EASTER IN DETROIT

 

In the corner of the backyard were the hydrangeas

Mother called them snowballs

Before the hydrangeas bloomed in the summer

there were little snowball blossoms

on the clover in the spring

which attracted the bees

Big black and yellow bumble bees

to come out from underground to buzz

around and drink from the clover.

And I wonder now why I never took a shovel and paid the

bees a visit.

Two giant plums that had more thorns than plums

A bird bath, a swing set,

And two tall thin acorns that Dave and I

climbed to the very top and swayed

while we looked out over Lake St Clair.

I remember showing my sister how to catch a bee in her hand

if you held it tight enough it could not sting your hand.

My little sister Lisa

Lisa only tried it once.

Lisa could not hold it tight enough.

Poor Lisa.

My mother wore me out.

STEVE, 2/6/2019

Fourth of July picnic...

...on the banks of the Trinity river just north of downtown, about 1986. My wife's family had set up camp early to get a good spot for the fireworks, and like an idiot I brought a fishing pole. I think I had shrimp as bait. Anyway we were there all day waiting for fireworks, the crowd filling up behind us, and I had my pole set up on the bank. All day people would come by and ask had I caught anything.
"Nope. Don't really expect to"
So just as the sun is going down there is a twitch on the pole. Another twitch, and another. I grab it and set the hook hollering "STRIKE!"
I play him for all he's worth and finally get him up to the bank. Its a 10 pound turtle.
I turned to look up the hill and there must have been ten thousand people watching me reel him in, so I Raised Him Up High, so everyone could see.
THE CROWD WENT WILD!

ITS JUST CAKE

 

My brother was best man at my wedding. He was a West Point grad and retired a colonel.
The day of my wedding the pastry chef at the Hyatt where I worked called me about an hour before the wedding, while I was getting dressed. She had made the cake.
“Steve, I’m lost, I can’t find the church”
“OK, tell me where you are and I’ll come get you and lead you to the church”
My brother grabbed the phone.
‘The address of the church is %%%%%. You should be able to find it. Steve is not going anywhere but straight to the church from here” and he hung up.
“Don, I have to go get her”
“Steve, you are not going anywhere but straight to the church.”
“But Don, she has the CAKE. The CAKE!”

I’ll never forget the look on his face. I really cant even describe it. Maybe its the look you give a guy when you order him to advance on a fortified position, or clean the latrines.  I don't know. Maybe it was look you give someone who asks where they can get some Ivermectin, you know, the horse pill for COVID.
He said:
“Steve, we can have a wedding without a cake. Get your ass dressed, We leave in 5 minutes”

I think about this one a lot when I encounter situations where I (or someone else) is placing too much importance on a detail.
You CAN have a wedding without a cake.

Our Latest Crush

 

Here at Bulletholes we  have a huge crush on Pati's Mexican Kitchen. She has wonderful recipes, and tells you all about the food that she is using. She also has a wonderful accent to go with them. As she tastes a dish she gets this look of ecstasy on her face. "Yummmm" she says and her eyes flutter a little before rolling up and closing and it's very hot.

She comes off all sweet and innocent but she knows what she's doing.

She knows exactly what she's doing.

SOMETHING TO CRY ABOUT

My father used to give me licks with his belt.
It was always a very formal affair,
Like going into the manager’s office
And getting written up.
There was no emotion,
He just reviewed the infraction with me
(throwing tomatoes at cars, playing chicken with the hoodlum in the jalopy down the street, sass talking a teacher))
Reminding me this was going to hurt him worse than I,
Then he told me to grab my ankles.
I learned that if I started to cry
On about the 3rd lick or so,
He would stop and put his belt back on.

Then one day I decided not to cry.
The licks went on for some time,
But I didn't cry.
It wasn't a display of courage.
It was an act of defiance.
Rebellion, grabbing its ankles.
Without a whimper I had quit the program.
When he had finally had enough
The belt came to rest at his side
I stood straight up and turned to look him in the eye.
My father was crying.
And that was the last time
My father ever gave me licks with his belt.

srenfro 3/2013

ON THE PRICE OF OIL

Back when I was a chef I would call three produce companies to get prices for produce. Prices changed weekly and seasonally.
I called Ben E Keith one week. Orange prices had tripled from the week before.
I said "Why are orange prices so high?"
He said "Because they had a freeze in Florida."
I said "Can't we get some California oranges?"
He said "They heard about it in California."
That's about lesson number five when you're learning to be a chef.

IN LINE AT THE GROCERY

 

When I was in the sixth grade living up in Detroit, I went to middle school for a month before we moved back to Texas. In that month, walking home in the afternoons, I would walk behind a girl named Mary McD#######. She had gone to a different elementary school than I. She may have been in one of my classes, I don’t know, but sometimes I would pass her in the hall. She was easy to spot because she always wore a white blouse and a green or red Tartan style checkered skirt. And the shirt was usually untucked, which along with her tousled hair and striking Scottish lines, gave her a very tomboyish look.  But after school I would follow twenty feet behind her and after about two blocks she would turn right, and I would continue on ahead to my house. I don’t recall we ever spoke, but I never forgot her, the strawberry blonde hair, her name, or those Tartan skirts. For fifty odd years there’s probably not a year go by that Mary would not enter into some reverie or daydream of mine. In my minds eye I could see her face and wondered if I had ever spoken to her at all (how could my memory be so vivid and everlasting had I not?), if she ever stopped dressing like a Catholic schoolgirl, and whether we would have been friends had I stayed in Detroit and ever got up the nerve to speak to her..

Fast forward 50 years and there she is on Facebook. She looks just like I remember her.
That’s her on the right and I swear she hasn’t changed a bit. If I stood behind her in line at the grocery I would be tempted to tap her on the shoulder and ask “Is your name Mary?”

I guess that maybe I did get up the nerve to speak to her in that small one month window before moving to Texas. Mary says she has some recollection of me.
Or maybe she is just being kind.

 

THE KEYSTONE PIPELINE

I keep hearing a lot of chit and chatter about how Biden shut down the Keystone pipeline and that’s why oil here, and in Tokyo and Europe has gone sky high, blah, blah, blah.Fact is, the Keystone pumps about 1.5 million barrels a day to Houston and someplace in Illinois with the unfortunate name of Patoka.
The proposed construction of Keystone XL was terminated by Biden. It was only 10% completed and never moved a single drop of oil.
Seems like I heard Trump say one time that while he approved the construction of the Keystone XL, he knew it would never be built to completion. It would be tied up in court forever.
I think there may be larger factors than the Keystone XL that have brought about rising oil prices.

 

THE PROMISES

 1. If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are half way through.
2. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness.
3. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it.
4. We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace.
5. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others.
6. That feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear.
7. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows.
8. Self-seeking will slip away.
9. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change.
10. Fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us.
11. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us.
12. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves 

Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us - sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we work for them.

Alcoholics Anonymous p83-84

VALENTINE'S DAY AT CENTRAL JR HIGH, 1970

Seventh grade. I was hopelessly in love with the cute mousey straight-haired girl that lived across the street. Her friends called her Peanut, and she was a bit bucktoothed and her ears stuck out the sides of her hair. But as I think about it, she really wasn't bucktoothed exactly. As I see her in my minds eye, as I am sure you are doing now, she was "over-toothed"...that is to say, her two front teeth were a bit out of proportion, a bit larger than the rest of her teeth, giving her a kind of Lola Bunny look that drove me absolutely wild.

The day before Valentines Day 1970, at the age of 13 years old, I told my best friend Billy that I was going to ask her to "Go Steady" the next day. First thing the next morning I went to the Student Council stand to put down my $1 and send her a Valentines Telegram, a "Love-O-Gram", in which I intended to declare my undying love and devotion to her.
Anonymously, of course.
Peanut was in three of my classes that day and I watched her as she got the Love-O-Gram in Second Period. I saw her show it to her friend Vicki. Later, I watched as it was passed around to all her girl-pals at the lunch table. I was terrified beyond belief, making sure I did not watch too closely lest I be found out, and I was starting to understand what a wimp I truly was, and that in my wimpiness I had no business asking a girl to go steady just because she lived across the street and might need braces.
I am glad that I have no recollection of what was in my Love-O-Gram or I would be tempted to divulge what my Seventh Grade mind might have written.
She had no idea it was me—how could she know?-- or so I thought, because I was a real squirrel back then, carrying a trombone with me everywhere I went and forever talking about the Chess Club, model rockets and stuff. Several times that day I nearly summoned the courage to ask Peanut to go steady, but in the face of those ears and teeth I always chickened out. I could barely stand to look at her.

Living across the street from me, Peanut and I rode the same Bus #29 home every day, and we got out together every day, just the two of us. Having lacked the courage throughout the day, it was now my intention to pop the question after we got off the bus. Do or die. It was Hammer-time.
We were standing there at the curb as the bus pulled away.
She had a funny look on her face as I toed the ground and studied my shoe tops and cleared my throat.
But before I could speak I hear her say through the ringing in my ears:
"Steve, can I ask you something?'
"Sure Peanut"
"Billy Rucker told me you were going to ask me to go steady today. Is that true?"
I felt dizzy, sick, weak at the knees. The earth spun under my feet. The blood drained from my face and my heart was in my throat.
Of course I completely and categorically denied it. If Billy had not been twice my size, I'd have kicked his ass the next day.
We seldom talked after that, she and I. She lived across the street from me for another two years and moved away to Houston. But the fates brought us together in May of 1975, the night of Graduation. A random meeting on the street in front of our houses, in almost the exact spot from five years earlier when I had lacked the balls to ask her to go steady. She had come to town to see her best friend Cindy, who lived up the street, graduate. It was then I confessed to her that my intention that Valentines Day in 1970 had been to ask her to "Go Steady", and that, yes, it was me that had sent the Love-O-Gram.
"I know, and I still have it" she said and laughing, gave me a light kiss on the cheek.
She had gotten braces or else her face had caught up with her mouth. She no longer had that Lola Bunny look and her ears no longer showed through her once-thin-and-mousey, but now stylishly permed and frosted blonde hair.
That is to say… her charms were somewhat faded in my eyes.
But I'll never , ever, ever, forget that sweet little kiss.

THE WHOLE WORLD IN HIS HANDS

Originally posted in 2013 without addendums...

I’m really lucky. I only have a 10 minute drive in to work. There is not really a lot that can happen to you in that 10 minutes.

Up ahead this morning there was a school bus stopped. It had the flashing yellow and red lights, and the STOP sign out. Traffic was stopped on both sides of the bus, and I was able to watch the bus driver do her business.

It seems this bus was equipped with a lift for a wheelchair, and at this particular stop, the woman driver was out and lowering it for a smiling young man in a wheelchair as his father looked on. Traffic was building on both sides of the bus as the lift slowly lowered. I watched the woman driver roll the young man onto the lift. The father handed him his lunchbox. I looked in the rear view mirror at the man behind me on his cell phone. I watched the oncoming cars, stopped now, motionless, except for the woman ahead absent-mindedly drumming her fingers on the steering wheel.

It was like the whole wide world had stopped, and would stay stopped as the bus driver secured the chair to the lift with a strap; that time would stretch itself out while the lift slowly rose. That for just five minutes the earth had stopped its rotation and this child in the wheelchair was the center of the universe, the most important person in the world, and I sensed that no one in any of the stopped cars was in any kind of hurry, that no one felt put out, and it made me feel proud to live in a country that would take this kind of care for one single person. To live in a school district that is able to do this. Maybe not all of them can, I don't know. Seldom do I get to notice such a manifestation of my taxes doing such good work.

My heart swelled, it really did, and now the smiling driver rolled the chair from the lift into the bus, and I wondered how the kids in the bus felt about taking a moment this morning, taking a moment every morning, to get their pal loaded up. I wondered if anyone said “good morning”, or helped get him strapped safely into his spot on the bus. I wondered if he was a good student. The lift disappeared into the bus, and the driver smiled at the boy’s father, who smiled back, then looked up to see me.

Me, also smiling now, having witnessed this act of care play out. She smiled and gave me a happy little wave, got on the bus and after a long moment the lights stopped blinking and the STOP signs disappeared, traffic resumed and the world started back to its business again.

The whole world in His hands.

My moment of Zen.

Addendum: Since writing this I have had the privilege of sitting behind the bus on a number of occasions. One morning I had a Spiritual Awakening. This was about much more that my tax dollars at work, or living in a caring, nurturing country. It was about my Second Tradition. "For our Group Purpose there is but one Ultimate Authority; a loving God as He may express Himself in our group conscience". Indeed! And here I am, waiting on the bus and watching Him express Himself.

Addendum #2: I told someone who drives one of these buses my story. She told me that what I couldn't see was that there is a person on the bus that receives the kid, and gets him all strapped in and settled. Isn't it marvelous? The things going on that we cannot see?

MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR

Yes, I know, I neglected my blog just terrible in 2021. Lets see if we can't get back on the ball for 2022.

Do you not miss those days when we were young and before MTV when you acted out entire albums with your best friend? For me Magical Mystery Tour was one of my favorites, and me and Scott would stay up all night on Friday nights, building our model rockets, and listening to his collection of Beatles albums, acting out every song. Looking for clues about Paul's death. Then a bike ride to 7-11 for an apple beer at 3 in the morning in the seventh grade.
Penny Lane was just wonderful to act out, with its four of fish and finger pies, barbers, bankers and blue suburban skies; fire engines, roundabouts, nurses and poppies and the fireman comes rushing in through the pouring rain.
Very strange.
I nearly had these memories dashed by someone that wanted to tell me some of these songs, including Penny Lane, weren’t on this album. Sometimes I make stuff up. Yes, I do. But its not important anyone knows when I do that, make things up.
But its important for me to know.

THE CHAINS THAT YOU REFUSE

I’m surfing through the channels last night, nuthin’s on. On Channel 13 they are having their Beg-A-Thon, trying to raise money, and they always use the “Celtic Woman” program. I guess it a big draw. But I’ve been watching Celtic Woman for 20 years now, ever since the Riverdance craze. I’m about done with gorgeous Irish lasses singing beautiful weeping Irish ballads.

But while swinging through from channel to channel, here we have the lasses doing a new song.
"Bonny Portmore".
"Bonny Portmore" is an Irish traditional folk song which laments the demise of Ireland's old oak forests, specifically the Great Oak of Portmore. It’s a beautiful song, it really is, especially the Lorrena McKinnett version, so I listen and move on.

Still nothing on anywhere, and passing by Celtic Woman again and what’s this?
They are doing “Beeswing” by Richard Thompson, a very beautiful love song about a little slip of a gal that cannot be tamed.
So you know I have to listen to it. Its about time they updated their playlist. The four lasses are doing OK with it, and there is a guy playing the pipes. The chorus:

"She was a rare thing
Fine as a beeswing
So fine a breath of wind might blow her away
She was a lost child
She was running wild, she said
As long as there's no price on love, I'll stay
And you wouldn't want me any other way"

But here is the thing.
They didn’t do the last verse!
What the hell?
How can you not do the last verse?
They stopped at “like a fool I let her run with a ramblin' itch”.
No Gypsy caravan, no wolfhound, no hip pocket, no faded flower, no chains refused.
Is that horrible or what?

The missing lyrics:

"Last I hear she's sleeping out
Back on Derby beat
White Horse in her hip pocket
And a wolfhound at her feet
And they say she even married once
A man named Romany Brown
But even a Gypsy caravan
Was too much settling down
And they say her flower is faded now
Hard weather and hard booze
But maybe that's just the price you pay
For the chains you refuse"

ITS A WONDERFUL LIFE

Last night I turned the TV on and Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer was on. The old Claymation one with Burl Ives. If I had a dollar for every time I've seen this show starting when I was 6 years old I could buy the North Pole. It was the part where Rudolph meets the adorable pretty-eyed doe with the little red polka dot bow, who flutters her huge eyelashes and tells Rudolph she thinks he's cute, that got me all blubbery, and I cried and cried.


It was just so sweet, and even a funny looking red-nosed bashful reindeer with a nasally sinus voice like Rudolph deserves to have someone with huge eyelashes that thinks they are cute to flirt and prance and caper about with them.
Then Rudolph tries to join in the reindeer games, and his fake nose he tried to use to hide his own spectacular schnozola falls off, exposing the big glowing red one, and all the other little boy reindeer started to tease him about his nose, and I cried some more. Then the coach of the reindeer games, in a very Trump-like fashion, starts to bully Rudolph too, and declares Rudolph unfit to play in the reindeer games, and I cried and cried and cried. I was a sopping wet mess.
So I figured what the hell, we may as well get this over with and put on "Its A Wonderful Life" and cried pretty much from start to finish.
Because Hey, its Gosh Darn Christmas.
Mercury is in Retrograde.
Let it bleed.


Melville says everything flows to the sea.
I that is so, then everything flows FROM "Its A Wonderful Life ".
Its got everything. Hockey, High School hijinks, real estate, Uncle Billy, car crashes, bar fights, skinny dipping, foxy librarians, bank crashes, bells, wheelchairs, spiders, ice cream, drugs, war hero's, singing cops, cab drivers, Italian Americans, malfeasance, crows, angels, angel wings, and Fully Clothed Women.
And Zuzu's petals.

JUST KILL ME NOW

Phone rings. “Hello?”
“Mr Bulletholes, this is (garbled ) from Texas (garbled) and we have the results from your sleep study in. Can we schedule your follow up appointment?”
“Yes, please”
“Would you like morning or afternoon?”
“Either one. The sooner the better”
Long silence.
“How about 2:30 on January 21st?”
Long silence while Mr Bulletholes calculates that this is five weeks away, and does his best to keep from blowing his top.
Then, in his sweetest voice “Miss (garbled) do you know I started this process all the way back in July? I was really hoping in July to have this done before the end of the year.”
“I’m sorry Mr. Bulletholes.”
“Is there nothing you can do for me? I'm so tired of being tired”
“Well, let me see….” Long silence. “Did you say morning or afternoon, Mr Bulletholes?”
“Either one”
Long silence.
“How about this Friday at 11:00 am?”
“You are a miracle worker. Thank you.”

Amusing Ourselves to Death

 “What [George] Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What [Aldous] Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism … In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.”

— Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death

FOR MR RITTENHOUSE

 

Great Movies From My Youth
James Stewart as Charlie Anderson, scouring with several sons and a daughter the Shenandoah Valley, looking for his youngest son, accidentally taken prisoner during the Civil War.

Charlie Anderson : [a young Confederate picket has just shot one of Anderson's sons] Dead. Dead! How old are you? How old?
Young Picket on Road : Sixteen.
Charlie Anderson : [In a rage, but restraining himself] "Six - Sixteen. I'm not gonna' kill you. I want you to live! I want you to live to be an old man. And I want you to have many... many, many children. And I want you to feel about your children then... the way I feel about mine now! And someday, when a man comes along and kills one of 'em, I want you to remember! I want you to remember."

To young Mr. Rittenhouse, I hope you will remember.

NEED TO KNOW

"I found out I was in love with you, winter before last," she said. "I wasn't going to say anything about it because - well, you know. If you felt anything like that for me, you'd have known I did. But it wasn't both of us. So there was no good in it. But then, when you told us you're leaving... At first I thought, all the more reason to say nothing. But then I thought, that wouldn't be fair. To me, partly. Love has a right to be spoken. And you have a right to know that somebody loves you. That somebody has loved you, could love you. We all need to know that. Maybe it's what we need most."

— A Fisherman of the Inland Sea, Ursula K. Le Guin
 

"YOU BEEN PUTTING IT UP YOUR WHOLE LIFE"

Last year about this time lots of folks were pointing out that the odds of contracting Covid were about 1 in 100.
The chances of dying from it were 1 in 10,000.
As of today (9/20/2021), 40 million Americans have contracted Covid (about 12%), and the death rate according to population is 20 for every 10,000.
The reasons are pretty clear; the highly contagious DELTA variant which took hold this year, the huge increase in cases among the younger population, and the reluctance of many to vaccinate.
It took 170 years after the smallpox vax to eradicate the disease. Lets hope it doesn’t take that long for Covid.
What do you stand to win?
Everything.

Anton Chigurh: What's the most you ever lost on a coin toss.
Gas Station Proprietor: Sir?
Anton Chigurh: The most. You ever lost. On a coin toss.
Gas Station Proprietor: I don't know. I couldn't say.
[Chigurh flips a quarter from the change on the counter and covers it with his hand]
Anton Chigurh: Call it.
Gas Station Proprietor: Call it?
Anton Chigurh: Yes.
Gas Station Proprietor: For what?
Anton Chigurh: Just call it.
Gas Station Proprietor: Well, we need to know what we're calling it for here.
Anton Chigurh: You need to call it. I can't call it for you. It wouldn't be fair.
Gas Station Proprietor: I didn't put nothin' up.
Anton Chigurh: Yes, you did. You've been putting it up your whole life you just didn't know it. You know what date is on this coin?
Gas Station Proprietor: No.
Anton Chigurh: 1958. It's been traveling twenty-two years to get here. And now it's here. And it's either heads or tails. And you have to say. Call it.
Gas Station Proprietor: Look, I need to know what I stand to win.
Anton Chigurh: Everything.
Gas Station Proprietor: How's that?
Anton Chigurh: You stand to win everything. Call it.
Gas Station Proprietor: Alright. Heads then.
[Chigurh removes his hand, revealing the coin is indeed heads]
Anton Chigurh: Well done.
[the gas station proprietor nervously takes the quarter with the small pile of change he's apparently won while Chigurh starts out]
Anton Chigurh: Don't put it in your pocket, sir. Don't put it in your pocket. It's your lucky quarter.
Gas Station Proprietor: Where do you want me to put it?
Anton Chigurh: Anywhere not in your pocket. Where it'll get mixed in with the others and become just a coin. Which it is.

REALITY

 “The thing under my bed waiting to grab my ankle isn't real. I know that, and I also know that if I'm careful to keep my foot under the covers, it will never be able to grab my ankle.”

Stephen King, Night Shift

BE LIKE ROD

 

Due to a worldwide 80% vaccination rate for smallpox back in the '60's, people don’t even need to get vaccinated anymore. Through a global effort, we wiped it out. The vaccine itself had a high rate of efficacy at 95%. You may have heard there has never been a vaccine that achieved 100%. They don’t have to. Mumps vax comes in at a measly 88%.
See Rod’s Smallpox scar? Thank you Rod.
Now go put on something decent.

I USED TO BE A RULEBREAKER

It has taken me 64 years to learn simply following the rules eliminates most of the problems in my life even if they don't make sense to me at the time.

BUT MADGE!

 

"You're soaking in it."
Waiting for the Ivermectin craze to blow over.

ANTI-VAXXERS

 

"Most importantly, we are marshaling America’s scientific genius to produce a vaccine in record time. Under Operation Warp Speed, we have three different vaccines in the final stage of trials right now, years ahead of what has been achieved before. Nobody thought it could be done this fast. Normally it would be years, and we did it in a matter of a few months. We are producing them in advance so that hundreds of millions of doses will be quickly available. We will have a safe and effective vaccine this year, and together we will crush the virus."

Donald Trump, RNC speech August 27, 2020.

Yes Donald, and 75% of your electorate will refuse to take the Trump vaccine. There will be a new spike and a new strain due to low vaccination rates that will affect a large number of children and completely stress the county's Health Care System.

It is not entirely your fault.

HOW HARD COULD IT BE?

I’ve been keeping a friends little puppy dog for about 6 weeks. Little Buster, ain’t he cute?
I called her a couple weeks ago.
“Buster needs a groomer. He’s getting a little stinky, and he pulled down my hot wax smell good thing, so he’s got a shiny blue waxy butt and matted hair”
“You can take him to PetSmart, they know him there” she says.
Well two weeks went by and I still hadn’t taken him. Then he and I were playing “Where's the Treat” a few nights ago.
That’s when I saw it. His little tear ducts were all matted up with eye boogers. I mean really bad. I felt horrible. I’d neglected poor Buster.
I called his owner but there was no answer.
I called my daughter, who knows all about these things.
“Dad, you can go online and make an appointment.”
I looked at Buster’s pitiful neglected eyes. The sooner the better.
I went online to make an appointment. But I didn’t really have access to Busters account, so I figured I’d make one of my own. How hard could it be? Its just a form you fill out. That’s what I do at work. I fill out forms. I’m pretty good too!

The form goes:
Dogs Name: Buster!
Weight: 10 lbs.
Color: Blonde
Breed: Lhaso Apso
Birthdate: 7/1/2021
An lastly a pic of Buster. I uploaded the one above and clicked CONTINUE.
(Big Beeping Sound and a warning message)
“Your dog is only 1 month old. We do not groom puppies this young”
Well, drats!
And good golly, there is not a way to edit or delete Buster, and those eye boogers are horrible so there is only one thing left to do.
Make another dog! How hard could it be?

I named this one “Mister Pete”, changed the birthdate by a year, uploaded that cute pic and clicked “CONTINUE”
(Big Beeping Sound and a warning message)
“This dog is already in the system”
Well, damn! I need a new pic for dog number three!

I named # 3 “Butterball”, uploaded the new pic and there was no warning buzzer. Success!
But now PetSmart wants me to upload Butterballs shot record, which I do not have and if I did the records would be for a dog named Buster.

And that is how I came have 3 dogs registered with PetSmart.

 

SEX SELLS....BEACH HANDBALL!

 

The European Handball Federation's disciplinary commission imposed a fine of 150 euros per player (around $175) on the 10-member Norwegian Women's squad. The squad traded the skimpy bikini for some nice athletic shorts. apparently this is against the rules. In a joint statement with the International Handball Federation, the officials said that "all efforts will be taken in order to further promote the sport. This includes the ideal presentation of the sport and, by that, includes the outfit of the players."
Shame on you International/European Handball Federation. Why not go all out and have them play topless? I'd wear that. As long as everyone in the stands is wearing that, incuding the members of the European Handball Federation.
You should see the Russian team. Who knew they even HAD beaches.

I BLESS THE RAINS DOWN IN AFRICA

 

What a great salt map Africa would make, with her 38 mountain ranges, Kilamanjaro, and the Rift valley.

Mrs Dahl, 5th grade teacher: "Bulletholes, have you been eating Isabel's salt map of the Pacific Ocean?"
Bulletholes: "No Ma'am"
Mrs Dahl: "Then why is your tongue so blue?"
Bulletholes: "Would you believe lack of oxygen"?

IF WE WERE IN PHILLY

 

I remember down in San Antonio, and Linda and I were trying to find a place to park in the endless caravan of cars creeping along the riverwalk. It went like this:
"There's a spot, Steve!"
"Its two lanes over"
"Well, get over there"
"I'll try..."
"Theres a spot!"
"I wont fit"
"Back up and try"
"There's a car right behind me"
"Oh, you missed it then"
"I tell you what, I'm going to take a right up here and see what happens"
I take the right.
"You should have gone left"
"OK hot rod, the next turn I'll ask what we should do"
We creep along in silence, her arms across her chest.
"OK Linda, right or left here?
You look both ways a couple times...
"Ummm...Ummm..." you say.
The guy behind me honks. I take the left.
"I was about to say right!"
"Too late now!"
Then you say "If we were in Philly and I was driving we'd be parked by now. This is nothing compared to Philly!"
And we both just cracked up!
Ended up finding a good spot.
Ya know, if we can get through that we could probably get through anything.

She is a very pretty girl. My god, she is timeless!

ANY LUCK?

 

Bloodrock is legendary around here. Famous for but one early 70's hit, DOA, about a fatal car crash Back when I was 16 I heard Bloodrock lived out at Eagle Mountain Lake. So me and some buddies loaded up and went looking for them. All weekend, cruising Eagle Mountain, hit every beach, every Foosers Hut, every underage bar, looking high and low for Bloodrock.
You may wonder did we have any luck?
Hell yes!
But we never did find Bloodrock.

Apparently he got that one wrong.

 "I don't think anybody is questioning the legitimacy of the presidential election"

~Kevin McCarthy

THE LATEST ADDITION TO THE RENFRO CULINARY REPETOIRE

I told my friend Nancy about my first week as lunch cook at The Crystal Cactus, the Hyatt's gourmet Restaurant back in 1982.
"My third day the chef came to me and said that the special tomorrow would be Cannelloni. I had no idea what that was, and had no intention of revealing my ignorance. There was no such thing as Google back then, so I went that evening to Barnes and Noble bookstore and found a recipe for Cannelloni's. The next morning I went in an hour early to do something I had never done before:
Make pasta from scratch and roll out the dough as thin as I could get it.
It sounded like it might be difficult, and there had been mention of a machine that would do it for you. It ended up being more difficult than it sounded, and I found out why old Italian women have big burly arms.
Never having made pasta dough I could only hope the consistency was close enough. I was rolling that dough pretty hard when the chef appeared at my side.
"What are you doing, Renfro?" he asked.
"Making cannelloni's, chef" I replied.
He reached into a cooler and pulled out a box of Eggroll wrappers. Genius!
"We usually just use these." he said "but its looks like you got it going."
The next week he showed me where they kept the pasta roller machine. There is a lesson here I think"
I told Nancy this story last weekend, and today came in the mail my new surprise Pasta Roller Noodle Making Machine.

THE MASK NAZI

 

I had an unpleasant experience at a local Will Call picking up a package.

Big sign outside saying masks required, and "Employees Only" for inside. After a few minutes a girl comes to the door, opens it a crack and mumble's something. She had to repeat it 3 times before I could figure it out.

"Where's your mask? she asks "You need a mask."

"I'm not coming in, am I? I'm not supposed to come in, right?" and I try to hand her the invoice. She won't take it.

"You have to have a mask"

"Out here?"

"Yes, its our policy"

"Oh... I do not have a mask with me"

She disappears, obviously exasperated that I would dare come to her door mask less. A minute goes by. She brings me a mask. I put it on. Now, through the crack in the door, she will take the invoice. She brings my package and slips it, wordlessly, through the crack in the door. I cannot for the life of me remember ever leaving a place of business without saying "Thank You" to someone. This was a first.

I am all for masks, I’ve got both vaccines and still wear one everywhere I go, but if you are going to ask me to wear one outside your door, you really should at least say "Good afternoon" first.

I've been trying to decide whether to call the company or not, and now that I've written it down I surely do believe I will.

THE FIRST TIME I MET CATHEY JUNE

 

Me and a buddy had an apartment at Brown Trail apartments in 1976. We did everything we could to make sure it was a 24 hour 7 day a week party there.
Somebody brought Cathey over. She was 17, and they said she was a Raiderette. She was the first Raiderette to ever come to our place.
So there she was, a gorgeous long legged blonde with a shapely figure and those blue eyes-- did I say she was blonde-- and I dont know how it came up but I managed to tell her that her ass was a little big for my taste and she slapped me and left.
Forty years later when we started going out she asked me why I had said that to her all those years before.
"Because you were so pretty, and your legs were so long and your entire body so lovely, and your bosom so firm, and you had those Cupid's bow lips, and all that blonde hair and I could barely stand there in front of you without fainting"
"Yes" she said "But what about my ass?"
I blushed and hung my head. "It was perfect too."


Cathey and I went together for about two years 3/2017 to 4/2019.

We enjoyed each others company immensely, and stayed in touch even after we were no longer a thing. Sometimes that's just how love goes. She stayed in such pain and in such poor health I sometimes didn't know how she managed to stay so happy and so pretty. Sometimes it took her a long time to get ready to go somewhere, and sometimes when she finally got ready we would both just decide to stay in and watch Game Of Thrones for the 16th time. And that was just fine. I have a lot of pics of Cathey, and some of these are from the first time we went to Oklahoma to an Art Show and Music Festival where my son was playing. She had just gotten all the bones removed from her feet and I got to push her around in a wheelchair It felt good doing that. Cathey always made me feel good, especially about other people, and that made me feel good about myself at a time in my life I really needed to try to feel good about me.

Rest In Peace Cathey, Gone Too Soon
9/11/1959 ~ 4/15/2021

AND OUR HEARTS WERE AN OPEN BOOK

 

It would have been Mom and Dads 74th Anniversary. Its hard for me, at the age of 63 and them being gone 35 years now, to believe they had ever been this young.

"In a rush this weekday morning,
I tap the horn as I speed past the cemetery
where my parents lie buried
side by side under a smooth slab of granite.

Then, all day long, I think of him rising up
to give me that look
of knowing disapproval
while my mother calmly tells him to lie back down."

- Billy Collins -

Poem gathered at "Alive On All Channels"
https://allchannels.blogspot.com/

HOME REPAIRS

I moved into my new house a few days ago. It needs a little TLC. And curtains. I woke up last night at 3am, thinking about the damn closet light that wont come on. It would be nice to have a closet light. I went in the kitchen, bare beamed and buck naked, got a butter knife, took the cover off the closet light switch, crossed the terminals with the butter knife and the light came on! Top wire was a little loose. Project complete!

Tonight I plan to tackle the doorbell. If anyone wants to stop by, or wants to learn about how a doorbell works, the show starts at Midnight.

TOMORROW

 

"People are always getting ready for tomorrow. I didn't believe in that. Tomorrow wasn't getting ready for them. It didn't even know they were there."

Cormac McCarthy, The Road

IF YOU SEE HER SAY HELLO

Back when I first got on FB, and there were all my sisters old pals; Suzi, Carol, Susan S, and Maureen O. And I’d leave a comment now and then about an old girlfriend from 1972 who had moved away. I’d say (imagine a really whiny voice) “Where is Rhonda? Why? Why is Rhonda not here on FB? Y’all have to find her for me.” They would laugh at me and say they lost track of her, maybe she was still in Phoenix, or Utah, and what was her married name?

And for a year or two, I’d ask about her every now and then, in as whiny a voice as I could without whiny voice font. Really, I’d just liked to have known that she was OK, and I wanted them to know I had not forgotten about Rhonda I.

But after two or three years of this, I changed my tack. I started pretending I was mad at her (in my mad whiny voice).
“Forget about us finding Rhonda! Why is she not LOOKING FOR US! We are all right here, just waiting for her to show up!”
And they would all laugh at me and promise they would look for her.

Then-- after six years of asking about her-- about three years ago Susan S sends me a message. She has found her, and there is a pic of her in a white sweater, waving, and she had a black beret on, and I’d have recognized her anywhere.
Susan said “She is still in Phoenix!” and I just got the feeling that was that, and really shouldn’t ask a bunch of questions. I was satisfied to see this pic, and to think that she was doing well.
It prompted me to write this story about her bracelet I gave her, the going steady bracelets all the boys gave to the girls they loved.

So another two years go by, and I’m at a bar last year and Carol is there.
I’m talking with her, and I say “Hey guess what I got?”
“What do you have Steve?”
“I’ve got a picture of Rhonda from a couple years ago! Susan found her!”
I said it like I was bragging, like I was something special.
Carol says “That’s nothing. I see her all the time on Facebook!”

 So now I’m all set for my imagination to start running wild. Why didn’t Susan tell me? How is it everybody is friends with Rhonda except for me? Maybe she's hated me for 49 years.
but no, Rhonda could never have a bitter heart. So I went looking for her on FB. It wasn’t easy. Didn’t know her last name. I can’t see Carols FB page because she blocked me years ago. I’m way too liberal. I voted for Reagan twice and Bush three times, I like less government control mostly and own 4 guns, but I’m a whacked out Liberal. And on Susan’s page, I cant find any Rhonda’s. Finally, I get a brainstorm. I’ve got my sisters log in, so I go to her page and look at Carols page.

 Jackpot!
There she is on Carols page.

So now I have to figure out what I want to do. Should I friend her, even though my overall gut feeling from Susan is that she isn't looking for new friends? Or should I just go ahead and inflict myself upon her!
I went back and forth for a long time. Part of me said, like Rick said in Casablanca “If she can stand it so can I” and another part said “Stop being so weird and overthinking this thing. If she doesn’t want to be friends, she’s a big girl and just wont accept the request. It really is just that easy!”

I tell you what. If it wasn’t for COVID, and all the isolation, it might have taken me a lot longer to contact her. But she accpted the request that same day. She seemed delighted to be found. Its been such fun chatting it up, getting reaquainted, and being able to trade gifts. And a blessing too!
And that’s the story of how I finally came to send Rhonda a friend request months after having located her, and years after whining to her friends that they must find Rhonda for me.

One big question I had for Rhonda was whether she remembered a poster she gave me in 1972. It hung on my wall long after she moved to Phoenix. There is no way she could know how much the poster had burned itself into my psyche, and how it had seemed to be the theme of my whole life, and got me through the numerous heartbreaks I’ve had, and love found and lost, and found again.
It took my breath a little when she replied "I wondered if you would remember"

Amazing. You can still buy the exact same poster after all these years.

I MISSED MY CALLING

In High School they tested me to see what career I should choose. They recommended I be a preacher. I shit you not, that is what they said. You probably should not drop acid before you do such an evaluation.

HE ALLOWS IT

 Continued from “Return To Living”…

...That is how I came to remove myself from a burned out trailer and rejoined the world of the living. Its August of 004 and now I’ve got an apartment and a job. The kids live just a mile away. I'm back in their lives for the first time in almost two years.  I can walk to work at Subway Sandwiches, two blocks. It pays 6.50 an hour, plus a sandwich a day, and all the cookies I can eat. That’s a major move up from eating dry ramen noodles right out of the pack, although they do make a nice crunchy little snack if you are so inclined. Its an end to eyeballing the chickens that run across the Chester Boyer road right up the way from the old trailer and trying to run over one when I would pass by. Dinner. But that’s a whole ‘nother story.

Out at the trailer I did do a little work. An occasional odd job and a couple tile jobs where I didn’t charge near enough. I had a guy’s lot I mowed from time to time. Perhaps my most steady job, that I kept for about 6 months was as a sampler at the grocery store. You’ve seen them; usually little old ladies with a booth set up, sampling little cups filled with the latest Ritz wheat cracker, and maybe she has some peanut butter or a slice of the California Happy Cow cheese to go with it.

Having been a chef for 30 years, it felt a little like being in the old chef’s graveyard, or on Lumpfish Row haha,  but for 3 days a week it let me get out of the trailer and engage with human beings and talk to strangers about food. I had fun. I’m good at being a loner and isolating myself, which I had done at the trailer. But I love people. I love talking to them. It makes me happy to see them. And I was probably the best food sampler ever. Not probably. I WAS. The lady I worked for told me so. At Thanksgiving I sold more Spiral sliced hams than anyone in the nation. I had women lined up around the block to buy a ham. I got a bonus!

Its because I’m loud. And when called upon have no problem calling attention to myself. I remember at  Kroger one day-- I don’t remember what I was selling-- a woman popped her head out from an aisle about 4 rows down.
“Steve Bulletholes?” she says.
“YES!” says I.
And she starts walking toward me. I don’t recognize her at all until she is about ten feet away. I hadn’t seen her in about 5 years.
“Well, I’ll be,  my old friend Terri! How are you Terri!” I say.
“I’m fine. How are you Steve?”
“I’m good. But I have to ask you. How did you know it was me from thirty feet away?”
She says “Steve, I knew it was you when I walked in the front door. Don’t you not have an inside voice?”
And we both just laughed. Dumb question.

Then one day the display lady brought me a chef’s hat to wear. I told her I was not going to wear a chefs hat to sell anything at a grocery store display. It was humiliating enough to be a chef reduced to this, but I had to draw the line somewhere.
“You’re my best guy” she pleaded.
“Not going to happen.”
"Then I have to let you go"
"Fine"

Funny, how you start out to write one thing and something else just falls out. This is what I was supposed to write:

I had the apartment and the Subway job for about three months. But I was still spending a good portion of my paycheck on dope. And I don’t mean pot. I mean serious adult dope that ruins lives dope. And after about 3 months I was far enough behind on the rent that on the 5^th of December I had to go to my apartment manager and tell them they may as well start the eviction process. I still owed for November and didn't have a red cent to give them. Whatever break I’d gotten getting out of that trailer, I had  blown it . And then I had to go to the Ex Mrs Bullets.

She was pretty calm. She said “C’mon, I’m going to take you down to Kelly Girls and they will find you another job.
I said “Kelly Girls? That’s like office work, right? I talk too loud and laugh too hard to work in an office”.
But like before I just did what she said.
We got down to Kelly and the manger, Liz, said “We don’t do walk ins, but I can schedule you for an interview tomorrow morning”. An interview was set for 9AM the next morning.
I worked my shift at Subway, and sometime during the night I got cold feet. I can’t work for Kelly. I don’t know anything about office work. And the next morning I called Liz at Kelly.
“Liz, I ended up having to work this morning. I’m not going to be able to make it in” I lied.
“OK Steve. Would you like to reschedule? And I want you to know if you reschedule, and cancel again, then I cant reschedule another one. Ever”
It was a cusp. I hadn’t trusted anything I’d done in years. But someone was willing to tell me what to do, and I guess I could trust that.
“Sure!  Let’s do tomorrow!”
And I made it to the interview. I could tell Liz liked me. That is always a good thing, when someone likes you. I think part of why she liked me was something I learned at Subway. That it is a good thing for people think YOU LIKE THEM. Smile, say hello, be pleased to meet them.

I told her that I needed a job within two miles of my residence because of transportation issues. This was on Friday 12/10/2004. She called that afternoon. She had a job at the airport. “Too far” I told her.
An hour went by. She called again.
“I have a job at 4510 Blue Jay Way. Its in your zip code. Can you be there Monday morning to interview?”

So duly I arrived Monday morning. Talked with the manager. He said they did communication systems for the airlines industry.
‘I wont have to talk to pilots, and talk them down when something goes wrong up there, will I?” I asked.
“No Steve, we don’t do much of that around here.”
I could tell he had a great sense of humor and he liked me. I liked him. Liz called that afternoon. I started the next morning at 8:00 making 12.50 an hour.

EPILOGUE

I started the next morning at 8:00 making 12.50 an hour. Double my wage at Subway. It was a Tuesday, the 14^th of the month. I managed to get 40 hours in by Friday. I turned in my time, and on Monday the 21^st I got my check. Apparently, Kelly is fast getting you paid. Between that and the check I’d received from Subway on Friday I paid rent in full.
Paid in full.
I’m not real good at saying it, but Someone was sure looking out for me. Through all of this, including those darker days at the trailer, Someone was looking out.  I continued to work both jobs for a few months. It was quite a learning curve between using computers and learning office etiquette. Around May of 2005 the company offered me a job as a full time regular employee. It’s a large corporation with a top-notch benefits package I was no longer the best Kelly Girl ever. (That’s what Liz called me).
And I’m still there now.
Sixteen years later, and I'm still there now. 
Believe it or not but I still talk too loud and laugh too hard. But some people in the company will call me just to hear me say "Good Morning". I give the best good morning in the business.

Its amazing what can happen if you follow some instructions. Learn to say OK, you're right. One thing I think I’ve learned about all this is that we seem to continually mess up Gods plan. God doesn’t always plan it, any more than we plan for the pooch to shit on the living room floor or chew up a new pair of shoes. But He allows it, and then goes to work when you let Him. He uses it, and we learn to use it too. It can become our ministry.

It would be a few more years before I finally quit doing dope. But that is a whole ‘nother story.

See the chef on the pizza box?
Thats the ultimate degradation right there. Being the model for a pizza box cover.
But a mans gonna do what he has to do!

RETURN TO THE LAND OF THE LIVING

I lived for 18 months in a  burned out trailer. Like my son says, I just kinda threw in the towel. Fell out of love with being a chef and got chewed up and spit out trying to be a tilesetter for a few years. It was excruciating, and by the time I got to that trailer with no electricity and no plumbing I didn’t care if I ever worked again. And somehow in Gods good plan, the trailer and Arnold blessed me with blessings that extend to the present.
(follow linky's)

But this part of the story is about how I got OUT of the trailer. Its quite simple really.
I let someone tell me what to do.
My ex wife came out there one day and said “You cant do this. You got two kids that need you. What do we have to do to get you to re-engage?”. She may not have been as pleasant about it as all that. But when she decides the heavens and earth must move, the heavens and earth shall move
I told her I had no drivers license, no social security card, no birth certificate, no prospects, a car that didn’t hardly run, and no telling how many warrants out for my arrest.
I said "Frankly, I have never heard of anyone being quite as lame as I am right now."
When I look back, that right there may have been the finest thing I have ever said.

Well, the first thing we did was go downtown. She pretended to be my sister so that we could get a copy of my birth certificate. We went to the post office and I filled out a voters registration card. With a Birth Certificate and a voters registration you can get a Texas ID Card. I could not get a drivers license. Wouldn’t you know that my license had been suspended for some time? A result of the stack of registration, inspection and no insurance tickets I had piled up.

So when she dropped me off at the trailer, she said she would be back in a few days and we could go get an ID Card. I got out of the car, and the wind was blowing about 40 miles an hour. As she pulled away, my birth certificate blew out of my hand, and I had to chase it a half mile down the railroad tracks. If I’d lost that certificate she would have skinned me alive.

So 3 days later and here she is. We go get me an ID. Then she takes me to her neighborhood, where the kids live. “Your going to find a job today” she says. We went to the grocery, where I applied. We went to an MRI Imaging place, where I applied. We went to an IHOP, where I didn’t want to, but I applied because that’s what she told me to do. I was wanting to ask how I was going to get to these jobs, my burned out trailer being 15 miles away, but figured I'd just follow instructions for now.

Then we went to Subway Sandwich shop. I walked in and found the manager. I said “I was a chef for 25 years, and I swore I would never work food service again, so…HERE I AM!”
She said “Can you close?”
“Yes ma’am, I’m the best closer in the business. You’ll walk in in the morning and wonder why your job just got easier, and your coffee suddenly started tasting sweeter.”
She hired me on the spot.
But the ex Mrs Bulletholes, she wasn’t done. We went across the street to an apartment complex. It was like the cheapest in the city.
She said “Go in there and rent an apartment”
“But I don’t have a deposit. And working at Subway isn’t enough money to rent an apartment.”
“Tell them you do tile too”
“But...” and I started to say my car doesn’t run good enough to do tile, but by the look on her face I changed my mind and just said “OK”
(As an aside here, let me say there are three thing I’ve found to be very helpful things to say in any given situation: “Youre Right”, “I’m Sorry” and “OK”. There's a fourth one too, but it takes some practice knowing when to say it, and you don’t really say it out loud. It is “SO WHAT?” and you say it to yourself.)
So I went in and schmoozzed the nice apartment lady and walked out with a lease in my hand, based on having a job I hadn’t actually, you know, started yet. 

That is how I came to remove myself from living in a burned out trailer and rejoined the world of the living. After almost two years I would be able to see the kids regular again. But that’s only half the story. Its difficult to keep an apartment on Subway Sandwich wages, especially if you are doing dope. And despite bankruptcies, foreclosures, divorces, evictions, being a deadbeat dad, the degrading of basic moral fiber, and 18 months of living in a burned out trailer, I was still doing dope.

To be continued...

A LITTLE BIT OF HISTORY REPEATING?

 

Deceased Pope Formosus was impeached by Pope Stephen the 6th and the Catholic Church in 897. Formosus body was exhumed; he was dressed in the papal vestments, seated on a throne and he stood trial, dead as a doornail. He was found guilty of being unworthy of the office.
The damnatio memoriae (erased history) was applied to Formosus, all his measures and acts were annulled, and the orders conferred by him were declared invalid. The papal vestments were torn from his body, the three fingers from his right hand he had used in blessings were cut off, and the corpse was thrown into the Tiber, later to be retrieved by a monk.
Following the death of Stephen VI, Formosus' body was reinterred in St Peter's Basilica and further trials of this nature against deceased persons were banned

I COULDA BEEN A CONTENDER

 Last year I was on pace to pretty much double my blogging production from the last several years. 
Sixty posts in July had me on track for over one hundred post for the year. I hadnt had a year like that in a long time. My best year production wise was when I first got clean in 2009.
340 posts in a 365 day period!

I'm not sure why I fell off last year. COVID Fatigue? Isolation? Politics? Lack of Interest? Probably all of the above. Also, after 15 years of blogging sometimes you just run out of stories to tell, especially if you stop paying attention.

Anyway, I know a lot of people that write about writing but never actually write anything. 
I'm not going to start doing that, but maybe this will help jump start me for 2021.