420

sometimes I'm so out of it...

I cdn't understand why some folks on Facebook were celebrating today. I had to look up 420 & learn abt the Waldos in the early '70s & the time of their meetings at the Pasteur statue.

o sure I smoked pot back in the day but as a non-smoker I found it unpleasant. I never really got high because it was just too difficult to hold that smoke down in my lungs. I did try hash brownies a couple of times & found that experience quite blissful.

Allen Swift (1924-2010)

altho I saw him in an O'Neill play   Swift was best known as a voice actor. he gave voice to everyone from Eisenhower to Popeye -- even Santa Claus.

but he had a special moment in tv history. he was the voice of Mr. Bluster & other characters on "The Howdy Doody Show." & for abt a year he actually was Howdy's voice.

Swift's son is actor Lewis J. Stadlen.

here's a famous cartoon for which Swift did all the voices:

weeding

is an activity which bores me so I don't do it with frequency.

but thinking is an activity which often riles me so that I need a replacement.

so for a short time today I crouchd in gravel to pick weeds from the drive. I tried to empty my mind while dirt collectd under my nails. it didn't last long.

old flannel shirts

are like comfort food
or a healer's touch

Joan Woodbury (1915-1989)

she was one of those minor actresses who always grabbd me. I think it was something abt her nose. tonite I saw her in one of her many forgotten pictures. she was as good as the script. but when she was on screen I cdn't keep my eyes off of her.

garlicphilia

to make up for yesterday

I adore garlic & when home eat at least a raw clove daily.

cilantrophobia

how wonderful to learn that Julia Child had an aversion to cilantro too.

I love to eat & dislike few edibles. but cilantro has such an awful taste to me that it can destroy an entire meal. so I'm careful to ask if it's in certain ethnic dishes. & when I do encounter it -- like Julia -- I pick it out.

spring

plus = blossoms

minus = winds

Phil & Rita & I

Kevin O'Malley took this in front of Eliza Thompson House as we were waiting for a cab to the airport yesterday

the other Mercer

Mercer House became famous because of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. long before the Jim Williams tenure however it was the residence of General Hugh Mercer. but it was his great-grandson Johnny Mercer who is ubiquitous in Savannah today. this statute was erectd in Ellis Square last year for his centennial.

you knew I had to go here

the murder took place in the room you see behind me

azalea time in Savannah

away

for a few days.

let's hear it for the flops

with the loss of Ted Hook's Backstage & Barrymore's I guess the only theater restaurant from my past that's still around is Joe Allen.

the wall on the restaurant side is a sort of Hall of Fame for Broadway flops. here is a display of the posters of those shows.

what in the hell

is wrong with airlines?

on the heels of this carry-on fee comes news that an Irish airline is considering a fee to use the restrooms.

maybe we shd all pee in the aisles.

I've never

flown on Spirit Airlines & I hope I never will. they are going to charge for CARRY-ON luggage.

according to BlogPulse

every day there are some 40000 new blogs.

mugs

"Morning Cantata"

train whistling past General Industries
wakes me in my boyhood bedroom

Dad’s snore is base line
clock’s metronome numbers my pulse

cars drone down Broad St
while I await twack of Plain Dealer on porch

I flail under sheets
hearing a morning long ago:

Mom hiding Disney figurines
around living room

& later telling her little boy
they were left by the Easter bunny

musics past & present
collide in my ears

till tears blotch wrinkles
under my eyes

time to get up   gas the gridle
for Dad to flip flapjacks


(reprintd from Elyria: Point A in "Ohio Triangle"
publishd by Crisis Chronicles Press in 2009)

Easter cheese

I don't have the family recipe. but it's a favorite boyhood memory of that holiday.

Mom & Dad broke many eggs into a large pot to which they'd add milk & cinnamon. that's all the ingredients I remember. after it came to curdle the contains were pourd into a cheesecloth which was hung from a door handle overnite.

I no longer recall if it was the taste of the cheese or the experience of its making which was more important.