Remembering My Dad

This post by drjim put me in the mind to reminisce about my father a bit. Our relationship was pretty tumultuous, and a large part of that was my fault. He automatically wanted things from me I wasn't willing to give, and I was willing to fight about. Which, according to his lights, was verboten, since I was his son and he was The Father. Respect for him to his standards and his way of thinking was me submitting to pointless domination. Not my style.

On the other hand, he did instill in me some pretty valuable morals. One of his pet peeves and now mine is that you should own your mistakes. Lame excuses, never taking responsibility for one's actions, lying and denial set his teeth on edge. That was a mark of deficiency of character to him.

One thing he did that I have been unable to match was his service to various committees and boards in the area. First and foremost, he was heavily involved in the VFW. Dad dressed up for a ton of funerals back in the day. He was on the local electric cooperative's board, as well as the Soil Conservation Board. He spent a lot of nights making hard policy decisions no one else wanted to do, with no pay. My current profession prevents me from similar efforts now, but there is no doubt I will never match his contributions in this manner.

A lot of what I learned from him was based on his actions. Fighting through blizzards, dragging hay bales over snow covered fences to feed hungry cattle in freezing weather. Struggling to get a tractor to run in that same weather to move snow or feed. Once, we got in a shipment of calves. They were not settled in - used to their new surroundings - when a wicked thunderstorm passed through. They panicked, and through the corral fence they went (you cannot stop cattle with most fencing). Dad was up most of the night gathering them back in the dark. Or the uncounted worried conferences with the neighbors over a problem calf that just wasn't responding to the various treatments, even up to calling the veterinarian out. Or the nights spent on patrol during calving season, to help cows who might be having trouble giving birth.

Or perhaps the sight of him crying quietly on the front porch during a hailstorm, knowing that this year's crop was going to be completely trashed. Or up half the night checking the temperature worried about a late freeze killing the wheat (what has already happened this year - not gonna be much if any crop at all already). And I'd also seen him a couple times standing out on the very same front porch, sobbing quietly because he'd managed to grow a bumper crop. He was sad because he couldn't share that with his father, who'd had very few crops like that himself. And to note - since he has passed, I have celebrated exactly one such crop. They are rare for a dryland farmer out here.

At any rate, what he taught me was a love for the land and the knowledge that we are connected to the land and it's occupants intimately. That we need to pay attention to what we see, and how we react, if we wish to profit and even to survive here. And that it is truly beautiful - the birds singing in the mornings and evenings, the deer frolicking, cottontails playing, calves kicking up their heels with their grumpy mothers watching closely. The hawks patrolling the skies looking for their next kill. Cocky pheasants strutting their stuff within rock throwing range (until hunting season - then the wily suckers hide out). Mourning doves and their lonely calls. The coyotes howling their songs in their native tongue. The marvelous, dangerous beauty of thunderheads growing malevolently in the sky. The many hued sunsets - beautiful apterif for a long hot day. Grabbing a handful of freshly worked soil, still slightly loamy with the smell of future growth. Oh yes, these things I learned from my father. Not my mother, who was a city girl at heart.

My father was a farmer/stockman born and bred, as was his father before him, and his father as well. Such is the stuff they were made of, and I remember my father in this manner as well. He sleeps peacefully in his grave on the prairie.

Happy Father's Day to all you dads out there, and for the rest of us, remember yours.

Stifled

Most of you know I can't stand Jeff Danziger. However, this effort of his is pretty nice. Gotta give him props here. He even got the details correct for a LaSalle.

It is apparently still "running great."

Honest Is The Best Policy

For me, being an honest and moral being was a learning experience, mostly by having my butt warmed when I transgressed a social norm. I had sticky fingers - in particular, the Matchbox cars that I did not own. I "liberated" them from my best friend (who had a ton, he wouldn't miss any) and the drugstore in town. After having to return the frankly tiny collection to my pal (yeah, what a pal I was) and paying the drugstore, stealing seemed far less lucrative than my initial thought. Or lack of thought; I sure didn't put in much before I acted. It seemed to me that a life of crime had better have a huge payout for the risks involved, and some payouts would never ever be enough.

And time went on, I was fairly honest unless other people were involved and I was a follower. This continued in my career as an altar boy.

I was generally paired with another Catholic classmate who I will call by his Confirmation name here. Those of you who know both of us will recognize his nickname. At any rate. Philip John and I were a pair, and we handled our duties in about as professional a manner as we were capable.

I suppose we'd been serving for a couple years when it occurred to Philip John that he could use a loose dollar from the collection plate once in a while. I finally gave in and took several bucks over the course of time myself. He even got so bold as to take a fiver once in a while. Beer money, he'd say.*

By then I'd realized I'd probably burn in hell, and had stopped helping myself. We were even so bold as to take a swig of the sacramental wine as well, but Lordy did it ever taste like crap. At any rate, things had settled into a routine. We were called upon to serve about once a month or so, and we were well into high school.

Then one day, Philip John was continually needling me about something and it was getting under my skin. He wouldn't stop, and my wolf pack classmates were more than willing to jump in at the smell of blood. My blood. I found this, as always, very tiresome and irksome.

So, I told Philip John that he'd better damn well stop that nonsense, or what he was doing to me would be a walk in the park compared to the bombshell I would drop on his a$$. That everyone would be on his case forever if I opened my mouth. I did not say what my secret was.

He ignored my warning, and one day as I was getting teased about whatever the hell it was that he had started, I unleashed my doomsday knowledge. I told everyone about how we had been taking money from the collection plate, and how I had stopped, but Philip John had not, even to this very day.

Somehow, I instinctively knew that I'd catch the slack even though I had done the exact same thing. The idea that I'd learned and stopped no doubt helped my cause.

And Philip John was quite unable to handle it - he stammered, totally embarrassed and spewed futile excuses the whole time. He could sure dish it out, but he was quite unprepared to take it. It was as I figured - no one got onto me about my part in the crimes, but they sure piled on Mr. Philip John.

To this day, he is known as The Guy Who Stole From the Collection At Church.

I feel bad about taking the money. I've since confessed my sins and done my penance. I will never feel sorry for getting my revenge on Philip John. I warned him, he ignored the warning and kept right on torturing me because he could. He's been paying penance of a different sort.

*Even though we were underage, we all had fake IDs and purchased lots of beer before we were 18 and could legally purchase the 3.2% brews available at all the regular commercial outlets. The good 6% was available at liquor stores only, and they were far pickier about age than the local convenience store.

Memorial Day 2013

Every year I decorate the graves of my family at our local cemetery, take pics, and post them here so my relatives can see what I did. These four are the main reason I go - from left to right is my Aunt Patsy, my Grandmother Jeanette, my Grandfather Leo (who died before I was born) and my father - Robert J. Borland. Dad and Leo were both veterans, so I put flags as decoration on their graves.

Looking to the northwest, then west, then southwest from the family area - this is part of the "new" section, and it's usually fairly well decorated. Further south there are no graves.

This is in the old section of the cemetery - Jesse would be a great uncle of mine.

Jesse's parents and sister. Dad was named for R.J., and then I was named for Dad. I am a junior, but I really should be a III. Elizabeth - mother and wife, and Letha - a daughter.

These two pics more or less show the layout of the graves in the plot. There is still room there - this may be my final resting place since there is no room left near Dad, unless they tear out a shrub. I have to wonder what the holes in the concrete footings were for - they clearly had steel posts embedded and then cut off at ground level. I suppose there was a wrought iron fence there at one time.

And, as has become my custom - I purchased some extra small flags just like I used on these graves and went searching for veterans who had nothing decorating their resting place. Usually, I start looking in the old section and catch the old Civil War vets and others, but today I could see a few close by my Dad's place, so that is where I went. I couldn't believe the number I saw there that had nothing. I can understand why - as we will see in further comments.

I didn't even know "Mr. Giddens" was buried here. This veteran also happened to be the principal of good ol' USD #102 for years and years, certainly while I was there attending grade school and on into high school as well. There was no separate principal for grade and high schools back then - he was it.

Last I'd heard, his wife was still alive, but she had moved some years ago. None of his children are even close anymore, either. I'm sure it would be a hardship to drive to Cimarron each and every year to decorate his grave and say a prayer or three. Just a shame, anyways.

I've decorated Mr. Davis's grave before - his is just west of the old family plot. I had five or six flags left, but it was ninety nine degrees when I left the house for the cemetary, and all that walking and bending over trying to push things in rock hard dry pasture ground had me pretty well shot. I went to the grocery store and got something to drink, and after I'd had about half the cup, I started sweating. I hadn't noticed I was that hot. Certainly not acclimated to the heat yet - I should have had something to drink with me to chill some.

I never made it into the old section - it seemed my efforts were better spent in the new section this time. Maybe next year I'll bring more flags and hopefully more stamina. Like I've said before, I could give a rat's a$$ what anyone thinks about me decorated neglected graves - I do it for entirely selfish reasons. I just feel I could do more.

I noticed a flag holder on the house when I moved in, so I bought a flag, by golly. However, it didn't fit in that holder, but it did come with a new one. Which I mounted, obviously.

You know, I'm pretty likely to say that I enjoy the simpler things in life, and that flying our flag would probably qualify. However, there are a lot of complex thoughts and emotions involved in flying our nation's flag - all wrapped up in the symbolism, the sacrifice of our fore bearers, what our Founding Fathers endured, and the ideas of liberty and freedom it represents to the masses who would love to live here across the world. Maybe we're not so simple for flying it, after all.

Ahhhh, Sweet Memories

Saw this on Facebook tonight, and it really brought back memories. I used to drive a single bunk version of this very truck with much the same paint scheme. And yes, I had it shined up like this one as well.

Sorry about the quality of the image - it's off an elderly Tripod website I set up years ago. Now when I sign in, I cannot access the original images. I can only copy the thumbnails. But go there if you wanna see some of the trucks I used to drive as well as my ol' Vette and other personal vehicles. I did get a Hooter's waitress to pose in the Batmobile (that is what little kids called my car back in the day), and those pics are there as well.

At any rate, this particular Ford CLT-9000 had Detroit two stroke power in the form of a Silver 8V-92 rated at 475hp. The regular ol' green ones were rated at 435 tops, but this series was supposed to be new and improved, and had a high mileage warranty on it. Which we used, since some o-rings failed and started dumping the contents of the radiator into the crankcase. Detroit stood behind it and rebuilt it into a smoking shadow of it's former self. Never ran right again.

But when it ran, boy did it run good. I could really piss off the Caterpillar boys. The famed 3406B had come out, and people were cranking on the fuel pump hard for that "little extra help" in the HP dept. This sucker could out drag them. It had a ten speed direct (no overdrive) and 370s, so it didn't run much faster than seventy five or so. This was back in the 55mph days, so that kind of speeding was kinda risky anyways.

I'm sure I've told this story before, but what the hey. Back in the good ol' days, National Carriers really was "The Elite Fleet" like you see on their trailers to this day. Back then, the tractors that leased on with the company had to be nearly show quality and fairly new. And they all drove fast as well, fuel mileage be damned. One guy had several yellow Petes with V8 Cats and sidepipes. They'd go blowing by me in one of the far lesser trucks I started in and just rumble on by, sucking out my windows whilst I putted along. That generally happened in an older Ford cabover with a 350 Formula Cummins turned up to 400 and worn down to the point where stock 350 Cummins would outrun the thing. It also had a nine speed - the Chicken Hauler Fleet Truck Tranny.

But not the Blue Beast. I and a compadre were idling through Kingman, KS, eastbound on US54 one fine day and we could hear some Critter (old slang for National Carriers) drivers talking. We were in the left lane at the last stoplight in town, and they pulled up next to me in the right lane. Peterbilt 359. Cat with straights. Big walk in sleeper.

Yeah, we'll blow off these grain haulers here in town, then when we get outta town on the four lane, we'll do some serious motoring to get to the Air Cap (Wichita).

Uh huh. I let out on the clutch and went to hammering, and slamming my way through the gears. Left him in the freaking dirt. Truly it was sad. What was even worse was my compadre, who was piloting an older and pretty rough looking IHC 4300 conventional pulling doubles cranked him as well.

We cruised on out of town where the four lanes ended, then after a couple miles, it opened back up to a four lane all the way into Wichita. After about five minutes, one of the lead Critter's partners asked:

Why aren't we blowing off these grain haulers? I thought we were gonna stroll into Wichita?

He started grumbling about not running what other people wanted him to run, and not being forced into something he didn't wanna do, or some such drivel. He was pissed that his doors were sucked out, and didn't have the sense of humor to deal with it.

At any rate, that damn truck required more screwing around than I wanted to put into it. All the air lines were Ford specific, and not what you'd find in any other American made Class 8 vehicle. This truck was old enough that there were a ton of air leaks, and every air line required special adapters. The HVAC system was cobbed from their automotive division, where all the switches activated vacuum motors. Vacuum motors to switch from heater to vent to defroster. Vacuum motors to vary the water valves for more or less heat. And so on.

Vacuum goodies that were designed to be in carbureted gasoline powered vehicles. Diesels are fuel injected and generally turboed, so vacuum is a pretty scarce commodity in one. So, Ford's solution was a vacuum generator, which was a venturi port that ran compressed air through it all the time. Which, since air dryers were also a scarce commodity back then, meant the thing was using air all the time, and since Detroit compressors put out oily air, meant the thing would plug up all the freaking time. The various vacuum motors were spring loaded, by the way, to a default setting of full heat and defrost. So, running down the road on a hot, sunny summer afternoon in excess of a hundred degrees, enjoying the A/C would actually find yourself scrambling to shut everything down since your defroster was cranking out some mighty hot air,since the venturi was plugged up.

Then, just because it was a cabover, it sucked. Remember, this was back when all trucks had leaf spring suspensions, not air ride. Cabs were firmly mounted to the frame. You were riding ON the front axle. Being high had one being pitched from front to rear, and side to side. There was a saying: You'll always be the first one to an accident in a cabover.

And another Ford peculiarity - if you look at the top pic, you can see the depressed handhold. That was actually kinda cool, but look for the bottom step. It's a thin strip held out by two curved pieces of steel. I'd usually bail out of the thing by swinging around, grabbing the grab bar with one hand and jump out into space, skipping the two inset steps, grabbing the bar with my other hand, and land on the bottom step with my right foot.

However.

Sometimes I'd miss that step and my foot would go inside into that big gap, and I'd bust my ass hard. That setup trapped my leg up to about my calf and I was just along for the ride.

And, the damn thing was too tall for a lot of elevator loadout doors back then as well. Most were originally designed to clear Grandpa's '39 Chevy, not semis. Finally the grain elevators started to knock out their doors to accommodate the stand up sleepers that started showing up on their doorstep to load, but I always had to barely scrape by. I replaced several horns, horn covers, and bent the turnouts on the stacks several times. There was no "air dump valve" available to lower the truck.

I had a real love/hate relationship with that truck. When the motor was fresh from the factory - boy did it ever run. But, typical two stroke Detroit, it went to hell tout suite. And Ford just needed to get out of the Class 8 truck business, which they eventually did. But it sure did look nice with it's blue and silver multi colored stripes, with a fresh coat of wax and the wheels and tanks all polished up. It was sharp, man.

If I had to drive that today, after running air ride cab conventionals with air ride suspensions for all these years, I'd tell you to go straight to hell.

Sigh......

Happy Birthday, man. Miss ya.

Twenty Years Ago Today

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Alan Kulwicki, reigning Winston (now Sprint) Cup Champion , lost his life in a plane crash along with key crew members and personnel involved with Hooter's - his primary sponsor. It was their plane.


Alan was a significant personage in NASCAR history because he bootstrapped his way to the top. His pit crews were often volunteers, and Alan's education as an engineer was key in setting up his cars. At one point, he had no sponsors. Hooter's sponsored car was unable to make the race in question, and asked to talk to Alan. A one race deal was struck, and at the Atlanta 500 he scored am eighth place finish. This led to a continuing relationship between Hooters and Alan.

The car was a Ford Thunderbird. Later, Alan campaigned NASCAR to allow him to change the nameplate from "Thunderbird" to "Underbird" to note his underdog status, and they allowed it.

He won his Championship in one of the closest races ever in the pre-Chase days.

The 1992 Hooters 500, the final race of the 1992 season, is considered one of the most eventful races in NASCAR history.^[47] It was the final race for Richard Petty and the first for Jeff Gordon.^[47] Six drivers were close enough in the points standings to win the championship that day.^[48] Allison led second-place Kulwicki by 30 points, Bill Elliott by 40, Harry Gant by 97, and Kyle Petty by 98 and needed to finish sixth or better to clinch the championship.^[49] Kulwicki received approval from NASCAR and Ford to change the "Thunderbird" lettering on his bumper for the race to "Underbird" because he felt like the underdog in the contention for the championship.^[50] During Kulwicki's first pit stop, the first gear in the car's transmission broke.^[20] Andrews said, "We had to leave pit road in fourth gear, because we had broken metal parts in there, and only by leaving it in fourth are you not going to move metal around as much. We could only hope that the loose piece of metal didn't get in there and break the gears in half. We had three or four pit stops after it broke. I held my breath all day long."^[20] Allison was racing in sixth place, closely behind Ernie Irvan, when Irvan's tire blew with 73 (of 328) laps left in the event.^[49] As a result, Allison ran into the side of Irvan's spinning car and his car was too damaged to continue.^[49] Kulwicki and Elliott were left to duel for the title.^[47] While leading late in the race, Andrews calculated the exact lap for his final pit stop so that Kulwicki would be guaranteed to lead the most laps and would gain five bonus points.^[46] Kulwicki made his final pit stop only after leading enough laps to guarantee the bonus points.^[20] To save time, the pit crew did a fuel-only pit stop. Not changing tires allowed them to be available to push the car to prevent it from stalling, since the car had to start moving in a higher gear.^[20] Because the team's fuel man hurried to add the gasoline during the quick stop, he did not add the desired amount into the tank.^[20] As a result, Kulwicki had to conserve fuel to ensure that his car was still running at the end of the race.^[20] Elliott won the race and Kulwicki stretched his fuel to finish second.^[47] Kulwicki won the 1992 Winston Cup Championship by maintaining his 10-point lead over Elliott.^[3] He celebrated the championship with his second Polish Victory Lap.^[51] Always conscious of his appearance for potential sponsors, Kulwicki combed his hair, making a national television audience wait for him to emerge from his car.^[52]

1992 NASCAR owner's championship trophy

Kulwicki had overcome the 278-point deficit in the final six races of the season by ending with a fifth, a fourth, and two second-place finishes.^[23] Kulwicki won the championship because of his consistent high finishes.^[43] It was the closest title win in NASCAR Cup Series history until the implementation of the Chase for the Cup format in 2004.^[48] The championship was noteworthy for other reasons: Kulwicki was the last owner/driver to win the title for nearly two decades,^[53] the first Cup champion with a college degree,^[24] and the first Cup champion born in a Northern state.^[24] The song that played during a short salute to Kulwicki at the year-end awards banquet was Frank Sinatra's "My Way".^[1] During the prep work for the banquet, Elvis' version of "My Way" was found, but Alan insisted on Frank Sinatra's version.

Alan was also noted for being pretty picky!

Another tradition he started was the Polish Victory Lap. After he won a race, he'd cruise around the track backwards, so he could see the crowd and wave, and they could see him. After his death, several of his peers honored him by doing the same when they won, including Dale Earnhardt and Rusty Wallace.

I was a Dale Earnhardt fan back then, through and through. I think I was rooting for Davey Allison to win the championship, but when he had to drop out, I just sat back and enjoyed the race, watching how Kulwicki and his crew chief  Paul Andrews work out the strategy that won them the points necessary to defeat Bill Elliot. Awesome Bill from Dawsonville had won a bunch already, so it seemed to me only fair that the Underbirds should have a shot.

The whole thing was pretty cool because no owner/driver had won the thing in many, many years. We all knew we'd seen history being made, and it was quite a shock when Alan and his mates were killed. What a loss......

And as a side note, Hooter's is still involved by sponsoring their own racing series. They just couldn't bring themselves to sponsor a car in NASCAR's higher echelon. They tried, but found no happiness. They were never to have a relationship like they had with Alan. He was truly one of a kind, and the world is a lesser place without him.

March Dadness

My father was a big time college basketball fan. The sun rose and set upon the Kansas Jayhawk Empire for him, but he was always up for watching a good game on television.

He really came into his own during March Madness when I had a 4DTV C and Ku Band satellite system. You know, the huge dish that had a motor to move it across the sky to receive different satellites. He always claimed not to know "how to run the damn thing" and usually made me switch satellites to find whatever it was he wanted to watch. The 4DTV had one of the first interactive program guides on it, and it worked quite well.

But when I was off at work, he had no choice but to learn, and he did. At the time, one could purchase a package that showed all the games, but the kicker was that you had to pay. Or you could surf the "wild feeds" for the games. Wild feeds were usually dedicated to syndicated programming - they'd broadcast the Jerry Springer Show at a certain time each day on a certain channel for local stations to receive and record for their own broadcasts. However, the major networks also used them for programming like March Madness, where just a couple channels for east and west weren't enough. When they had several games going on at once, they had to find a way to send out the signal for each game so the local affiliates could broadcast the game they wanted to show. However, at the time, they weren't scrambled - they were "in the clear" meaning all you needed was a standard receiver to watch.

But the networks weren't completely altruistic. You would think you had the game tuned in and all of a sudden, the picture would go snowy. They'd switched to another channel, usually on a different satellite. Of course all the affiliates had a schedule of the proper channels and the times to switch, but us consumers were purposely left in the dark.

After a couple days, Dad had 'em figured out. If I happened to be at home watching a game with him, all at once he might reach for the remote and tune to a different channel. Sure enough, there would be the game we were watching. He never even wrote any of this down, like I'd surely had to do.

He passed away before the networks finally locked it all down and scrambled all their feeds, period. I was highly impressed with his memory and his ability to learn a new to him technology so well in so short a time. He wanted to know, so he learned. Before, he had me to mess with it. When I wasn't around to do it for him, he figured it out.

I cannot help but wryly note that this is the same man who "forgot" all his promises with regards to my transportation - like fixing up the old pickup he had purchased for me, or the promise that he'd buy something a little better. Yep, forgot all about it, and should I remind him, I got yelled at and my name was mud for the rest of the day and perhaps a week. It was ok for him to spend thousands on his hobby - model airplanes, but that largess didn't expand to me or any other members of the family.

And we're closing in on the fifteen anniversary of his death in April of 1998. I most definitely miss him, and I loved him dearly. But Lawdy, was he ever a pain in the ass, and he wasn't even trying.

Road Trip I Don't Want To Make

Well, crap.

Sis is coming up from OKC and we're headed to southwest Michigan.

To my Uncle Bill's funeral.

Not sure when it is just yet, but we need to get going if we're gonna get there. He had been failing - was on dialysis for years, had bypass surgery years ago, and some strokes in the past few. He had really failed in the past few weeks.

It had been decided that his last dialysis was the day before yesterday and had been checked into a hospice. He had been lucid enough to communicate his wishes, apparently.

This whole ordeal has been pretty difficult for my aunt. It hasn't been easy on his three children, either.

He is the last of his family - his parents (my grandparents) and siblings (Dad and my Aunt Patsy) have all preceded him.

He was really a cool guy and I'm gonna miss him.

Kansas On My Mind

No, not the state - even though we're covered in snow. No, not the KU basketball team, even though I did see them win a squeaker last night over the OSU Cowboys in a double overtime. Nope, been thinking about the rock group.


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This is from their second album Masque. I'd say they had the rock ballad pretty well down by this point.

Early in the morning sunlight Soaring on the wings of dawn Here I'll live and die with my wings in the sky 

And I won't come down no more
 
Higher than a bird I'm flying Crimson skies of ice and fire 

Borne on wings of steel, I have so much to feel 

And I won't come down no more
 
Sail on, sail on I will rise each day to meet the dawn 

So high, so high I've climbed the mountains of the sky
 
Without my wings You know, I'd surely die 

I found my freedom flying high I've climbed the mountains of the sky

 Floating on a cloud of amber 

Searching for the rainbow's end Earth so far below me, I'm here alone 

Free, I can't come down no more

Y'all can keep yer rap. Don't need it none hyar.

Crummy Time of the Year

 

This particular stretch of time finds me in a funk every year. My mother passed away on January 30, 2001. Her birthday was on Valentine's Day - February 14th.

I miss my mama.

Take A Break

"Walky Talky Hawky" from Foghorn Leghorn Quotes on Vimeo.


And remember this is kind of entertainment is what warped us all irretrievably so many years ago - all that gratuitous violence and all. Not like the healthy purple dinosaur and his ilk.

Not.

Warner Brothers had the best cartoons, end of story. Even as a small child, I could see that the Hanna Barbera (Tom and Jerry) were far more cheaply done. And I never cared much for the Mouse stuff. The Warner characters were all subversive, warped and derned funny. And no one, no one ever can match Mel Blanc.

This boy doesn't pay attention.

Blast From The Past

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Ahhh, 1977. The year I graduated from high school. This video really took me back. I really don't recall Oakley Ralph wearing a cowboy hat much. Had his son as a classmate at St. Mary of the Plains College but never got to know him very well, because he didn't live on campus. I competed in a speech contest put on by the Optimist Club with Nancy Jo Trauer's daughter. As I recall, she won the thing - mostly because she gave a far better speech than I!

And at the Longbranch Saloon you can get a soda, but what you really really want is a sarsaparilla. Good for what ails ya. The sales barn hasn't changed much, compared to many of the other shots. The mall shown was nearly brand spankin' new back then, and that area has been built up considerably. The "new" Civic Center mentioned was actually built in 1954 - heh. Downtown looks a lot different as well - some streets have been closed off and parking put in, plus an old mill across the tracks from Front Street has been demolished and is now parking for the Dodge dealer. Most of the downtown streets are still brick, but the theater is kaput these days. Cattle are still fed from "feed trucks" just like the one dumping feed into the concrete bunk in the film.

Oh, and the video cuts to a Black History moment about Harvard's "new" Afro-American Studies at about the 5:15 mark. Interesting for sure, but I am puzzled why they were lumped together.

The Ol' Library

Was considerably depleted on June 26, as you can imagine. If you are a reader at all, you have probably participated in the "desert island" exercises where you pick the books you absolutely cannot live without should you be stranded on a desert island and have a choice.

Well, restocking a book collection is a similar process. I've spent some time mulling over what to buy first - that I want on hand at all times just in case I want to read it. Of course, my list is far larger than just these few, but I sure gave it some thought. So, I bought these:

The complete series of Horatio Hornblower books by C. S. Forester. I discovered Horatio as a freshman in high school because some outfit or another had a book sale where they brought the books to school, and if we liked what we read, we could buy it. I bought Ship of the Line, which in retrospect was a good starting point even though it was more or less in the middle. Hornblower was at his obsessive best with the huge responsibility of a ship of the line and all the endless attention that required, plus having to fret about Lady  Barbara Wellesley, whom he carried on board in the previous novel, and had fallen in love with her, plus his tangled feelings of shame because he was already married to the hapless Maria (whom he had married in a fit of feeling sorry for her, as earlier novels revealed). Plus, every decision he made was endlessly dissected in fits of self flagellation.

Well, for an angst filled teenager who felt much the same, this was quite a revelation - that he could feel this way and still be a success. It was a bit of an inspiration. I spent some years trying to accumulate the rest of the books in the pre-internet world of the seventies and eighties - and I think it wasn't until the nineties that I actually had all of them. Not matching editions at all, but By Gawd I had 'em. This set had to be purchased from three different places online, but they do match, and dammit all, I've got 'em all! Whee!

There are so many other books that I gotta have, but I think I can find them in used bookstores if I just look - things like Lonesome Dove and some of McMurtry's other works, some of James Clavell's stories of the Orient including Shogun, Tai-Pan and King Rat, for sure. Science fiction and fantasy classics have to be included - Ringworld, Ringworld Engineers, The Foundation Series (Asimov), and probably even The Lord of the Rings series. I used to have a big collection of Stephen King novels up to a point - I suppose I'll have to get The Stand, but he started pissing me off politically, I didn't think he was as good as he used to be, and he took too damned long on the Dark Tower series and I lost interest.

Sis got me hooked on the Kinsey Milhone alphabet novels by Sue Grafton, but Ms. Grafton has left poor Kinsey stranded in the eighties, and that was just a little while ago, you know. I kinda feel the same way about the Joe Leaphorn/Jim Chee novels by Tony Hillerman, which are fascinating looks into two members of the Navaho Tribal Police and all the cultural ramifications that involves. If I need to read them, I know just who happens to own all those books, and she happens to be willing to loan them to me!

Of course there are the Great Novels - Les Miserables, The Count of Monte Cristo, Steinbeck, Jack London (for sure The Sea Wolf!) and so many more that just slip my mind at the moment, but when I run across 'em, I'll be snagging immediately if not before (finances willing).

So, it's kinda fun to do this - I'm sure I'll end up with a bunch of rag tag dog eared paperbacks, but that suits me fine. I'm not much of a snob when it comes to what a book looks like, as long as it doesn't fall apart and I can read it, we're good to go!

Kind of a Reminder

Former Mayor Koch Is Hospitalized for Anemia

Edward I. Koch, the former three-term mayor of New York City, was hospitalized on Tuesday for anemia, said George Arzt, his former press secretary and longtime friend.

Mr. Koch, who is 87 and served as mayor for 12 years, starting in 1978, had been “extraordinarily weak” in recent weeks, Mr. Arzt said by phone.

“He used to eat like a horse, and now he just pushes the food around his plate,” Mr. Arzt said. He said he expected Mr. Koch to be released from the hospital within a few days.

snip

I hate to see these types of notices come up in the news. It's generally an indicator that the person in question is likely not long for this world. And I hate to hear this about Koch.

Believe it or not, I actually like the guy. Way back when, after he was no longer Mayor, he used to appear quite a bit on a USA network morning talk show that I have since long forgotten the name. I had just purchased a dish and Dad and I had more than the basic three channels. Fox and PBS had not started broadcasting out here yet.

At any rate, the show, which had a single female host, had Koch on all the time - it was based out of NYC - and even though Dad and I were dyed in the wool Democrats at the time, we found Ed Koch to be witty, funny, smart, charming and full of common sense. I'm sure there are plenty who will disagree, but I look back on those mornings spent with my father laughing or agreeing with something he said with a large fondness.

Ed Koch is one of the few politicians that I came to respect, and that happened after he was out of office. I surely hope his health improves, and we'll have him around a while longer.

Fourteen Years Ago Today

April 7, 1998. I was at Texas Motor Speedway for the (at that time) Winston Cup NASCAR race. I'd been there most of the week - one of my friends was/is the sports editor for a local paper. He got us in with press passes, and that year, I even got a garage pass. The press pass by itself got me into the infield, the pits, and the media center, where we were fed a catered lunch - especially during practice and qualifying days.

I was having the time of my life.

I was ostensibly there as an adviser. My friend had little NASCAR knowledge (at that time), so he truly wanted me there to help him ID people and find story leads. He found the story of Dave Marcus and the wingtip shoes he always wore, plus his gritty owner/driver status compelling. We pretty well spent the entire race hanging out in his pit stall. After the race was over, T had to post his wrap up, so we were there for a while after the race. Even so, it was quite a struggle to get back to his place, because the track was still pretty new and the roads hadn't been improved nor the local LEOs familiar with handling large amounts of traffic, unlike the situation is today. We got back pretty late.

T's babysitter cornered him when we got back, and wouldn't look at me. T delivered the bad news - I was to call my neighbor no matter the time.

She told me my father had been found immobile, and the ambulance was called. I interrupted with some inane comment like "He'll be alright, right????" but she continued - no, Jeff, I'm afraid he passed away. They thought he had slipped away in his sleep on the fifth. "My" farmer at the time, and my current farmer (the guys who lease the family ground) found him and reported it. Needless to say, they were also upset and greatly affected. They liked Dad, and it hit them hard.

I had a cell phone, but at that time, follow me roam was pretty high dollar. Sis had even had me paged at the track, but if you've ever been to a NASCAR race, you'd know how useless that is. The only time one can hear the announcer is during a yellow flag, when the cars are in the pits idling or idling around the track. When they're all out on the track floored, you can barely scream at your neighbor and be heard.

I did not get much if any sleep that night. I got up fairly early, showered and headed for home. My original plans were to stop in OKC to see my Sis, but I was going to be seeing her back home, so I drove straight through to the funeral home.

My cousin, a nurse, was the only close relative the funeral home could find on short notice, and she decided to forgo an autopsy. Heart failure was the likely culprit.

Dad had told me many different times that he wanted to be buried in blue jeans and a blue chambray work shirt - his favorite set of clothes. After perusing his selection, Sis and I chose a fairly new and comfortable looking pair of blue jeans, his usual white socks, a pair of his favorite dress boots, and since we didn't like the looks of his current selection of work shirts, purchased a new long sleeved one for him. The only ones who got to see him were the morticians - they recommended a sealed closed casket, and our memories of him would be better served if we didn't see him the way he was.

After several more late nights and early mornings, not enough sleep and too much stress, we got Dad buried. That afternoon, I bid everyone adieu for a short time - I was worn to a frazzle and took a short nap. Everyone understood and left me alone. To this day, I recommend to anyone going through burying someone close to remember to take care of themselves, too - they are gonna need some time alone, if just to take a nap.

I had a mercurial relationship with my father, but that does not mean I don't miss him, and my mother as well. I still hear him in my head in certain situations, when he tells me what he'd tell me were he there, if that makes any sense. His litany of opinionated phrases is forever etched into my memory, and requires barely any trigger at all to be activated.

My Dad's Hot Rod

I do not have a picture of my father's farm truck - a 1948 or 9 Ford F-6. Imagine this truck painted white, equally dented and neglected and showing some rust. The bed and sides were wood as well, and were gradually deteriorating in the Kansas sun. Dad's baby sported black wheels, with a black bumper to match.

Driving the ol' girl was quite an adventure - it had a non synchromesh transmission and a two speed rear axle. The push/pull switch for the two speed was in the dash rather than on the shifter like newer trucks. The brakes were the disappear in the floor variety, like a VW. It was new enough not to have a floor starter, but it did have a separate starter button on the dash. Twist the key, pull the choke, and push on the button to start.

The brakes were vacuum boosted - you could hear the gurgling, whooshing sound of the booster when applying the brakes - but you didn't want to use them for very long or they'd disappear like a gaseous eruption in a breeze. Windshield wipers were vacuum assisted - but Dad wasn't much on replacing the blades. If the sky dropped some moisture, the wipers were generally a waste of time. You could stop 'em by stepping on the gas, and let them wipe by backing off.

The transmission had to be double clutched to shift it - otherwise you'd just grind gears and I guarantee ya you wouldn't have the strength to force it in. It was a pretty stout tranny with straight cut gears - it would whine it's way through every gear. Newer trucks (and cars) eventually went to helical cut gears to minimize the noise, but that was just part of the ol' schweetheart's charm. Meanwhile, this old relic would just keep on whining and not break down.

Power steering was provided by The Armstrong Company. One did not even try to change course unless there was forward or reverse progress, particularly if it was loaded. Turns were negotiated with careful planning as to how one could avoid moving the steering wheel unnecessarily. Peaked gravel roads made 'er a little squirrely when it was loaded, so ya had to be careful there. The tires dated from the fifties mostly, very weather checked. The thought that one might just pop off kinda was a self governor as far as driving fast went.

The interior was spartan, to say the least. It was a pretty narrow cab, so the dark gray vinyl bench seat would hold two kids and the adult driver, three adults would be an uncomfortable squeeze. The floor consisted of one big fitted black rubber mat. Brake and clutch pedal pads looked like rubber representations of the Target logo. The dash had a big plastic (it was white, so I doubt it was bakelite) ventlike grill in the center of the dash, shrinking with old age. The gauges were minimal - the example above is a customized truck, but Dad's had the same layout. Just not a chrome turn signal switch - heh. That is the correct steering wheel, too, but ours was a bit more worn and cracked. There was no radio. The knob on the dash above the instrument panel ran the wipers.

But, all those amenities were not what made Dad's truck a charmer. When I came upon the scene, it was on it's second engine. The first was an inline flathead six. It had a flathead V8 for engine number two. It shelled out, and the local garage recommended a Chevy 327 V8 smallblock, so that was shoehorned into the engine bay.

Now, this was just an average truck engine of the day - two barrel carb with an oil bath air filter. It was, I'm sure, just a two bolt main block. However, in that truck, it was a performer. I was under the penalty of certain death were I to hot-rod or abuse that truck in any way, and that included driving fast. Mostly because of the tire situation, but still. That truck was a big time sleeper most of it's life with that particular motor. Using only part of it's performance would still hustle that ol' warrior up to about forty five mph in a hurry, which was about as fast as you would want to drive any of it's compadres of the day. It hid it's light under a bushel basket, so to speak, except when we took it to town.

There is a hill on the north side of Cimarron - not much of a hill, when compared to mountains or even in other towns in the Midwest. But, even the minuscule drop off was too much for many of the elderly grain trucks back in the day. The driver might come into town a little "hot," heat up the brakes to the failure point, and just keep rolling through town, through the stoplight (all those years and runaway trucks and there were no t-bone collisions), across the rather high tracks (hoping the aged springs didn't give away or some ancient suspension part didn't fail), and roll on down towards the river bridge until they'd coast to a stop. So, when behind the wheel, one approached that hill with extreme caution.

Which meant the truck had to be in a lower gear, and to stay in that lower gear, no matter how slow it seemed. The lack of synchros meant you did not dare shift it without error, so it was just a better idea to stay in second gear, maybe playing with the two speed axle. In this baybee, that meant the exhaust popped, cracked and rumbled like any Chevy small block would - man, it sounded good. Just hearing it for the first time would astound people who knew what it did sound like, but weren't expecting to hear it from a Ford farm truck! Frankly, I enjoyed driving the old girl.

One time, I was riding with Dad from a trip to town to unload some wheat during harvest. We were ambling along on a wide gravel road headed back to the field, when a shiny new custom harvester's tandem went blowing by us, with the young driver tooting his air horn in derision at the no doubt lower life form Dad was driving. Eat his dust. Well, this inspired the Ol' Man to show off a little. He stomped on the gas and she took off after the cocky driver. He saw us coming, and I'd bet the Mega Millions his foot was to the floor. As we went by, I waved at him and smiled. His eyes were like saucers. Unbeliever is what he was. Dad backed 'er down - always worried about the tires but unwilling to bear the cost of replacing them, and the kid kept behind us.

Quite the machine, it was.

Happy Birthday, Betty White!!!

link

Normally, I just don't watch much network television, but for a few select programs. Tonite, while waiting on a basketball game to come on, I decided to watch Betty White's 90th Birthday: A Tribute to America's Golden Girl on NBC.

Totally worth it, even if Teh Won was on. Luckily, I was out in the kitchen stirring supper when he came on. I'm sure he totally owes his sense of humor to Betty White and wanted just to congratulate her on her successes, and the fact that it's an election year had nothing to do with the free shot at some tube time.

So far, I've seen a whole litany of Betty's former costars and television legends - Carol Burnett and Mary Tyler Moore (both looking pretty good, frankly), Vicki Lawrence, Ed Asner, Gavin McLeod, Carl Reiner, Jay Leno, William Shatner and Chevy Chase. There were also a bunch of more contemporary stars such as Amy Poehler, Tina Fey, Morgan Freeman, Hugh Jackman, Ellen DeGeneres, and Ray Romano among others.

It's hard for me to envision a world without Betty. She's been on the boob tube since I can remember in one form or another. She was nominated for the first ever Emmy for Best Actress in television (she didn't win, dammit). She was a master at live comedic television - her timing is always impeccable. Her ad libbing is also seamless. You have to admire a woman who was worked for so long successfully in the essentially heartless and cruel entertainment industry. We hear all the time about how Madonna has reinvented herself. She can't even begin to hold a candle to Betty. Plus - take a good look at her in the clip above with Johnny Carson. That video dates to 1979 - when she was fifty seven years old!!!  The first part of that clip was played on the show, and luckily I found it!

Truly, I do not particularly want to see Madonna at fifty seven. Just sayin.'

I mostly remember her from the Mary Tyler Moore Show days, and then her appearances on Carson and on the Carol Burnett Show. On MTM, she played against type - instead of America's Game Show Sweetheart (another thing we all saw her appear in), she became the perpetually horny Sue Ann Nivens. After her turn in Mama's Family, she went on to perhaps her biggest television role in The Golden Girls.

And she's still busy! Hot in Cleveland, countless guest appearances (lots of appearances on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson), numerous film roles (Bringing Down the House with Queen Latifah and Steve Martin), a Snicker's ad with Abe Vigoda first aired on the Super Bowl in 2010 (rated the number one ad), and perhaps most notable, as host of Saturday Night Live after a grassroots campaign on Facebook requesting just that succeeded. She had the highest ratings for the show since 2008, and she quipped:

(she) "didn’t know what Facebook was, and now that I do know what it is, I have to say, it sounds like a huge waste of time."

Of course she was playing it as a bit of a ditz, which she's done for years.

I used to think the variety shows weren't cool, or were corny. Back then, they seemed pretty tame compared to SNL in it's early life, and the comedy records of Cheech and Chong and George Carlin outlined what seemed to be funny to me. However, as time has gone by, I can really appreciate the ol' hoofers' pioneering work, and how much skill was involved - and how much the survivors can still kick it up when they wanna.

I tell ya, these people are national treasures, and the ones who aren't gone ain't gonna be around much longer. Enjoy while you can.

Bittersweet Memories

Pretty sure I've covered this meme (First set of wheels) before, but I'm lazy and ain't gonna look it up in the archives. That is my only digital picture - robbed it off an old Tripod site I uploaded it to years ago, and the original picture has apparently been lost in their many upgrades and the many hard drives I've had go bad over the years. So that pic is it.

That is a 1965 Ford F-100 SWB with a three on the tree and a 240 cubic inch six banger. A fifty cent piece would choke the huge carb right down. Dad bought it for me with the promise that we'd really work it over - we were gonna get 'er painted and drop a V8 with an automatic to make it go. Well, with many of my father's promises, that never worked out. When it came time to cough up, he always had an excuse. He paid for the truck, the insurance and tags, and the gas. The flip side was I had to stay with him for a summer job - one that didn't pay very well or get me many hours. My friends were making three to four times as much as I during summers, and could afford to buy halfway decent cars. He just couldn't understand why I wanted to move on to something else years later - I guess I should still be driving it according to his thinking at the time. Oh well. It served me pretty well for what it was.

What it was - indestructible. The valves would float before it revved out, so it could be floored and it had it's own natural redline - it just wouldn't run any faster, and it wasn't fast enough to grenade. I could get it to lay a scratch, but I had to wind it up and dump the clutch. Can you say axle tramp? I could make the bed bounce in pain. Wham wham wham wham! I'm sure the quarter mile times were well over twenty seconds. One of my buds had a '66 with the 300 and a four speed - he could always get me out of the hole, and I'd ever so gradually ease by after the quarter mile line had gone by as we lumbered over it. I always got beat, but it was close. These races were always quite amusing to our friends with serious quarter mile cars. They'd sit in the ditches watching us rolling with laughter.

The sheet metal was thick. When it was loaded down with mud, I could kick the body panels to dislodge huge chunks without denting the beast. The paint was a lost cause, so another scuff? Which one? I did my best to customize my pride and joy - I bought some white high back bucket seats from a Charger in a junkyard to replace the bench seat, those white wagon wheels in the picture (Dad bought some chrome ones originally, but they rusted out even though I kept them polished and waxed), an AM/FM 8 track from JC Whitney, a floor shifter from Hurst and other little odds and ends. That fade out red paint? It looked really good for about a week if I slathered on some wax and didn't really work on buffing it out, spray a ton of Armor All all over, then wax it again a couple times. The Armor All worked it's way into the paint and made it look pretty shiny (even slicked over scuffs!), but it didn't last. But I tried, anyways.

All this lack of power surely meant it made decent fuel mileage, right? Not so much. It didn't matter how fast or slow I drove - eleven to twelve mpg. Since it was a six banger, it was geared pretty low, and seventy mph was really pushing it hard. Fifty five was more to it's liking. Didn't matter. It drank fuel like it was cheap and was always gonna stay that way.

Those bucket seats were the spark behind one of the worst arguments between my parents I ever witnessed. I bought the things with the idea that Dad would help me install them - they needed some brackets fabricated to fit and I did not know how to weld at that time. Dad kept putting me off, and the seats sat outside in the weather for a couple of months. My mother finally got tired of seeing them sitting in the yard and how disappointed and hurt I was - because I'd ask for help every once in a while and fail. Generally, a nap during a baseball game on television was a priority over helping me. She jumped into Dad big time and ate his ass out about leaving me in the lurch, how the seats were going to rot, and any other thing she could throw out. At first, he was arguing back, but she eventually proved her point, because he grabbed me, and in tears, went to town to buy some angle iron. I got to hear all about how he was just about to get to this project, etc., what a bitch my mother could be and so on. I'd heard all that before, and I'd just seen her behavior get more action than anything I could safely pull off, so my sympathy meter was running pretty low that day for the Old Man.

Like I said - this truck has bittersweet memories for me.

Another time, he sent me out to get estimates for a repaint. He wanted the best - back then one hammered out the panels carefully and used lead rather than today's plastics for filler. Yesterday's plastics had a tendency to fall off after a period of time. The tech was new and needed work. He even directed me to go to another town to a highly regarded shop. After I got home with the estimates, he about had a cow and told me that we weren't going to paint this pickup - no matter what we did or how much money we spent, it was always going to be a six hundred dollar pickup - that being the original purchase price. I look back on that now and wonder WTF was he thinking? Why send me on a wild goose chase building up my hopes? I got home all excited and pumped. Which changed in a hurry.

I started hearing a clunk when going around a corner, so I told Dad about it - I had no clue where or what to even begin looking for. He correctly determined that the rear bearing in the transmission was going out, but he kept putting off fixing it. It kept getting worse, and I guess he got tired of hearing me, worried, telling him about it, so we made an appointment in town to get it fixed. He was following me when all of a sudden, the driveline locked up. Luckily, I was on gravel. I fought for control, and gaining it, even managed to slide off to the side of the road out of the way, until it could be towed into town. The bearing had broken apart and locked the gears in the transmission. Dad said he was pretty proud of me for the good job of driving I did, and that lasted until one of the shop owners said it was a good thing that it happened on gravel. On pavement, it might have broken a u-joint, and if it was the front one and the driveshaft drove into the ground sending the pickup into a roll, Dad might have been burying me instead of bragging on my good driving. He should have gotten that truck in there long before he did.

Dad wasn't always an asshole - I've written about another incident where he rose above the situation. Plus, the ol' Ford had an oil consumption issue when he bought it, so he knew it was going to need overhauled. During a slow period one summer, we took it over to our neighbors and tore it down. The cylinder walls were really in pretty decent shape - we just honed 'em out and took a ridge reamer to the tops. The pistons were coated with carbon - it was my job to carefully chisel that crap off. The rest of the motor was full of crud, so we washed it all out. Detergents in engine oils have improved off the charts - back then, it was not unusual to find sludge all over and even plug up oil galleys when the motor was operated in a dusty environment.

The cylinder head got hauled to town to get rebuilt - the valves, guides and such were all pretty well shot and we just didn't have the tools to fix that. We went back with cast iron rings - figuring they'd seal up on the still slightly grooved cylinder walls. Dad figured we'd be back in to bore it out within about 10k miles, but those rings sealed up tight and I put on way more miles than that before we sold it. So that was one father/son project promise that was fulfilled, and that I enjoyed.

That old pickup did provide me with a freedom that I appreciate to this day. It was far from what I would liked to have, but it worked most of the time. It was more than a lot of kids had, too. It got me home from after school activities like football practice, took me to school events, got me to and from our various fields, took me hunting, cruising around aimlessly listening to the latest eight track, and so much more. Some girls turned up their noses at riding in it, but that was a sure fire clue that particular girl was not for me - even if I'd had a beautiful car good enough for them. I learned a lot of life lessons with that pickup - some were not positive, but they were valuable.

Happy Mother's Day!

To all the Mothers out there - have a great day! Even though mine is gone, I still remember her. Happy Mother's Day, Mama, and some day we'll meet again.