. Everyone in her classes loved her.

I thought of Mrs. Murphy this week when there were reports of a survey on school age children that showed them to be weak, weak failures in Geography. They haven’t been taught where anything is. They don’t know the capitols of the states. Only a wee percentage could point out Louisiana on a map despite its recent prominence on TV and in newspapers.. Foreign countries were beyond the ken of most. Mrs. Murphy was our Geography teacher. This was well before something called Social Studies replaced Geography in the schools. A little of what is now “social studies” may have slipped into her teaching, but her aim was to have her kids know where things were At lunch hour she would let us play games on the maps rolled up like curtain shades in the front of her room. We made great fun out of finding obscure towns and then challenging classmates to locate them.

Imagine...today you can easily get your Ph.D. in most anything without knowing what rivers flow through Pittsburgh. We couldn’t make it to eighth grade without knowing that and a lot more about the towns, cities, rivers, mountains, and people of the world.

Spontaneity is Fun

Spontaneity is a fun quality and I like almost everything about it except trying to spell it or trying to pronounce it. Anyway, we were “it” the last few days. On Sunday, personal business took us to north central Florida. We finished late and were tired. So we planned to spend two nights in a Holiday Inn up there before coming home on Tuesday (today). But Monday morning, I was unhappy that I couldn’t get online and the motel wasn’t the greatest in other respects. So in a quick decision, we checked out. Our brilliant idea was to go as far as Disney World and try to find a room in one of the tacky, inexpensive motels which surround the place. Notice now how one bright flash follows another. As long as we were near Disney, we might as well stop by and renew our annual passes which expired last month. This has to be done at a ticket booth. We knew that the closest ticket booths to the handicapped parking were at Animal Kingdom. As we rode down the parkway toward the park, we came to a fork. One side went to the park and the other to the Animal Kingdom Lodge. At the last second I swerved toward the Lodge.

And that is how we came to spend Monday afternoon and evening sitting on the porch of our room watching the animals munching grass and leaves in the savanna. Neither we nor the animals had a care. Of course, we substituted for the grass with a dinner at the Boma “Flavors of Africa” restaurant with delicious South African wine . .


Just can’t understand these people that say they don’t want to retire

Holocaust Remembrance Day

WE MUST NEVER FORGET

Today, April 25, 2006, is Holocaust Remembrance Day. It is largely considered a Jewish holiday, but it is a day when everyone should remember. I am not Jewish, but I was present one joyous and horrific day when a concentration camp was liberated. I will never forget. All mankind MUST remember and never let a thing like that happen again!

Chess Master, Not

I fear that one of the things that a youth of either gender, but mostly male, has to eventually learn is that he is not nearly as good at chess as he thinks he is. I learned the moves quite young as did many of my friends. I took a book or two from the library and mastered some of the standard ploys, openings and end games. I got to think in terms becoming a hot shot in the chess world. Then I went into the Army and ran into more challenges than ever before. Interesting what was hidden under the grime and tin hats of infantry men! But I voluntarily resigned all thoughts of even beginners’ competence when I started playing against the guy in the next bunk at the repo-depot on the way home from the Philippines. This guy was a drunk and I mean he was drunk 24/7. He also was the brother of a successful author. He had "issues". Most of the day he was either reading a book or writing his “great gift to American literature.” I don’t know about his writing, but he beat me at chess, he stomped on me at chess. And every time we played he also serenely read a book concurrently. I quit chess entirely and took up bridge for a while. However, I soon realized that in that game, it is possible to be yelled at by your partner at the same time you are laughed at by the opponent. I gave games up for girls about then and never regretted the move.

Our Heroes

While we probably do not express sufficiently our appreciation, the entire elder community of south Florida owes a lot to the teams of Fire –Rescue people that respond to 911 calls. Few of us reach the age of eighty or eighty-five without having been the beneficiary at some point of these ladies and gentlemen. They are on the go night and day serving not just private homes, but also all the Continuing Care Retirement Communities, but Assisted Living facilities and Nursing homes. Our neighborhood station is proud to be “on scene” in under seven minutes from the call and usually faster.

I can attest to the fact that they know their stuff. Just as important, they are caring souls that make the extra effort when necessary. My personal experience: I was on the way from the hospital to our skilled nursing center for recuperation from an operation to glue together the pieces of a shattered acetabulum. I was in a pseudo-ambulance, a vehicle equipped to transport, but not much more. I was chatting with the attendant in back with me. There was a sudden jamming of brakes and the driver let out a censorable exclamation. The attendant with me instantly became authoritative. He calmly said to the driver, “Call it in!” He examined my IV carefully as he asked, “Can you be alone for a few minutes?” I couldn’t see what was going on but I learned later that two people were trapped in a car which had been broadsided in front of us. The Palm Beach County Fire-Rescue arrived soon. I could hear them arrive. With that the crew driving me returned and we were on our way. The attendant explained to me that he was a Broward Co. EMT and his insurance was provided by Broward. He was moonlighting in Palm Beach. If he was hurt outside Boward, he was not covered. Yet he went yanking and prying on a smashed car to try to save those people even though he was not covered.

There should be a “Day” for these folks.

First Experience with Computer

I am bad at remembering dates, I can guess though that, this happened in the '50s sometime. I was working as a group leader in Research and Development. Computers were being talked about in the newspapers and pictures showed huge arrays of tubes that resembled radio tubes. The department signed up for a service offered by General Electric. A gigantic work station was installed in a central location at the labs. Supervisors were gathered together and given a lesson in "Basic" computer language. The work station was connected by telephone wire to a big computer somewhere in north Jersey. There was no monitor, no mouse, just the oversized typewriter-looking thing and an enormous printer. The printer used paper that had those holes along both margins and fed up in a continuous stream from a cardboard box on the floor. I decided that I would like to be able to enter the data my group gathered and have this miracle machine do all the calculations. But first I had to write a program.

I wasn't burdened with a lot of confidence (never was good at languages). So, I waited until after hours when most everyone had gone home. I labored away at the program-writing until I thought I had it. It was time to send my imput to the big computer at GE. (There was a substantial cost per minute of connection.) I pushed the appropriate keys and, sure enough, the printer groaned and started printing. First problem was, it was printing gibberish. Second problem was, I couldn't turn the darn thing off. I could see the Department being charged dollar after dollar as page after page of random letters and numbers accumulated on the floor. With no help available, I did the only thing I could think of. On hands and knees, I crawled under the monster and pulled the plug. I stuffed the acres of paper into my briefcase, put on my coat and went home.

p.s. Later, I got the hang of it and became a steady user.

The Sky is Closing!

Remember when you were very young, there became an age when expressing fear out loud was no longer "hip", "sharp", "cool", whatever the "in" word was? My parents and I were outdoors waiting because the radio and the newspapers had reported that on today's U.S. arrival of Germany's airship,the Hindenburg, it would pass over New York City and then over the suburbs in New Jersey. It was the largest man-made object to ever fly. They told the time and we were out there waiting. Suddenly, I was frozen with fear! The sky darkened and was filled with this monster, roaring "Thing". Pop and Mom seemed fascinated so I resisted the desire to run in the house and hide under the bed. Gradually is crept across the sky and slid south. Folks were jumping up and down in some sort of excitment I didn't understand.

Follow the link above for the first step in linking your way through the romantic and tragic story of the passenger-carrying light-than-air aircrafts of the prewar era in aviation. I am still convinced I had a reason to be scared that day. I have since done the math: there were 13 houses on each side of our street. Each had a 50 foot front footage. That meant that our street measured about 650 feet. The Hindenburg was 808 ft long and 135 ft in diameter. Flying very low, it smothered our street, my world. I was rightfully frightened.
If you read further about dirigibles, you will learn that the U. S. Navy was a pioneer in their use. You may also be surprised to know that America's refusal to provide Germany with nonflamable helium may not have been the cause of the Hindenburg's demise in a ball of fire at Lakehurst the year after I saw it fly over. Another surprise to many is the fact that the construction of the Hindenburg's sister ship (the Graf Zeppelin II) was completed and it flew after the crash. The onset of World War II kept it from ever achieving fame.

A bitter postscript for me was that I was doing homework with the radio playing on May 6,. 1937. I heard the broadcast of the fire and crash

How Leaders Learn to be Leaders

On Monday nights it is often our (yours too, I’ll bet) misfortune to watch the bumbling efforts to practice entrepreneurship on “The Apprentice” on TV. The winner gets a job in management, something they all (almost all) seem woefully inept and ill-equipped for. We seem to be raising bunches of overweight followers, trained to move a mouse while sitting down and obeying electronically imposed rules. The really well motivated parents get their children out in the sunlight exercising by enrolling them in organized play on a properly lined play ground. But many just hang around and play video games or watch TV.

When the “greatest generation and before”, was young, they just gravitated to a group of like aged kids down or up the street and stood around until someone said “whad’ ya wan’ ta do?” The group chose a game or activity by strength of persuasion or muscle, or who owned a ball. They argued about who would be captain of the team, who would call the plays, what the out-of-bounds and goal lines would be. They chose up sides. It was their game, not “the after-school counselor’s”. It was “organized” only after they organized it. They practiced management long before they knew what it was.

Sorry, I guess I just bemoan the disappearance of: Hide-and seek, tag, two-hand touch, one-hand touch, hop-scotch- jump rope, bicycle racing, one-a-cat, two-a-cat, foot racing (aka known as “last one there is a rotten egg!”), pick up baseball and football, building a tree house, going skinny dipping, fishing in the creek. Even good old cowboys and Indians (PC be darned, besides the Indians won half the time.). Do today’s kids know what a skinned knee is? This is where leadership was learned and managers were born.

ONE MORE BEFORE WE LEAVE

If you are a senior, and even if you are not, you frequently see surveys and polls asking your opinion on the greatest advance in technology in the last century. The computer gets a lot of votes., probably the most. We hear about the transistor and microchip from more technically oriented folks. Disposible diapers are credited by new mothers often. Radio and TV are cited as is assembly line manufacturing. Spray antiperspirants are favored by city dwellers.

BUT AS A LIFE_LONG SUBURBANITE I would like to praise the developer of the power lawn mower with grass catcher. To this day I remember vividly the Saturday I picked up that faithful old Pennsylvania push mower in a temper and threw it as far as I could ( about 18 inches) . I walked straight to the car sitting in the driveway, drove to "Two Guys From Harrison" and without cosulting the checkbook OR my wife -- purchased a POWER MOWER. Outdoor life began that day!

Second choice goes to the power edger. Of course, the manual grass clipper developed a strong handshake, but... the calluses!

Of course, in the "home" where I now reside, I must cofess I look out the window (closed to keep the air conditioning in) and watch the landscaping crew (probably illegal Guatemalans) make the lawn pretty.

Short Paws

We will be gone again for a week. More sitting in a courtroom. This time we should hear the sentence arising from the trial we attended three weeks ago. Be back soon.

The Boy Scouts of America

The Boy Scouts of America were probably in their heyday just as I reached the age to join. There were three troops in our little town and practically every kid joined one or the other when they reached 12 years of age. One troop was in the rich end of town and we had little to do with them. But the others overlapped in terms of area. Our troop (Troop 12) was “unaffiliated” while our competition was sponsored by the Presbyterian Church. My father, a sound Episcopalian, was on the troop committee of Troop 12, so, of course, that was my troop. We had a good and active troop. I don’t think at the time I ever gave a thought as to why so many of our members were Catholics. And I think now that the “competition” was at the troop committee level. We boys didn’t much give a darn what church anyone went to or what troop anyone joined..

Now that a skillion years have gone by, and I have grown aware, suspicious, and cynical, one thing bothers me. The Scoutmaster was a middle aged man that lived in a very large house with his feeble mother. Up on the third floor he had a “scout room” which he devoted to the scouts. He would have young boys up there to give tests, etc. At the time, the “etc.” didn’t occur to me as anything to worry about. I did wonder why the scoutmaster was dismissed by the committee soon after I left for the Army. But I was such a dork at the time!!

One of the highlights of my scouting career was a father and son twenty five mile hike on the Appalachian Trail. For Westerners who aren’t familiar with the AT – It is a wilderness trail that goes from Maine to Georgia along the mountain chains and only for purposes of getting across highways and country roads does it ever touch civilization. We were dropped off somewhere in New Jersey and picked up four days later somewhere in New York State. We camped out and cooked for ourselves three nights. I suspect that I was terrified and sleepless the whole time. I know I jumped out of my skin the day my father, who was walking in front of me, stepped on a snake and it curled itself up and around his hiking boot. I was doubly scared when he chased it and caught it by its neck to show it to me and prove it wasn’t poisonous. Yeah! But he didn’t know that when he stepped on it!. I bet I almost tippi-toed the rest of the hike.

But if it hadn’t been for the Boy Scouts would I have ever learn the up close and personal beauty of the natural out of doors? And would I have had to learn self-confidence in a less basic way? We took many hikes into the deep woods and I would take my dog on day long adventures into the parks and reservations that existed then. Today the adventurous types buy $45,000 SUVs and drive “off-road”.
I find it a shame that political correctness has deprived so many youth of the virtues of organized scouting..