Since I cannot speak for you, I can only speak for myself.

Whether it is true that I only write when I find myself having something substantive to say is debatable.  Often I indulge in a little dribbling for no apparent reason. 

We write because we feel a certain need to express our feelings, the good, and the not so good.  We reach out and attempt to communicate with someone who, we think, has a modicum of understanding and appreciation of our predicaments, and who can read or listen, without judgment or condemnation.  There is no one holding a gun to our heads to force us to write.  We write because we want to, not because we have to.  The motivation to do so is internal, rather than influenced by outside forces.  The act of writing, communicating, and sharing fills a certain need which each of us has that seeks satisfaction.

Categorically speaking, since it is always dangerous to make general, sweeping statement, there is this possibility that men are genetically not wired to air their innermost thoughts and fears so readily, nor openly, as women.  It has also been postulated that some men are not capable of genuine emotions or true affections, as they had been emotionally crippled by past events and relationships in their lives.  There are of course exceptions to almost every rule.  Surely there are men who are rather emotional.  They simply have trouble showing their emotions though, either as a matter of habit, or for fear of ridicule and rejection.  The male ego is both strong and fragile at the same time.  It can be easily bruised, if not shattered altogether.  Most women are aware of this particular shortcoming, among many other shortcomings, shared by most men.  Women have learned to live with it, manage it, and sometimes even manipulate it.

So, for all you astute female, and stronger, of the species out there, let us hear your assessment to the contrary. 

In memory of those loved ones who are no longer 
with us:

Splendour in the grass

What though the radiance
which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass,
of glory in the flower,
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering;
In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.

 	-- William Wordsworth

The grass may wither, but the roots die not
and when Spring comes it renews its full life;
Only grief, so long as its roots remain,
Even without Spring, is of itself reborn.

    & nbsp;   &n bsp;   &nb sp;   &nbs p;     ;  - Ch'en Shan-Min, Sung Dynasty

Last week, the slow boo from the Netherlands received a green card in the mail.  It was from the Tampa Improv, congratulating him of the fact that he was a winner in their comedy lottery drawing, that he was thereby invited to join up with seven of his closest friends, making it a party of eight, for any of the evening performances scheduled for this week, at the unheard of admission price of one buck apiece.  What a deal!

Since all his known inmates were already laughing their heads off at the farm, gratis, de Boo decided that SofP should be in charge of this gala event, inviting six of her most enchanting companions to join us for the festivities.  Unfortunately, yesterday, on the night of our of selected evening performance, one of the tall girls who worshipped Buddha was already having a party for the few pearl whites she wanted to keep, but forgot to floss, while simultaneously getting ready to put her newly found yet clingy beau on ice, whereas her marching companion, the other tall girl, was too busy slinging pizzas to the vibrant variations of Macarena.  So we winded up with the Captain and his wife for a friendly gathering.

All things considered, we had a jolly good time.  The MC did his intro monologue bit with as much fanfare and excitement as I would when I was stoned, and in my sleep.  The next two warm up acts were progressively livelier, as they should be, leading onto the evening’s headliner, whose claim to fame was so pronounced that I had already forgotten where he had misplaced it.  He was neither Richard Lewis, coming the second week of June, nor Tony Rock, brother of Chris, who had already left his calling cards a few weeks before.  That much I did remember, thanks to my Alzheimer’s Lite.

Of the comedy in three acts, personally I liked the second act better because of the man was really liberal picking on himself, instead of picking on others in drive-by shootings who could not possibly defend themselves.  At one point, he did find it humorous to inquire a member or two in the audience as to which trail parks they came from.  Presumably he must have an inside track, or else he carried a substantial amount of life insurance.  When he was the designated driver and got stopped by the po-lice, the good news was he had only one beer.  But the bad news was the beer was in his hand, and he offered it to the officer, “Hey, this bud’s for you, Dick!”  I believe he called himself John.  He named his first-born son, Andy, after his father.  He also believed that men are genetically predisposed to masticate, since the ones with the short hands all died off.

The headliner was an act of a different color.  These days, it seems that the more outrageous you are as standup, the funnier you are perceived as a comedian.  This particular talent was no different.  He had plenty of material on sex and violence, all graphically portrayed, catering to our lowest denominator, oozing with mass appeal, and bespoke the sophistication of our predominantly younger crowd. 

Fortunately, he was somewhat judicious in his choice of vintaged Angelo-Saxon words, the abuse of which has long deflated the currency of our language.  I am not sure about you, but I could do without the disarrays of words as long as ten and twelve letters, punctuating every other sentences.  Now there is a four-letter word, which, when the occasion arises, with so many variants of meaning, from the question mark to the exclamation point, nothing like it can suffice.  I remembered once SP was so tickled that I reported the joker who stole my rental property for a song told the city code enforcement officer to go make love to himself.  Now, there was no ambiguity in the meaning.  Needless to say, our powerful bureau-crat closed down his firetrap immediately.

In all fairness, in his perpetual piss-off mode, our headliner was quite hysterical.  He had people in his audience so eating his dropping off of his hands, that we left a substantial portion of our collective derrière sticking to the floor which had to be scraped off after the show.  (O, Gawd, I can speak plainer than that.  No wonder, I was once smacked by God as le Windbag!)  Of his many hilarious homilies, his closing remarks would serve as the lowlight of his hour of grandeur.  Our man voted for his Bushes twice, he said.  But after the second go-around, he was appalled as to his own choice of a political candidate.  Bush was standing in front on the television, with Colin on his right, and Dick on his left.  He looked over to his right, Colin, and his left, Dick.  Colin, Dick.  Colin, Dick.  And then there, in the middle, was himself, Bush.  Hey, if I have to explain it to you, you probably didn’t get it neither.

Should you be in the greater Tampa Bay area next time, be sure to hook up with the illustrious SofP.  She is destined to be our next comedy lottery winner.  If you are really persuasive, you may even twist her arms to be your tour guide, to that infamous hot sport called the Improv, located right across the wrong side of the track from Urban Outfitters, in hysterical Ybor City, land of the honey, home of the rave, and the jack-downed, wheels a-spinning, pimp-a-ride, honking automobiles.

So it came to pass, many moons ago, one of my spiritual mentors, we will call him Brian, told me on tape that Tolstoy once wrote a short story.  To a group of youngsters on a scavenger hunt in his mystical garden looking for the secret of happiness, he said that whatever they did, they must not think of that white rabbit, for surely then the secret of happiness would elude them.

For my very own white rabbit, Brian asks me to select from the following:

Are you too young, or are you too old? 

Are you too tall, or are you too short? 

Are you too heavy, or are you not heavy enough? 

Are you too drop-dead gawdjous?  Or are you not drop-dead gawdjous enough? 

Are you too loaded with inheritance, and burdened by pedigree?  Or are you poor as a church mouse, with nary a pot to piss in? 

Do you come from a dysfunctional family?  Or do you lament your family only functions on special occasions? 

Can you read, but don’t?  Can you smile, but like to keep looking gump? 

Surely you know, he says, that those who don’t read are no better than those who cannot read.  And those who don’t smile are the same as those who cannot smile? 

What is keeping you from climbing up the ladder, and going where you want to go?  Is it you, or the ladder?  Or have you just gotten out of bed, this early in the afternoon?

Since I like to pretend I am far from the Mongolian idiots from where I sprang, I answer Brian’s questions. 

I am too old, or getting that way.  George Burns was younger than me by many years. 

I am too short.  The NBA will never draft me. 

I am not heavy enough.  When the wind blows, I think I will be in serious trouble. 

I am not gawdjous enough.  Standing next to the Hunchback de Notre Dame, I may be considered tall, dark, and handsome. 

I am almost poorer than my church mouse, as I would soon be outfitted so I don’t have to piss at all. 

I don’t even have a family any more, functional or dysfunctional.  I am out on a limb, as well as on the lam. 

I can hardly read anymore.  “They” told me if I didn’t stop, surely I would go blind.  I think it is too late for that now. 

I would like to smile more, but then there are small children around, and my makeup would crack.  Besides, have you checked the price of pancake makeup lately? 

The ladder in front of me I know is leaning against the wrong wall, and I like driving around in Chicago, looking for my destination, with a map of Boston in my grubby little hands.

I just finished reading a book about my very distant cousin’s mother, who could very well have been my mother.  In addition to her mother, she also described quite a bit about her relatives, her grandparents, and some of her ancestors from way back.  In other words, she was writing about my ancestors.  It was a scary book, because most of what she wrote I could identify with, relate to, or even remember.  It is not always a good thing to read about my ancestors.

My ancestors were a scary lot.  Most of them had never ventured beyond the boundaries of their villages, and if they did, they trotted over on foot to the next village.  Some of the desperate ones, because of starvation, famine, diseases, and the collateral damage of wars, had made their way to the cities.  A few of them even set foot into the next province, and eventually made their way overseas. 

My ancestors did not disembark from anything resembling the Mayflower.  Some of them arrived at these shores, dazed and starving, packed and stacked in hulls reminiscent of slave ships, crossing the Pacific instead of the Atlantic from Africa.  Some smuggled themselves, after paying exorbitant sums as stowaways to Cuba, San Francisco, and New York harbors, whereupon they jumped ship and became illegal aliens.  Many were sold by their village elders as indentured laborers to work in the sugarcane fields of Hawaii or blast through the Rockies for the coming of the railroads in the Wild, Wild West.  It was our version of the Diaspora, punctuated by an occasional lynching, for the sure sport, but in general, we were fortunate enough to being simply tarred and feathered, or run out of town on a rail.  We did not have to endure through that infamy that would be forever remembered as KrystalNacht in Nazi Germany, and all the subsequent horrors, of man’s inhumanity to man.

My ancestors were a superstitious lot.  They did not throw salt over their shoulders because some of them did not have enough money to buy salt.  They did not fear walking under a ladder because many of them had never seen a ladder.  They did not disdain from eating a black cat when it was the only animal available.  They carried their traditions like mountains of dead weight, and they were indoctrinated to pass on their biases and bigotry from generations to generations.  They believed that daughters should be drowned or sold as slaves, that their women folk looked best when their feet were bound to deformity, a practice so vile that can only be compared with the cutting away of the clitoris in some African countries.  They believed the world was flat, and their considerable land mass was the very center of the known Universe.  Anyone and everyone outside their Central Kingdom were looked down upon as barbarians.  They were after all the direct descendants of the Yellow Emperor, who mended the heaven and the earth, invented agriculture, the domestication of animals, and the art of silk worming.  To the rest of the world, however, they were known as the Yellow Hordes, or simply yellow.

My ancestors were also a stagnant lot.  They invented gunpowder, but not guns.  They invented writing, but produced no writers known outside their world.  They also invented pasta, but forgot the marijuana sauce.  To my ancestors, there were only nine tombs ever written by mortal men.  They were the Four Books, and the Five Chings, all compiled before the advent of Christianity.  These esoterica are still revered and studied today.  Among my ancestors, there were only a handful of original writers, who had long since become the butt all jokes at cocktail parties, spouting -isms along with the mumbo-jumbo of non-being and non-doing.  Half of my ancestors sounded like Mongolian idiots, while the other half were Mongolian idiots. 

My ancestors were a blood thirsty lot as well.  They perfected the etiquettes of government and family, but ebbed and flowed in gleeful slaughter in grand scale, from one violent rebellion to the next, every couple of hundred years, when the Mandate of Heaven was usurped from one decadent despot by another enlightened peasant, in that seismic cycle known as the Dynasties.  Until the forced opening of its doors by gunboat diplomacy from the West, none of my ancestors had ever heard of Jesus, so they could not be saved.  They were, by default, destined to be burned in eternal hellfire, forever.  They were a God-less people, but they saw gods and ghosts everywhere.

I can write disrespectfully about my ancestors because they are all dead now.

So, given the accident of my birth, may I be forgiven for being held captive in my asylum?  What, then, is your crutch?  And where, pray tell, is your favorite White Rabbit? 

Last night, after my command performance at the funny farm, I stayed up till two in the morning, watching Sling Blade, recommended to me personally by the comments on the DVD jacket that hails it as one of the year’s ten best. 

It was a very slooooooooooow movie, probably from a very slooooooooow year, and my list is likely very different than yours.  I am not suggesting that you should watch this movie unless you are working in an asylum like mine, that you are born either slightly or totally retarded like me, or the padding in your cell is thicker than mine.  When one has the balls to insist on flaunting Billy Bob as one’s moniker, in the fantasyland that is Holy-wood, one must be a twin brother of Smuckers, because one’s got to be gooooooooood.  At the end of the two hour long flick, was I ever so elated that there was no one in close proximity that I needed to, or wanted to, whack over with a sharpened lawn mower blade!

One of my fans, and you know who you are, an outstanding scholar in Biblical studies no doubt, beamed to me not one, but two hyperlinks, for me to feast my eyes on, forthwith I presume, at the twitching hour.  One link deals with an esoteric term, known as nephilim, not found in my spellchecker mind you, while the other is, which I made the mistake of mentioning previously, The Book of Job, where I may peruse online all 42 chapters in their entirety without having to resort to my King James version that I usually do not take to bed with me.  She also called me a wind bag, which lead me to lose a considerable amount of shuteye.  How can I possibly merit such a term of endearment, I wonder!  Brevity is the soul of wit, as well as of bikini, and it happens to be part of my middle name.

Frankly, I already have more books than money, sitting on my shelves and closets throughout me humble hut, and a third of them I haven’t even cracked yet.  So I think I may defer that pleasure of perusing those hyperlinks until it is raining felines and canines again.  Besides, with my deteriorating eyesight, I can hardly read anymore; I just look at the pictures, and The Book of Job isn’t quite illustrated like, say, Playboy.  These days, my mental supplements consist mainly of a variety of cassette tapes, while I am touring about in my antique chariot, acquired over a period of years, my tapes not my chariot, which I recycle from time to time.  Yes, if you insist, I also have more tapes than money.  What a surprise, hah?  Most of my programming has therefore been self-inflicted, imported from Nightingale-Conant, mainly as it is.  Now and then, at the most importune and embarrassing moments, my programming, like many a purloined thought, leaks out like used battery acid, so Achtung Baby to you all.

So what does one do having just fallen out of bed, after an unsuccessful wrestling match with Morpheus masquerading as a pillow?  One must jot down said rambling thoughts before they evaporate back into the ether from whence they came.  Having done so, now may I return to being one of the gentlest of character, combined with a great simplicity of mind (just so there be honor among thieves, I stole that too!), and may I be the kind of person who would try to grow tomatoes, bell peppers, scallions, and yellow squash, starting from seeds, instead of tripping over my face at my neighborhood veggie stands?

Ah yes, good morning to you too!

The redoubtable Madam April, alias Godsmack, our numero uno blogger of veritable celebrity status on this here land had left me a comment that I should put in my two cents, on the debate she's currently having with her neighbor as to whether or not “celestial” beings, in the form of “Angels”, did come down from Heaven there be, and took advantage of our luscious women in antiquity in all their voluptuous forms?  The debate, if I perceived correctly, arose from certain Biblical references some of us have been getting so attached to.

Well now, we must not take the name of the Bible in vain, must we?  But which version of the Bible are we referring to?  Most of us illiterates know, in a manner of stretching the imagination, only of the King James Version, because we are not so well versed in Greek, Hebrew, or Aramaic.  Given that the Bible was compiled or inspired by Our Divine Creator at a time when few people knew how to read, it was deliberately couched in poetic and allegoric forms.  Parts of the Bible were so well translated that you can stay up all night long and never come up with anything more uplifting.  The Book of Job, for instance, is among my favorites. 

There have been references, not only in the "Scriptures", but in other ancient texts as well, and in such modern day speculative thesis as "The Chariot of the Gods" that the Sons of Heaven were so enamored by the fair Maidens of Man that they took them as mates to propagate their race, which eventually became our race.  Was Homo sapiens really descended from our simian cousins according to evolution, or were we, our remote ancestors many many times removed, the unique results of a "celestial" union between heavenly creatures and mortal women?  Only Carnick the Magnificent could tell, but unfortunately, The Lord had already called upon him to return Home. 

If I research my faulty memory, which is defective at best, we have yet to come up with the "Missing Link" whereupon primates developed speech recognition, and eventually became human.  No one can provide a qualified answer because there can be no answer. 

Given enough time, we can chew this fat all year long until it becomes jerky, and no one can arrive at a conclusion that can be substantiated to the point of irrefutable.  It is along the same line of reasoning and argument of the chicken or the egg.  Or the metaphysical equivalent of why did the chicken cross the road?  Who knows?  But more importantly, will such an answer provide any more substance to living and enduring our fleeting existence, a mere eighty years, give or take, in terms of billions of years in the river of time?

So, if you must know, my final answer is, “I don’t know”, preferably to be followed by “I don’t care”.  But then I will be branded as not being able to distinguish between ignorance and apathy, won’t I?

On that sweet note, I think I will put my head down now until my indigestion goes away.

In her continuous attempts to educate Heni, to keep him more hip and less square, as to what’s going on in the world, SP suggested that they should take a leisurely Sunday afternoon drive to that enchanting spot that is Downtown Dunedin, a stone throw north from the famed metropolis, euphemistically known as Clearwater, along the Florida Suncoast.

With unsurpassed piloting skills, SP steered her deluxe cruiser up the highroad, whistling all the way, and soon we arrived at Dunedin, reminiscent of a sparsely populated St. Augustine, in less than three shakes of the lam’s tail.  As if by magic, we were transported to a parking space, reserved in her name, off the Main Street, in front a bungalow type of establishment, painted in red, with cream trim, amidst a garden of flowers and shrubbery, in a rainbow of complimentary colors, oozing with curb appeal.  Before we got to the front house however, our senses were immediately drawn what might be beyond our line of sight, as we walked past the little front gate, and trekked along a curvy path, towards the back house.

Now this back building you may visualize as an all-in-one-room structure, popular at the turn of the century.  It had long since been transformed by some entrepreneurial spirit into a gift shop, filled from walls to ceiling with veritable brick-a-brags which feasted zee orbs.  Immediately, feeling very much in her element, SP was soon chatting up a storm with the lady proprietor, about their various eclectic tastes, and esoteric finds.  As a result, she did make out like a bandit, with a “shabby chic” planter made of wrought iron, with the lime paint peeling off a bit, which had survived from a previous age, or from a recent episode of Extreme Makeover from the Home Show.  And you don’t want to know how convenient her debit card is.

While SP was so preoccupied, Heni was fascinated by the little “victory garden” planted in that tiny plot of land between the front and the back houses.  There was a colorful assortment of flowers, veggies, ferns, including a clump of sunflowers of considerable height.  The enchantment, Heni was subsequently told, was to linger about in this little garden, during the evening twilight, with a glass of wine in one hand, and a watering can in the other, sipping along slowly, to the strains of Vivaldi, drifting from only a few steps away.  Presumably, Heni did have a momentary fantasy of planting such a garden in his own backyard, so he might snip a few peppers and vine ripe tomatoes to be tossed into his salads, but Heni would also imagine that he would soon lie down, until his fever went away.

The front house, when we finally got around to it, turned out to be a unique card shop, specializing only in the out of the ordinary, for the most discerning of clientele.  Hallmark would not have made it here.  Another lady proprietor, younger and more elegantly attired, said hello, and promptly returned to her discussions with an enthralled couple planning their wedding invitations.  Hey, if matrimony was on your mind, and moola was no object, this would not be a bad place to start.  Where else would you find an engraved set of writing pad, complete with matching envelopes, designed for invitations for a mere eight people per box, for the nominal cost of a dinner pour deux at your favorite bistro?  Or if you were so inclined, you could stock up, for the equivalent of a bottle of imported vintage, a stack of Maxine’s bar napkins, which says, “Some people have tennis elbows, but I have VISA wrist!” eh?  Suffice to say we also passed.

Up the streets we sauntered into “The Purple Moon”, which was another bungalow turned into an Age of Aquarius hideout, operated by two former flower people from the “free love” era.  This dig was filled with t-shirts, greeting cards, alternative books and CDs, incenses, and in the back room, there were original paintings, or rather prints, with Dali like themes, by an artist who was obviously not invited to exhibit at the Dali Museum.  The side yard had been converted into an outdoor café where a few tourists and locals were enjoying their favorite aperitifs in the shade, awaiting the scheduled performance by a live classical guitarist, another starving artist no doubt.  While I was engrossed by such pearls of wisdom as found on one of the cards which says, “Remember, my child, only dead fish go with the flow,” SP was perturbed by some loud mouth hovering over the cash register, extolling his own virtues as to how he had ripped off copy-righted materials from song writers, in his pre- and post-hippie days.  No, we did not linger to smell the coffee.

Across the Main Street, we spotted another building filled with antiques, and scurried over we did.  At the entrance, there was this “Monet”, already framed, which made my eyes watered.  Now, it was not the kosher thing to ask the soon to be birthday girl if she would like to have such a print as a token present.  So after a spell, Heni properly demurred.  As you might be in accord, one man’s junk might just be another man’s treasure.  But of all the two thousand and one items on display, eagle eyed SP did come away with the only Lu-Ray water pitcher; pink of course, to add to her collection.  She was ecstatic with her acquisition, and Heni jumped up to volunteer as the preferred carrier, and to guard it with his worthless life.

Next we strolled past a famed Mexican dive, a couple of drinking holes in the wall, and then a tiny affair, known as “The Black Pearl”, fresh from the Caribbean no doubt, where, according to the menu posted on the window, their pirate chef would be happy to grill us half a dozen or so shrimp, for an arm and a leg, naturally, with wine, dessert, gratuities, and batteries not included.  Since we were not yet starving, onwards the promenade we strolled afresh.

At another old curiosity shop, a tourist trap by any other name, we ventured into.  This one was overflowing with all things plastic, rubbery, and synthetic, dripping from the walls, and hanging from the ceiling, in complete disarrays of strings, spindles, and spirals, in every color known to man.  As we slashed our way further into the store, it was like a jungle back there, where dusting was not needed, nor ever possible.  SP did however bag another purchase of a t-shirt, but Heni imagined the only reason for the acquisition was the sage saying printed in front of the shirt that proclaimed, “Women who behave seldom make history.”

There were other shops and boutiques where we visited, but none of them received SP’s patronage.  She did ogle over a deluxe bed ensemble, in a linen store, with a reported price tag of four and a half grand, demonstrating once again her impeccable taste, but she frowned at the designer sheets set at close to three hundred dineros where the thread count was so bare, that even  Martha Stewart would loath to market as her Everyday brand at K-Mart. 

The afternoon was fast drawing to a close, as we took a breather and enjoyed our own cuppa of mocha-cinno before returning to our chariot for that long drive down the scenic route, past the Church of Scientology Headquarters on Fort Harrison, back to our local Hooters for wings and a pitcher of suds.  Them Hooter girls were indeed delightful, but we must leave them to their gyrations till another post.  Our presence was being requested to join the gathering thongs to catch a glimpse of the elusive green flash at Caddy’s over at Sunset Beach.  Yes, we did finally meet up with Captain Robin, his wife Claudia, and their imbibing companions, and yes, the incomparable SP did keep her audience in stitches while regaling the now famous episode of her swan dive, and her New England improvisations.  But there were too many clouds over the horizon, and once again we missed the green flash.  So despite another absolutely gawd-jous sunset, the appearances of the tall girls who worship Buddha not withstanding, Heni was afeared that the swilling of Budweiser, Corona, and Ice House, especially after the little “victory garden” that afternoon, made for very little Zen.

It is getting late, and I am tired.  The day has taken a lot out of me.  I don't really feel like writing anything that resembles clever nonsense.  What is the point of this exercise?  Self expression, sharing of thoughts, of airing dirty laundry in public, of parading family jewels in front of all seekers, of trying to capture in words and phrases, what really cannot be captured?

Now and then, I wrote a page or two, mostly as an act of vanity, introspection, reflection, self examination, that sort of thing.  What I wrote, I wrote for myself, for my eyes only, to see where I have come from, how far, and perhaps, where I may be going, and for how much longer.

Rather than retrieving my shovel, and dig deep again into my archives, this late in the evening, although there may be a few odds and ends buried there, from weeks ago, months ago, or even years ago, that may or may not be all that smelly, aromatic, or flagrant, I think I will resort to that emergency till a truly rainy day, when it's pouring sheets, horizontally, like during the upcoming hurricane season.  Off hand, however, there is one item which I debated about sharing, but since I am so good at procrastination, I think I will wait till tomorrow.  In the meantime, you are welcome to twist my arm.

On the door of my study, there is hanging a "poem" which I cannot give the author credit for because I truly don't remember where I had stolen it from.  It has a great deal of relevance for me, that's why I had it framed and hung on my door.  It may have some relevance for you as well.

To laugh is to risk appearing like a fool,
Laugh Anyway.

To weep is to appear sentimental,
Weep anyway.

To reach out for another is to risk involvment,
Get involved anyway.

To expose feelings is to risk exposing your true self,
Be vulnerable anyway.

To place your ideas and dreams before the crowd
is to risk losing them,
Present your ideas anyway.

To love is to risk not being loved in return,
Love Anyway.

To hope is to risk despair,
Hope Anyway.

To try is to risk failure,
Try anyway.

To live is to risk dying,
Live anyway.

The person who will risk nothing, does nothing,
has nothing, is nothing.

Only the person who risks can be truly free.

On the evening of the feast, before twilight, Chuck had a brilliant idea.  She wanted to go for a walk.  Since I was the designated gofer, and I happen to think that Chuck is the prettiest and smartest thing since the shirt pocket, I jumped up as a volunteer to accompany her.  Now the Mistress of The Estate, though not outwardly alarmed, thought it was best that she should accompany us as our chaperone, to make sure that neither Chuck, her precious, nor I, her soon to be indentured literary agent, would not be molested by the ruffians and bandits in the neighborhood.

So off we went, waking up at six in the evening, to the smell of coffee and roses, along many a beaten path of a sidewalk, in one of those soon to be totally gentrified neighborhood, where if I had the foresight of snatching up a few bungalows a decades or so back, when snatching was still legal and economically feasible, you probably would not be reading this little blurb by now.

Our stroll was uneventful with the exception of an encounter with one ferocious beast, threatening to jump the fence and make minced pie out of yours truly, when we, three’s a company, immediately scampered over to the other side of the street, to avoid having our collective hides tanned and leathered.

As we were rounding a corner on our way back, about two blocks from the Estate, Chuck hopped to attention as she saw something definitely familiar, and she immediately sounded the alarm.  It was that dark blue van, reported stolen a couple of days ago, belonging to the distinguished gentleman and scholar, Mr. Jeff de Mutt, who lived across the street.  That’s when a cell phone really came in handy.  Jeff was summoned and came running.  There was no mistake.  Chuck scored high, and I did not mean just on her I.Q. test.  All four wheels appeared to be still attached to the vehicle and all the antique tools were still in their creative disarray in the back of the van.  Immediately, the local fuzz was advised by Jeff via Atcatel to come pronto to dust for prints left on the crime scene of this abandoned vehicle, before he could reclaim ownership.

 Not often in my sheltered life do I get a chance to be in the company of a real life personality.  Yesterday evening, at the invitation of Sweet Pie, I had the pleasure of dining at The Chateau de Pudlin, with the Captain of The Bounty, Robin, and his lovely wife, Claudia.  They had just returned from St. Vincent after several months of filming of the sequels to "Pirates of The Caribbean" with Mr. Johnny Depp and company.  So many people have proclaimed their boast that “they have been there, and they have done that.”  I believe that Mr. Robin is somebody who has a legitimate claim to that cliché without any sense of bragging. 

For once in my life, I sat at the Captain’s table, and I got it straight from the Captain’s mouth.  Unlike the notorious and bracingly evil Captain Bligh in the Mutiny of The Bounty, Robin is unpretentious, charming, understated, friendly, laid back, and creative.  In between his Captain’s duties, he had just recently built for his wife, and himself, not just one, but two custom kayaks that will take the wind out of your sails.

One of the first things he told me that made an impression was, during the ten year plus tenure as Captain of the Bounty, he practically never took any kind of an extended vacation.  When he told his crew to man their unending tasks of keeping The Bounty in top ship-shape, starting at say 8 o’clock in the morning, he couldn’t very well be sleeping till the high noon himself, could he?  So he had to there, on board the ship, before the crew arrived.  In my book, that is leadership by example, not the kind that commands, “Do as I say, but not as I do.”

Over the years, Robin must have sailed everywhere, to places where you and I only dreamed of, with celebrities by the dozens, movie stars like Johnny Depp, television icons such as Walter Cronkite, and royalties like Prince Andrew, to name a couple.  I asked him whether he had kept a journal of his many adventures and encounters.  Regrettable he said no, they were all part of his memories.  What a shame I thought, as his journals would undoubtedly make fascinating reading, you can imagine.  In addition, he was also a photographer of some note, but for reasons he did not elaborate, he had more or less given professional photography in preference to being a Sea Captain.  Talk about “being there” and “present at the creation”!  How many of us adventurous wannabees would give their left cojone just to be in his shoes on the quarterdeck.  Not having walked in his moccasins, I can only presume that to Robin, living is far superior than dreaming, doing is far more enchanting than griping, and having the real life experiences are infinitely more satisfying than reading about them.

Naturally I asked Robin about Johnny Depp.   Is Mr. Depp nearly as charismatic in person, as he is on screen?  Or is he spoiled by the trappings of fame and fortune to be arrogant, detached, overbearing, and obnoxious?  Not surprisingly, Robin said that Johnny Depp behaves very much like his on screen persona, easily likeable, and without pretensions.  Johnny is a studied artist, and works hard at his craft.  As a devoted father, Johnny flew back to his home outside Paris to be on hand for his son’s birthday party while filming was put on hold in his absence.  Your kids wouldn’t like to have such a father I am sure! 

Since Johnny Depp is an aficionado of Marlon Brando, who was in the remake of the original “Mutiny of The Bounty” (they did a movie together called “Don Juan DeMarco”), Robin asked if Johnny might like to have one of the ship’s pins as a souvenir.  Now these pins are like rolling pins, in the shape of a rounded club of polished wood, more than a foot long, and over the years, tourists have been swiping them off when they took the tour, while the crew was not looking.  There aren’t many of the original pins left on board.  The handfuls of the authentic pins have since been scattered around through out the ship, and they had been nailed down from future pilferers.   Robin had himself go for a scavenger hunt.  Johnny Depp was most gracious in his acceptance of a pin when Robin had located one and presented it to him.  I saw a picture of Johnny Depp, in full make up and pirate costume regalia, holding his pin and smiling into camera. 

That picture, along with dozens of others, many of the film cast, and members of the film crew, was taken by Claudia, Robin’s wife, who has been giving them away to her drooling girl friends.  Incidentally, Miss Claudia got to play one of the extra wenches in the film, and you can catch her debut in the Sequel to “Pirates of the Caribbean”.  Robin also told me that the upcoming epics of “Pirates” II and III were shot pretty much at the same time, for obvious costs savings, in the same way that the sequels of “Back to The Future” and “The Lord of The Rings” were shot back to back. 

For his charismatic appearances and cinematic presence, Johnny Depp was compensated to the tune of many millions of dollars for a few month’s play.  It’s nice work, if you can get it.  That just goes to show you that all men are created equal and blessed, but some men are more equal and blessed than others.

Now, I want to take this opportunity to thank the incredible Miss Pudlin for her energetic hospitality, and for inviting me to partake of such a wonderful dinner with such sparkling company.  If you are curious to know, but afraid to ask, dinner consisted of several courses, starting with grilled shrimp on the Barbie, grilled tuna marinated with a secret family recipe of a teriyaki sauce, grilled t-bone steaks judiciously seasoned, scalloped Yukon Gold potatoes with onions, market broccoli from a bamboo steamer, home made cold slaw freshly whipped, and accompanied by ice cold bottles of Yuengling.  The Captain himself preferred, and polished off, a bottle of dry white wine from Woodridge, domestic not imported.  For the rest of you starving hordes out there in la-la-land, you are encouraged to eat your heart out!  Just kidding!    

I have concluded that speaking ill of Religion is not going get me many fans or admirers, not that I am suffocating to get me any more fans.  It is a hot day though.  Along that same line of reasoning, there is also sitting on my shelves, a hunk of scrape metal I bought from a dealer, which reportedly came from the Brooklyn Bridge, the metal, not the dealer.  You are welcome to make me an offer before I trek over to eBay.  So there, take two salt shakers, throw them over your shoulders, and you don't have to call me in the morning. 

Today, my warden has decided to let certain animals out of de zoo for good behavior.  I have been invited to partake of a little drunken-ness, and perhaps even debauchery.  Now, sitting here in my monkery, contemplating the meaning of existence, how can I possibly refuse such an invitation?!

Thus, should I not be heard from again, please send money, no flowers, or t-bucks, to me, or my favorite charity.  Lord only knows what I am going to do with them t-bucks, seeing that I don't even know how to change "weblog" back to my original title, "Welcome to Duh Funny Farm".  But I can always donate them away later, to some younguns dying for more bells and whistles to tinkle their oh so jazzy Blog, like Miss Smack por exemplar. 

The subject line I had already run through with my English checker.  There are no miss-spellings.  For your edification, any errors of mine are purely intended, and I am excited to take all the credit for their recurrences.

This baby-sitting today is putting me to sleep.  I have not slept well for weeks now, maybe months.  Something has been gnawing at me, and I have not yet identified what it is.  So I label that gnawing sensation as part of the growing up process, the art of maturing gracefully, without passing wind.

The phones blissfully have not rung for sometime, like they normally do, jumping off the hooks, or rocking off their cradles, since hooks on black phones are no longer in fashion.  Orders to be processed are coming in drips and drabs, like the token amounts I used to collect when I was in low income property management, when the rent was paid only after all the assorted vices were satisfied.  For once, no one is jumping out the windows, or down my throat.  I get a chance to contemplate my fuzzy navel, and to read a few pages of my current book of interest.

Now and again I try to sit up straight, instead of slumming over my chair.  I am not paid to fall asleep on the job, or for reading pages unrelated to my performance of specific tasks.  Should El Grande (Top Dog in Italian) materialize over my shoulders, I would be handed my walking papers fo schizzle.  (Er…. I am not as square as I sound.)  But El Grande obviously has plans for the weekend, cats to skin, fish to fry, so I should be relatively safe.  Besides, it isn't too easy to find a qualified baby sitter these days.  The work itself isn't hard, except for the people, like the world is essentially a beautiful place. 

In addition to being a nation of drug addicts, we are also close to being a nation of illiterates.  Reading, what's that?  I am done with reading since graduating from High School, or getting out college.  Reasoning?  You jest!  I am here, I am in the manner born, and I am entitled to it, period.  Common courtesy, telephone etiquette, please, and thank you, hey, schmuck, if I didn't learn those minor details in Kindergarten, are you suggesting that I should learn them now? 

It is the holding of hands, the constant interruptions on the typical days, the repeated answering of inane questions from unruly employees, fellow workers, team members, if you must, ill-mannered children one and all, thirty years old and up, that can have you scaling the walls.  Like, if 0.5 mg of my favorite injection is 2 ml, how much do I shoot myself up with if I only want 0.25 mg?  We are out of vitamin B-12, can't we give two B-6 instead?  And if I were to give myself this suppository, must I take off the tin foil first before administering it?  Now that I have wetted my pants, because I am not totally potty trained, will you bring up some toilet paper, and while you are at it, would you also wipe my ass with it?  You get the picture, if you are not in the picture, or you are the picture. 

A revolving door policy, coupled with one of scooping them up by the busload when the primary criterion for hiring seems to be the ability to fog up a mirror, does not for quality material make.  And excellence in service, which we are so keen on, at least in the exercise of our collective lips, starts with quality material, does it not? 

I remember not long ago, I too was among the motley crew of thirty something plus everywhere, filled with piss and vinegar, oh so tragic, angry at the world, which wasn't quite revolving around them as the center of Universe, catering to their every whims and desires.  Or else many of these up and comers have already deluded themselves that because of youth, vigor, beauty and brawn, not to mention cunning, (oops, I just mention cunning) they have, or about to, become the Masters of The Universe. 

Today, I am happy to report, is not a typical day.  Today, I get to look at the sands of time flowing through my hourglass and imagine the coming of the void, which will be inevitable, like a rowboat without oars, carried by the gushing torrents, dashing towards the edge of Niagara Falls.  Instead of the mighty Falls, though, how do you imagine the void that is formless and changeless?  Does living a few more years, and rushing head long towards retirement age has something to do with this change in perspective? 

You, I am relatively certain, are not having one of my days.  Your days have yet to come.  Just imagine what you have to look forward to!

In the dead of the night, in the wee small hours, when the demons come out to haunt, and our own doubts surface to taunt, what do we do to smooth the savage beast that lies beneath the thin veneer of the civilized being we think we are? 

To bite the hand that feeds me, there are drugs galore, be them prescription or the socially condoned or the illicit kind, we are a nation of drug addicts.  So what if we are not into heroin, speed, PCP, Angel Dust, Esctasy, or simply good old "crack" where we can readily procure for ourselves, in nickel and dime bags, from our friendly neighborhoo d dealer on bicycle, with the loose t-shirt, and the Saturday Night Special tugged behind his back, there are always the much less innocuous variants such as caffeine, ethanol, and nicotine, or the poly-unsaturated fats in the form of a whole coconut cream pie, devoured at one sitting, which will do us in just as slowly.  So may be we don't like coconut cream pie, surely there are other treats what may tempt our fancy.  How about the really fine stuff imported from Acapulco, or Marrakesh, or that little mushroom from South of the Border?  In judicial doses, all recreation can be relaxing, and mind expanding.  Soon, we may even thinking like Carlos.  But in the end, have we not seen the enemy, and have we not looked in the mirror? 

Legally, one is not supposed to pose the question unless one is presumed to have the answer.  As The Almighty has intoned, fuck that!  I, for one, do not have any answers, much less the answer.  Having imbibed my own small doses, strictly for medicinal purpose, don't we know, I am merely tossing out this message in a bottle, and hoping that someone in the vastness of the four oceans, and the seven seas, will eventually retrieve it, and shed some light on my nefarious query. 

Alas, we drift along ever so merrily, all inequities not withstanding, ships without rudders, having for some one tiny tin pot, or for most no pot, to piss in.  Man's search for meaning continues, and to steal once more from one of my favorites: 

"We shall not cease from exploration. For to arrive at where we started, is to know the place for the first time."

Good night and peace be with YOU all wonderful people in la-la land.  May you wake up refreshed, and never have to ponder what may indeed have been a bad dream.   

This posting is going to win me a lot of fans I am sure.  Yeah, right!

Tonight, I am feeling a bit depleted, or perhaps uninspired is a better word, to come up with something mildly interesting to share with one and all.  So I went into my cellars, dug deep, and unearthed a rather moldy, but hopefully not too smelly piece.  Now, please do not expect such bon-bons on a regular basis.  My cellar truly is poorly stocked!  Just like my upstairs apartment, where there is plenty of room for real estate development!

A century or so ago, shortly after my opera watching debut, I went to Bananas! - a local music store recycling hundreds of old vinyl (yuk!) records, along with new and used cassette tapes and CDs.  By my undisciplined method, I selected Volume One of Maria Callas’ La Divina series, and a RCA Red Seal CD entitled Operas' Greatest Love Songs, a collection of arias by currently popular tenors and sopranos.

I wanted to find out if the opera virus I was exposed to was virulent.  By the time I sat through the first recital of the entire repertoire of La Divina, I knew I was bitten by the bug.  I should only hope that my disease was uncommon, but not terminal.  Immediately I put away my Santanas, Frank Sinatras, and Barbra Streisands.  Boys should put away their toys when they grow up.  Since then I have acquired other CDs on various excerpts of well known operas performed by renowned opera singers.  For the next six monhs, La Divina and the RCA Red Seal Opera's Greatest Love Songs CD were the only music I played and listened to recently more than any other record, cassette, or CD in my collections, even more so than Beethoven's Ninth when I was first hooked on Classics.  I just hoped they would not wear out.  While I was listening, I yearned to have the corresponding libretto of each ballad or aria in front of me so I could be transported even more.  You think it would help if I understood what was being sung???

On track 4 of the RCA disc, there's a piece entitled Sempra Libre from La Traviata by Guiseppe Verdi, performed by Cabella Monstraat, a diva is a diva by any other name.  The piece was enchanting, but Monstraat's voice and rendition was liquifying and all encompassing.  I have since listened to three or four other interpretations of the same piece, including an abbreviated version by the one and only Maria Callas in La Divina.  Still I like Monstraat's version best.

But what was Monstraat's singing or wailing about?  That's where Franco Zeffirelli came in.  So back to the Main Public Library I went.  My quarries were always available, or so it seemed.  How many poor souls out of the two hundred thousand plus peons in this berg would be crazy enough as to entertain himself till the wee small hours with arias breaking through the high Cs?  And behold, there's a film version of La Traviata done in the 80s by, guess who?  This production, and production as it usually was in the case of Zeffirelli, turned out to be his second film effort of translating opera onto celluloid.  It starred once again the hauntingly beautiful Teresa Scotto and a much younger Placido Domingo, as worthy a pair as any in the opera world of yester-years.  Domingo could play almost any male lead, and was young enough then to be the dashing and impetuous Armand.  Scotto, small and frail, had as good a voice as say, the hearty and robust Joan Sutherland, then reigning at the Met.  But in this tragedy, Scotto fitted into the role of the consumptive Marguerite far better than Sutherland ever could.

To paraphrase Hemingway, all good stories end in death.  And so La Traviata, as another classic of the romantic era adapted by Verdi, based upon the book Camille by Alexandre Dumas the Younger, is a good story.

Incidentally, for all your trivial pursuit fans out there, if you like Pretty Woman, or if you are the pretty woman, Julia thought La Traviata was so good she almost peed in her pants, while Richard had to translate for the puzzled blued hair old lady in the next balcony that Julia thought it was better than the Pirates of Penzance.

Now I expect rotten eggs, spoiled cabbage, and dozens of over-ripe tomatoes flinged to me pell mell and with gusto.  Otherwise, think of this rambling piece as the indulgence of an “older” man, sitting on his thumbs, because he has yet to get up to his walker, you know, the one with the tennis balls, remember?  And if you don’t, then stick that in your pipe, and,......... little matter, never mind!