WE ALL FLOAT DOWN HERE

We have a new ritual. We normally sleep like a baby. Head hits the pillow and we are gone.
But we had some french drains installed last month in our backyard. We thought spending 4000 bucks on our new house would be fun. In our mind the finished product would look like the 12th hole at Pebble Beach.
But it was a nightmare. The drains were poorly installed, and now our backyard looks like Fukushima.
We lay awake, thinking of how we are going to fix them; how much it will cost to bring the guy whose bid we DIDNT go with in to fix them; how much crow we will have to eat to do so; googling up how to properly install a french drain in the dark on the phone at 3:00a.m. , the price of topsoil, sharpshooter shovels, pallets of grass, maybe a flagstone patio; contemplating that water will not drain uphill in that spot we pointed out to the installer; visions of a tsunami erupting from the drains, snakes sewer rats flotsam and jetsam, and a weird clown named Pennywise sitting in my kitchen laughing at me; the flood carrying our flatscreen TV, sofa cushions, Laz-Z-Boy, all our worldly possessions and mineral resources being carried downstream to the east fork of the Trinity river; then looping back into the resentment we have against the SHOEMAKER that SCREWED us in the first place. He broke our fence and stole our baby crowbar. Our dads baby crowbar, worth a couple hundred dollars sentimental value alone.
Do we have the energy to take this on and fix the drains ourselves?
Not if we don't shut off the brain and get some sleep.

BEEP BEEP STEVIE BOY!

DREAM WITHIN A DREAM

I had a weird one last week. I dreamed that an old buddy of mine needed some help on something. Don’t remember exactly what.
I said “I’ve given you enough help. You are going to have to do this on your own”
And he said “But I helped you in in the exact same thing. Why wont you help me?”
I said “When did you help me?”
He said “In the dream you had earlier”
And while I was in this dream I thought back and yes, he was right, I had dreamed earlier he helped me.
And the thing is in real life this guy has helped me a lot. Back in my addiction he tried to help me so much I had to stop calling him for help.
But back to the dream.
I said “When did you help me?”
He said “In the dream you had earlier”
So I said “Yeah, but that was different”.
You should have seen the look on his face. I woke up, LMAO.

That was Thursday last week. He calls me out of the blue on Sunday night.
“Steve, Vickie and I had a fight. I need a place to stay tonight”
Surprised I was not. She’s a bitch.
“Sure Buddy, come on over!”

UNDER SURVEILLANCE

For some reason this reminds me of the family vacation we took to South Padre when I was 17. Two families really, my dads best friend Bruce and his family went with us.
Anyway, here we are on South Padre and I needed to get away from the families in order to score some pot from somewhere. This would amount to approaching some stranger a mile north of the Mexico border and asking where I could get some shit. I guess in 1974 it wasn’t as risky as it would be these days.
So I make some excuse to use the car to drive to a store and buy a book to read. Because what 17 year old freak wouldn’t want to do some summer reading at South Padre right? Bear with me here.
I cruised around and finally found a dude that looked like I might score from him and as luck would have it, I did!
Now I had to find a book.
They had a book rack in an old Skillerns drug store. I spent a long time looking at books and finally found one titled “The New American Revolution; How A French Marxist Society Is Coming To America”. It would go well with my Dick Gregory collection at home, provided that I could figure out what a fucking French Marxist was.
When I got back to the hotel with my stash and that book, Bruce wanted to see what book I’d bought.
I pulled it out of the bag and handed it to him. I thought he was going to shit a brick.
Later, on the beach rolling a joint I turned to glance back at the hotel and I could see Bruce on the balcony with a pair of binoculars, eyeballin’ the shit out of me, a newly born French Marxist.

ON ROUX

"The assistant of the stock, the roux, brings to the brown sauce only a flavor note of little importance, beyond its thickening principle, and it has the disadvantage of requiring, in order that the sauce be perfect, an almost absolute elimination of its components. Only the starchy principle remains in a sauce properly skimmed. Indeed, if this element is absolutely necessary to give mellowness and velvetiness to the sauce; it is much simpler to give it pure, which permits one to bring it to the point in as little time as possible, and to avoid a too prolonged sojourn on the fire. It is therefore infinitely probable that before long starch, fecula, or arrowroot obtained in a state of absolute purity will replace flour in the roux."

August Escoffier

CHIEF WAHOO AND THE REDSKINS

A friend of mine invited me to a church camp back around 2000. I think the idea was maybe I might get saved. I didn’t. But I enjoyed cooking for all the church people. So, I was grilling burgers on Saturday night. I was wearing one of my favorite shirts; a Cleveland Indians shirt with Chief Wahoo on it. I loved that shirt.

So I’m grilling burgers and this guy pulls me to the side. Says “I’m Native American, and you shirt is very offensive to some people. I’m not asking that you take it off. I just want you to know.” He was as polite as a person can be while saying something like that.
I didn’t see anything wrong with my shirt.

So a few years later I’m in my closet looking for something to wear and I see my Wahoo shirt. I start to put it on. And I thought about that guy a few years earlier. I took the shirt off, hung it back up and it went to Goodwill a year later. I don’t know what came over me. Its not like I suddenly thought the shirt was offensive. I just decided I didn’t need to have that shirt. Why wear a shirt that might offend anybody?
The Redskins insignia is a little more dignified than ol’ Chief Wahoo. Or, I should say, was.

I guess on another level my spiritual practice, my sacrament, is not wearing that shirt for a guy I'll never see again. I think about him a lot whenever I have a chance to protect someone else's dignity. I don't expect anyone to be able to relate to any of this, its just my story.

I can see why Chief Wahoo is a little offensive. But he can come to my party anytime!

BEING KING

I like Biden. I guess one of the most important things to me in a president is "Does he like people?" I think Biden likes people.
Trump? Trump likes money. I think he likes money more than he likes people. He seems to have a huge list of people he doesn't like. He's pretty loud about it too.
And even the people he seems to like tend to fall out of his favor very quickly.
I think this is a bad combination when it comes to being King.
Being King.
I have a story somewhere about a King...

"This is the story of a very kind and generous Arab King. The nation did not know hunger during his times.
He would part with anything, but one thing.
One of his horses was very dear to his heart. That was the one thing he wouldn’t let go of. Not for all the money in the world.
A thief decided to scam the king. There was one way to scam a generous soul.
He knew the King took his dear horse out for a ride, same time, same path, everyday. So, he threw himself on the ground, on the kings path, screaming that he’s been hit and robbed by thieves.
The king came down off of his dear horse, and ran to help this man.
He hit the king, and ran to ride the beautiful horse away.
The king asked him for one thing,
“Can you please not tell anyone how you took my horse?
”The thief said, laughing, “Why, are you afraid they’ll call you a fool?”
“No.” The King replied. “I fear people in my kingdom will not be stopping for a man in need anymore.”

Can you imagine Donald Trump saying that?

#1 COVID 19 BUDDY OF THE DAY

I had a weird one yesterday. I left the Dollar Store and a girl came up to my car window and wanted to buy my mask.
Really?
I told her they would give her one in the Dollar Store. So I watched while she went in because, well, she looked kinda nice if you know what I mean.
Then she came right back out with a mask and went to the Liquor Store next door.
Friggen' East Side. This town is a trip.

Image stolen from Peteski @ https://thisisnthappiness.com/archive

ON THE "N" WORD

When I was Garde Manger at the Hyatt I had four little black ladies that worked for me. Panola, Geraldine, Georgia, and Pearl. The Salad Ladies. They loved me and we had a blast. I found if I could get them talking in the morning they would work their ass off for me. They used to use that n-word all the time, threw it around like peanuts at the circus. No, they didn’t use it that much. This was 1985. It was not quite like today where you hear and see it a lot. One day I decided I would try to use it. Panola, she was like the leader, she put her knife down, and the other three stopped jabbering. The look on their faces was surprise and hurt. Panola said you are crazy white boy if you think you can use that word. But it was too late. I already figured it out just by the looks on their faces. That's not my word to be able to weigh in on. they went back to working like nothing ever happened but I never tried that again..

I see the question come up now and then. “Why can’t white folks use that word? Black folks use it plenty.” My first reaction is that any white person using that word is going nowhere in a hurry. Its an ugly word with a horrible past. My second reaction is that black folks own that word, bought and paid for. It was inflicted upon them in the most hateful ways imaginable and often accomanied by physical violence. Its called “appropriation” I think, and probably by making it a term of endearment among themselves, they took its power away.

I think the last time I used it was a couple years ago. I had just seen this Denzel movie "Fences", and its full of the n word. It just kind of slipped out, me mimicking Denzel. Denzel Washington. He can say the shit out of nigger, I tell you what. Luckily I was just with a good friend, who looked at me kinda like Panola did that day. It felt...awkward. I got enough racist history without taking that on.

Way back in HS for a Psyche Class I picked a book off a list to read. The title was “Nigger”, by the political activist and comedian Dick Gregory. Written in 1963. It was basically his autobiography. After I read that I read his other two books. Both had a great effect on me. A few months later when I was 17 I heard that Gregory was speaking at UT Arlington. I talked a buddy of mine into going with me.
I may not have been the most enlightened person in the auditorium that night, but I’ll bet I was the only 17 year old.
And thinking about it, it may be that what we see these days with blacks having taken ownership of the word Nigger is due in large part to Dick Gregory.
He said things like if he ever opened a restaurant he would name it Nigger for all the free advertising he would get.
A few times over the years, on Facebook, I have done a series of posts during Black History Month. Historical informative type pieces.
It was mostly in reaction to friends who would say “Why do we have a Black History Month”.
One year I titled all the posts as “Educate Your Ignorant White Ass On Some Black History Month”.
I had more than one person take exception to my title.
I wonder how they would be trying to handle being called something as inflammatory as Nigger?

TURN IT UP

When I was in the sixth grade the big kid across the street had a reel to reel. He said “Pick out what you want to hear” and handed me a list of songs on the reel. I looked it over. He had Grass Roots, Marty Robbins, Steppenwolf, Jimi Hendrix, Tommy Roe.
About halfway down there was the "Theme to the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly". That’s what I picked.
He said “You’re a weird little kid aren’t you?” and handed me the headphones.
Ennio Morricone, Composer extraordinaire, dead at 91.

The Manly Task

I had some drains installed in my backyard a few weeks ago. A big pile of dirt left over to back fill around the house and spread over the yard. I started out with a Home Depot bucket. After about 20 buckets I determined I was going to have about 450 to go so I went on down to Home Depot and got a manly wheelbarrow. It helped considerably.
So with all the dirt spread nicely over the clay in my backyard I turned my attention to my gutter. The one with the low spot. The one that spills tons of water over the edge every time it rains. And every time it rains more of my beautiful topsoil I have spread goes down the drains.
I sent a text to my handyman pal to come over and fix my low spot in the gutter. Low spots in gutters are way too technical for me. I had a low spot in a gutter years ago that I spent a decade trying to correct and all I ever did, all I ever succeeded in doing, was to punch holes in the gutter and the fascia of the house.
But my handyman pal never texted me back. With storm clouds on the horizon and my beautiful topsoil at risk I stopped at Home Depot and bought the big long nails and ferrules that are supposed to correct a sagging gutter. Once more, into the fray. .I watched several YouTube's. I got on the ladder and installed two ferrules. No appreciable difference. I installed another. My God, is my gutter sagging even lower? We are heading the wrong direction here.
So I determined that instead of trying to correct a sagging gutter I would just install a downspout at the low spot. Genius!
But could I actually pull it off? Do I have the manly skills necessary? Of course not. But I was fucking desperate. Back to Home Depot I went. I got the little downspout thing, some pookie (that's like a sealer), and a 2 inch hole saw.
Let me tell you my friend, it's been a long time since I was so determined. A long time since I was so focused. I was either going to succeed or completely ruin my gutter. My gutter that spilled water every time it rained. What did I have to lose really?
And I found myself strangely aroused. I was hard for it. A manly household task. Performed from the top of an 8 ft ladder!
I drilled a 2-inch hole. I took my hacksaw blade and made some slits. I took my needle nose pliers and bent the gutterslits in order to Fashion the oval shape necessary for the downspout thingy. I was into it big time . I didn't even take a break . I applied the pookie and a couple set screws and I think I'm in business! I'll find out tomorrow when I screw up the downspout.

MISSISSIPPI BURNING

"The rest of those who have gone before us will not steady the unrest of those who are to follow"

Mississippi, the last state to ratify the 13th Amendment, will also be the last state to rid itself of Confederate Insignia on its state flag.

BAD ASS SITE OF THE DAY

A friend posted an interesting link last year. I took the first test “How Rational Are You?”
I figured myself to be pretty rational. I was surprised to only score 28% rational. 
That means that 72% of you are more rational than I am!

I told one of my workmates about this. With my arms waving I screeched my complaint:
“They said I was only 28% Rational!”
He looked at me calmly and said “And this surprises you how?”
So I went over three of the questions with him, which he answered perfectly. This guy is so rational I cant believe I even LIKE him. But I do.
With so many people with so much time to kill I’ll provide the link to a pretty cool site. I’ve taken several of their tests, and a couple of their courses.
I just finished the one “How to spot a strong vs weak argument.” I did pretty well overall, and scored low on letting preconceived notions affect my ability to rank an argument.
Again, it’s a great site, not the usual “ What color Teddy Bear are you” kind of thing.

Here is the (click here) How Rational Are You Test. Let me know what you think.

CLEARER THINKING
Clearer Thinking’s mission is to close the gap between insights from research about human behavior and actions in the real world. We start with the best research we can find and perform our own original studies in order to build best-in-class, interactive tools and mini-courses that you can use to change your habits, make better decisions, and achieve your goals.

FEELING GOOD WAS GOOD ENOUGH FOR ME

On his way to teach at the United States Military Academy at West Point, Kris Kristoferson stopped in Nashville and decided to stay and become a big ol’ country star. He pushed a broom at Columbia Record Studio and tried to write some songs. He had some success with “Sunday Morning Coming Down” and “Help Me Make It Through The Night” covered by Johnny Cash and someone else, cant quite recall.
A producer, Fred Foster noticed him and said “Ok, I’ll let you write some songs for me, but first I want to produce an album of you singing.”
Kristoferson said “But I caint sing, I sound like a Bullfrog” and Fred says “Do you want in this business or what?”
The record was a flop.
But Fred Called Kris up one day.

“I got a great idea for a song” he said.
“OK, what is it?” Kris asks.
“Me and Bobby Mcghee” says Fred.
“What?” says Kris.
“Me and Bobby Mcghee” says Fred.
“That’s it? Gee thanks” says Kris, and hangs up the phone.

A few months later Kris writes “Me and Bobby Mcghee”. He and Roger Miller record it, but it goes unnoticed.
Then Janis Joplin records it. The release comes after her death.
Fred Foster calls Kris one night.
“Man, have you heard Janis Joplins version of “Me and Bobby Mcgee”?
“No”
“You better be sitting down when you do”.
The rest is history. Janis made it her own, and Kris gave equal writing credit to Fred Foster, who had supplied the title.

YOU NEVER KNOW

My son just got to Alaska to work in the fishing industry. I have a cousin in Costa Rica that has worked a Sports Fishing boat for years.
He said “That’s the great thing about being on the water. You never know what the day will bring”

THE SHOPPING CART LITMUS TEST

Do you return the cart? What kind of person are you?
It's a pretty good indicator of my spiritual condition. When I'm feeling slovenly, and it's a dark November in my soul  I leave the cart. Wherever. I don't even look back. Just drag my sorry ass to the drivers seat and go.
But when I'm in tune with the universe, birds are chirping and the sun shining brightly, and people everywhere seem to shine, then it is my delight to return the shopping cart, whistling "Rhinestone Cowboy as I go. You should see the spring in my step as I do so.

THE LEAST RACIST PERSON I KNOW

Back about 1999 I was living off Lancaster Ave. Largely colored community. I had my kids for the weekend and I was taking them to the Children's Museum downtown. We were going to ride the bus. I’d never ridden the city bus before. It pulled up and we got on. Nothing but black people on this bus. I’m ushering the kids down the aisle. Looking for a seat and I see a Fort Worth cop sitting there, an empty seat in front of him. I ushered the kids into the empty seat and announced “Here we go kids, we’ll be safe here”.
I’m not sure if anyone other than the cop heard me, but I’m not known for being soft spoken. I didn’t even realize until later what I’d said and how it must have sounded. Any one that heard me must have thought “What kind of cracker we got here?”.
I like to think I’m one of the least racist people I know.
Race in America.  Its like a Greek Tragedy. The more you try to run from it, the more you run into it.

Somewhere there is an upside

I've learned two things:
1) I have got to stop touching everything all the time. Everywhere I go, everything I see, I have a need to touch it. I walked in a restaurant for an order pick up a few days ago and started to run my hand 50 feet down the counter to the register. No, Bulletholes! Stop!
2) I got to stop crowding people. When I step in line somewhere, I'm usually right on top of whoever is in line with me. When this is over I need to try to give them at least 18 inches.

MONTHLY DEATH COUNTS

I keep hearing about how the number of cOVID-19 deaths is way overstated. Then some anecdote about how someone committed suicide or was killed in a car crash then listed as a COVID death.
But these statistics people are sharp as shit. They cross reference these numbers every which way but loose. In New York City for instance, they usually have about 8000 people die between 3/15 and 5/1. Its somewhat predictable. This year 32,000 died. And it just so happened that 24,000 deaths were attributed to COVID in that time period.

So it kinda all checks out for NYC. They do that for all the regions around the country. When they find discrepancies, they will be looking for problems in the data. These guys are smart...
Here is a chart from Michigan that you can compare deaths for April 2019 and April of 2020. Deaths from all causes and by cause. Interesting how closely balanced the variance is accounting for COVID deaths.

Click HERE

AUNT LOUISE

Years ago I found my grandmother about to set fire to a suitcase full of old family pics. It took a while, but I talked her out of it, and saved the suitcase. I finally started framing some of these pics last week. Most are 100 years old.
One was my Aunt Louise. I never liked Louise much. She seemed all stuffy, like some kind of fuddy-duddy.
Then I found this pic of her this weekend. Look how adorable she is! Those glasses! That mischievous look! Never mind that she kept plastic on the furniture and whenever we went to visit I had to sit on the sofa with my hands in my lap.
Look at her!
If she was to walk into Boomer Jacks tonight they wouldn’t be able to leave her alone.

TUESDAY MORNING

I bought the cutest little lamp at Tuesday Morning 7 years ago. My first lamp I ever bought. Susan helped me carry it in. She dropped it at the doorstep. It shattered into a million pieces. I still tease her about it to this day every chance I get. I know, I'm horrible.
Its like I love Susan even more for it.

The lamp had a fabric shade with a lavender floral design in it that was invisible until you turned the light on. I kept it in the closet for a while hoping to get another lamp to put it on. I was in the closet one day rearranging stuff and the shade fell off the shelf and an avalanche of boxes came down and crushed it. Some things just aren’t to be.