Frank Denton - The Rogue Raven

Aching Back and a Good Book

2012-01-08T17:35:00.000-08:00

Oh, my aching back. We got a cord of wood yesterday morning. There is no way that I can put it all in the woodshed in one day. About five wheelbarrow loads is enough for one day. It will probably take all week to get the job finished. But for now I can take my shoes off and put my feet up. I’m reading Connie Willis’ Blackout and enjoying very much. The trials and tribulations of historians who have time traveled back to the time of World War II, have various jobs as covers, and find themselves trapped in situations that were not supposed to happen. A shop girl during the Blitz, a caretaker of displaced children who have come to the country, a supposed American reporter who was supposed to be in Dover during the withdrawal at Dunkirk but finds himself in Dunkirk itself and a young officer in the FANY (First Aid Nursing Yeomanry), transporting wounded soldiers to various hospitals. Things are not going as quite expected for any of the characters. A fascinating, well-written book.

Merry Christmas, etc.

2011-12-25T18:46:00.000-08:00

Just a short note on Christmas day to wish everyone a Merry Christmas or a Happy Hannukuh or just general good wishes. I hope your holiday was as nice as ours. I'm off to our cabin for several days of general laziness and overeating with so old cohorts of mine. Will return of New Years Eve. So I will wish you the best of New Years now. I promise this blog will be written more often this coming year.

A Little Success

2011-12-22T16:22:00.005-08:00

I haven't talked about our race horses of late. Actually I haven't talked about anything of late. One of my New Year's resolutions will certainly to to do better with this blog. Who knows? I might even garner a few readers if I wrote more often.

But this is about Seven Demons, our two-year-old colt. We've had a piece of him since before he was born, as we bought shares in Go Girl Gone before she was bred. We had to wait for two years until he came of racing age. He ran during the summer at Emerald Down in Auburn, WA. He didn't win but consistently came in second or third. After a short layoff he was shipped to Portland Meadows in Portland, OR. He didn't do very well there until last week. All of sudden he woke up and waltzed away with a win by ten lengths. We think he has grown and learned and maybe he's on the winning path. We're looking forward to seeing whether he can carry this winning attitude into this next summer at Emerald.

He's one of only two who are racing at present. Appealing Resume is running at Golden Gate in CA. Bella Cavalla has been bred to Grindstone, A Kentucky Derby and we expect a foal in the spring. Holy Mama has retired with an ankle injury and will be bred in the spring.

We're holding our breath that Boogie to Seattle will be sent to Kentucky to be bred to Big Brown, another Derby winner. Though we probably send her back to Kentucky for the Keeneland sales as a mare in foal. We think she will bring good money. Wish us luck.

A Little

2011-12-22T16:22:00.003-08:00

A Little

2011-12-22T16:22:00.001-08:00

Gone Away! Gone Away!

2011-10-07T15:02:00.000-07:00

That's what the Master of Hounds says about the hounds when they are sent after the fox. And that's what I say, now that the first eye surgery is over. Our usual fall trip is somewhat shortened by the pre-op appointment for the second eye surgery. We have to be back by the 25th. I suspect that we will get to Yellowstone and perhaps see a bit more of Wyoming. I'm not very faithful to this blog but I actually may find some time to write something along the way. Don't whistle while you wait. I'm grateful for the few faithful. And I will return, I promise.

Eye Surgery

2011-10-07T14:56:00.000-07:00

I had cataract surgery on my right eye a week ago today. I had to be at the hospital at 6:00 a.m. so we were up at 4:30. Or as my friend who had a career in the artillery says, 0 dark 30. After we checked in, we waited for a call to the preparation room. Over the next hour I met many people who were somehow involved in my operation. They were something like a United Nations. There was a nurse from somewhere in Eastern Europe, a nurse from Kenya (she had a wonderful lilting speech and reminded me, a couple of Japanese (one a doctor new to the hospital who asked me if she could observe) and several Caucasians. All were cheerful and gracious. At that time of the morning? I applaud them.

One of the things I was surprised about was the number of people involved. There was the first woman nurse who took my blood sugar levels, and blood pressure and pulse. And covered me with a warm blanket. Next was a male nurse who went over my meds and asked about my heart attack in ‘93. We had a nice chat. He lives in Austin, TX and works on 13 week contracts. He’s been asked to stay until January. He’s married so I don’t know how that works as his wife is a teacher. But I can see why they’d like to keep him. Next was the anesthesiologist with a few simple questions, then two nurses, then a nurse anesthetist and finally the doctor. And after the operation two people in the recovery room. That’s a lot of people for what seems like a simple operation.

Shortly they wheeled me off to the operating room. There was some general conversation while the sleepy time medicine worked it way through my system, then one by one the team introduced themselves and spoke certain information, obviously being picked up by a mike and recorded. The doctor repositioned my head to his satisfaction and the operation began, removing the lens from my right eye and replacing it with a new lens. Apparently it went well, the doctor was pleased and said that I was an excellent patient. Soon they were rolling me into a recovery room, where I was fed. Bagels and cream cheese and apple juice never tasted so good. Soon Anna was called and told to get this bum out of here.

The eye was irritated and I had to cope with that for a couple of days. I played pirate for a day, then went in to have the patch removed and the doctor looked at his handiwork. I’ve been assured by many people that I’ll be very pleased with the results. No more will I have to read the newspaper with a magnifying glass. What a relief that will be.

A Sad Tale with a Charitable Ending

2011-09-11T14:36:00.000-07:00

A month ago a little girl died in a terrible automobile accident. One always is sorry for a death in one so young. Rachel Beckwith had only recently turned nine. She was bright, vivacious and above all, caring. As she came close to her birthday she told her parents that she didn’t need any presents. She wanted to raise $300 for a charity called charity:water. It provides clean water to African villages that have no water or no clean water. Her mother put the request on a webpage that she created. To the time of her death there had been $200 donated. Her death in the accident was reported on local news. It was a couple of days later that they reported on her request for donation to the safe water charity. Money began to pour in and to date over a miilion dollars has been raised. The death of this little girl and her birthday request has obviously touched the hearts of people all over the U.S. If you’ve got a spare dollar or two you might consider sending it along in this thoughtful little girl’s memory.

The Tale of Boogie to Seattle

2011-07-24T18:31:00.000-07:00

We retired Boogie to Seattle from racing on Friday. This filly had a bunch of potential. Her sire was Bluegrass Cat, winner of nearly $ 2M. She was originally offered at the Keeneland sales and was expected to bring $50-100K. For some reason she was withdrawn from the sale and sold privately. I’m not sure how she ended up here in the northwest but our partnership claimed her out of a 2-year-old race last summer. She ran well and we had grand hopes for her as a three-year-old.

But such are the vagaries of racing. Boogie showed little desire to run this year. Our trainer, one of the best at Emerald Downs, tried everything. We ran her short at 6 furlongs; we ran her long at a mile. We ran her from the back of the pack and we tried her up front. She just didn’t seem to want to run. Friday evening she acted up at the starting gate. She finished last in a five horse field. It was decided to retire her.

Her grandsire was Storm Cat and back in her pedigree is Unbridled Song and A.P. Indy. So her breeding is pretty darn good. Boogie will be bred to Demon Warlock, one of Washington’s top sires and the sire of our two-year-old colt, Seven Demons. We hope he will contribute some of his heart, courage and willingness to run to the foal. So now we have another foal to look forward to. Wish us luck.

Days at the Cabin

2011-06-03T15:05:00.000-07:00

5.20.11 Posted a little late: We’re spending a few days at the cabin. We haven’t been here over the winter. There was a lot of snow so we just stayed home in the lower elevations. Here it is May and the trilliums are in bloom. The stellar’s jay visited when we put out some seeds and this evening I heard a winter wren quite near and farther off in the woods the coarse cry of a raven. Over the winter or early spring there obviously were some pretty good wind storms. There are a lot of small trees down. Eventually I’ll drag them out of the trees and brush and add them to the pile of things that need to be sawed. This will provide firewood for the fall when it begins to get cold. And the path alongside the cabin and into the back of our property was filled with fir needles and small twigs. At my age I am concerned about tripping on some small thing and falling. So out came the rake and I spent a little time raking the paths and making them safe for old men (and my much more youthful wife. She may be nearly my age but she’s in a lot better shape than I.)

Mostly, though, I’ve been reading. I brought three books along, S.J. Bolton’s Sacrifice, Sharan Newman’s The Difficult Saint, and William Murray’s Tip on a Dead Crab. I’m almost finished with the first, have a decent start on the second and haven’t touched the third. I also have a couple of magazines, the newsletter from International Campaign for Tibet and the latest copy of CADS, Geoff Bradley’s wonderful magazine from England about crime and detective stories. Plenty of reading for the few days that we will be up here. And perhaps I will get some other writing done besides this blog.

There has been a lot of snow in the higher elevations of Washington this year and snow much later in the spring. Mount Rainier was absolutely white. In normal years there are places where rock sticks out and gives the mountain some detail Not this spring. Of course it will melt some during the summer and the rock will reappear. But for now it is just a gigantic snow cone jutting into the sky.

Northwest Symphony Orchestra

2011-05-05T20:12:00.000-07:00

We enjoyed a fine concert last Saturday evening performed by the Northwest Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Anthony Spain. Part of the orchestra’s mission is to perform works written by northwest composers. The first piece was Concerto for Horn and Orchestra by Samuel Jones. Jones was Dean of the School of Music at Rice University and is currently Composer-in-Residence with the Seattle Symphony. I don’t generally enjoy contemporary classical music, finding it often too dissonant for these ears. Not so this piece, which was very listenable. The French horn soloist was Jeffrey Fair, assistant principal horn player for the Seattle Symphony.

The second piece was Prayer of St. Gregory by Alan Hovhaness. This was a relatively short piece by one of America’s most prolific composers. Its trumpet solo part was played by 12-year-old Natalie Dungey. With perfect aplomb, her playing was exact, her tone bright and clear. Afterward she took her place in the trumpet section of the orchestra.

This was the one hundredth anniversary of Hovhaness’ birth. Mr. Hovhaness lived in this area and I can remember seeing him in our local super drugstore, writing music while he waited for his wife, who was shopping. Probably his best-known composition is Symphony No. 2, Mysterious Mountain. This work was premiered by Leopold Stokowski and the Houston Symphony.

The orchestra finished with the superb playing of Antonin Dvorak’s Symphony No. 9, the New World. The orchestra performed wonderfully and the audience responded with a standing ovation at concert’s end. A wonderful evening for little old Burien.

Our Thoroughbreds

2011-04-27T21:32:00.000-07:00

I don’t recall whether I have ever talked about our horses on this blog. Well, they are only partly our horses. Several years ago we got involved in a partnership which owns a number of thoroughbreds, race horses. The particular partnerships we are involved in own horses which mainly race at Emerald Downs in Auburn, WA. Currently we are involved in four horses.

Appealing Resume and Boogie to Seattle are racing at Golden Gate Fields in northern CA. They are fillies, aged 4 and 3 respectively. AR raced at Emerald last year, took some time off from late August to March was then was sent to run at Golden Gate. Seven Demons is a 2-yr.-old who has been broken and been to the track to train, but was sent to his home farm to let his knees develop. He should be back in June to resume training at Emerald and could race by July. Our fourth is a mare, Bella Cavalla, who is to be bred to Grindstone, the winner of the 1996 Kentucky Derby. We will have to wait several years to see what the offspring will do at the track.

Appealing Resume has had some success at Golden Gate, winning four in a row and stepping up in class each race. Last time out she met horses of her own level, running third. Boogie was ready to race up here, but couldn’t find a race so the partners shipped her to Golden Gate also where she will become accustomed to the track before racing.

Currently we are disappointed to have no horse to watch. The partners attempted to claim a lower level horse last Friday. She won her race, but there were several claims in on her and we lost the draw. Gizmo Girl went to another barn. We’re still looking. Wish us luck. I’ll keep you posted. Maybe I won’t neglect this blog so much if I write about the horses and the track.

George Shearing Dies

2011-02-19T19:45:00.000-08:00

George Shearing, jazz pianist, has died. Shearing was a piano stylist and probably today would be termed soft jazz. He was quite popular in the fifties and had many fans during his working life. George was blind and it was interesting to watch him play and to see him get around during his intermissions. Of course there have been other blind pianists: Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder and Marcus Roberts some immediately to mind.

In the late forties and early fifties I was working in a plywood mill in order to pay for my college education. Going to school during the day, I worked the swing shift, roughly four to midnight. There was a jazz show on the local radio station. My wife, Anna, was listening one evening. There was a quiz with the prize of two tickets to hear George Shearing. No one had won by the time I got home sometime after midnight. The jazz dj had played a jazz piece featuring a clarinet, piano and drums. Identify the players. I said that had to be the Benny Goodman Trio, with Benny Goodman on clarinet, Teddy Wilson on piano and Gene Krupa on drums. She immediately called the program and we won two tickets to see George Shearing at some funky roadhouse outside of Olympia, WA.

I remember that I had to borrow my folks’ car because we didn’t own one. We drove from Tacoma to Olympia and had a wonderful evening listening to Shearing. At one intermission I was able to talk with him for a few minutes. There was not a very big crowd. I told him the story of how I had won the tickets. He chortled and said that he was glad that I had known the answer. That’s a fond memory from sixty years ago.

Empty Bowl

2011-01-30T19:06:00.000-08:00

Today (28th) was empty bowl day..that should be Empty Bowl. Once a year there is a benefit in our fair city for the food bank. Potters work in a building at Mosier Field, which backs onto Highline High School and the football stadium. Each year these potters make, among other things, hundreds of soup bowls. Several of the restaurants in the area make soup, usually three kinds. People come, pay $15 (up from $10), pick out a bowl, get soup, bread, cheese, cookie and coffee and sit down and eat. When finished the bowl is yours to take home. The crowd was so big last year that they changed the venue to the community center, which is Burien's old library remodeled. Shannon and Mike, our daughter and husband, came in. Jenny, our granddaughter also met up with us. They had to be to work at 2 pm so we did the soup thing for lunch. Last year they had 900 bowls and made $13,000 for the food bank. It should be even better this year. We sat with Merillee Cogswell, who is the managing librarian for the Burien Library and the Highline cluster. That includes several other smaller library branches in the area. Later who should appear out of the blue but Don McQuinn, a local author. I greeted several other people that I know in the community. Anna Jo saw lots of people that she knows through exercising at the community center several times a week. So a good time was had by all.

Picasso Exhibit

2011-01-13T21:28:00.000-08:00

Tuesday we finally got to the major exhibit of paintings by Pablo Picasso at the Seattle Art Museum. The paintings were on loan from the Musee International Picasso in Paris. The exhibit was about to close in a few days and the museum was crowded with people like me, who waited until near the end. Tickets were sold for a specific time for entering to prevent overcrowding, staggering the entry times. Still it was crowded enough. I avoid the crowding at the first paintings in the exhibit by going past and picking up the paintings a bit further along and later backtracking to the beginning when the crowd had thinned.

I must say that I am not enamored of Picasso’s work. His early work was representational and I enjoyed seeing works from his blue period and red period and even his cubist period. Once he got beyond that, I was less enthralled. I think I understand what he was trying to do but I’m not sure I care for some of the works for which he is famous. Still, it was a must see exhibit for me, though what little I know of art is self taught. I try to see any major exhibit which comes to Seattle and I have visited many art museums on my travels, both here and in England. I particularly love the Impressionists, French and American.

Our daughter and son-in-law accompanied us to the exhibit. We were all worried a bit about the weather. Snow had been forecast for the evening commute time. We were fortunate to get home before the snow, which came a bit later than anticipated. It snowed several inches but was gone by noon the next day.

Happy Holidays

2010-12-24T21:45:00.000-08:00

Just sitting here on Christmas eve. Family has all gone after opening presents and sharing a meal...Way too much food...but delicious. I was thinking it's was time to send holiday greetings to my readers. You've been faithful although I have not written much this past year. A New Year's Resolution...No. But I will try to do better. Off to the cabin after Christmas to spend six days with old friends. Eat, sleep, tell tales, watch movies. We've been doing this for forty years. Why stop now? I'll return to civilization on New Year's Eve. Unless we're snowed in.

Meantime all of you have a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. I'll catch you in 2011.

Weather

2010-12-22T21:00:00.000-08:00

With nothing else to talk about, should I talk about the weather? By chance this morning we were watching Canadian television, the one channel that we receive down here in the states. The weather news from the Maritime Provinces was pretty bad. Cape Breton and the eastern side of Nova Scotia were especially hard hit, with much rain, flooding and high tidal surges. Beaches are getting ripped away, a boardwalk through a wildlife refuge swamped. I am particularly interested in these things because I've been to many of the places the newsperson talked about.

And then my friend, Andy Porter, of jolly old Brooklyn, sent me a message about photos of the snow in Devon, England. Devon is one of my favorite places in England and I know it pretty well from a dozen trips there. The website can be found by googling "BBC E-mail Snow Across Devon" I found the photos very interesting. The Exe River is frozen. I've hiked along the Exe. The shingle beaches are covered with snow. I hope the people weather it well. The photos seem to indicate that they are taking it in stride.

We've had our bit of snow here in Seattle a week ago. We don't deal with it very well and it brings the city and environs to a crawl. We hope that it is finished for the year.

2010-12-16T19:55:00.000-08:00

Terrible! Terrible! I haven't blogged for a month. Surely even an old guy should find something to say in a month. I've been catching up on reading other blogs. One such mentioned the writer's favorite CD for the year. I don't know that I could name my favorite but I've been listening to several good things in the last week or so. I felt in the mood for some vibraphone music and pulled out a Modern Jazz Quartet CD and listened to Milt Jackson. I decided to follow that up with other vibe players. Cal Tjader came next, then Gary Burton, then Lionel Hampton and Dave Samuels.

Recently I replaced my turntable. The old one went kaput. Now I have access to a rather extensive collection of LPs. Yesterday I suddenly had a yearning to hear some Atlanta Rhythm Section, a rock banmd from Doraville, GA in the 70s. Fun to hear them once more in a live concert. The record is called Are You Ready?

Well, that's it for now. At least I've put down a few words. Maybe I'll write more often if I select mundane topics.

Lost in Yaak Valley

2010-11-12T21:58:00.000-08:00

Adventure #1 - For a number of years I have been reading a writer by the name of Rick Bass. When I first started to read his work and early in his career he had moved to the Yaak Valley in northwestern Montana. At the time there were only about seven people living in the valley, pretty isolated in the northwestern corner of Montana. I decided that I would like to see what the place looked like and put it on my travel map for this year’s trip. We traveled over the north Cascades highway in northern Washington, then across norther Idaho, passing through Sand Point. The road to Yaak follows along the Yaak River. At one point we stopped to see a small falls in the river. Talking with a couple of bikers, they recommended traveling straight on at Yaak, coming out at Eureka and then dropping down to Whitefish. It sounded like a good idea.

There really is no town of Yaak, just a couple of bars across the road from each other. One is The Dirty Shame and a number of motorcycles had stopped for a beer. It was mid-October and they were taking advantage of possibly the last good weekend for a ride. We went straight ahead at Yaak, heading for Eureka. The road ran through pine forests and occasionally we would spot a house or a weekend cabin. I'm told there are probably about a hundred people scattered through the valley now. The days were getting shorter and the sun began to go down. Finally we came to a T in the road and took a left, as the biker had described. In another ten minutes we came to civilization.

Anna decided we needed to find out where we were. Map in hand she crossed the road to talk with three women standing on the porch of a saloon. She told them she thought she might be lost. “Honey, you’re not lost. You’re right here. We found you.” one of the women said. They took the map from Anna’s hand and pointed at a spot where the name was Yaak. Anna turned and looked the other way. Across the road was The Dirty Shame. We had obviously taken a wrong turn somewhere and driven in a circle. We were back to where we had passed through a several hours before.

“Where were you headed,” the woman asked. When Anna said, “Eureka,” the woman said, “Well, you just go straight on from here and you’ll come out at Eureka.” “Oh, no,” Anna said. “How do we get to Libby?” The woman grinned. “Just turn right at the end of the porch.”

And we did. So much for one of our big adventures. Getting lost in the Yaak Valley.

Three Weeks on the Road

2010-10-21T19:52:00.000-07:00

We've been on the road again. We took a little car trip. starting with the North Cascades in northern Washington. We crossed into northern Idaho, stopping briefly in Sandpoint and Bonner's Ferry. On into Montana's Yaak Valley, Libby, Kalispell, Polson, Missoula and on to Helena. The final destinations were Yellowstone National Park and Jackson Hole. Then it was time to turn around and head home. I have a few stories which might be interesting. Or not. They will follow in a day or two.

Visit to Vancouver Art Museum

2010-09-20T19:50:00.000-07:00

Early September: Recently we traveled north to Vancouver, B.C. to catch an art exhibit at the Vancouver Art Museum. We had not been to British Columbia for a couple of years and were surprised at how much the traffic had increased. I think Vancouver’s geography is even worse than Seattle’s. The city is very much hemmed in my mountains and water. High rise apartments and condominiums are dense in the city. Much growth has occurred across the Lion’s Gate Bridge over Georgia Straits in West Vancouver and North Vancouver. Houses have been built up the mountains as far as they can go, I suspect. The other way for growth is out the Frazer River valley to the east. Thus the heavy traffic out that way. And that highway is having a lot of construction along it. It looked like light rail perhaps.

The exhibit we saw was one of sketches, studies and drawings by the Impressionists. There were ninety-seven pieces in the show. Most were in charcoal, red chalk or pastels, although a few were in watercolor. All of the important Impressionist artists were there plus many minor artists, or should I say, artists with whom I was not familiar. Renoir, Degas, Toulouse-Lautrec, Gaugin, Manet, Seurat, Pizzaro plus many more.

These drawings were from the collection of the Musee d’Orsay in Paris. Oddly enough, they have never been exhibited there. Apparently the museum does not have the space to exhibit drawings, although such a space is being planned for the future. These drawings were only going to be shown in Vancouver and then were to go directly back to Paris and into storage. So if a French person wanted to view these drawings he or she would have to come to Vancouver.

We spent nearly three hours in the exhibit and had no time for any of the other exhibits on display. Anybody who loves art and has taken their time with an exhibit knows how tiring it can be. Although we missed the other floors of the museum I was more than pleased with just the Impressionist drawings. The exhibit was called “The Modern Woman.” It was divided into The Portrait, the Nude, The Space of Intimacy, the Private Realm, the Public Realm and Beyond the City. I have never before purchased the catalog of an exhibit which contained reproductions of all of the pieces in the show. As far as I can tell, this catalog did. It is exceptional. I am so glad I roused myself to travel north to view this exhibit.

Under Heaven

2010-08-18T15:52:00.001-07:00

At the end of Zen meditation the other morning, during that delightful time we dub “Tea and Conversation” someone asked me, “Who is your favorite science fiction writer?” Without a thought I responded, “Guy Gavriel Kay.” I went on to say that I really didn’t read much sf, that I read much more fantasy. I’m not quite sure why I or many other people, make that distinction between the two, but there it is.

I’ve read all but two of Kay’s novels (and you can be sure that I will be reading them soon) and have enjoyed them all. But his latest novel, Under Heaven, is, for me, the best. It is set in ancient China, taking the Tang dynasty (900-1200) for a model. Shen Tai, second son of a deceased general, has determined that, to honor his father during the two-year period of mourning, he will remain at Luongo Nor to bury the dead soldiers littering the battlefield and lay their ghosts. The White Princess of the neighboring country learns of this and gifts him with 250 Sardian horses. This makes Tai a very powerful man in Kitai (China).

We follow Tai as someone attempts to assassinate him, as he travels toward the capitol to present the horses to the emperor. Several more attempts are made on his life. A warrior woman, Wei Song, has been hired to protect him. He longs to see a woman courtesan he knew, but she has become the consort of the first minister. An Li, general and governor of several provinces in the north of Kitai, rebels and war ensues. This is a long novel, nearly 600 pages, filled with action, intrigue, wonderful well-rounded characters. It holds, perhaps, a hint of how life was lived in that far off time in China.

Kay seems never to write about the same period or place twice. I would like it very much if he were to write another novel set in the same time and place as this one. There are minor characters that could well be developed into major characters. But perhaps that is asking too much. I will be grateful for whatever he writes next. Alas, that is probably several years away. Meantime, if you have the slightest interest, I recommend this book, or any of Kay’s, quite highly.

Traveller on Horseback

2010-04-07T15:21:00.001-07:00

Recently read: A Traveller on Horseback; in Eastern Turkey and Iran by Christina Dodwell. New York, Walker and Company, 1989.

Miss Dodwell must be an amazing woman, although she probably doesn’t think so. She has written several books on her travels in China and Africa. Here she chose to travel in the mid-east by horseback and alone. She had acquaintances in a couple of places but otherwise was not averse to going it alone, speaking some of the local language (of which there were several) and dealing with the inhabitants of the towns and villages she came across. She seemed most interested in the ancient architecture of churches and castles, some built before Christ. Some that once were Christian churches are now mosques. This adventurous journey was taken during the war between Iraq and Iran. She was arrested and questioned more than once, propositioned at least once. But mostly she was welcomed, found lodging with the local headman or others and had an interesting journey. This was a book that seemed to fit my mood at the moment and I enjoyed it.

Spring Is Here

2010-03-09T20:48:00.001-08:00

Spring is not here as yet, at least not on the calendar. But we have had an overly mild winter here in the Northwest. Although it did snow today...or so they tell me. I did not see a single snowflake. My wife, an earlier riser than I, insisted that she saw snow yesterday morning, But to me it feels like spring. The weather has been clear. Temperatures have been in the low 50s. The Olympic mountains stand out to the west, snowcapped from end to end. The flowering plum is in full bloom and the winds blow pink blossoms about, most of which stick to my car. The daffodils are not only up, but blooming. The iris are growing like weeds. And today, as I strolled back and forth on the patio, I heard the songs of house finches. Their song, to me, indicates that they have returned and brought spring with them. So to heck with the calendar. Spring is here.

The America Cup

2010-02-18T21:24:00.000-08:00

The America Cup races recently held were a disappointment to me for more than one reason. I’m not a sailor; I’ve only gone sailing one time. But I have always been fascinated with this yacht race. The race was last held more than three years ago. In recent times there were five or six teams vying for the cup and there was a series of elimination races until they were down to two. Then the finalists raced a series of five races and the winner had to win three out of five. This year there were two yachts. They were racing two out of three.

The two teams were the Swiss team, Alinghi, and the American team, Oracle. But first they had to argue in court for two-and-a-half years before they could race. They did not race in single hull yachts, but in trimarans, triple-hulled yachts. Apparently there were no duels rounding the marks, when a sail was taken down and a spinnaker went up. This was one of the most exciting parts of the race, as far as I was concerned.

But then I never got to watch. In previous America Cup races one of the networks, one of the sports channels, carried all of the qualifying races as well as the final races. This year there was no television coverage. There were only two races, as Oracle ran away form Alinghi and won two races. This brought the America Cup back to the United States since sometime in the mid-nineties. It would have been fun to see how the huge trimarans handled and how the crew got around on them. In what I have read there was a good deal of talk about a particular sail, but I have yet to find photos of it. Or maybe wouldn’t recognize it if I did see it. But alas! The winning yacht, Oracle, was built in Anacortes, WA, just up the sound (Puget Sound) from Seattle. A small consolation.

I Have Returned

2010-02-09T20:07:00.000-08:00

The comment from Reed Andrus reminds me that I’ve been away from this blog much longer than I intended. Most of January was taken up with coughing, sneezing, sore throat, gargling, sniffing salt water and even using an inhaler. Two trips to the doctor. I guess when you get older it takes longer to get over such a thing as the common cold. So I’m back. That is not to say that I will be any more regular at blogging. I’m not very good at talking about the ordinary things of life. Maybe I should make an attempt to do that and see where it takes me.

Anna, my wife of almost 60 years, said she was going to make bean soup the other day. I love navy bean soup. I also occasionally make a pot of seven bean soup, which is nothing more than emptying seven cans of different kinds of beans in a pot, a bay leaf, some grated carrot, maybe some sliced celery, oregano. Let is simmer for tenor fifteen minutes to blend the flavors and enjoy. It’s hard work to take the lids off of those cans of beans. A little work brings a lot of pleasure. But I digress. Anna didn’t make navy bean soup; she made navy bean vegetable soup, with beans, spinach, carrots and other ingredients. It wasn’t what my mouth was watering for. Several days later she did make a pot of navy bean soup since I had wept so bitterly.

And today I made a batch of carrot cake muffins. I found the recipe a while back and they were terrific. Not as sweet as carrot cake, but quite tasty and nutritious. So there you have it, a little piece of the life of this old retiree.

Dateland, Arizona

2009-12-22T00:03:00.000-08:00

I was sitting and enjoying a cup of coffee and musing about our recent road trip. I like to rethink certain days or events, sort of fix them in my memory. Who knows whether I will ever be back to a certain place. I was thinking about a small stop, northwest of Yuma, AZ, called Dateland. It’s mostly a gas a restaurant stop and it’s right next to a grove of date palms. In the restaurant one can buy a date milk shake. I did and thought it quite wonderful. The place is well worth a stop.

Dates are the oldest known cultivated fruit. They are also the most expensive crop to grown. And they are not easy to grow. Because they are fragile, everything must be done by hand. There are a number of operation that the grower has to perform up among the leaves where the date fruit grows. I think I remember that there are twenty-three such operations necessary to bring the fruit to harvest. And harvest time comes at the hottest time of the year, when temperatures can reach 120 degrees. I don’t think I want to be a date farmer.

There are over a hundred varieties of dates, but only a few in commercial production. The Medjool date is considered to be the finest. It was originally grown in Morocco for the exclusive use of the royalty. In 1927 disease threatened to destroy this date. Eleven offshoots were sent to the United States. The trees in Morocco were destroyed by the disease. All Medjool dates in the world now are descended from those eleven starts that were sent to the U.S.

I don’t think that many people in the states think of dates very often. A Christmas treat in our house when I was a boy were dates which had been pitted, a walnut half inserted in the middle, and then rolled in powdered sugar. I think I’ll make some of these this holiday season. Mmmmm! Nature’s candy.

On the Road 4

2009-11-08T20:59:00.000-08:00

This is just a response to several comments about the Andy Devine Museum. It was a bit of a disappointment. I had heard from a friend that it was pretty good. It may have been at one time. Now it is only a small room with some photos, movie posters and newspaper clippings about Andy. It is part of the Mojave Museum in Kingman, AZ, Andy’s home town. I was sorry that it wasn’t better. The museum itself is quite nice, but I, too, was disappointed that there was not more about Andy Devine.

We holed up in Las Vegas to watch the Breeder’s Cup. I won’t bore you with a lot of horse racing stuff but the two days of racing were terrific for this old guy. And Zenyatta, the mare, went up against the guys in the Breeder’s Cup Classic and won. She’s a huge horse. 17-1/2 hands.

Now we’re in Tonopah, NV, about halfway between Las Vegas and Reno. It’s over 6,000 feet in elevation and a bit cold out at night. It’s touted at being the best place in the U.S. to star gaze. The nights are clear and cold and there is a map of places you can drive to where you have no light obstructions for looking at the stars.

On the Road 2

2009-11-04T22:08:00.000-08:00

On the Road 2 - 11.02.09
Coming north from Soccoro, NM we passed a GMC car dealer. His name was Tillery. We wondered whether his first name was Art or Dis.

We stopped at the Laguna Pueblo casino, about 60 miles west of Albuquerque, for lunch. It is a small casino but the most friendly people. The casino is called Dancing Eagle after a ceremonial dance of many Pueblo people. Our waiter was Will Louis and we had quite a conversation with him. He had been up to Washington state and told us of the many things which he had never seen before. Driving across the Narrows Bridge high above Puget Sound was one of them. Another was watching the fish mongers at the Pike Place Market throw big salmon from the front of the cases where they are kept in ice to the person who weighs, price and wraps the fish.

The people at the next table were from Minnesota on the way to visit their daughter who is in the service and stationed at Fort Lewis, near Tacoma. They were happy to hear a weather report from the Puget Sound area. They began to talk about the beauty of Minnesota, especially of the Boundary Waters area near the border between the U.S. and Canada. Since we have been there I knew exactly what they were talking about. They were trying hard to convince Will that he must visit there and canoe in to experience the silence when there is nothing or no one else around.

I told Will that he could read about that part of Minnesota in the wonderful books written by Sigurd Olsen. Olsen taught and was sometimes Dean of a community college in Ely, MN. I’, quite sure that he could have had a university post almost anywhere but he chose to stay in the area of the country that he loved. He’s been dead many years but his books have been republished within the last few years, I think by the Univ. of Minnesota Press. Anyone who loveds the outdoors or even to read about it would do well to search Olsen’s books out.

Oops! Apparently this did not get posted. Randon abstracts, rejoice!

On the Road 3

2009-11-04T21:58:00.000-08:00

On the Road 3
We stayed in Soccoro an extra day because Anna came down with the flu. A couple of days later it was Frank’s turn. Blessed be Immodium AD. In each case it only lasted a day. Weak, we journeyed on. This is written in Kingman, AZ where we will visit the Andy Devine Museum tomorrow morning. Andy Devine was not my favorite western sidekick but he is well-remembered for his gravelly voice and his rotundity. He sure acted in a heap of western films from my childhood and youth. I’m anxious to see what is in the museum. Then we’ll go on to Las Vegas. To gamble?? No, we’ve already done that on the horses and dogs in Phoenix. To watch the Breeder’s Cup on television. Two days of horse racing. Supposedly the best horses currently running. And Zenyatta takes on the boys. We wish her the best and we’ll see how that comes out. You go, girl. More from Las Vegas – maybe.

On the Road 1

2009-10-23T22:04:00.000-07:00

It's been a month since I've written anything on this blog. Excuse #1 is that we've been on a road trip. Excuse #2 is that I have a new laptop and have been learning my way around it and how to get on the internet at the various motels at which we lodge. We old folks are slow learners. You can teach an old dog new tricks but it takes a bit longer.

We have traveled out to the ocean from Seattle, then all the way down the Washington and Oregon coasts and followed the California coast down to Big Sur. There have been many highlights. The exotic names of Bodega Bay and Half Moon Bay beckoned. I hadn't been to Big Sur since sometime in my late twenties. I thought it would be nice to see it one more time. The towns turned out that they were just other tourist places with nice ocean scenery. But the coastline scenery was spectacular. Monterey we had visited before. We spent most of an afternoon on Cannery Row, one of the most touristy places of all.

One of the highlights of the trip so far was backtracking to Salinas, in the heart of agricultural California, to visit the John Steinbeck Museum. I first was introduced to Steinbeck's novels in 1949. I took to him right away. Now that I think of it, he wrote about times that are far away from current times. He was much closer to the Great Depression and World War II as was I. Anyway the museum was fabulous with many rooms, each devoted to a specific novel or time period. There were mock ups of dwellings, such as Hooverville shacks from The Grapes of Wrath, or Doc's lab from Cannery Row. Many quotes were on the walls; artifacts from the time period and place abounded. Screens showed scenes from movies made from Steinbeck's books, or from plays. Sometime readers read sections from his books. It was a wonderful experience, spending a couple of hours in the museum. I have read many of Steinbecks novels but I was surprised at how many I had not read. Something which I must remedy. Soon. Afterward we ate lunch in a cafe where Steinbeck occasionally ate. It's now called Sang's.

More from the road later, now that I've semi-mastered the beast.

Radon Daughters

2009-09-19T21:19:00.000-07:00

Radon Daughters
I finally finished this book by Iain Sinclair. I’ve read several non-fiction books by Sinclair and enjoyed them very much, This was fiction of the most surrealistic kind. Non-sentences, short phrases, rarely a complete sentence. It really was quite difficult to read. I found myself reading four or five pages at a time before putting the book aside. But buried in all of this was a plot, a story, several stories, in fact. Most interesting to me was Sileen’s search for a manuscript, an unpublished work by William Hope Hodgson, a sequel to The House on the Borderland. Also somewhat entertaining was a brief scene in which a science fiction convention was the focus. I once attended many such. I hope I was not a model for any of these characters.

I had read The House on the Borderland once and it probably was equally dense and difficult to read as Radon Daughters. I won’t recommend this book. I merely wanted to make a record that I had eventually come to the end of its 458 pages.

Owner's License

2009-09-19T20:18:00.000-07:00

Word has come down from the Washington Horse Racing Commission that partners in syndicates should have an owner’s license. I wish they had told us earlier because the perks are pretty good. Unfortunately there are only a few racing days left in the meet. But our horse, Gavin Slew, can’t run this week unless the partners are licensed. So off we hied to the track, not to watch races, but to take care of this licensing business. They decided they didn’t need fingerprints but did take a photo of my physiog. The perks are free parking, free passes to the track any day, free seating in the grandstands and access to the barns after morning training sessions are over. That will be useful next year. So I guess I’m legal now.

Late word is that Spring Run, the filly, has an injured hoof. Doubtful that she will run again at Emerald Downs this year. A rest and healing will find her at Portland Meadows.

Thoroughbred Yearling Sales

2009-09-10T18:19:00.000-07:00

Anna and I spent Tuesday afternoon at the Washington Thoroughbred Breeders Association Yearling Sale at the Sales Pavilion at Emerald Downs. There were close to 200 yearlings up for sale. It always amazes me that these magnificent youngsters are only a year old and haven’t gone into training yet. Many of them are only halter broke and have not had a saddle placed on their backs nor been ridden yet. They will be saddle-broken and go into training in the spring. Truthfully most of them are about a year-and-a-half old. Thoroughbreds have their birthday on January 1st no matter when they were born. We have part ownership of a young filly who was born in early April. She will be one year old this coming January 1.

The sales pavilion is very comfortable. It has sloped seating with theater seats. The sales ring is raised so there is good viewing. Potential bidders were able to view the yearlings the previous day. The managing partner of Horseplayers Racing Club had the assistance of three trainers and a veterinarian to view potential purchases. The auction crew was very professional. One person described the yearling and its breeding and ancestor’s earnings. Two auctioneers each took long sessions at calling the bids. Three persons caught the bids from the audience. A young man and a young woman took turns bringing the yearlings into the ring. Many of the young horses gave a resounding neigh when they found themselves in the sales ring.

Needless to say we enjoyed the afternoon very much. But we did not bid on any horses. If horse racing is the sport of kings, it is also a sport for people with deep pockets to support it. We feel fortunate to be able to share ownership of several horses with others who could not do it alone. It would be fun to follow the careers of some of the horses auctioned, but many of them have not been named as yet so that will be impossible. But it was a joy to be able to see so many beautiful horses up close.

During a break to get a brat for lunch, I ran into Jason Beem, the race caller for Portland Meadows in Portland, Oregon. He is quite active on the Emerald Downs Fan Forum, a bulletin board for the track. As such, the rest of us get insights from an insider who is not an owner or trainer. I had met him briefly a couple of years ago but it was nice to introduce myself to him again and have a very pleasant chat.

Unfortunately the economy has taken its toll. The bids were dismal. We were in attendance from Hip # 1 to Hip #99. Only four or five horses brought bids between $30,000 and $60,000. Maybe ten or so were in the mid-teens. And many were in the very low thousands. I’m sure breeders especially are moaning that the end is near. I know of one breeder who is getting rid of much of his breeding stock. For the moment, it is sad, but with the recovery of the economy will come the recovery of the thoroughbred industry.

Swiss Mailing

2009-08-25T19:25:00.000-07:00

I subscribe to a magazine called Cumbria which is about the Lake District in England, or, as it is sometimes called, Lakeland. The magazine is small in format, but beautifully produced, on slick paper with many lovely photographs. It is published in Yorkshire, along with a sister publication called The Dales. It is sent in a protective plastic sleeve, so it always arrives in good condition. The surprising thing about all this is that is mailed from Switzerland. I’ve been puzzled by this since I would think that anything mailed from anywhere in Great Britain or Europe would pay the same rate of postage. The only thing I can think of is that, for whatever reason, it is cheaper to mail the overseas subscriptions to Switzerland in bulk to have them remailed individually. Anyone know if I’m corrrect?

Legionary

2009-08-20T17:37:00.000-07:00

Legionary by Philip Matyszak. London, Thames & Hudson, 2009.
For the last ten or more years I have had an interest in ancient Rome. I think it started with the mystery novels of Steven Saylor. If you like historical fiction, and particularly, historical mysteries, I recommend these highly. I also am interested in Roman Britain, where, in days past, we visited quite a few sites from the time when Britain was part of the Roman Empire. I was intrigued when I found this book. It purports to be “The Roman Soldier’s Unofficial Manual.” Having read many novels with the ever-present legions somewhat in the background, I found this book to be very interesting.

The book is exactly what it says it is. I was told how to join, the training, discipline and ranks, the equipment, where I was likely to be sent, who the enemy is. I learned what life was like in camp, what it like when on campaign, even how to storm a city. I learned the style of battle, the use of auxiliaries (who do the early fighting) and when the legions come in, how the cavalry are used. I was even told what retirement was like, in case I had lived out my twenty-five year enlistment. Nicely illustrated with statues and bas reliefs, and drawings, especially useful for the equipment and the formations for battle. There were also colored photos of modern day reenactors in full uniform displaying their weapons. The use of shields was especially impressive. Scattered throughout were quotations from various sources of the time, Caesar, of course, Ovid, Tacitus, Strabo and others. And occasionally a quote is given at the top of the page in Latin and translated, for those of us who have forgotten anything but ‘parva puella’ from our Latin in high school, at the bottom of the page. I enjoyed this book very much. It goes on the shelf with my small collection of Roman Britain.

2009-08-19T17:23:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday was another big day at the race track. It was the running of the two biggest races of the year, the Distaff for fillies and mares for $100,000 and the Longacres Mile for the boys for $300,000. Naturally this day draws the biggest crowd of the year, so the food lines are long, the betting windows lines are long and just generally there are too darn many people. Still, we wouldn't miss it. Lots of pomp and circumstances. No, neither of horses were on the card, but our trainer had several horses in. Sorry to say they didn't do very well. But generally we had a good time, didn't lose much money (I was down $3.50 at the end of the day), and we had a nice dinner at Applebee's on the way home. I should mention that I picked the winner in the Mile, Assessment, a horse that had the outside post. No horse had won the Mile since 1935 from the #12 post. And he beat a couple of big horses that had shipped in from California. Good for a Washington-bred.

The catalog for the Yearling Sales came in the mail today. No, I don't intend to do any bidding, but it's fun to watch others spend their money. There is at least one yearling in the sale that is owned by the partnership that we belong to. We'll see what she brings. Enuff. I'll try to talk about something other than horses next time.

2009-08-13T15:55:00.000-07:00

Yikes! I didn't realize that it had been so long. I'm going to give it another try. I think I was in one of those moods where I thought that I didn't have anything to say worth reading. And I read other blogs with beautiful photography and ask why anyone would read something as plain as mine.

It has been a busy summer for this old guy. In April we bought shares in another race horse, a 3-year-old filly named Spring Run. She came up from Golden Gate and has raced seven times at Emerald Downs. Last Friday we saw he win her first race. She's a beautiful horse and likes to run out front but then she fades in the stretch. Two races back the jockey was instructed to hold her back. She broke well and none of the other horses would go with her. Consequently she found herself out front once again, then faded. The same jockey rode her last Friday with instructions to hold her back by 8-10 lengths. He practically strangled her coming out of the gate and was still strangling her when they rounded the first turn and started down the back stretch. Still the best he could do was keep her third or fourth. Finally at the 3/8ths pole he let up on her. At the quarter pole she took the lead and flew down the home stretch, winning by 1-1/2 lengths. The owners, about a dozen of us, were truly excited. First time to the winner's circle, photos with the jockey and horse. Much celebration.

That's enought to ease back into this blog. I wish I felt more comfortable just writing about the everyday happenings. Jason Beem, the track announcer at Portland Meadows, writes a very down-home blog entitled Life On the Roof. I'll try to be more like him.

Clerkenwell

2009-05-21T21:24:00.000-07:00

“Clerkenwell in the early hours of the morning is one of the most unsavoury neighborhoods in the whole of East Central London, which is saying a great deal....”

I stumbled upon Look to the Lady by Margery Allingham his afternoon and sat down to read a few pages. Thus I came upon the above sentence and for several moments closed the book and wallowed in memories. I’m getting old and it’s not likely that I will ever visit England again. So please bear with me. Look to the Lady was first published in 1931 and features, of course, Albert Campion and his man, Lugg. And Clerkenwell, as I have read elsewhere must have been a very different place from the Clerkenwell that I visited in 2000.

It was a very sunny and pleasant day when Anna and I decided to spend the day walking. From our hotel near Trafalgar Square, we headed up the Strand, which becomes Fleet Street. Along the way we stopped at an optometrist to have Anna’s glasses put back together, a lens having fallen out. A nice Indian gentleman did the job, no charge. We continued on to St. Paul’s Cathedral.

After a quick tour of the crypt and the gift shop, we turned onto High Holborn and wended out way toward Soho, eventually coming out at Seven Dials. By happenstance there was a celebration going on. The day had been declared a day for no cars in London. Fat chance, but we could tell that traffic was somewhat diminished. A parade was in progress. I especially recall a couple on a tandem bike, she in a very fancy long-skirted red dress with a red parasol to match and he in a suit with top hat playing a jazzy tune on a trumpet. There were stalls along the street, food and other items for sale, balloons everywhere. It was quite a festive scene. Quite a difference from the poor district of earlier times, with cheap cafes and flophouses where one could find a doss for a few pence.

And may I recommend Margery Allingham’s mysteries if you have never read them. Dated, perhaps, but plenty of action and fine storytelling. Try The Mystery Mile or The Crime at Black Dudley. And let me know if you enjoy them.

Garden and Cosmos

2009-05-04T14:25:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday we went to the Seattle Asian Art Museum to take a look at an exhibit out of India. The exhibit was of paintings from the courts of several relates maharajas in Jodhpur in the northwestern part of India. They were from the reigns (if that is the correct word) of Bakhat Singh, Vitai, Singh and Man Singh. The period was 1725-1843. The paintings were all of pretty decent size, say 18-24" wide and probably 12-16" high. One of the first things that struck me was that the people were all in profile. And several pools depicted were two dimensional. Apparently the painters (or perhaps the traditional style) of painting three dimensions on a flat surface had not reached this part of India as yet.

The paintings depicted court life, the celebration of holidays, and generally incidents in the maharajah’s life. There was exquisite detail in the paintings. For example, the second floor of the buildings which house the women’s quarters, had very detailed latticework. This allowed the women to see out but someone standing on the ground would only be able to see nebulous figures. All of the paintings contained human figures, from servants to the noble family. There were some paintings which showed running water, presumably a river. I was perplexed when I saw a wolf’s head in the water among many ducks. Later I realized it was the image of a crocodile.

There was a triptych in one of the rooms. I studied the last third of the triptych. The entire painting portrayed an encounter of the god, Krishna, with female swineherds. The last part had two rows of these women. I spent a good bit of time on the upper row which contained eighty-four women. As I looked I discovered that the skirt of each woman was different, colored differently and ornamented with a different pattern. Whether geometric or flowers, the patterns were each different from any other depicted. Other details in railings, trees and bushes were exquisite. I’m glad that we took this exhibit in, though we waited until almost the last weekend. The exhibit was crowded and very hot. Next time I’ll try to remember that.

I wasn’t too tired to go across the lobby to the Chinese exhibit to observe a couple of favorites. There was a triple-life size Kwan Yin in a relaxed state carved of wood. I don’t recall the age but the wood was split. There were also two very fine China figures of Kwan Yin, probably 16" tall. Kwan Yin is the bodhisattva of compassion in the Buddhist world. She is sometimes called “the one who listens.” So tell her your woes.

Tim and Family's Visit

2009-04-22T17:02:00.000-07:00

The visit from my son, Tim, and his family was terrific. On Monday evening we went out to Chinese dinner. Second son and his two girls came down from Arlington and daughter, Shannon, and her daughter, Jenny, also came. The only one who couldn’t make it was Mary Rose, Sean’s wife. She is a massage therapist with her own business and school and she had clients scheduled late into the evening. So for the first time in a long time the whole family was together. Natalie, Tim’s eldest, had her mouth watering for sweet and sour prawns. I think she got her fill, at least for the day.

At home Tim and Sean shared guitar licks for a while. Currently Sean is playing a lot of blues in the north Puget Sound region. Tim hasn’t played with a band for a long time. Tim's kids played Uno and Mille Borne, card games nearly forgotten now. Mandy, Tim's wife, has been recently diagnosed with M.S. and napped. Later she said that she had heard that I had a videotape of Song of the South, the Disney feature that shows plantation life and has animated Uncle Remus stories. This film is not on the market; you can imagine why. A Japanese copy. So I dug it out for her.

The visitors left for home at 2 in the morning. There was snow in the pass and the 4inches of snow in Spokane. But they had to be home for a ten o’clock appointment. Tim left behind a wonderful box. When he first showed it to me I wondered what it contained. It was a sextant. I don’t know why Tim thinks I can figure out how to use it. Or why I should, for that matter. Shoot the stars or the sun. Find out where you are in the middle of the ocean. No sea voyages for me. But the instrument looks to be complete (what do I know) and probably quite old. Maybe Tim thinks it will be safer with us, after all he has four kids. I will guard it with my life. A very nice visit.

Easter Sunday Visit

2009-04-12T20:40:00.000-07:00

It’s Easter Sunday so I wish all my readers, both of you, a Happy Easter. I’m just sitting here waiting for my eldest son, Tim, to arrive. He and his family live in Spokane, which is a “far piece,” as they say in westerns. They have traveled over to visit Mandy’s ailing grandmother, and to visit other relatives of Mandy’s. They are going to stay here tonight and Monday night before heading across the mountain pass to return to Spokane. We haven’t seen them for almost a year and a half. So the visit will be good. It will be interesting to see how the kids have grown. Ricky is eight, Emma is nine, Brittany is ten and Natalie is fourteen. So we will celebrate Easter a little late. A big Chinese dinner tomorrow night with Tim’s brother and sister and niece. First time the whole family will be together for a long time.

In Search of England

2009-03-26T21:07:00.000-07:00

In Search of England

I’ve been reading a book entitled In Search of England. It was written by H.V. Morton and published in 1935. Morton had been living in Palestine and became homesick. He returned to England and motored all round the island. I’ve known about this book for a long time. It dawned on me that this might be the perfect time to read it. My wife and I have been to England twelve times. The shortest period was for five weeks and the longest for eight weeks. Altogether we have spent more than a year there. With age and an ailing back it’s not likely that we will go again. So it has been very pleasant to read Morton’s book. Almost all of the places he writes about are places that we have visited and they dredge up interesting memories of our visits. Whether it was Winchester Cathedral or Salisbury, Wells, Durham, Lincoln, or Ely, we have visited them all. Whether he’s writing about Land’s End in Cornwall, Beaulieu in New Forest, Shrewsbury, Nottingham Forest it conjures up fine images of places and sometimes even persons we’ve met and conversations we’ve had. Last evening I read about the Norfolk Broads, the Wash, and the sandy coasts of East Anglia. He’s written other books in the same vein,
In Search of London should be fun. And In Search of Scotland will be interesting, although we’ve not spent a lot of time over the border.

Pontiac Bay Symphony

2009-03-11T21:20:00.000-07:00

Sunday evening we attended a concert by the Pontiac Bay Symphony at the Museum of History and Industry in Seattle. The Pontiac Bay Symphony is an interesting group of musicians. It is composed of mostly high school and college students who have auditioned for positions. Each section of the orchestra also includes an adult mentor. The conducting is usually by a professor from Western Washington University or sometimes a guest conductor, such as Hummie Mann, a composer of film music. The director of the orchestra is Sheila Espinoza. Sheila also composes and it was a delight to hear music from a suite that she had composed.

The theme of the concert was “How the West Was Won” and it naturally was music from western movies, television and two pieces from the pen of Aaron Copland. We heard music from The Magnificent Seven, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly by Morricone, High Noon and the Wild Wild West and Copland’s Billy the Kid in the first half. After intermission music from How the West Was Won, Wyatt Earp and Copland’s Hoedown. A member of the Seattle Opera Chorus sang two numbers, High Noon and Rawhide. It was a terrific concert with a good audience. The orchestra gets better every time we hear it. They are to be congratulated. They’re getting a good experience at a fairly young age.

And then we left the concert to find that I had locked the keys in the car. But that’s another story.

Theater Week

2009-02-22T21:34:00.000-08:00

It’s been a theater week. Last Sunday we drove north to The Village Theater to watch a performance of Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Our granddaughter, Nora, age 11, had several small parts in the production, including a small singing part. The cast was all children, with the major roles all being taken by high school students. The choruses and ensembles were all grade school children. I was trying to imagine how one controlled that many school age kids, how they were rehearsed and how it was all put together. My own experience with the theater was directing a one-act play at a junior high where I taught. Good grief! That’s almost sixty years ago. Anyway, we were delighted to see Nora perform. After the matinee performance we went to a fine Italian restaurant along the Everett waterfront with son, Sean, daughter-in-law, Mary Rose, and Nora and her sister, Grace. I’m sure it won’t be long before we see Grace performing and we look forward to Nora’s future appearances.

This Sunday we attended the Burien Little Theater’s production of Christopher Fry’s The Lady’s Not for Burning. Burien is a small suburb of Seattle with a population of about 37,000. But the greater Seattle Theater has many many amateur theaters so there is a large cadre of actors to draw from. The actors in this production were uniformly good. The leads had very long speaking parts. It must be a heck of a play to memorize. The play has long been my favorite, but I had never seen a production of it. It involves Thomas Mendip, returned from the war in Flanders, who has seen so much of the frailties and foibles of mankind that he wishes to be hanged. He claims that he had murdered Skipps, the rag-and-bone man. Conversely, Jennet Jourdemayne, a young woman whose father was an alchemist and who follows in his footsteps, is accused of being a witch and is condemned to be burned. And, oh, how she wants to live. I’ve had a recording on LP of the original Broadway cast and have listened to it many times. Unfortunately this Sunday’s matinee was poorly attended. But I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Cal Tjader

2009-02-16T20:43:00.000-08:00

Every night before I retire I listen to some music with headphones. My wife, Anna, has gone to bed long before me. Usually the music I choose is jazz, although sometimes it is classical, folk or world, even rock. For the last several evenings (well, actually about 2:30 a.m.) I’ve been listening to Cal Tjader, the vibraphonist. The album is The Ultimate Cal Tjader with his favorite recordings chosen by Eddie Palmieri, Tjader’s longtime friend and pianist.

Listening to Tjader’s terrific touch on the vibes (vibraphone or sometimes called the vibraharp) took me back many years. It must have been the late 50s when Cal Tjader performed for a couple of nights at a place called Pete’s Poopdeck in Seattle. The club was under the viaduct near the waterfront. It was the kind of place that gave you handfuls of peanuts in the shell and the floor was littered with peanut shells. I don’t remember a bandstand. I recall Cal playing surrounded by the tables of the customers. It was the first time Anna and I had heard or watched anyone play the vibes up close. I was impressed at how deft Cal was with the mallets. And how beautiful the sound of the instrument. I tried to follow his career from that time on. Later he became a huge advocate of Latin jazz and he pursued that until the end of his career. He died in 1982, I believe. I’ve followed other vibes players because of first hearing Cal Tjader. Milt Jackson, Terry Gibbs, Lionel Hampton, Dave Samuels, Gary Burton. Those are some of the experts on the instrument. But Cal Tjader was my first and I’ve spent several quiet early morning moments wallowing in Cal’s music and my own nostalgia.

Fringe Group

2009-02-04T21:41:00.000-08:00

I see that Sarah Palin, esteemed Governor of Alaska, defended the shooting of wolves from airplanes. She was speaking about criticisms of such activity from environmental and conservation groups. In doing so she named the Defenders of Wildlife organization as a fringe group. So that makes me a member of a fringe group. I am elated...I think.

Opening of Training at Emerald Downs

2009-02-03T21:48:00.000-08:00

Just a short note to commemorate the opening of training today at Emerald Downs. One horse in which we have a small share is resting and recuperating at Oakhurst Farm in Oregon after leaving the winter season at Portland Meadows. He'd run ten races since last April and the trainer decided that he needed a little r&r. Let's hope he's kicking up his heels and having a good time. He'll come back to Emerald Downs in a bit and begin training again for the meet which begins on April 17.

Meantime the barns are starting to fill. Almost 400 of the stalls are already full and horses have had a couple of sunny days to begin the daily regimen. Good luck to them all. The stalls, all 1420 of them, will be full by the opening day.

Walking

2009-01-29T16:23:00.000-08:00

All of my life I have walked for pleasure. I belong to a volkssport club and used to walk a 10K route every weekend. My wife and I completed 200 miles of the Southwest Coastal Footpath in England, beginning at Minehead in Somerset and ending in St. Ives in Cornwall. But recent years have not been kind to me. Back problems which surgery did not alleviate plus several other procedures. I can walk only about a hundred yards before pain hits. What’s a guy to do?

My answer was virtual hikes. I measured the patio. I can walk it seven times before pain. So I do this four to six times a day. This Saturday I will complete a virtual tour of the Isle of Wight, where the coastal footpath is 67 miles. What next?

I just searched the web for another challenge. I found that the Isle of Man also has a coastal footpath. It’s 95 miles in length. That should keep me walking for well over a year. Wish me luck.

Ken St. Andre, a Visitor from Phoenix

2009-01-20T18:04:00.000-08:00

I spent part of yesterday with an old friend whom I had not seen for some years. Ken St. Andre is a librarian from Phoenix, AZ. I first met him and saw him often during the years that I attended Science Fiction conventions. Ken is also a gamer and invented a game called Tunnels and Trolls. It has been around for many years and is still popular. Ken had been guest of honor at a Seattle gaming convention over the weekend.

With Monday free until his flight home, we had time to take in a couple of the local sights. Ken and his friend wished to see the Space Needle up close and personal. On the drive there he mentioned that Seattle had a science fiction museum, didn't it? Yes, it surely did and by circumstance, it was practically next door to the Space Needle. So we spent an hour-and-a-half in Paul Allen's Science Fiction Museum and then had a very nice lunch in the Space Needle restaurant, just below the top of the Needle's observation deck. Fortunately the fog burned off and we could see the city, the lakes, the mountains north, south and across Puget Sound. The guys from desert country were properly impressed, I think.

So, after some years, Ken and I have connected again. We have email addresses and should stay in touch. I enjoyed the day very much and hope that Ken did as well.

Horses

2009-01-13T16:39:00.000-08:00

I haven't talked about our horse. A thoroughbred. An honest-to-God race horse. Well, truth to tell, it's mine and about forty other people. Sometime in late spring of '08, we had the opportunity to buy shares in two horses, both two-year-olds. One filly named Promise Me Gold and one gelding named Gavin Slew. We were able to watch them race at Emereald Downs in Auburn, near Seattle. They were like teenagers, not quite sure what was expected of them. They tried, but all those other horses around them, and what do you mean I'm supposed to stay near the rail around the turns, and why is that person hitting me with a stick. They did not win at Emerald.

When the season ended at the end of September, they shipped down to Portland Meadows in Portland, Oregon. Unfortunately Goldy developed a sore ankle there and it was determined expedient to retire her. She's at a farm in Enumclaw, WA and living the life. I had an e-mail from the person who has her and she's doing just fine.

Gavin continues to run and on December 30, 2008 he broke his maiden. That's race track talk to say that he won his first race. Exciting! It was at a mile.

Yesterday he was entered in a 6 furlong race at PM. We drove down to witness the race. Unfortunately there are not many longer races that his trainer can find to run him in. So the thought was that he might have an outside chance in the sprint.

He was outclassed and ran last. He needs the mile length to run to his potential. So we were disappointed. But in spite of it, we had a great time. We met several other partners who were also at the track and had some very nice conversations. It's a three hour drive from our house to Portland's track. We listen to music, talk some, Anna takes a nap. On the way home we stop for a nice dinner. So regardless of the disappointment we had a very day.

And a Happy New Year to You

2009-01-01T14:48:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year to Everyone. Last evening we went a New Year's Eve party. Old friends, whom we have known for many years. The hostess had read of a Spanish New Year's custom. Twelve grapes are put onto skewers, alternating red grapes with green. At midnight everyone eats the twelve grapes, counting the first at January and continuing on. The eater is supposed to judge the sweetest and that month is going to bring good luck or be the luckiest month for him or her. It was fun. February is my lucky month. Perhaps it is because that is my birth month.

The Scots bring in the new year with "a wee doch an doris, just a wee dram that's a'." I suppose there's nothing wrong with that, a nice tot of single malt scotch, say a twelve year old. I'm not sure what we Irish are supposed to do. Perhaps I'll do a search this evening after the family has gone.

We've had a lot of snow, very unusual for the Seattle area. My son and his family have been unable to get out, living a couple of miles up a gravel road, and having as much as 27 inches of snow and power outages. So today is Christmas for the granddaughters, Nora and Grace, 10 and 7, and a happy birthday for Jenny, just turned 22 on New Year's Eve. We'll all have a good time, I'm sure.

Andrew Wyeth

2008-12-20T16:53:00.000-08:00

There is lots of snow on the ground in Seattle and environs. Lots of hills here and we don't deal with snow very well. Time to hunker down with a good book. I recently acquired a book entitled Andrew Wyeth: Autobiography. The title is misleading. The book is an art book containing one hundred thirty-three of Wyeth's paintings with usually a short comment by Wyeth. Wyeth is probably most recognized for his painting, "Christina's World" and for a series of nudes of Helga. But his landscapes and portraits of people, commonplace things, and buildings around his home in Chadds Ford, PA are wonderful examples of 20th Century realism. Some of you may know that he is the son of N.C. Wyeth, the wonderful painter of illustration for many classic books. He is also the father of Jaimie Wyeth, the third generation painter in the family, equally talented.

Sometimes Wyeth's commentary tells a story in a sentence. Commenting on "Teel's Island," painted in 1954, he says: "Henry Teel had a punt, and one day he hauled it up on the bank and went to the mainland and died."

This is a wonderful book I will treasure. We saw an exhibit at the Frye Museum which featured works by all three Wyeths. And on a trip to the east we saw an exhibit of Andrew's work, including all of the Helga nudes, at the Portland Art Museum. This book was remaindered from Daedalus. Search www.salebooks.com

Brendon Gleeson

2008-12-11T16:23:00.000-08:00

I did go to imdb to learn more about this heavyweight actor. I mean, he is a big man. Anyway...duh!...he has played the part Alastor "Mad Eye" Moody is two Harry Potter films, Harry Potter and the Order of Phoenix and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. He also had a role in The Tailor of Panama, from the novel by John LeCarre.

Short this time. The season gets very busy. Fifteen friends out for Chinese this evening and then back to our house for dessert.

In Bruges

2008-12-04T19:17:00.000-08:00

I can't recall where I read a review of this movie, but something in the review made me put it on my list. Colin Farrell and Brendon Gleeson are Irish hit-men who are sent to Bruges, Belgium to lay low for awhile. Farrell had been ordered to kill a priest and had inadvertantly killed a child with the same shot. Gleeson is pleased with the city of Bruges and enjoys seeing the sites, architecture, art, etc. Farrell is not, has no love of culture, but meets a woman working on a film crew and feels much better. Then their boss, Ralph Finnes, calls Gleeson and orders him to kill Farrell. The movie plays out in a tragic fashion after Gleeson tells Farrell to get on a train, go somewhere, and start a new life. Fiennes plays a loving family man who is heartless and ruthless in his chosen profession. The city of Bruges must be a spectacular place, or maybe we are just shown the highlights, churches, canals, public squares. I wouldn't recommend this film for everyone, but for those who can live with tragedy I found the story riveting and the acting excellent. Brendon Gleeson is a large man, reminds me of Rob Coltrane, but he acted his part with grace and style. I'd like to see him in something else. Will take a look at imdb right now.

Hello Again

2008-11-28T17:30:00.000-08:00

I've been away for quite some time. Any readers I might have had are surely gone after my long hiatus. I was traveling for the last two months throughout the southwest, just sort of wandering with my wife wherever my nose led. We returned home just before Thanksgiving. Every pleasure must have its price. Ours was to come down with terrible colds and sore throats immediately upon returning home. I'm beginning to feel better now, thank you. I hope I will find something to say every few days and gradually will return to blogging as I once did. I hope you all had a splendid Thanksgiving holiday.

A Very Happy Anniversary

2008-08-14T18:50:00.000-07:00

Our daughter is so good to us. On our 58th wedding anniversary she took us to Teatro ZinZanni. The theater is a dinner circus. It serves a five-course meal interspersed with circus and comedy acts. What a terrific show and likewise a terrific meal. The theater is held in a circus tent, housed inside a building. Of course there must be a kitchen, places for the actors to change, etc. But the original tent, what they call a ‘spiegeltent,’ was imported from Europe. We were told that it was originally built in 1910 in Belgium. It seats 300.

The show had a theme, Quest for Queendom. Queen Wilma, played by a comedienne with a very mobile face from London, was looking for a consort. Manchester, drag queen and her faithful servant, is looking for his/her own consort. Much to the concern of all the men in the audience, he scouts for an embarrasses several men before choosing one for the ultimate embarrassment. What a good sport he had to be. And Adam of Kent, although clearly embarrassed and wishing he were elsewhere, was very good. Interspersed with this ongoing theme were some terrific circus acts, two juggling, several high acts on a single rope, and a black woman singer from Atlanta with a terrific voice and style. Among others, she sang one of my favorites, John Coltrane’s “God Bless the Child.”

What an evening! Almost four hours of eating and entertainment. Thank you, Shannon.

A Day in the Life of a Guinea Pig

2008-07-21T19:46:00.000-07:00

I received a phone call from my HMO recently asking me to participate in a research project. I’ve have done so previously but it’s been a few years. So I said I was interested and answered a lot of questions about age, health, mental state, etc. I later was called and told that I qualified and would receive more questions in the mail. Today was my first appointment so last evening I sat down to read everything that had been sent. There were questions about past and current health problems and I was asked to list when each was diagnosed and what medications I took and when I started. I don’t know about you but I don’t keep track of those things. I have several conditions of which I have no clue when they started. It’s been so long. And I have a string of medications that I’ve been taking so long that I don’t even remember what they are for. I thought that knowing six our of nine was pretty good. The only real date I remember is my heart by-pass because I came to close to buying the farm that day.

I wasn’t too worried because I knew that the records were in the HMO’s computer and could be accessed easily. But I knew that I had been in several different hospitals for various surgeries. And I could remember having been in Swedish Hospital in Seattle but for the life of me could not remember the reason. At breakfast I asked my wife and she could not remember either. It was finally when I got to the appointment and was going over some questions that the answer popped into my head. I thought that it was a surgery but that it was not invasive. I guess I forgot because the surgery was done behind my back. Matter of fact it was a spinal surgery. Eureka!

The experience was very nice. I met four lovely ladies who were friendly and cheerful. I have three more visits over the next two years. I have to keep an electronic diary for fourteen days after each visit.
Just another day in the life of a guinea pig.

Goldy and Gavin

2008-07-19T19:31:00.000-07:00

All of my life, and it’s beginning to become lengthy, I’ve loved horse racing. For the past several years we have been attending the races at Emerald Downs, south of Seattle, on Friday evenings. A while back the opportunity presented itself to us to become partners in the purchase of two two-year-olds, a filly and a colt. Lest you think we’re wealthy, let me say that the shares were very affordable. A person could spend as much skiing or golfing. Along with forty others, plus the trainer and the president of Horseplayers Racing Club, we now own Promise Me Gold and Gavin Slew. Goldy (the filly) had a growth spurt and was turned out for a month lest she be injured with continued training. She is back in training but has not raced yet.

Gavin (the colt) has now raced twice. The first time he was upset by the action of two other fractious horses in the starting gate. When the gates opened he was sitting back and almost sat on his haunches. So he broke poorly, ran last most of the way but finished gamely in 7th place out of 8 starters.

Last night he ran for the second time in a $7500 claimer for a purse of $6700. This time he broke cleanly from the outside position and ran last down the backstretch. At the quarter pole his jockey moved him to the outside for a clean run to the wire. He was still last at the sixteenth pole. From there he was flying and he came third by a neck. Two more strides and he would have been second.

Now we know a little bit about the excitement that the big owners have when we see them on television. Gavin is a small horse and will do better at longer distances. I’m already waiting to see what he does as a three-year old. I’m sure you’ll read more as Gavin and Goldy continue their racing careers.

Foreshadowing

2008-07-17T21:30:00.000-07:00

What a strange topic for a guy who hasn’t blogged in a while. I hate foreshadowing. Yes, I know it’s a legitimate technique for the fiction writer. I’m currently reading Armadale by Wilkie Collins. A long time ago I read The Moonstone and The Woman in White and I thought, I really like this guy’s writing. So every once in a while I pick up a novel by him. Armadale is a very long book with interesting characters. Two principal characters come from the same stock, although they don’t know it. And things are going along fairly swimmingly until this:

“With trifling incidents, in which not even Midwinter’s nervous watchfulness could see anything to distrust, it was still to proceed, until the night came ---- a night which one at least one of the two companions was destined to remember to the end of his life.”

Well! You just know that something bad is going to happen. Whether to Allan Armadale or to Ozias Midwinter, you don’t know. Then you must read one, page after page, waiting for the shoe to drop. Wilkie Collins has me in the palm of his hand, and I just hate that.

Nevada Museum of Art

2008-06-26T21:54:00.000-07:00

Every trip to Reno means a visit to the Nevada Museum of Art. We have never been disappointed. Sometimes I think that they have better exhibits than the Seattle Art Museum. Not bigger but better, more interesting. This time was no exception. Most important was an exhibit of Frank Lloyd Wright, the great architect. The exhibit had many of his plans for residential dwellings and for individual rooms. There were also renderings of the rooms with furniture in place, often in color. But an exhibit of architectural drawings alone would have been boring. There was furniture, chairs, a dining room set with chairs, lamps, chandeliers, doorways, his leaded glass mirrors. Artifacts from a different time. We were surprised that much of the wood used was very common. Today an architect would have used more exotic woods. All in all it was a very interesting exhibit.

But the museum was not done. Another gallery contained the painting of Edwin Deakin, a California painter. We had not heard of him before, but we were very impressed. Deakin was active in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Deakin was a realist. He painted many of the missions in California and outdoor scenes, mountains and lakes. But he was most impressive when he chose some small area of a building and concentrated on a doorway, or a window with the light from inside streaming out. Or a corner in a cathedral with the light coming in from outside. He also did various paintings of clusters of different species of grapes, with the blush on them, the light reflecting the sun. You wanted to reach out and pluck a couple. I was delighted with the paintings and had to buy the book with many of his paintings reproduced.

A third room contained ceramics by Japanese potters, all of whom had been declared National Treasures. Beautiful pots, bowls, vases, cups, all utilitarian objects, yet beautiful in the rendering by these expert artisans. A couple of the potters had turned down the designation of national treasure. Two of the artisans had journeyed to Cornwall to study with Bernard Leach, a famous potter. The irony in this was that Leach himself had visited Japan to study with potters there. His famous pottery is in St. Ives, Cornwall. We visited there once. I have a cup and saucer done by one of his students. I could not afford one done by the master himself.

If you are ever in Reno, Nevada I would recommend the Nevada Museum of Art. It is quite near downtown and within walking distance of the major downtown casino hotels.

Reno Trip

2008-06-10T21:37:00.000-07:00

Fools, we! With gas prices rising every day...and not by a penny, mind you, we drove down to Reno. Let me caution you that gas prices are higher in California than in Washington, Oregon and Nevada. The people in Nevada were excited. There was measurable rain for seven straight days. This had not happened for ten years. And they could use the water.

Downtown Reno is changing. Two of the largest casino-hotels are being changed into condos. We have found a small casino with an attached motel just a short distance from downtown. Since I cannot walk very far without pain (arthritis, you know) we stayed there. When we wanted to go out we drove. Consequently I don’t know how much action the downtown casinos were getting.

Driving out we went to out usual haunts. The Nevada Museum of Art had a wonderful exhibit. More of that later. We got to the bookstores, especially one that we discovered last fall. Zephyr Books is right on Virginia St., well organized, with clean used books and has good prices. Meadowbrook Mall always attracts us and The Nugget in Sparks just next door to Reno is a must for me. The Oyster Bar there has Lazy Man’s Ciappino which I must have at least once during out stay. With the weather doubtful we did not drive out to the Stillwater Wildlife Refuge for a day of birding. We expected it would be rather fruitless. But we did get in a couple of walks (I have a seat cane) along the Truckee River at Idlewild Park. A delightful place with a nice paved footpath along the river. Who knows? We may never get back to Reno if gas continues to rise. But Reno is a city we have learned to appreciate over the last twenty years.

Anna's Eye Surgery

2008-05-18T17:48:00.000-07:00

Good grief, I’ve really slacked off with this blog. I’ve got to be more persistent. I do have a bit of an excuse. I’ve been taking care of my wife for the last couple of weeks. Not that I’ve had to do a lot. But she had eye surgery a couple of weeks ago. She said that her vision was obscured in her right eye. Within two days she had an appointment with our optometrist. He immediately called in a retinal specialist. The specialist immediately sent us to one of the local hospitals to visit Vitreoretinal Associates. Say that fast five times. After examinations and tests she was told that she could have eye surgery that evening or wait until the morning when the surgeon was rested. Even then the surgery was backed up and she wasn’t operated on until 4:30 in the afternoon. Detached retina, scar tissue removal, removal of cataract and implantation of a new lens. So for a couple of weeks I was doing the chores around the house. And putting the eye drops in her eyes. Her post op visit was very positive. The doctor said she was healing beautifully for all that they had done to her eye. Only one more visit in June. So without that excuse I’d better get back to blogging more regularly.

A Black Fox Running

2008-04-25T16:40:00.000-07:00

If you’ve been a book lover all your life like I have there are undoubtedly many books on your shelves that you have bought over the years but have never read. I discovered one such just last week. It is entitled A Black Fox Running by Brian Carter. I thought I might have purchased it in England but the publisher is American so I probably found it on sale or remaindered somewhere. I like foxes a lot and have read several books about them. This book is fiction, however, and it takes place on Dartmoor in Devonshire, England. It was about a black fox living there, his exploits and adventures, his romance and becoming a father. There are humans in the story, including a poacher and his greyhound who are intent on killing the Fox.

Brian Carter has obviously spent a lot of time on Dartmoor. He knows the animals and birds very well, and his descriptions of the seasons and topography of Dartmoor are excellent. I have spent much more time on Exmoor but I know many of the places that Carter names and describes. There’s a wonderful feeling in a reader when he can say “Oh, I know exactly where that is. I’ve been there.” The names of the villages roll off his tongue; Widecombe, Ilsington, North Bovey, Chagford, Bovey Tracey, Lustleigh, Peter Tavey. When he names the cider apples, Bloody Butchers, Slack-ma-Girdles, Grenadiers, Kingston Blacks, I can remember stopping at roadside orchards and tasting their ciders and scrumpies. I wouldn’t recommend this book for everyone, but would suggest it to those with a love of wildlife or would like a taste of village life on this small piece of southwest England.

Goodbye, Wayne Cantrell

2008-04-11T20:44:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday was the memorial and burial of an Indian acquaintance of long standing, Wayne Cantrell. I knew Wayne from the powwow trail. He was the lead singer on a drum. While he was not from the plains, he had an affinity for the Lakota at Fort Peck, Montana. He visited there often in his youger days and learned many Lakota songs. At one powwow he sang the most beautiful Indian song I’d ever heard. I asked him what the song was about. He said it tells the story of a village crier going through the tipi village and saying, “Come, come dance, come to the dance.” Wayne was only 61, much too young to die. He had been in poor health for the last several years and had lost his sight to diabetes. After the memorial we drove to the cemetery and buried Wayne. Back at Chief Leschi School a feast was being prepared. People stayed, ate, conversed, told stories until late afternoon. It was a good send-off for this fine, gentle man. He would have enjoyed it. And perhaps he did.

An Old Guy's Birthday

2008-03-06T14:33:00.000-08:00

What do you give an old guy for his 78th birthday? Certainly not a new tie. Or a pair of slippers. My daughter and granddaughter are very clever. Not only did they find a birthday card that was full of love but they found some really neat presents. Shannon and Jennie often visit antique malls in the area and I’m sure they found my gifts there. First was a glass from the Longacres Race Track. That track closed in 1996, twelve years ago. The glass has a jockey and the motto of that time, “Doo Dah.” Next was a silver thoroughbred with jockey aboard and saddle blanket bearing number 6. I guess when I’m in doubt this year, I’ll just bet on number 6. Finally there was a metal rack containing four cups with portraits of Jack Skellington, hero/villain of The Nightmare Before Christmas. Not to mention the bottle of Tullamore Dew that my daughter’s boyfriend gave me.

If that wasn’t enough they took Anna and me out to dinner at a fairly new place in Burien. Italian place called 909 and the ravioli special was terrific. Three cheese raviolis. And a chocolate cake that was scrumptious. Best of all was the jazz keyboard player with the portable keyboard that plays different voices as well as laying down a bass and drum beat. Paul Richardson really knows his way around the keys. Then along came Miss Josephine Howell, singer and dancer. She did both, moving from the front of the narrow little restaurant right through the room, singing and playing to the crowd, encouraging people to get up and dance, getting the crowd involved in greeting people as they came in and waving with loud goodbyes to those leaving. Fine singing and fine jazz piano. We stayed for their entire first set and enjoyed the entertainment immensely. We made sure to tell them so when we left and had everybody wave goodbye to us. It was a fun evening. And a great birthday celebration.

2008-02-25T18:01:00.000-08:00

Not long ago one of the book reviewers for the Seattle Times wrote an interesting article/review of a new translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Obviously he had studied this poem by the so-called Pearl Poet in college. As had I more than fifty years ago. I was intrigued by the article and sought out this new translation (there have been many) by Simon Armitage, the British poet. I found the translation to not be a literal translation but one in which the translator tried to match the alliteration of the original. It’s quite a good story. Gawain, a knight of the Round Table, takes up the challenge of the Green Knight to cut his head off. In exchange Gawain must seek out the Green Knight a year later and offer to do the same.

The original text is on the left-hand page and the translation on the right-hand. The further I read the more of the Middle English came back to me. In the end I was able to compare the original text with the translation. I enjoyed the experience greatly. I knew that Seamus Heaney, the Irish poet, had recently translated Beowulf. So I thought I might as well give that a read also. The original of Beowulf is in Old English and though the format is the same, the Old English is beyond me. Heaney’s translation is quite literal and the story reads easily. Beowulf, a Geat, comes to the rescue of the Danes when they are being devastated by Grendel, a monster. He kills him in single combat. Then he must take on Grendel’s mother, who is seeking revenge. He defeats her also. After returning home and becoming king, he is threatened by a dragon and must do combat with him. Ancient heroics.

What next? I may take on The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer.

Charlie Chan Theater

2008-02-09T17:37:00.001-08:00

The other day I took advantage of a Borders Rewards coupon for 40% off and bought the first collection of Charlie Chan movies on DVD. The first movie of the four was Charlie Chan in London. I've enjoyed the Charlie Chan films over the years and have many on VHS. (VCRs to play them on will soon be a thing of the past, so I hear.) I was reminded that a couple of years ago one of the local television stations began a Charlie Chan Theater and theoretically was going to show all of the Chan films available. One a week late at night. There was an outcry from the Chinese community, which in Seattle is sizeable. The series was cancelled.

This DVD series has four collections or sixteen films. There is also a Chanthology which contains another five films. But that's not all of the films. I'm not quite sure how many there are in total. I think somewhere around I have a list of twenty-seven.

Of the two actors who played Charlie I prefer Warner Oland over Sidney Toler. In London Charlie saves a man from execution by visiting a country house and finding the real murderer. The collection has good clear black-and-white images, apparently remastered. Very enjoyable. I suspect that eventually I will acquire them all.

Will Thomas - To Kingdom Come

2008-01-29T18:40:00.001-08:00

Will Thomas has written a very interesting series of mysteries featuring Cyrus Barker, an enquiry agent in the London of the early 20th century. His assistant is Thomas Penrith, a young Welsh lad whose wife has died and who has just come out of prison. Despondent and unable to find a job Thomas is thinking seriously of suicide when he answers Barker’s advertisement and is surprised to be hired. Thomas finds his new employer rather unusual, speaking several languages, knowing strange martial arts, with the ability to disguise himself and evidently quite wealthy. Immediately Thomas finds himself being taught skills he never dreamed of. He finds himself well-clothed, well-fed and in comfortable surroundings for the first time in a long time. Will Thomas’s first novel, Some Danger Involved, concerns the murder of Jewish citizens. This second novel is about Irish radicals attempting to blow up London in their quest for independence. London, indeed all of England, was a hot pot of radicalism in those days prior to World War I. An interesting time period in which Will Thomas has chosen to set his mystery adventures. He has written two additional novels in the series which I will get to eventually. Recommended.

And All I Got For Christmas Was A Goat

2008-01-15T17:28:00.000-08:00

Christmas eve is always a busy time at our house. With two granddaughters, 10 and 6, it’s a wonder that anyone gets to open their presents. Grace, the youngest, was passing out presents. Finally she got around to passing out a gift to Grandpa. In the envelope she handed me was a card from Heifer International. On the back was a note. It said, “Here’s that goat that Dad always wanted.” It’s true. I’ve always had a fondness for goats, especially Nubian goats with the long floppy ears.

Heifer International is an organization which helps struggling people from around the world become self-reliant for food and income. So I hope some family in an poor village somewhere is taking good care of my goat and treating her nicely. She’ll give them milk for themselves and maybe a bit extra to sell. I wish them well, parents, kids (a pun) and my goat. And thank you to Sean, Mary Rose, Nora and Grace (who happen to have two goats of their own...to keep down the brambles and brush on their ten acres.).

As If That Wasn't Enough

2008-01-11T16:02:00.000-08:00

On top of the break-in, we had some trees down. There have been several big windstorms in western Washington in the last few weeks. One big tree was leaning into the top of another. We’re talking fir trees that are probably eighty feet tall. It threatened the power line. A somewhat shorter was leaning over the power line that comes to the cabin. So after I returned home we called around to see who we might contact to take the trees down. Also called the power company so they could come and drop the line. Word has come back from Bubba that the job is now done. He has cut the trees he took down into 16-inch lengths so we can use them in the stove at the cabin or bring them home and burn them in our Jotul stove in the living room. Only cost $250. Twenty years ago, even ten, I could have done it myself. But old age has brought wisdom. I know better. So Bubba’s price was cheap. Who knows? Maybe we got $250 worth of firewood out of the deal.

The Case 0f the Kindly Break-In

2008-01-05T19:23:00.000-08:00

Every year between Christmas and New Years I host a group of old friends at our cabin near Mt. Rainier. Obviously I arrive first since I have the keys. This year when I unlocked the front door I knew immediately that something was wrong. The lights were on. Then I saw the mess, things strewn all over. The back window was open, the curtains blowing. I should explain that many years ago we installed shutters over all the windows when we were broken into previously. I looked out the back window and saw that the shutter was intact, as were the hasps. I didn’t know that bolt cutters could cut through Master locks.

A survey of the cabin showed some funny things. The thieves took my very good sleeping bag, the vacuum cleaner, the VCR, the electric blanket from the bed in the loft. In fact, all the blankets. They did not take the television set, the two-burner hotplate, the microwave or the toaster oven. They took all of the spare bed clothes, some old clothes from the closet, the can of coffee but not the coffee pot. They took the basins for dish washing and draining, but not the drainer. The trash bags, the small garbage can, the emergency lantern were gone. They left two rolls of toilet paper.

So we have some replacing to do. Thankfully they did not break the hinges or the hasps on the shutter. And they did not break the glass in the sliding window. Small things to be thankful. This is only the third break-in in forty-five years.

The upside is that we can now give the cabin a good cleaning and throw away some stuff that needs to be thrown.

Slipping In Quietly

2007-12-13T16:52:00.000-08:00

I warned you that I was going on a road trip. However we returned home on November 4th so I'm not quite sure where the time has gone. Obviously we've been busy. I suspect in the coming days I'll write about some of the more interesting things we visited. But for now I just wanted to see if I still remembered how to blog.

Hear Ye

2007-10-01T00:38:00.000-07:00

Know you, one and all, that I will be missing for about five weeks. We have worked on a volksmarch (10K walk) on Saturday. 216 walkers, thank you. And we closed out the horse racing season at Emerald Downs today (Sept. 30). I must say it was a sloppy track but an entertaining day withal. My betting got worse rather than better as the meet went on. Now I must wait until next April to begin again. Meanwhile we are off on a driving wander: Washington, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Nevada, California or parts thereof. Maybe I'll have some adventures to write about during the trip.

Visiiting Emerald Downs' Robert Geller

2007-09-25T19:48:00.000-07:00

We’ve had a pretty good summer. There was something to look forward to every week because we attended the local race track in Auburn, Washington every Friday and a couple of other days for special stakes races. We sat in the grandstands and became quite good friends with the woman usher who took care of our section. My wife, Anna, made knitted hats for her kids and last week Mary Kay presented us with Georgia Pickles, a family recipe from her home state. In real life she is a teacher’s assistant in a class of special ed kids. She jokingly says that Anna and I should come back and substitute teach because the pay is about $125 a day. Then we’d have more to bet. Actually we bet very conservatively. Over 25 racing days and 190+ races I’ve lost $70 and Anna about the same. We have only two more race days to attend. Can I make up my losses? Doubtful.

One of the highlights of the season was meeting up with a former student, George Cottrell, who worked for me in my library at the community college. He’s been a race fan since his high school days and now writes for the Daily Racing Form. Two weeks ago he arranged to take us up to the sixth floor to the track announcer and race caller’s booth. Rob Geller was born in England, moved to Australia when he was two. He came to Emerald Downs after a six-year stint in Hong Kong where he was the race caller in English. There is also a race caller in Mandarin. When Emerald Downs closes he will call races at a track in New Mexico called Sunland Park. We had a wonderful conversation for over a half-hour with Rob, during which he would intermittently switch on the mike to make announcements concerning the upcoming race. I wondered how he memorized the horses’ names. When they were warming up on the back stretch he took a look at them through binoculars, matched the names with the colored and numbered saddle cloths, and was ready to call the race. He’s been calling races for seventeen years or more so he surely knows how to have the card in hand. And as usual he did a wonderful job of it. We appreciated George’s effort to get us an invitation to the booth where few people get to go and to Rob for his warm welcome and the time he spent with us.

Afterward George showed us the suites in which people more wealthy than I can party and enjoy the races at the same time. We found an empty suite and watched the sixth race from high above the finish line before returning to our grandstand seats.

Iain Sinclair

2007-09-09T18:24:00.000-07:00

I have discovered (with a little help from an English friend) a new author. Since I am no longer able to do long walks this writer seems perfect for me. Iain Sinclair is a writer who was previously what I would call a book scout. A far as I can tell he scouted small book stores all over England and brought them back to sell to higher market bookstores in London. He’s written poetry, fiction and non-fiction. At present I’m more interested in his non-fiction. Turns out he and friends are capable walkers as well. The current book I’m reading is Edge of the Orison; In the Traces of John Clare’s ‘Journey Out of Essex.’ John Clare was an early 19th C. peasant poet, for a time adulated in London, quietly went mad, escaped from an asylum in Epping Forest, and walked home to Helpston. Sinclair and his friends try to follow his route as closely as modern roads and buildings will allow. Sinclair not only describes their journey, but tells us of John Clare’s life and problems, his own wife’s childhood and upbringing in the Helpston area and much musing about contemporary England and society. He has an unusual prose style with many phrases that only hint at sentences. It is sometimes challenging to follow his train of thought but I’m finding him thoroughly delightful. So much so that I’ve ordered a further five titles. Some concern a walk around the M25, the ring road around London, journeys through London looking at the Ripper, another book about London and others. Good reading which should keep me enthralled for some time. Since my daughter and I walked through Eping Forest from Chipping to Epping during our first trip to England when she was a teen, Clare’s escape from the asylum there was especially interesting. Later we visited many of the towns Clare walked through or which Sinclair mentions.

My Old Friend, George

2007-08-22T16:05:00.000-07:00

Funny things happen on blobs. Today I received an e-mail from a fellow who used to be a student worker in the college library of which I was administrator. George Cottrell was a dandy worker when he was there. But, you see, he had a love for the race track. “Where’s George today?” “Well, he’s probably at Longacres.” George loved the track and the horses and the betting. And guess what? Now he writes commentary for the Daily Racing Form, or as we ‘race track degenerates’ know it, DRF. It was a real pleasure to hear from George. I hope we can get together sometime soon so I can hear his many tales of the track. It’s been twenty-five years since I retired. I have seen George a few times since then. He would occasionally stop by the house. But I haven’t seen him in a long time. I am very pleased to be in touch with him again.

David Fulmer's Jass

2007-08-14T22:15:00.000-07:00

I recently finished Jass by David Fulmer. It’s a novel set in New Orleans during the 1920s. The protagonist is Valentin St. Cyr, half-Italian and half-Creole, but pretty much passing for white. At one time he was an officer on the New Orleans Police Department, but now he is a private detective. Mostly he works for Big Tom Anderson who has the section of N.O. known as Storyville under his thumb. Fulmer’s first novel, Chasing the Devil’s Tail, had Buddy Bolden, early jazzman, at its center. In this one the murder of four men who had once played in the same jass band are murdered and St. Cyr, with some slight urging from Jelly Roll Morton, set out to find the murderer. Meanwhile Valentin’s love life with the octoroon, Justine, has gone sour and soon she leaves him. When Anderson calls Valentin off and Lt. Picot of the police threatens him, he is more than ever eager to find the murderer. This is an excellent mystery novel set in the early days of jazz in New Orleans.

By circumstance, I recently had acquired a recording of Kid Ory, legendary New Orleans trombonist. He had his own jazz bands as well as playing and recording with King Oliver, Louis Armstrong’s Hot Five and the aforementioned Jelly Roll Morton. These recordings were made in 1922 and 1926, which I assume was approximately the time of Fulmer’s novels. (I know that I will be condemned as a heretic, but I never cared much for Armstrong’s horn nor his voice. But I must say he was playing a much cleaner trumpet in this recording than at later times.)

Anyway, I have high regards for this novel, both as a mystery and as a glimpse of life in the lower sections of New Orleans when jazz was just beginning. And if you like this early kind of traditional jazz or Dixieland (as it's now called)I can recommend the CD as well. It features Edward Kid Ory and is entitled Ory’s Creole Trombone. It on Living Era label and is CD AJA 5148.

The Thirty-Nine Steps

2007-08-08T16:43:00.000-07:00

Recently I took the opportunity to view The Thirty-Nine Steps. This was not the original movie but a BBC production from 1979, I believe. It featured Robert Powell, John Mills and Karen Dotrice. I remember when the film was featured on televison. At the time we did not own a VCR. But I had a friendly gas station man. (Remember when you didn’t pump your own gas? I guess in some states that is still true.) I was yarning with Roger about the upcoming viewing and lamented the fact that we didn’t own a VCR and how much I liked the story, which was from the novel by John Buchan. He offered to tape it for me.

I hadn’t watched the film for a long time and had forgotten much of it. The film is quite different from the original 1935 version of the film which features Robert Donat and Madeleine Carroll. I also have not read the novel for a long time. I think the last time was in ‘93 when I was in the hospital and had an omnibus volume of the ‘Richard Hannay’ stories to pass my idle time.

Quite a few of the scenes are changed. Basically the story is about the attempt by English anarchists to blow up Parliament while the Greek statesman is addressing it. This will surely set off World War I. Richard Hannay obtains some information early on and becomes the object of pursuit by the bad guys to get it back. One obvious difference is the opening of the film. This later version has a lot more about politics and statesmen meeting to plan for the protection of the Greek statesman. In the original film the ‘Memory Man,’ a music hall act, was an important part at both the beginning and again at the end. Missing completely in the later version. And the scenes at the hotel where Hannay is handcuffed to the woman are missing as well. The ending plays out at Big Ben. ‘The thirty-nine steps’ in the latter film refers to three sets of steps leading to the clock tower of the parliament building. I seem to remember that in the original the thirty-nine steps referred to the stairs down to the harbor.

Robert Powell is quite good in the film. There is an exciting scene which Hannay plays out on the face of Big Ben, attempting to stop the minute hand. Karen Dotrice has beautiful eyes and wonderful hair. A search of the web tells me that she was born on the Isle of Guernsey and acted for Disney as a child. She’s seems not made many films as an adult but appears in television productions frequently. With the many differences I think I’m going to have to go back, read the novel again and then view both films for comparison. Not a bad task.

Time Flies

2007-07-26T19:40:00.000-07:00

I don't seem to be blogging more often. The spirit is willing... I spent most of last week at the cabin near Mt. Rainier with some fellows who have been gathering since 1971. At first it was at Christmas time but for the last several years there seems to be a need to meet sometime in July as well. Much eating, much conversation, a few movies and quite honestly, quite a bit of napping. We all seem to be getting older which should be enough of an excuse.

One of the surprises was the appearance of an old friend from Portland, OR. He had attended once some years ago but most of us had lost track of him. He could only stay for one night but it was nice to see him, to have some new topics of conversation, and for me, to take a close look at his Nikon digital SLR camera. I am in the market for same and have been thinking about the Nikon and the Canon. Later in the week the nephew of one of the regulars came to stay for one day. He's recently retired from the Navy after twenty years and is frantically searching for a job. Two of the regulars had to leave early; one for a business meeting that he could not miss and the other to prepare for a trip to Alaska. He is a ham radio operator and is taking part in an event in which radio amateurs try to contact other stations on islands. Over a hundred islands are involved and he and a friend will be working from Prince of Wales Island. Sounds pretty fascinating.

All in all we had a good time. The film fest wasn't quite as exciting as it has been in times past. Hopscotch with Walter Matthau and Glenda Jackson, Rogue Male with Peter O'Toole, Fast and Furious with John Ireland and Dorothy Malone, two episodes of Foyle's War and two episodes of Roy Rogers tv show. Fun just the same.

Just Checking In

2007-07-08T19:30:00.000-07:00

I figure I should check in once in awhile since I’ve been way too lax in posting lately. Maybe I haven’t been doing enough lately to have anything exciting to say. We’ve been attending the horse races every Friday night but you don’t need to hear about my losses every week. Although some exciting things have happened at the track. Maybe I should write about a new book about another track far far away. Suffolk Downs in Boston, to be exact. I suppose I could talk about books read or movies seen. Those things happen in my life more often than anything that’s more exciting. I’ll be spending six days at the cabin with a bunch of guys starting Saturday so I thought I’d better check in now. Maybe they'll have something interesting that I can report on. Anyway, this is short and sweet but I’m still alive.

Walter The Rat

2007-06-21T17:26:00.000-07:00

Every once in awhile I run across a reference to a children’s or young adult book that attracts me. You see, I was once a junior high librarian before I went on to bigger (but possibly not better) things. I check to see if the library has a copy and put a hold on it. Thus the wonderful short book Walter, the Story of a Rat by Barbara Wersba with illustrations by Donna Diamond. The book is only 70 pages long and can easily be read in one or two sittings. Walter is an elderly rat who was born with the ability to read. He’s read an amazing array of books; The Way of All Flesh, Franny and Zooey, The Little Foxes, This Raging Desire. He has moved into the house of a reclusive lady, Miss Pomeroy, who writes adventure thrillers for children. The only trouble is that they feature a mouse, a secret agent mouse named Bromberg who works for the government. Walter wonders why all these writers think mice are so cute and never write a story with a rat as protagonist. He finally decides to reveal himself and leaves the woman a note. "I’m a rat and I’ve been living in your house for sometime." Her reply is short: "I know." Thus begins a correspondence between the writer and the rat. I found the story and the illustration absolutely charming and would recommend it to anyone, child or adult. The half hour or so spent in reading this book will not be time wasted.

Sunset

2007-06-05T15:59:00.000-07:00

I don’t talk about movies watched very much and I suppose I should do so more often. The other night I watched Sunset. It features James Garner, Bruce Willis, Malcolm McDowell, Mariel Hemingway and Patricia Hodges. Garner plays an aging Wyatt Earp come to Hollywood to act as consultant on a film featuring Tom Mix. Willis plays a pretty duded up Tom Mix. Having visited the Tom Mix Museum near Bartlesville, Oklahoma, I can vouch that none of Tom’s duds were nearly as pretty as those Willis wore in this film. The story concerns nothing about the film being made. Instead Tom and Wyatt stumble upon a murder, attempt to solve it, while battling corrupt police and McDowell as the owner of the film company and something of a sadist. Patricia Hodges plays McDowell’s wife. She is apparently an old friend of Wyatt’s and can show the bruises as evidence of McDowell’s abuse.

The costumes are very much period, as the cars, those wonderful cars. Mix seems to own at least three different cars, all spotless and shiny. The other cars are just as beautiful, whether pulling up in front of the theater for an opening or chasing each other through the countryside.

This film is pure fantasy from beginning to end, but it’s great fun. If you like period pieces and lots of action, I think you’ll find it in Sunset.

Scott's Visitors

2007-05-18T14:58:00.000-07:00

I’ve been reading a biography of Sir Walter Scott, a very long, 2-volume biography. It’s probably more than I need to know about Scott but I find it interesting so I continue several pages a day. Truth to tell I read it during the late evening news. The news is pretty much the same every night, another drive-by shooting, another attempt to grab a child, another bad accident on the freeway. Even the several minute segment on the weather is pretty much the same. And the sports, another home run for Barry Bond, another loss (or sometimes win) for the Sonics or Mariners. So it’s quite easy to read about six or seven pages a night in this sometimes ponderous tome.

I was struck last evening by the number of guests who were visiting Scott. This was at a time when his novels did not identify the author. They were still being published as "by the author of Waverly." Several people did know that he was the author, but speculation among the public ran rampant about who the author was. Scott was well known and very popular for his poetry and his reviews and other contributions to the Edinburgh Review and similar publications, as well as for a History of Scotland. And I’ve just come to the part of his life where he was made a baronet and became Sir Walter Scott. He also continued his career in law.

So he was a very popular man and having acquired an estate with the money, he had built Abbotsford, the home for him and his family. I have visited Abbotsford and I can attest that there was plenty of room for visitors. What amazes me is with all the visitors and Scott acting the gracious host he was able to find time to write. He was usually working on one or two novels at a time (at the time I speak of he was writing Ivanhoe and Kenilworth plus an article for another publication). And he was hosting at least five people from two different families and had recently hosted the Prince of Sweden. But then he had previously been grievously ill, in much pain and continued to write through it all. My admiration increases with every page.

More Spy Stuff

2007-05-14T21:41:00.000-07:00

I still have spy novels on my mind. I was wondering if anyone could suggest a book concerning either or both of the following: 1) A book that brings up to date the book I have read, The British Spy Novel which was published in1984. That’s twenty-three years ago and there are surely writers who have come upon the scene in the ensuing years. 2) A book that covers American spy novelists. I know of Helen MacInnes, sometimes called the Queen of American Spy Novelists. But were there any other women spy novelists? Robert Ludlum whom I tried a couple of books and wasn’t enthusiastic about. Although I must say that I like the movies of The Bourne Identity and The Bourne Supremacy. And I understand that a third Bourne movie is being made. Trevanian was around for a while but I never tried any of his books. Don’t know for sure whether he was American or not. And I don’t know whether you can call Hammond Innes a spy novelists or not. An adventure thriller writer for sure. And Adam Hall (Elleston Trevor) whom I met one time at a Bouchercon shortly before his death. He was going to send me some notes on writing spy fiction but never got around to it, alas. My loss. I was looking forward to what he had to say. Anyway, I’m open to suggestions of books about the writing and writers of spy novels as well as recommendations of any that I’ve missed.

Spy Novels

2007-05-13T20:37:00.000-07:00

By chance the other night I spotted a book on the shelf in the family room and wondered what it was. When I plucked from the shelf it turned out to be The British Spy Novel by John Atkins. I started to look through and pretty soon settled down to read it front to back. It pretty much covers the major spy novelists from the beginning, probably Erskine Childers’ SandThe Riddle of the Sands up to the year 1984. Not very contemporary, is it? But I realized that I hadn’t read any spy novels, or as Atkins likes to say, espionage and counter-espionage novels, for a very long time. When I get onto a kick like this I like to visit the Fantastic Fiction website and make lists. (A very useful website for anyone who reads a lot.) I ended up with a dozen spy writers I would like to read more of. Then it was a dash to the library on Sunday afternoon before they closed at five. I came home clutching Len Deighton’s City of Gold and Eric Ambler’s Journey Into Fear in my hot little hands. I’ll let you know how they are. But I am confident from reading previous books by each of these authors that I’m in for an exciting ride.

Emerald Downs

2007-05-08T21:12:00.001-07:00

This is my 200th post. I'm not the talkiest person in the world but I'm quite amazed that I've come this far. Shall we shoot for 300?

Ah, the best part of the year. The ponies are running again. Emerald Downs, our local race track opened for the season on April 20. The season will consist of ninety-one race days. We’ve been four times already. The early part of the season is made up mostly of 5 and 5½ furlong races but as the horses round into racing shape there will be longer races. Last week saw the first mile race of the season. The ushers who work the grandstand welcomed us back. One of them, a special ed teacher originally from Georgia, works this as a second job. She is pretty knowledgeable about the horses at this track. Week nights there isn’t a huge crowd and most of them are downstairs in general admission. Evidently few want to pay the extra cost of the grandstand. So we have time to talk. She’s introduced us to some regulars and one owner, this latter when I wanted to be assured I was reading the pedigrees right. Turns out that not many pay much attention to pedigree but I do. Anyway, we’re having a grand time and so far are ahead in the betting. The weather has been good. Racing is only three days a week this early, Friday nights and Saturday and Sunday afternoons. Maybe no trips this years, just lots of days at the track.

Pricey Stuff

2007-04-18T22:52:00.000-07:00

I have little reason to read the Business Pages of the newspaper but since I read the newspaper pretty thoroughly I do at least glance at Business. I was caught by one article. In it was quoted some woman who had her hair cut and styled at the cost of $150. Further down was an item about a purse for $1650. What have we come to? People are starving around the world, some even in our own United States. I rarely talk about social issues in this blog, but this just caught me wrong (or maybe right). Lady, get a $40 cut and style and send the other $110 to Doctors Without Borders or CARE or the charity of your choice. And as for the $1650 purse....

Lest the men think they are any better...notice how many Hummers there are on the road? And how about the salaries and perks for CEOs and the $4M mansions or the exclusive clubs, gold or otherwise that have memberships at $4-5K a year. I shall now get down from my soapbox.

Tin Tin Movie

2007-04-03T22:02:00.000-07:00

I read in the newspaper the other day that Steven Spielberg is making a movie of Tin Tin. Or maybe has just acquired the rights. Either way, the news is exciting. I presume that the movie will be live action. Finally we’ll get to see Tin Tin, the boy adventurer, and his white terrier, Snowy, on the screen. And possibly the detective, the Thompson Twins, the professor and other characters from Tin Tin’s various adventures.

The characters were created by the Belgian artist, Herge, who created twenty-one graphic novels over his career. Very successful, fun to read, and still in print after many decades. I hope Spielberg hurries the process forward and that I get to see the movie before long. After all, I’m an old guy. Something to look forward to.

Rider on the Rain

2007-04-02T21:59:00.000-07:00

I watched the movie, Rider on the Rain last evening. It was a French film made in 1960 and starred Charles Bronson and Marlene Jobert with Jill Ireland, Bronson’s wife, in a major supporting role. Marlene Jobert is followed and raped while her husband is absent. Later she discovers the rapist still lurking in the basement of her home. She kills him with two blasts from a shotgun. Soon Bronson shows up, hinting that he knows she murdered a man. He says he is not the police and it quite a long time into the movie before we find out who he really is. He hounds her constantly and she begins by denying the murder and consistently denies to the very end. The film has quite a few twists and turns and almost a satisfying ending. At least for me.

I can barely remember 1960. It must have been a good time because the skirts were short. Marlene Jobert wears hers jauntily, as does Jill Ireland, playing her mother. Jobert is not beautiful, but rather cute in her short haircut and wearing her all white clothes well. She has a wonderful figure to carry it off with elan.

The story is from Sebastien Japrisot, a French mystery novelist, not very well known in this country. A few years back the film A Very Long Engagement was made from one of his novels.
This is an offbeat film which I enjoyed very much. There was some discussion of the film on Imdb and I gather that the original DVD was pretty bad and had some scenes cut from it. I commend it to those who are looking for an offbeat mystery. I should warn you that the music track has a warble and is a bit distracting, but the dialogue is just fine.

Ross's Birthday

2007-03-27T22:48:00.000-07:00

I have just returned from a wonderful celebration of a good friend’s 70th birthday. Ross Weinstein was the celebrant, along with his wife, Nancy. Another couple, the Ginny and Randy Potter, and a good friend of Ross’s, Hans, who last name I did not get, along with Anna and I made a very lively sevensome. We met at Calabria’s, a fine Italian restaurant in Kirkland. The food was wonderful. Speaking only for myself I started with an Italian beer, Moretti’s. I followed with a caesar salad, spaghetti alla putanesca for a main course, tiramasu and coffee to finish. The others raved equally about their various dishes.

All the participants are members of Family Wanderers, a volksport club, excepting Hans. The conversation was all around Robin Hood’s Barn, or maybe it was Geppetto’s Barn. Nancy and Ross had just returned from an elderhostel in Hawaii and regaled us with stories and photos. Volcanos and exotic flowers as well as other scenery. Much of the talk was about food and restaurants in various cities. Hans suggested that he always looks before traveling to see if the city he is going to visit has a school of culinary arts. He says that he has had some very good meals there. Travel, architecture, libraries, Japanese and Chinese gardens were just some of the topics of discussion. What a fun evening. We should celebrate birthdays more often, say once a month. Especially with meals like this. Happy birthday, Ross.

The Road Home

2007-03-08T21:19:00.000-08:00

More and more I seem to be enjoying films from Asian countries. The other night I watched The Road Home which features the lovely Zhang Ziyi, who most of you will probably know from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. This Chinese movie was not the slashing swords, flying warriors type of film at all. It was a rather simple love story. It opens in black-and-white as a son returns to his village from the city. His father has died away from the village and his mother wants her husband’s body be carried back for burial. The son argues that he can hire a horse and carriage but the mother insists. The film then changes to color as the story of the young girl falling in love with the young teacher who has come to the village. Then he is arrested and taken away to the city for some political crime. Ultimately he returns and they marry. He continues teaching and has been the village teacher for decades. The young woman waits patiently through the many seasons for his return. Eventually he does and the two marry. As the film returns to black-and-white the son and the village mayor have agreed to find the money to hire men to carry the teacher’s body back to the village for burial. There is a wonderful scene with a hundred people following behind the coffin as the men exchange places carrying the coffin. Behind the people walking there are five or six cars following. Former students of the teacher have heard of his death and have come to pay him homage. A simple story, a love story, and beautifully filmed.

Scottish Novels

2007-03-04T20:34:00.000-08:00

I appear to have been on a Scottish kick in my reading of late. First it was Sir Walter Scott’s Waverly and The Monastery. Then it was Robert Louis Stevenson’s Kidnapped and David Balfour. Somehow I did not remember much of Kidnapped. But I must have read it sixty years ago. So I thoroughly enjoyed reading it again and following it with David Balfour for the first time. Lots of action and adventure in Kidnapped and less so, more of a love story with its ups and downs in David Balfour. Then I grabbed a novel by Jeffery Farnol off the shelf. Over the Hills turned out to be another novel set in Scotland. I’ve enjoyed them all but I think the Scottish run is over. Except that I’m reading a two-volume biography of Scott which is probably telling me more than I care to know. But it’s one of the best Scott biographies so I will endure. Somehow I love this old stuff that was popular decades ago and sometimes, as in the case of Scott, almost two centuries ago. Currently I’m reading The Golden Scarecrow by Hugh Walpole, published in 1915.

Of course, I read contemporary stuff too. Some mysteries, some science fiction, some military novels set in the age of fighting sail.. I’ve just finished The Shape of Water, the first mystery by Andrea Camilleri, a Sicilian writer. The setting is certainly different and it gives some insight to the Italian ways of justice, somewhat different from our own.

Concert for George

2007-02-16T18:34:00.000-08:00

It’s been a while. What a slacker! I’ve spent the last several nights watching Concert For George, in honor of and featuring the songs of George Harrison, He always was my favorite Beatle. Don’t know why. Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney, Billy Preston. Jeff Lynne, Gary Brooker. And a wonderful group of Indian musicians playing a special piece composed by Ravi Shankar and featuring his beautiful daughter, Anoushka Shankar on sitar. A two-and-a-half hour concert plus and hour-and-a-half of extras on a second disk. I enjoyed it very much and will watch it again and again. Go do likewise.

2007-02-02T20:04:00.000-08:00

I was talking with an old friend this evening. Her husband had recently had a stroke, was in a care facility, and she seemed a little uneasy about caring for him when he returned home. I asked her what sort of condition he was in. He is talking and walking, able to eat by himself. So I think things are not as bad as might be. Let us hope she is able to cope. But she didn't want to talk to me about the situation and quickly passed the phone to her sister, who was visiting briefly on her way home.

Freya (the sister) with whom I used to play folk music a long time ago, and who lived in England for a long time, played in a folk group and often appeared on BBC programs was in a talkative moods. Funnily, she wanted to talk about Barbaro, the Kentucky Derby winner who later broke a leg in the Preakness and has been in the hearts of many people ever since. He underwent many surgical procedures but last week when he was no longer comfortable, he was euthanized. I was surprised at how closely Freya had followed the course of Barbaro's procedures and ups and downs of recovery. She was truly distraught about the horse, his tribulations and subsequent death. She had written a poem in tribute to the great horse. Perhaps he might have been even greater. Might have been sire to many other great race horses.

I think perhaps the topic of conversation changed to Barbaro because neither of them wanted to talk about the situation much closer to home. Meanwhile all I can say a prayer for my friend who has had the stroke, and mourn, with the millions of horse lovers and school children, the loss of the great horse, Barbaro. I remember writing about him months ago when it was felt he had a chance to win the three races that make up the Triple Crown. It was not to be. Get well, Dick, please! Rest in Peace, Barbaro.

Scott's The Monastery

2007-02-01T18:00:00.000-08:00

I seem recently to have had a rebirth of my interest in Sir Walter Scott. I remember back to my high school days when our English reader, Prose and Poetry, contained Ivanhoe. In those days each year we had one novel and one play by Shakespeare as well as a great number of short stories and poems that introduced us to some of the great writers. Ivanhoe may have been the first adult (grown up) novel that I read.

During our trip last fall I picked up a copy of Scott’s Waverly and read it after breakfast each morning. One of the delights of retirement is that you can read for a half-hour or so before getting dressed for the day. Just this morning I finished The Monastery. Scott wrote complex novels, most of which involved local history of the border country and the legendry of that area. This novel also involves the Catholic church, for so long the religion of England and Scotland, and the new Reformation under Queen Elizabeth and the Scottish reformer, Knox.

Part of the story concerns Father Eustace, the sub-prior of St. Mary’s monastery, a strong man at odds with Henry Warden, a preacher of the reformed faith who had once attended a college in France with Eustace. Formerly they were great friends. Another part concerns Julian Avenel, who has usurped the castle and grounds of Mary Avenel, the rightful heir. Driven from her estate, she finds refuge at Glendearg, up a dark and hidden glen. There she is befriended by Dame Glendinning, and her two sons, Edward and Halbert. They have thrust upon them the foppish Sir Pearcie Shafton, all slashed doublets and ringing high-flown speech. Scott does a wonderful job with this character.

In the end there is near conflict between England and Scotland over this fop, who turns out to be not at all what he seems. And there is a good bit of supernatural, for Pearcie and Halbert are at odds and fight a duel. Halbert runs the foppish knight through and flees. But the White Lady of Avenel heals the young man and though he shows the marks of the blade, he is completely healed.

I ramble on. There is a wonderful showdown between the Earl of Murray (Scotland) and the Earl of Morton (England). But all’s well that ends well. A fine story. But by today’s standards of writing, the syntax is overblown. It takes a while to become accustomed to the language but for me it was well worth the effort. My next breakfast book is likely to be from a more recent writer, Jeffrey Farnol. Still not contemporary, but 1920s. And after that Stevenson’s Catriona, the sequel to Kidnapped.

Geri Larkin's New Book

2007-01-21T20:36:00.000-08:00

Anna and I drove downtown today to attend a reading at the Elliott Bay Book Store. We parked several blocks away so I could get a bit of a walk in. I can’t walk very far these days without pain but I need to walk or the consequences are likely to be more pain. We passed a store with dry soda displayed in the windows. This is a drink prepared by a woman in Tacoma who saw a need for a drink to occupy people’s hands but who are not wine drinkers. There was a recent article about her in the Seattle Times. We saw at least four flavors; kumquat and lemon grass are the ones I remember. Not for me but I wish her success. Next we passed a fine wood furniture store where a simple bench was priced at $950. Beautiful things but one should be prepared to pay for them. I saw a lovely rocking chair but was afraid to go inside and see the price. I might have fainted dead away and never reached the reading.

The reading was for Geri Larkin’s new book, The Chocolate Cake Sutra; Ingredients for a Sweet Life. I’ve read all of Geri’s books which are Zen in nature. She attended a Buddhist seminary in Toronto where she was ordained. She was given transmission (permission to teach) by a Zen Master in Ann Arbor, Michigan. I had thought that she might be a little reserved. Not so. She was very welcoming, very outgoing, easy to smile, laugh and tell jokes on herself. She has recently moved to Seattle after being the founding teacher for a Zen Buddhist Abbey in the inner city of Detroit called The Still Point Center. She answered questions readily, read a couple of sections from the new book. She currently is not teaching but she said "Who knows what the future will bring?" I was struck by her very down-to-earth nature.

We celebrated a fine Seattle afternoon by having dinner at Dinos, a fine Italian-Greek restaurant near our home.

Dreamer; Inspired by a True Story

2007-01-19T21:40:00.000-08:00

Being the thoroughbred racing enthusiast that I am I watched the movie Dreamer: Inspired by a True Story the other night. It starred Kurt Russell as the father, Elizabeth Shue as the mother, Kris Kristofferson as the grandfather, and Dakota Fanning as the child. The story is that a horse trained by Russell breaks a leg during a race. The manager not only fires Russell but wants to put the horse down. Russell takes the horse as part of what he is owed. Any dolt can see where the story is going. It’s nicely filmed but I can’t say the racing scenes are great.

I was more intrigued with which horse was the inspiration. Indeed, there was a horse that came back from a broken leg to win a Breeders Cup Race. The year was 1995 and Mariah’s Storm was the horse. She is also famous for being the dam of Giant’s Causeway, one of the recent great horses. But I’m afraid the resemblances between reality and the film story end there. The film is pure fantasy. But I’m a sucker for racing stories so I sat back and enjoyed it.

In looking through the web I note that there are many other folks who also enjoy horse and horse racing stories. I found several lists of horse movies and have jotted a few of them down. I also found that some folks really enjoyed putting Dakota Fanning’s acting down. I found her facial expressions quite charming, a more than passable actress. I think she needs work on her diction. Some of her lines I could not understand. I’m anxious to see how she does in Charlotte’s Web, just recently released.

Gift of a Set of Kipling

2007-01-14T18:01:00.000-08:00

I’ve been away too long. It’s easy to get lazy. But I shall resolve to do better. A while back I was writing about the visit of a friend and a gift that he gave me. But I said that there was more. The friend is Mike Horvat, who, by the way, recently sold a huge fanzine collection to the University of Iowa Libraries. Many of the fanzines in that collection were my fanzines and those of many other people in the science fiction and mystery worlds of fandom with whom I had exchanged zines.

Mike has been recently trying to put together matched sets of authors he has enjoyed. Sometimes he gets carried away. The second gift that he gave me was eighteen volumes of a matched set of the works of Rudyard Kipling. These were published by Scribners. I have since learned that the complete set runs to thirty-five volumes. At first I thought "well, I can attempt to fill in the missing volumes one or several at a time." My second thought was that I might try reading these eighteen volumes and if I’m still alive then I might search for the others. Probably the second thought is better. Whatever the outcome, I need to thank Mr. Horvat publicly for the fine gift. Now what about those Stevenson and Scott books you were talking about?

I seem to be on a kick all of a sudden of reading older authors. I’ve recently read books by Robert Louis Stevenson, R.D. Blackmore, Sir Walter Scott and Eden Phillpotts. My current after-breakfast book is The Monastery by Scott. It’s interesting to get involved in books of this sort which move more slowly and use a much different syntax than the current books being published, be they mystery, science fiction or mainstream. The payoff is that they are truly good stories and there is a sense of accomplishment when you are finished.

Happy Holidays

2006-12-23T21:59:00.000-08:00

Christmas day draws ever closer and things get way busy around our house. So I'll take just a moment of your time to wish each and every one of you a Merry Christmas, a Happy Hanukkuh, and the Happiest of New Years. I'll be at the cabin for a few days after Christmas so I'll be in touch when I return home. Happy Holidays, Everybody.