Tuesday, November 21, 2017

THE SEVEN YEAR ITCH



In the sexually repressed era of 1960-1966, with Rob and Laura Petrie safely sleeping in separate beds, I was quite aware of Marilyn Monroe. I was quite aware of Ginger, a castaway on the desert island. I was quite aware of Stella Stevens in The nutty Professor, and hoped someday to have a love potion that would turn me into a chick magnet, just like Jerry Lewis was transformed into Buddy Love. I didn't really know why, but the power of suggestion was pretty strong, and one did not need to know anything about the mechanics of sex to feel its undercurrent.
In the first grade, I didn’t know what sex was, but I knew there was something there that I was SUPPOSED to like. It went on between men and women, and I was supposed to like it a lot. By the age of eight I had some awareness of what "The Seven Year Itch" was about. There were several movie titles that set my imagination running wild. I remember "Mans Favorite Sport" being one, and I knew it was probably not a movie about fishing.

All you really had to do to know everything you needed to know was watch one Elvis movie.

Like these famous guys getting caught these days, there are probably a few girls, even dating back to about the fifth grade, that would tell you stories about me that I would find embarrassing. 
What stories? Well, lets see.

In the fifth grade there was  playground game we played for a day or two.  A bunch of us guys chased a couple of the girls and eventually cornered two by the fence. Everyone was pawing at them. Somehow I managed to get my hand up a skirt, if only briefly. After recess, I was invited to the principals office and quizzed about this episode. Like President Trump I denied any wrong doing and it was my word against hers. maybe all the guys got invited, I don't quite remember. It seemed like harmless fun back then. 
How terrifying this must have been for those girls.

I was 23 and had just broke up with a girl I went with for two years.
One summer night I was standing in my driveway, smoking a cigarette, forlorn over my lost love. Two young girls wearing skinny little halters, and them cut off britches came walking by the house. They stopped and talked a bit. They were still in High School.
The next night they came by again. 
About the third for fourth night (like clockwork I was hanging out hoping they would) just one came by. Next thing I knew we were in my bed and I was just about to stick her. Another half inch would have been past the point of no return. I stopped. Got her dressed and out of there. I quit hanging out in the driveway after dark for a good while. You don’t have to be a predator to get your ass in a sling. 
I pretty well have that episode blocked from my memory mostly. Fact is I very nearly fucked a 16 year old when I was 23.  
It takes a lot to shake it loose.
Judge Roy Moore, he shakes it loose.
His accuser says he had her down to bra and panties. I believe her. Its not that hard to do. And just like me, I bet he got to just about there and thought "What the fuck are you doing, Steve" and let her pass. Someone has to be the adult, right?

I guess if I was running for senator, I'd have a hard time admitting to it if this young lady were to suddenly surface.
Shit, would I even consider putting this on Facebook?
I think probably not.
Not at this time.


Growing up in 1964 I didn’t know much about the mechanics of sex, but I knew this movie probably wasn’t about fishing.


Friday, November 17, 2017

THE FITBIT



My doctor threatened me last month with some kind of diet.
All I really heard was “Protein Bars”.
I said “Give me a month Doc, I’ll lose some weight. I’ll get the amount of my diabetes medicine I take down some”.
I bought $100 pair of shoes. I was invested.
But I hate walking.
After a month I’d lost two pounds. That’s not much on a 280 pound guy.

“How’d you do?” he asked.
“Two pounds Doc, but I reduced my medicine by 15%”
He laughed.
“You need to get a Fitbit”
“Will that help?”
“Yes, 10,000 steps a day” he says.

What we are doing is avoiding the elephant in the room. The protein bars, the diet.

I break the ice.
“What about that diet thing with the candy bars?” I say.
“Protein bars.” He laughs and looks at me. “If you aren’t into it, it won’t work”
I say “Doc, I like good food. I cook a lot and eat real well. No junk food, REAL food and lots of it”
He says “If you like to cook, this diets for you. Its real food, with the protein bars supplement. No junk food”
I think about it a minute.
“I just have one question Doc. Will I be able to still have my pancakes with real maple syrup on Saturday and Sunday? Its kind of a tradition.”
You should have seen his face.
“Steve, I want you to go get a Fit bit and start waking 10,000 steps a day”



Next time I go in I'll have to tell him about "The Bulletholes Ten". Its a ten minute loop around my apartment. If I'm feeling frisky, I'll do two laps.
I always think about my nephew Dave, and what it takes to do one of these ultras he runs. An Ultra is an 80 mile jog over mountains and rivers and stuff, and you have like 24 hours to do it. I wonder how long it will take me to achieve the mindset of the ultra runner.
I had told Dave about "The Bulletholes Ten" last month. I said "The great thing about "The Ten" is that if I decide I need to bail, I'm never more than 10 minutes from home".
Dave looked at me, pitifully.
"You mean five. You are never more than five minutes from home" he said.
I paused a moment, quickly reviewed my calculations, rocked back on my heels a bit and grinned.
"Right, Dave my boy! Only five minutes from home!"
Dave is not just a great Ultra runner. He's a damn fine mathematician as well.

Monday, November 13, 2017

I MIGHT NOT SAY NO



I’ve had girls make unwanted sexual advances to me. Some fairly flagrant, even after being told no. Like maybe I’ll change my mind. I’ve used the same tactic. Its very uncomfortable, especially when they look like Harvey Weinstein.
Why can’t it ever be Scarlett Johansson?

Monday, November 06, 2017

"I promised the good Lord not to dig no coal" Blind Willie McTell


WAYNESBURG, Pa. (Reuters) - When Mike Sylvester entered a career training center earlier this year in southwestern Pennsylvania, he found more than one hundred federally funded courses covering everything from computer programming to nursing.
He settled instead on something familiar: a coal mining course.
”I think there is a coal comeback,” said the 33-year-old son of a miner."



“The Stone Age didn’t end from a lack of stone. And the oil age will end long before the world runs out of oil.”
Some kid on a skateboard at the Mall

Sunday, November 05, 2017

FATE



"Do you also hurry, half-dressed and barefoot, into the garden,
and softly,
and exclaiming of their dearness,
fill your arms with the white and pink flowers,
with their honeyed heaviness, their lush trembling,
their eagerness
to be wild and perfect for a moment, before they are
nothing, forever?"

~from New And Selected Poems
by Mary Oliver

Statue~ "Fate", by Hugo Lederer
Ohlmsdorf Cemetary, Hamburg Germany

Friday, November 03, 2017

A WITCH HUNT


1. George P. is a 29 year old man who joins the Trump campaign as a foreign policy advisor, cultivates Russian contacts in order to get dirt on Hillary Clinton and to secure a meeting between Putin and Trump, then lies to the FBI saying he did all this before joining the Trump Campaign. When charged, George pleads guilty. Is this:
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation.

2. In the year 1693 in Salem Village, Sarah Good is a woman living in poverty and disliked by the townspeople. A jury of men decide that she was a witch after forcing her to confess that she signed her name in the “Devil’s book,” a thing that does not exist. She is hanged several days after giving birth to a daughter. Is this:
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation

3. Paul M. is Donald Trumps Campaign Manager. Paul holds fake passports and accounts, funnels money from shady Russians with ties to Putin and has it laundered offshore. Paul uses his hidden overseas wealth to buy property and avoid taxes, then secures loans on fraudulent loan applications and uses the money for purposes other than stated on the applications. While investigating these transgressions it was found that Paul knowingly and willfully made false and misleading statements regarding his work for the Ukrainians.
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation

4. Sarah Osborne doesn’t go to church like the townspeople of Salem expect her to. Because of this, a group of men decide she is a witch and is accused of using dark magic to pinch several young girls in town with invisible knitting needles. They arrest her, put her in prison, where she dies. Is this:
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation

5. Under the direction of Vladmir Putin, Russia creates 200,000 Facebook and Twitter accounts and floats a campaign of disinformation and fake news designed to manipulate the 2016 Election. These posts, ranging from reports of Hillary’s declining health to the idea she had given up Top Secret Nuclear Launch preparedness times, spread like wildfire on the pages of the more easily duped participants on Social Media. Easily debunked, yet picked up by Right Wing news organizations, hundreds of Russian sponsored fake news stories were then used by Donald Trump in speech after speech. Its hard to tell if he is plain stupid, a savvy ruthless unscrupulous opportunistic blowhard, or in bed with Putin. This is:
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation

6. Tituba is a woman from Barbados, but is now enslaved by white people in the town of Salem. She continues to practice her religion, which the people of Salem don’t understand. They assume it means she is a witch and beat her until she confesses and rambles about black dogs and riding on sticks, then imprison her, despite no evidence that witches actually exist. Is this:
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation

Inspired by and partly stolen from McSweeny’s.

And much thanks to Arthur Miller