DINER REVIEW ANNOUNCES PRIMARY WINNERS

Diner Review Picks Nominees!








I know that everyone is in a race to have the first primary or caucus or whatever and I know that they are going to try and spring all this on us in January but your friends at the Diner Review have decided to forego all of that and save your New Years by telling you now who the nominees are going to be. Absent a major stroke by the populations of Iowa, New Hampshire and Michigan the nominees will be:

Democrats: Barack Obama
Republicans: Mike Huckabee

You heard it here first. But why you might ask the great Diner Reviewer do you think they will be the nominees? I will instruct you as if i were the great and all powerful LIBERAL MEDIA. Well, the schedule is as follows for January for the Democrats:

January 2008
3 - Iowa caucus (per Iowa caucus, website of the Iowa Caucus Project)
8 - New Hampshire Primary (changed on 11/21/07 so it could move back up to first primary status; they waited to make sure Michigan wouldn't schedule their primary even earlier than Jan 15th)
15 - Michigan (on 11/20/07, a judge ruled the primary can be held on Jan 15th; DNC will probably penalize them by taking away delegates)
19 - Nevada caucus (approved by DNC)
26 - South Carolina Primary (approved by DNC)
29 - Florida Primary (may be penalized by DNC for breaking party rules, which may result in losing delegates)

The Republicans throw in a party in Wyoming:
January 2008
3 - Iowa
5 - Wyoming Republican Convention
8 - New Hampshire Primary
15 - Michigan
19 - Nevada, South Carolina
29 - Florida

So here are the problems and opportunities according to the Diner Review. Hillary Clinton is the only Democrat who can lose the presidential election. She is a galvanizing force for the Republicans and has no real governing experience and although advised by the BEST political machine in recent history she cannot fix herself. She has flipped on every important issue to make herself more palatable to what she perceives as the the main stream of the party and is nothing anymore to anyone other then Bill’s really smart, aggressive wife. She is too much of the same system that has brought us here. All Obama will do is the week before the caucus is to remind the Iowans that if she is elected we will have had 20 years of Bush and Clinton dynasties and are they going to tack on another 8 years... a whole generation of two family families having the the Presidency divvied up between them? Iowan’s will not tolerate it.

John Edwards is lost before he starts. he does have a great populist stump speech and I think he has a great heart but he got played out as Gore’s number 2 and people think that they have his number. He is a populist of the multi millionaire variety. he might make a nice VP candidate this time around but Obama will need someone from New York, California or Texas to round out his ticket. Bottom line is that Edwards would be tough to elect as well.
Obama is asking the hard questions and doing his best to tell the truth. He is telling the folks that there are no easy answers and that it is time for a change. Thats is what people want to hear, that is what they need to hear. I only hope the guy can deliver. he appears to be the only one of the bunch who can make any claim to be an outsider. Perhaps it is an illusion and maybe even a lie but... maybe night and that is all we really need. Once he wins Iowa Hillary’s bubble bursts, Edwards goes away when his funding dries up. New Hampshire even if Hillary can limp through and win that one starts to get killed in Michigan (which might lose it’s delegates anyway) but when they hit Nevada and South Carolina it will be over. Obama will kill her by then

The Republicans will be a lot easier. Huckabee beats Romneys well financed machine by 5 percentage points... or more. Guliani get killed in Iowa... killed. He and Romney limp into New Hampshire where they narrowly beat the rising tide of the Huckabee machine which then rolls on into Michigan, where he kills and the they fight a little battle in Nevada and then HE KILLS THEM in South carolina... and if Florida has to vote...they will and he will win there too.
Romney is a Mormon and the conservative christians will not line up behind him. Like it or not Christians view Mormons as nuts. I know that sounds bigoted or wrong but it is what it is and no amount of repositioning or pandering can get him there. Guliani is just simply unlikable outside of New York and he cannot say 9-11 enough to change that. Huckabee is pleasant, likable former minister who talks pretty well and has a nice story. he is also from Hope Arkansas and the republicans as much as they hate Clinton, admire the way he bitch slapped them. it is Huckabee and it is over before Super Tuesday.

Diner Review XI: Florissant Diner

Florissant Diner
831-4375 1060 St Francois, Florissant Missouri



I do not know whether it is well documented but I have a long standing lack of comfort in North County. Perhaps it is because it is where my wife grew up...perhaps it is the proximity to Alton and perhaps it is so close to something called “The Confluence” but one way or another, I do not wander there a lot. Recently I had occasion to be assisting in the dispensing of justice (and truth) at Florissant City Hall and I saw, right across the street, the Florissant Diner.
It is at the end of a small strip mall and has a great “curb appeal” diner wise with a nice neon sign and a big picture window you can look in and see the grill and everyone who is working and eating there. Seating is limited with three 4 top tables and a deuce and then (oddly) bar stools up against the counter facing the grill. there is nothing “bar” like about the place. They do not serve booze and it is very well lit. The over all impression is that it is small and there are a couple of refrigerators out in the area where customers are

On a Saturday morning the tables were full and I needed to sit at the counter with one of my diner aficionado companions (all good people). The place was being run and were served by a delightful Brazilian women who was very pleasant and full of conversation. She introduced us to her husband (a turk) who was doing the cooking. Over all it was one of the more welcoming places i have had breakfast at which makes me deeply suspicious.

The menu is unremarkable but in an “un-dinerlike” way there is an emphasis on “skillets” (which are conflagrations of ingredients with eggs thrown in) and omelets. It seems a little frou frou for this diner but I am happy to report that all my fears were over come by plain and simple exc ellent diner food. Although the chile was not sampled it is available (in season whatever that means) but there was no slinger on the menu. The hash browns were “breakfast potatoes” but DO NOT FEAR! They were mashed down flat into a delightfully browned (on both sides) potato patty that covered a good section of the plate. The sausage was flavorful and the cream gravy (though served in a styrofoam bowl) was hot and had some zesty pepper to it. My companion got the omelet which he reported as excellent and also was favorably impressed by the house hot sauce which was the lip smacking “Franks”.

As i said earlier, this diner is WAY off my beaten path. If the address confuses you it is directly across from that last bastion of law and order in north county, the Florissant City Hall. I get a nose bleed north of highway 40 that gets progressively worse as i head north. By highway 70 I am disoriented and north of 270 where this lies I can go into full on stroke mode. Still...I will come back to this place. If I could get one of the tables and be waited on again by the friendly Brazilian girl...it would all be worth it. Come for the hash browns and the conversation. 7 Slingers on the 10 scale.

Vacation VI: Amoeba Records

Amoeba Records is the largest independent music store in the country. It boast 250,000 titles. that is not 250,000 CD’s my 20 year old pointed out to me “but separate titles dad.” they probably have close to a million CD’s on site. It started in Berkley and then a second one in San Francisco before migrating south. My son and I have never been blessed enough to attend the northern California stores but no trip to southern California is acceptable without a pilgrimage to Amoeba.

As I have bemoaned in this space before, the internet and big chains have killed the independent record store. In St. Louis we only have two of any consequence (Vintage Vinyl and Euclid Records) and even our local chain of Streetside has fallen by the wayside. So an independent music store like an independent book store is to be treasured and admired and when it claims to be the biggest one in the world... pay attention.

The place sits on Sunset in Hollywood and although we fought 2 1/2 hours of mid day traffic through Orange County and L.A. to get there it is an inspiring place. It is huge and imposing. They have an acre of pop/rock CD’s but the real beauty of the place is stated on little placards where they admonish you to check their used CD section because they are cheaper and indeed they are. The place is a music snobs wet dream. When you find the slot for an obscure band like Okkervil River the place card also directs you to look in the sections for Will Sheff and Shearwater.

My mind tends to go blank when I walk in and my carefully disciplined shopping plans get flung to the four winds. I look at the many names over the CD’s (ignoring the new releases section as you can find those at Best Buy if you need them) and start wandering around and thinking of slots I need to fill... T-Bone Burnette’s back catalogue... oh look a life recording of a set by J. Mascis (of Dinosaur Jr.) playing solo at CBGB’s., two out of print Okkervil River EPs. A Magnolia Electric EP where they cover “Werewolves of London.” All good stuff that you simply cannot find anywhere else...even on iTunes (gasp!)

We were on a surgical strike having to return to the rest of the family by five and I was deathly afraid of the traffic returning home so I only looked wistfully at all the great poster art and concert art they had on display knowing I could lose an hour there is I started to look and i had neither the time nor the budget. I scanned their “folk” and “country” sections impressed by the mass of quantity and quality (They had over 30 different Johnny Cash CDs for instance) and then looked at the comprehensive vinyl section which was larger then any St. Louis record store all by itself.

Equally joyful is watching my son shop. I tell him I will buy him four CD’s and I feel pretty good about that until I see him separating out the 4 most expensive for daddy’s charge card. he is getting some rare Decembrist’s, Modest Mouse, Mountain Goats and some bands so pretentious I do not even know their names. I beam with pride as we check out and ring up 130 dollars in purchases. They have like 20 check out stations and the last time we were there on a Saturday night it took a half hour just to check out. Bottom line is that the place is amazing and that whenever in L.A. or Berkley or San Francisco... hit Amoeba and be AMAZED!

Vacation V: Mission San Luis Rey

San Luis Del Rey Mission: There are a lot of people who plan (a lot) for family trips. My wife used to be one of them and then we stated going to family camp up in Michigan and with me having a job there just was not much time for anything else. Now we have a son in college and Sandy has come to the belated realization that the best chance we have for spending any time with our children is on vacation. So we skipped the traditional Thanksgiving at home and traveled to southern California to see friends and play in the ocean a little. That was far as planning went. Other then Thanksgiving at the Tiemann’s and Pat swimming with the dolphins (not the Miami Dolphins 0-12 at this sitting) we had-nothing planned.

Playing in the ocean was to be a big part of the trip and we new the Pacific was cold and we brought wet suits to facilitate our cavorting. No one on the other hand told me that it would be cloudy and windy and generally not conducive to beach frolicking. So we had some time to kill and with no plans and no proper I.D. to get back into the country (thank you homeland security) from Mexico I cam up with a plan. A mere four miles from oceanside California where we were currently residing was a Mission called San luis Rey. Firing up the laptop I learned that there were something like 21 such Missions up and down the coast and that they had a long history. As I have noted before following the laws of physics, Beckers at rest will tend to remain at rest. The troubling part is that beckers in motion will tend to find a way to remain again at rest as soon as possible...preferably with a television on... with cable...and some Cheetos.

But... my wife was sick of this behavior having spent the previous day with two of my progeny as the eldest and I went on a five hour CD buying excursion at Amoeba records in L.A. So... thinking quickly and knowing my kids would not tolerate the 34 minute drive to the Mission at Capistrano I prevailed upon them to humor me and go to the one just four miles away. I sweetened the offer with a run by Starbucks and Mc Donalds and it was a done deal.

It really was a short drive and just on the eastern outskirts of Oceanside a large white Cathedral sits on a hill flanked by a cemetery and a retreat center. The place was large white stucco and looked fairly impressive. We walked in and got the family fare of 20 bucks getting a discount off the hefty 6 dollar regular admission and quickly were standing in dim rooms looking at religious artifacts, innumerable statues of St. Francis of Assisi (my favorite Catholic Saint) and various old pottery. It was underwhelming and moved quickly to a corridor with scenes from the old mission behind glass in a troubling life size diorama. The next room had several pieces of statuary (St Francis again) and two carpeted wooden benches to sit in front of a TV and watch a bad videotape of the Missions History. Let me summarize... started in late 1700’s changed hands a lot of time...no one cared...fell into disrepair and looted by locals...deeded back to local indians...rebuilt in late 40’s under a grant from Hearst foundation. That is what I got out of it but for a great history check out:

http://www.sandiegohistory.org/collections/missions/sanluisrey.htmhttp://www.sandiegohistory.org/collections/missions/sanluisrey.htm

After watching the video we exited into a Courtyard, to the left and shut off from us the retreat center grounds. We walked through a little courtyard with a fountain and a statue of St. Francis into a very dark room with 4 or 5 pieces of art... all of which were big, bloody, religious and reproduced. From there we got to go to the cathedral or Church or whatever and it was pretty cool. All stucco and wood, big with big wooden benches. Still used for worship. Lots of candles, not too much stained glass (none) it was interesting to wonder around. there were a number of paintings (Fresco’s?) on the wall and although we could identify Jesus, Mary and Joseph there were several people including one female that we could not positively I.D. There was also a nice rendering of St. Francis of Assisi.

From there we wondered into the cemetery with a lot of graves of people who had been dead for a long time and several from people recently passed away. There also was a cellar where it appeared all the priests who had served there had been buried. it was nicely landscaped and peaceful and I concluded that I could rest comfortably there if need be but that being a Lutheran the dead Catholics might be offended. You know how those people are. We left the cemetery and went at my daughters insistence to the gift shop where we had a remarkably good time buying:

1. A T-Shirt for Jon (very tasteful outline of Mission on red background)
2. A tortoise and silver cross for me
3. A St. Michael (my favorite Archangel) trading card that when you held it in different directions shows him standing on a rock or crushing a demon with his foot.
4. A shot glass
5. Some crap for Laura’s friends

All in all it was amusing although my wife said we were disrespectful. When I finished paying Jon took me excitedly by the hand and pointed me towards California first and oldest pepper tree. This was not nearly as exciting as it sounds. the family gratefully got back into the mini-van the cultural and historical portion of the family vacation having taken almost an hour and a half (including Starbucks) and now blessedly behind us.

Vacation IV: L.A. Traffic

I have come to really love Southern California. between business and pleasure trips i seem to get out there almost every year and have come to be somewhat awe filled by the fact that you can go from ocean, to mountain, desert to snow in so short of a physical distance. Everywhere you go it is amazing how beautiful the terrain is, and humbling too. I am sure you take it for granted (just as we in St. Louis take for granted the natural beauty of our River Des Peres) when you see it every day but wow... what a cool place.

Until you actually have to get somewhere. The you have to get in your car and get on the road and it is a nightmare. To misquote that great southern philosopher Forest Gump L.A. Highways are like a box of chocolates... you never know what your going to get. Generally what I get is one of those crappy dark chocolate things filled with an unidentifiable nut. That is what I get when I get on the freeway in L.A. If you need to go two blocks...no problem. two miles... no problem. But if you need to go 25 miles... pack a lunch. You might make it in twenty five minutes... it might take three hours. In my time out here this week I was caught in traffic jams at 7:00 Sunday night.... 1:00 Wednesday.... 4:30 PM Wednesday and finally (gratefully) at 10:00 Thanksgiving morning.

There is rarely a rhyme or a reason for this traffic. Just 4 million people in L.A. trying to get around and as far as I can see failing miserably every day. We in St. Louis are lucky to live in a dying, non-vibrant, somewhat backwards midwestern city which we claim “is a great place to raise kids.” If it takes us 45 minutes to get across town at rush hour we feel sorely oppressed. Californians crap bigger traffic delays then that every day of there miserable, car obsessed, polluting lives. Not that I am bitter regarding the huge amounts of Escalades, Explorers, Denalis and other modes of transportation slightly larger then my first house. I would say in the time on the highways I set forth above traffic came to a complete stop over 100 times. It made me feel powerless and angry. Feeling so angry made me question whether I really had ANY mental strength at all but seriously... what a nightmare. I believe it is the randomness of the traffic nightmares I found so infuriating. We know in our town that between 7-8:30 in the morning and between 4:30 and 6:00 at night that there are a lot of people moving too and from work and school. While you know the same thing in L.A. you might also run into an inexplicable jam, with no accident and no highway construction at 11:00 at night. Things like that make daddy nuts.

I do not care how pretty it is. People cannot live this way for an extended period of time. The only theory I can come up with is that these people know that sooner or later they and/or their homes and possessions will be:

1. Swallowed by fire,
2. Swept into the ocean; or
3. Swallowed into the ground by an earthquake

Based on these assumptions they toil on the highways for several hours each day figuring they only have a limited amount of time to suffer here before they have to move back to the midwest. It seems slightly sketchy as a life plan but clearly no one in their right mind could plan to spend the remainder of their life in a beautiful place trapped on a five lane highway with no chance at redemption or of ever getting anywhere in a reasonable amount of time. It may be beautiful but that and 7 bucks will get me a beer at a ball-game. I like to be on time and have control.... or at least the illusion of control over my schedule. You Californians take your beautiful place.... I will take the River Des Peres.

Mizzou Over KU: Rock Chalk... they suck

We take a break in our coverage of the Becker family vacation to say a words regarding the Mizzou Tigers. First of all.... what kind of topsy turvy mixed up world has Missouri and Kansas playing for the nations number one ranking this late in November? I mean... what the hell? Is this one of the signs of the apocalypse. I am 45. I actually saw Missouri play in an Orange Bowl. They were not playing for the national championship or anything like that but it was still exciting. There were plenty years of Liberty Bowl appearances and Independence Bowl and the like. The were many dark and long suffering years between Al Onofrio and Gary Pinkel. Nebraska and Oklahoma dominated the Big 8 and there were of course some very dark years where K-State had a team (sick and unnatural). The Big Twelve did not change things much accept now we had Texas and Texas A.M. to kick us around.

Pinkel came as a savior but we have seen so many saviors... Warren Powers, Woody Woodenhoffer to name just two and they all led us no where. Pinkel came in quietly and began to install a system but we had heard these excuses before. There was Brad Smith who he attempted to turn into a West Coast Offense drop back quarterback and almost lost his job. I actually thought he should have lost his job. I am of course, as we have said before... an idiot.

Last year they finished strong but once again we had seen that before too and although expectations were that we should be good, no one was talking about this. Sitting in my family room in front of a fire with my wife (we have no friends) watching Mizzou score twice and then watching KU miss a field goal starts me salivating about Sunday’s rankings but I still want to sit back and savor it as it is being played. On the second touchdown Chase Daniel ran about 40 yards before throwing the touchdown pass. What a great showcase to finally put him in the Heisman spotlight where he belongs.

KU’s Coach Mangino is a grotesque caricature of a man. He looks like he is 5 foot nothing and about 400 pounds. Seriously, the guy just looks ludicrous. How could this guy inspire a team to 11-0? He looks like an oompa loompa at best. Frightening and the pictures of him during the game made me laugh. A joke my brother in law told me.

Kansas City has a highway 435 serving as an outer-belt. Coach mangino has to pull off and get out of the car at a gas station to get direction and he asks, “Can you tell me how I get to 435?” The gas station attendent looks him up and down and says “How about just eating a fucking salad for lunch.” Made me laugh.

We went to a bar for the second half to watch with some friends who were Mizzou grads. The bar was packed and it looked like it would be a Mizzou blow out but KU stayed in the game even as Missouri racked up penalty after penalty. The game appeared questionably officiated but the point was slammed home when I added it up at the end and saw that Mizzou was penalized for 141 yards to KU’s 26. That is... quite a gap. The other thing to worry about going forward other then penalties was that KU never punted in the second half. They scored or turned it over every series. Mizzou will have to do a little better then that against the Sooners.
KU had problems getting into the end-zone but their poor kicker Scott Webb missed tow field goals in the first half, both make-able that frankly ended up being the difference. Still, KU played a good second half and made some touchdowns of their own but they just could not stop Mizzou’s offense. Still the game was touch and go into the last 2 minutes but Mizzou got a final sack to ice the whole thing. It was a sad image at the end to see their much beleaguered quarterback with turf sticking out of his helmet at the end. Priceless, Final score 36-28.

BCS Standings
 1. Missouri 11-1
 2. West Virginia 10-1
 3. Ohio State 11-1
 4. Georgia 10-2
 5. Kansas 11-1
 6. Virginia Tech 10-2
 7. LSU 10-2
 8. USC 9-2
 9. Oklahoma 10-2
10. Florida 9-3
Life is good! On to the Big 12 Championship and the Oklahoma game and whatever happens happens but what a great year. A gift to the whole state.

Vacation III Vasquez Rocks

Vasquez County Park is an amazing natural wonder. It is a little outside of Valencia off the 14 and is nothing so much a bunch of huge rock formations. I think that there are about three major ones but each one has a football field foot print and then go sloping or swooping up several hundred feet. out tour guide Tim Tiemann forced us out there (because Beckers have a depression related tendency to stay indoors, away from natural light and any form of exercise, preferably with a television on. Tiemann, who has come to enjoy an energy filled, physically fit life style always believe he can “help” our family but we resist... mightily. Still he is persistent and eventually he wins out because he wears us out.

We drove out to the park which took about 30 minutes. We saw some of the California fire damage but it is hard to tell in many of the areas because they are so naturally dry. Almost like a desert... oh... it is a desert. it is always hard for me to remember that without all the irrigation nothing would be green hear other then the pines and the cactus and the occasional palm tree on the coast. It really is a wonder that 4 million people populate this desert. It is also a wonder that is sucks ALL of the moisture out of your skin in about 2 minutes leaving you dry as a bone.

Vasquez has been the sight of numerous movies because the topography is so surreal and prehistoric. According to Wikipedia the following films had had scenes there:

• Joe Dirt (2001)
• Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001)
• Planet of the Apes (2001)
• Bubble Boy (2001)
• Very Bad Things (1998)
• Free Enterprise (1998)
• Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997)
• Guns of El Chupacabra (1997)
• Jingle All the Way (1996)
• Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie (1995)
• The Flintstones (1994)
• In the Army Now (1994)
• Army of Darkness (1993)
• Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey (1991)
• The Rapture (1991)
• Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989)
• My Stepmother Is an Alien (1988)
• Hell Comes to Frogtown (1987)
• Short Circuit (1986)
• Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn (1983)
• Parasite (1982)
• Hearts of the West (1975)
• Blazing Saddles (1974)
• Apache (1954)
• Werewolf Of London (1935)
• Dracula (1931)

Quite a list. It really is awe inspiring. Wikipedia goes on to say “Vasquez Rocks Natural Area Park is a 905 acre (3 km²) northern Los Angeles County, California USA park acquired by LA County government in the 1970s. It is in the Agua Dulce vicinity between the Antelope Valley and the Santa Clarita Valley just north of Los Angeles and seen easily by motorists driving the Antelope Valley Freeway. Vasquez Rocks have been used innumerable times in motion pictures, various television series and in moving and still photography advertisements, and continues to be used in them today.” Nice summary.

The only other place I have been to that is anything similar is Enchanted Rock in the foothills outside of Austin and to a lesser extent “Elephant Rocks” in the eastern Ozarks. the raw rock power here tends to inspire and the last time we were here Jon was about 17 and I had a few anxious moments with him not knowing how to get down from a spot about 30 feet up in the air. I always thought “free climbing” was cool... until I saw my son do it. We tromped around the park, up and down for an hour or so with Jon climbing one nice crevasse and the group of us sitting at the top of a nice high crag. Pat and Laura made it to the top without mishap and we walked down on paths as Jon found more creative ways to descend. I strongly recommend this place for any trip to southern California. From wherever you go there it is definitely worth the trip and beats Sea World and Six Flags all to hell.

Vacation II Sea World

We hit Sea World on Monday. There were not many people there. I am not a big fan of any amusement parks. They provide a combination of crowds, children, thrill rides, bad food, expensive food and walking which I do not really appreciate in ANY way. Still, as a father accommodations have to be made... even as a bad father and I am above all things a bad father. So when we sojourned to southern California to the little town of Oceanside a pilgrimage to Sea World was requested and in the spirit of being a guilt ridden, lousy father I acquiesced. It was of course several months ahead of the trip where it was easy to be magnanimous.

Being from St. Louis where Anhueser Busch rules it was relatively easy to make some requests from AB employees and score some free passes. I cannot imagine spending the 55 or 58 bucks and going without the passes but it felt like getting something for free. We drove the 30 or so miles from our condo to Sea World which is located a few miles north of San Diego and near the Old Town of San Diego. No matter what anywhere you drive in southern California without traffic is a beautiful drive and it was relaxing to head down there. It was the Monday before Thanksgiving and the parking lot indicated that we would be blessed with not too much in thew way of crowds. They did jack us for 10 dollars to park on their massive lot but it was a small price to pay. It was a hazy and cool day with patches of blue sky and temperatures in the low seventies which did not feel bad for November.

Entering the park was relatively easy and lines were blessedly short. We chose a path and veered off checking for the times for various shows and saw that The Dolphin show was about to begin. Like all shows it was in a steep seated auditorium sloping down to a large pool. A Jimmy Buffet knock off was warming up the crowd with acoustic guitar sing alongs and we were admonished that the first 4 rows would definitely get wet. Blessedly we were late and went way up high on one end.

There is something off putting and cruel about any trained animal show but at the introduction when they begin to make themselves out as great friends of the dolphins by working closely with them and “communicating” with them it makes me a little queasy. Still, despite what Douglas Adams might have told us they are just fish..or mammals..or whatever the hell they are. They pick a good looking blond family of three with a cute little daughter to be special guest hosts and after introducing them they introduce the three dolphins which are the ostensible “stars” of the show. each has a thin, pony tailed girl as its “trainer.” After all the introductions they swim the dolphins around and they use their tales to splash people in the front rows and an uproarious time is had by all. I watch with my somewhat bored family a little bemused. The actual “show lasts about 15 minutes with the dolphins (or at least one of them) jumping high over a rope and then jumping high to snag a flag. All in all it was nothing.

Shamu was out on this day so there was not as much to do. Pat (my 17 year old) had always wanted to swim with the dolphins so that was scheduled for early afternoon and while he waited with his mom for instructions Laura, Jon and I rode up the revolving space needle as things were described to us which we could not see through the fog. Evidently the Sea World Space Needle has an excellent view of San Diego as well as the ocean. We could see neither but it was delightful anyway as I like looking down on other people.

We came back to the “dolphin center” which as a series of pools and there were four groups of people each with their own “trainer” and dolphin. Over all it looked pretty fun. They got to pet the dolphin, dance with the dolphin, make the dolphin roll over, make the dolphin jump and generally be in close proximity to flipper. Pat seemed to enjoy it tricked out in his wet suit with three girls standing in the cold chest high water. the dolphin also seemed to enjoy it as we all took pictures. When it ended, on top of the 150 bucks paid for the 1/2 hour we got to buck up for some more pics of Pat taken by the professional photographer. it was pricey but once again... he got to play with flipper, and we got to watch.

We had a crappy lunch at one of the two open (sit down) eating establishments which purported to be a bar-b-q-place. it begged the question... again... about why amusement park food must taste like bland, warmed over crap? They are serving a captive audience. They know they will prepare 1000’s of meals in a day. They are owned by Anhueser Busch where quality is everything and brand name protection a high concern. They had baby back ribs which looked tasty. They were stringy and flavorless. My boys had cheeseburgers (dry and overcooked), Laura had a chicken fingers (bland and dry) and Sandy had a club sandwich (big, dry and flavorless, somewhat salvaged by mayo). How hard is it to make a decent hamburger? I can do it and so can 20 fast food chains. Even though the prices are absurd what I would not give for the chance to pay more for some chain fast food. it made me want to quit my job and set up a Weber Kettle and cook brats and burgers and hot dogs all priced at 12 bucks each with a bag of chips and fountain soda. I could give them half my profit and make a fortune. August the IV... if you are reading this... let me help.

We closed out the trip by walking quickly through some aquariums and exhibits of sharks and penguins and some fish and stuff that compared poorly to the Shedd aquarium in Chicago. In the shark tank you got to walk under it on a conveyor belt in a tube and THAT was kind of cool. The sharks look rather big and vicious and sadly enough did look vaguely like lawyers circling a fee. We petted some star fish. Laura and Pat were of course hungry after not eating their crappy food and bought cotton candy which they proceeded not to eat, calling it “lousy”. How do you screw up cotton candy? We sent the kids to the one “thrill ride ”that was open which appeared to be a roller coaster log flume thing and we settled down in the Anhueser Busch tasting and hospitality room. Clearly this was the high point of the day for me and though they had a variety of exotic brews.... I got two Busch beers. We went and paid for the Dolphin pictures and high tailed it out of there.

Once again, I felt lucky that the place was so empty but was distraught at the over all average to bad quality of the whole experience. it would seem that with a captive audience and very little price resistance that you could create something that was engaging, educational and entertaining (that is what we bloggers call alliteration) and do something really good and charge a lot for it. My son Pat had a good time with the dolphins. He said they felt like uncooked hot dog. My wife was happy because of that. Laura, Jon and I were bored or worse... annoyed. Over all it is 3 Slingers on the 10 scale.

Vacation II

We hit Sea World on Monday. There were not many people there. I am not a big fan of any amusement parks. They provide a combination of crowds, children, thrill rides, bad food, expensive food and walking which I do not really appreciate in ANY way. Still, as a father accommodations have to be made... even as a bad father and I am above all things a bad father. So when we sojourned to southern California to the little town of Oceanside a pilgrimage to Sea World was requested and in the spirit of being a guilt ridden, lousy father I acquiesced. It was of course several months ahead of the trip where it was easy to be magnanimous.

Being from St. Louis where Anhueser Busch rules it was relatively easy to make some requests from AB employees and score some free passes. I cannot imagine spending the 55 or 58 bucks and going without the passes but it felt like getting something for free. We drove the 30 or so miles from our condo to Sea World which is located a few miles north of San Diego and near the Old Town of San Diego. No matter what anywhere you drive in southern California without traffic is a beautiful drive and it was relaxing to head down there. It was the Monday before Thanksgiving and the parking lot indicated that we would be blessed with not too much in thew way of crowds. They did jack us for 10 dollars to park on their massive lot but it was a small price to pay. It was a hazy and cool day with patches of blue sky and temperatures in the low seventies which did not feel bad for November.

Entering the park was relatively easy and lines were blessedly short. We chose a path and veered off checking for the times for various shows and saw that The Dolphin show was about to begin. Like all shows it was in a steep seated auditorium sloping down to a large pool. A Jimmy Buffet knock off was warming up the crowd with acoustic guitar sing alongs and we were admonished that the first 4 rows would definitely get wet. Blessedly we were late and went way up high on one end.

There is something off putting and cruel about any trained animal show but at the introduction when they begin to make themselves out as great friends of the dolphins by working closely with them and “communicating” with them it makes me a little queasy. Still, despite what Douglas Adams might have told us they are just fish..or mammals..or whatever the hell they are. They pick a good looking blond family of three with a cute little daughter to be special guest hosts and after introducing them they introduce the three dolphins which are the ostensible “stars” of the show. each has a thin, pony tailed girl as its “trainer.” After all the introductions they swim the dolphins around and they use their tales to splash people in the front rows and an uproarious time is had by all. I watch with my somewhat bored family a little bemused. The actual “show lasts about 15 minutes with the dolphins (or at least one of them) jumping high over a rope and then jumping high to snag a flag. All in all it was nothing.

Shamu was out on this day so there was not as much to do. Pat (my 17 year old) had always wanted to swim with the dolphins so that was scheduled for early afternoon and while he waited with his mom for instructions Laura, Jon and I rode up the revolving space needle as things were described to us which we could not see through the fog. Evidently the Sea World Space Needle has an excellent view of San Diego as well as the ocean. We could see neither but it was delightful anyway as I like looking down on other people.

We came back to the “dolphin center” which as a series of pools and there were four groups of people each with their own “trainer” and dolphin. Over all it looked pretty fun. They got to pet the dolphin, dance with the dolphin, make the dolphin roll over, make the dolphin jump and generally be in close proximity to flipper. Pat seemed to enjoy it tricked out in his wet suit with three girls standing in the cold chest high water. the dolphin also seemed to enjoy it as we all took pictures. When it ended, on top of the 150 bucks paid for the 1/2 hour we got to buck up for some more pics of Pat taken by the professional photographer. it was pricey but once again... he got to play with flipper, and we got to watch.

We had a crappy lunch at one of the two open (sit down) eating establishments which purported to be a bar-b-q-place. it begged the question... again... about why amusement park food must taste like bland, warmed over crap? They are serving a captive audience. They know they will prepare 1000’s of meals in a day. They are owned by Anhueser Busch where quality is everything and brand name protection a high concern. They had baby back ribs which looked tasty. They were stringy and flavorless. My boys had cheeseburgers (dry and overcooked), Laura had a chicken fingers (bland and dry) and Sandy had a club sandwich (big, dry and flavorless, somewhat salvaged by mayo). How hard is it to make a decent hamburger? I can do it and so can 20 fast food chains. Even though the prices are absurd what I would not give for the chance to pay more for some chain fast food. it made me want to quit my job and set up a Weber Kettle and cook brats and burgers and hot dogs all priced at 12 bucks each with a bag of chips and fountain soda. I could give them half my profit and make a fortune. August the IV... if you are reading this... let me help.

We closed out the trip by walking quickly through some aquariums and exhibits of sharks and penguins and some fish and stuff that compared poorly to the Shedd aquarium in Chicago. In the shark tank you got to walk under it on a conveyor belt in a tube and THAT was kind of cool. The sharks look rather big and vicious and sadly enough did look vaguely like lawyers circling a fee. We petted some star fish. Laura and Pat were of course hungry after not eating their crappy food and bought cotton candy which they proceeded not to eat, calling it “lousy”. How do you screw up cotton candy? We sent the kids to the one “thrill ride ”that was open which appeared to be a roller coaster log flume thing and we settled down in the Anhueser Busch tasting and hospitality room. Clearly this was the high point of the day for me and though they had a variety of exotic brews.... I got two Busch beers. We went and paid for the Dolphin pictures and high tailed it out of there.

Once again, I felt lucky that the place was so empty but was distraught at the over all average to bad quality of the whole experience. it would seem that with a captive audience and very little price resistance that you could create something that was engaging, educational and entertaining (that is what we bloggers call alliteration) and do something really good and charge a lot for it. My son Pat had a good time with the dolphins. He said they felt like uncooked hot dog. My wife was happy because of that. Laura, Jon and I were bored or worse... annoyed. Over all it is 3 Slingers on the 10 scale.

VACATION I

Family Vacations








With my son Jon now in his second year of college and him working all summer in Michigan my wife realized that we had indeed lost him. Once that became apparent she announced that as long as he would go with us we would now be going on family vacations. Our family vacations for the past 10 years had been up at a family camp in northern Michigan which has been an awesome place for our family. Still, other then a few trips to Florida to stay in the in-laws condo and go to Disney World (I believe all theme parks to be stationed in the 6th ring of hell) we do not “travel” as a family. Jon and I have taken trips to see concerts out of town and Sandy has taken Pat to NYC to see plays but no family stuff or at least not much.
Originally we were going to go to Mexico because that is where I wanted to go. My parents used to take me there on a an annual basis and I thought a little shift in culture would be a good parenting thing to do but as the planning progressed and the motives were thunk out a little more it became clear that my only agenda was going to the ocean and that Mexico would just be a hassle for my closeted midwestern kids. That having been said my wife rented us a condo in Oceanside north of San Diego. We are doing this during Jon’s Thanksgiving break and I am going to be out of town for the first Thanksgiving of my adult life.

I love Thanksgiving. It is friends and family and food, the three f’s (there is a fourth but it is inappropriate.) I really like being in my town. Sitting in the house Wednesday night and knowing tomorrow will be a day of a little leaf raking and a lot of food. Two turkey dinners with all the trimmings is always the goal and I like to have either my wife or mother cook at least one of them because... that is the way I like it. I have become somewhat of a nazi regarding these rituals and can tell from the looks of my siblings, their spouses, my parents and others that I have stepped over the line from eccentric to extremely annoying. Sorry I guess but I really am not. I like Thanksgiving and I like the ritual.

We plan on having dinner at our friends the Tiemann’s. Since they were nice enough to let us invite ourselves I have taken the liberty of inviting everyone else I know on the west coast. That only amount to 5 or 6 people but two of them are showing up. They are friends from Michigan and it will be sweet to see them. Out host Tim has promised me a tofu turkey and has said he will shape at least a piece of it into a drumstick. It sounds hideous. I hope he does it, not so I can eat it but just so I have something to feed my fevered nightmares regarding what NOT to do at Thanksgiving.

On the night prior to our leaving my son arrived home from college at about 8 and we had pizza. despite just seeing him a few weeks ago my heart stops momentarily as I see him and even as I cooly say hello in a nonchalant manor and take one of his traveling companions home my heart aches for the boy and I am so happy to have him close at hand that even I cannot believe it. We scarf the pizza down and are briefly, if loudly and stupidly a family again. Then we scatter about the house to pack and organize, my wife beginning a controlled nervous breakdown timed to get the myriad of things involved with us leaving town all miraculously. mysteriously and unappreciated by her family completed at the exact moment we will walk out the door in the morning. I lay some clothes out, respond to some emails on Facebook, shower, read and go to bed.

My children amaze me. three teenagers they all get up at 5:30 and are all showered, fed something and ready to go by 6 and we trundle out the door, throw the bags in the mini-van and head for the airport. We hit the Southwest terminal and get through security, get some Starbucks and wait. I always insist on arriving at least an hour early. I have never missed a flight but I wait a lot. But soon they board us. Southwest, the Greyhound of the air has a new boarding policy and because my wife remembered to check us in the night before we are all in the first 35 people and have our pick of the sits. I head for the exit row where I know I have more leg room explaining to the stewardess that we have 5 people and it will be perfect. She admonishes me that if any are under 15 we cannot sit there and when she asks my daughter if she is fifteen I nod making eye contact for her to lie and heartbreakingly she tells the truth. As they move and I start to sit down she tells me that if i am a parent of anyone under 15 on the flight I cannot sit there either. I grudgingly move this manifest injustice ruining my entire life.

Flying is no fun anymore for me. It all seems stressful. The kids are jovial though and that makes it better. Our flight to Burbank goes the Albuquerque and Las Vegas so we have two annoying stops to sit on the plane. My daughter explains that we need to “upgrade” our seats which means moving to the front. Once again grudgingly I follow. It seems to take a long time to unload and load and Sandy points out that we will be on this plane for 6 hours and suddenly it becomes hard for me to breathe. No one cares.

We hit Burbank and got the bags. That was the first start for L.A. traffic. Seriously... how do people live here. We need to go about 30 miles to Valencia and it takes 45 minutes. Over the course of our time in California I would drive about 600 miles. Normally that would take me about 10 hours since it was all on Interstate Highways but not in California and especially L.A. where at 7:00 on a Sunday you can spend an hour to go 10 miles for no reason anyone can see. It is sixth ring of hell type stuff.

Book Review 14: Bridge of Sighs: Richard Russo

Richard Russo
Bridge of Sighs
Alfred A. Knopf
528 Pages

Writers write. These words damn those of us who think we would like to write. A harsh indictment of lack of discipline or even worse lack of talent or creativity but... it is what it is. Richard Russo is a writer. Although you can only find 7 of his books at Amazon there is actually an 8th which has been published and they are all, surprisingly in their own way brilliant. Most of his prose is about small towns in upstate New York although he did a brilliant book about life as a university professor (Straight Man) which was, frankly, fucking hilarious. the narrator english professor of that book had a theory that life was one long punch line to a bad joke and that he was, in all respects, just a straight man. Brilliant.

As I said most of his catalogue are small town, upstate New York stories of shut down, dying factory towns. They are populated by small town powerful families with fortunes on the wane and the common people who brilliantly and heartbreakingly surround them. he has done it at least four times now. First in “Mohawk”, the “Nobody’s Fool”, the Empire Falls” and now in “Bridge of Sighs.” When I realized it was another book about a small dying factory town in upstate New York and that it was 528 pages I sighed and wondered inside my head whether I still had the strength for another Russo book of this genre. After all, a guy can only have so much to say about this topic...right? Well, it IS at least partially right.

Russo, who grew up there paints these towns like a portrait that you cannot look away from. Brilliant, heartbreaking detail on every page and to be fair in every word. Like a great painting no word is out of place and you marvel at the detail and how it illuminates everything and it just seems to real. And he does it in each book. Bridge of sighs is set in a town called Thomaston and it is no different then Mohawk or Empire Falls. Cities which once had a factory town, an economy and an A&P but now have a dead or dying downtown, a dwindling hard scrabble population and if they were in current times a Wal-Mart 20 miles away where everyone shops. No one moves to one of these towns voluntarily so outsiders are normally drifters or people whose lives tanked in some real city and they have been banished here. They wander around with the “locals” who have been there for several generations and as a family stood as witnesses for the decay all around them.

So that is the same in all the books and even though brilliant it is numbing. What makes a Russo book are the nuanced characters he draws and for good or ill as he gets older he draws them with more and more detail. You really do know his characters and as they develop you are never surprised but it is still insightful, into them and into the reader. He makes me self identify more then any other author with the doomed traits of his characters and also with some of the subtle joy and grace that comes from just living life. As his characters pilot their lives through every day occurrences, school, jobs, deaths and births he gives you a sense for the expansiveness of it all and the uniqueness related to the sameness of each persons struggle.

All that having been said there are not many triumphs for the characters in “Bridge of Sighs.” We meet the Lynch family who has a brilliant mother who has settled for a nice, pleasant local boy rather then go off to college and getting out of Thomaston. Mr. Lynch is a kind man and a well loved village idiot and they have a son and a small grocery store. The son, Lou C. Lynch is forever condemned to the name Lucy and his friend comes from another dark local family called the Marconis and his best friend is their son Bobby. The majority of the story is about Lucy and Bobby and a local girl named Sarah Berg who settles for Lucy, as her mother in law settled for Lucy’s dad.

We follow Lucy almost from birth and get introduced to Bobby and Sarah at appropriate points. Bobby’s part is narrated from Italy which was where he escaped to be an artist while Lucy and sarah are in Thomaston telling their story and bopping occasionally back to the present and their own bittersweet marriage as they watch their son, married to an unhappy woman, playing out what they view (or at least she views) as their failures. Sarah’s character is generationally removed from her mother in law Tessa Lynch and might have an over all kinder disposition but they are both women who love, keep secrets and try and make the shrewdest decisions for their families that they can determine at the time and wonder that this situational calculating never leads them anywhere else but with the same struggles they had in years past.

The other characters are all brilliant. Different husbands and fathers, the high school teacher, the bar owner, brother in laws, girlfriend’s parents.... they populate this little dying town like an ant colony and everyone has a purpose and when people deviate from the purpose they either get destroyed or leave. These side characters add the texture to this really rich novel that like a really good movie, never really goes anywhere but takes the reader on a long journey.

And that was the big bone I had to pick with Russo. I am now old and while I used to bang out 50 pages a night reading I find i nod off laying in bed after 10 -15 hard fought pages so it took me all of November to read this and as I was reading it, for 400 pages I thought...”I think I am done with this guy” (meaning Russo) and it was almost a relief thinking I could finish this one and I had finished with the author and his long novels about the same town with a different name. Sure the characters were interesting and the setting brilliant but seriously, 4 times is enough. but then i hit the last hundred pages. The people’s lives unfold in ways that keep you reading incredulously but as you read and think, you know these folks and it could not have happened any other way for any of them and it is all just so sad and so beautiful and so much like our own lives where we plan and scheme and struggle and in the end can never get away from ourselves. And while that might seem bad, even in his ugliest characters, class bullies, town drinks, philandering wives and husbands.... they all have some grace and beauty, just like we all do and he reveals that and as he does reveals us, and gives pause and seriously does everything a great book should do.

He has a way of letting his characters age and as they do they learn things about themselves, some of them good but most unsettling. As you read about their jouney he allows you through their lives to have little “aha” monets of your own which are sometimes good but mostly unsettling. 60 pages before the end of the book he ends a chapter as Lucy lays in bed a 60 year old man, staring at his sleeping wife who will leave him forever in the morning:

“The line of the gray horizon is brighter now, and with the coming light I feel a certainty: that there is, despite our wild imaginings, only one life. The ghostly others, no matter how real they seem, no matter how badly we need them are phantoms. The one life we’re left with is sufficient to fill and refill our imperfect hearts with joy, and then to shatter them. And it never, ever lets up.
Blame love.”

That is good stuff.
But after that he surprises again with a nice 60 page sprint to the finish. The story does not end up happily every after for everyone but there is discovery and there is some peace of mind and purpose for a few of the characters and a little nice symetry. The books characters are well enough drawn that even for me there is a lot of emotion in their successes and failures and weaker person (me) might even tear up.

Even though it sometimes felt like it was a marathon, This was the best thing I have read all year and perhaps in a long time. it is probably Russo’s best book because he draws with so much confidence and is obviously at the height of his game. Wait until it comes out as a paperback next year. take it to the beach and lose yourself in the life of a small, dying factory town in upstate New York with a poisoned river, cancer, no possibilities, human tragedies and broken souls. Enjoy it.

10 Slingers on the 10 scale

Book Review: Bridge of Sighs: Richard Russo

Richard Russo
Bridge of Sighs
Alfred A. Knopf
528 Pages

Writers write. These words damn those of us who think we would like to write. A harsh indictment of lack of discipline or even worse lack of talent or creativity but... it is what it is. Richard Russo is a writer. Although you can only find 7 of his books at Amazon there is actually an 8th which has been published and they are all, surprisingly in their own way brilliant. Most of his prose is about small towns in upstate New York although he did a brilliant book about life as a university professor (Straight Man) which was, frankly, fucking hilarious. the narrator english professor of that book had a theory that life was one long punch line to a bad joke and that he was, in all respects, just a straight man. Brilliant.

As I said most of his catalogue are small town, upstate New York stories of shut down, dying factory towns. They are populated by small town powerful families with fortunes on the wane and the common people who brilliantly and heartbreakingly surround them. he has done it at least four times now. First in “Mohawk”, the “Nobody’s Fool”, the Empire Falls” and now in “Bridge of Sighs.” When I realized it was another book about a small dying factory town in upstate New York and that it was 528 pages I sighed and wondered inside my head whether I still had the strength for another Russo book of this genre. After all, a guy can only have so much to say about this topic...right? Well, it IS at least partially right.

Russo, who grew up there paints these towns like a portrait that you cannot look away from. Brilliant, heartbreaking detail on every page and to be fair in every word. Like a great painting no word is out of place and you marvel at the detail and how it illuminates everything and it just seems to real. And he does it in each book. Bridge of sighs is set in a town called Thomaston and it is no different then Mohawk or Empire Falls. Cities which once had a factory town, an economy and an A&P but now have a dead or dying downtown, a dwindling hard scrabble population and if they were in current times a Wal-Mart 20 miles away where everyone shops. No one moves to one of these towns voluntarily so outsiders are normally drifters or people whose lives tanked in some real city and they have been banished here. They wander around with the “locals” who have been there for several generations and as a family stood as witnesses for the decay all around them.

So that is the same in all the books and even though brilliant it is numbing. What makes a Russo book are the nuanced characters he draws and for good or ill as he gets older he draws them with more and more detail. You really do know his characters and as they develop you are never surprised but it is still insightful, into them and into the reader. He makes me self identify more then any other author with the doomed traits of his characters and also with some of the subtle joy and grace that comes from just living life. As his characters pilot their lives through every day occurrences, school, jobs, deaths and births he gives you a sense for the expansiveness of it all and the uniqueness related to the sameness of each persons struggle.

All that having been said there are not many triumphs for the characters in “Bridge of Sighs.” We meet the Lynch family who has a brilliant mother who has settled for a nice, pleasant local boy rather then go off to college and getting out of Thomaston. Mr. Lynch is a kind man and a well loved village idiot and they have a son and a small grocery store. The son, Lou C. Lynch is forever condemned to the name Lucy and his friend comes from another dark local family called the Marconis and his best friend is their son Bobby. The majority of the story is about Lucy and Bobby and a local girl named Sarah Berg who settles for Lucy, as her mother in law settled for Lucy’s dad.

We follow Lucy almost from birth and get introduced to Bobby and Sarah at appropriate points. Bobby’s part is narrated from Italy which was where he escaped to be an artist while Lucy and sarah are in Thomaston telling their story and bopping occasionally back to the present and their own bittersweet marriage as they watch their son, married to an unhappy woman, playing out what they view (or at least she views) as their failures. Sarah’s character is generationally removed from her mother in law Tessa Lynch and might have an over all kinder disposition but they are both women who love, keep secrets and try and make the shrewdest decisions for their families that they can determine at the time and wonder that this situational calculating never leads them anywhere else but with the same struggles they had in years past.

The other characters are all brilliant. Different husbands and fathers, the high school teacher, the bar owner, brother in laws, girlfriend’s parents.... they populate this little dying town like an ant colony and everyone has a purpose and when people deviate from the purpose they either get destroyed or leave. These side characters add the texture to this really rich novel that like a really good movie, never really goes anywhere but takes the reader on a long journey.

And that was the big bone I had to pick with Russo. I am now old and while I used to bang out 50 pages a night reading I find i nod off laying in bed after 10 -15 hard fought pages so it took me all of November to read this and as I was reading it, for 400 pages I thought...”I think I am done with this guy” (meaning Russo) and it was almost a relief thinking I could finish this one and I had finished with the author and his long novels about the same town with a different name. Sure the characters were interesting and the setting brilliant but seriously, 4 times is enough. but then i hit the last hundred pages. The people’s lives unfold in ways that keep you reading incredulously but as you read and think, you know these folks and it could not have happened any other way for any of them and it is all just so sad and so beautiful and so much like our own lives where we plan and scheme and struggle and in the end can never get away from ourselves. And while that might seem bad, even in his ugliest characters, class bullies, town drinks, philandering wives and husbands.... they all have some grace and beauty, just like we all do and he reveals that and as he does reveals us, and gives pause and seriously does everything a great book should do.

He has a way of letting his characters age and as they do they learn things about themselves, some of them good but most unsettling. As you read about their jouney he allows you through their lives to have little “aha” monets of your own which are sometimes good but mostly unsettling. 60 pages before the end of the book he ends a chapter as Lucy lays in bed a 60 year old man, staring at his sleeping wife who will leave him forever in the morning:

“The line of the gray horizon is brighter now, and with the coming light I feel a certainty: that there is, despite our wild imaginings, only one life. The ghostly others, no matter how real they seem, no matter how badly we need them are phantoms. The one life we’re left with is sufficient to fill and refill our imperfect hearts with joy, and then to shatter them. And it never, ever lets up.
Blame love.”

That is good stuff.

But after that he surprises again with a nice 60 page sprint to the finish. The story does not end up happily every after for everyone but there is discovery and there is some peace of mind and purpose for a few of the characters and a little nice symetry. The books characters are well enough drawn that even for me there is a lot of emotion in their successes and failures and weaker person (me) might even tear up.

Even though it sometimes felt like it was a marathon, This was the best thing I have read all year and perhaps in a long time. it is probably Russo’s best book because he draws with so much confidence and is obviously at the height of his game. Wait until it comes out as a paperback next year. take it to the beach and lose yourself in the life of a small, dying factory town in upstate New York with a poisoned river, cancer, no possibilities, human tragedies and broken souls. Enjoy it.
10 Slingers on the 10 scale

The Missouri Plan

So our Ally in the war on terror Pervez Musharef seems to be having some problems. Pulling a page from the cold war playbook our President chose a quality guy to our buddy in the region in the dreaded “war on terror.” Oops. perhaps young democracies forced out of dictatorships are not so stable when the dictator is having problems maintaining as President. This guy is no better and no worse then any latin american banana dictator other then the fact that he has Militant Islamists that he needs to add to his mix in order to stay in power. Unfortunately this made him less then effective in assisting us in squashing them... even as we feed him 150 million or so a month.

Now...the real turn about this is that he is having problems not with terrorists but with the lawyers and the judiciary. Sounds like the Bush administration here. He suspends the constitution so he can control the terrorists and then cracks down on the Democracy people...using our weapons and our training...OOOOOOOPS! Our bad. It is kind of cute that lawyers and judges are leading the revolution. These are the people who normally back the system and rake in the cash. But this time they are out in the streets getting arrested and God knows what else. Who could get this indignant about a guy suspending the constitution and dismantling the supreme court? It probably makes sense... these were likely what our Republican friends would describe as “activist judges.”

Which brings us to the story of the day. The Missouri Non-Partisan Court Plan. Wikipedia explains it as follows:
“The Missouri Plan (originally the Missouri Nonpartisan Court Plan), also known as the merit plan, is a method for the nonpartisan selection of judges currently used in 11 U.S. states as well as in many other countries. Many other states use a variant of it.

The Missouri Plan is a method to combine election and appointment of judges. Under the plan, judicial vacancies are first selected by independent commissions from all available applicants for that position. Three (3) names are forwarded to the governor who has sixty days to select one. If the governor does not select a one of the three to fill the position within those sixty days, the committee will then make the selection. At the general election soonest after the completion of one year service, the judge must stand in a "retention election". If a majority vote against retention, the judge is removed from office, and the process starts anew[1].”

A good link to explain the plan is on the Missouri Government site at http://www.courts.mo.gov/page.asp?id=297

This is also an excellent article about our struggles in Missouri to protect our courts at Justice At Stake: http://www.justiceatstake.org/contentViewer.asp?breadcrumb=3,570,679

Well said and simply put, although flawed it is the best system available to chose our judiciary. We used to elect judges which sounds awesome until you see how the elections get manipulated by big money and power politics. The Missouri Plan was invented because Boss Pendergast’s machine in KC was literally stocking the court with his people. Elections were held certainly but...they didn’t mean much and we had a bunch of political hacks. Now our current judges tend to be...political hacks but the system is designed for a better quality of political hack and also we tend to get hacks from both parties. Brilliant.

But this system is under attack. It is under attack from agenda-i-zed conservatives who know they can run attack campaigns which are just divisive enough to get 51% of the people who care to come out and vote for judges. This attack on our court plan takes many forms but it starts with complaints regarding “activist judges” who “legislate from the bench.” What they mean is that they need a group of patsy’s who will enforce the tenets of the Constitution in order to make sure that...in no particular order:

Abortion is illegal
Gays Can’t Marry
Haliburton’s Profits Can Go Unchecked
We can pray in school

I realize all these are divisive albeit important issues but do we really want the popular vote to decide these issues or do we want some people in our Courts who are intelligent and committed to the greater good whether agendaized or not. I don’t know but as a lawyer in St. Louis I have really come to enjoy the Judges we have in St. Louis City and County... especially when I go over to Illinois or way out in the Ozarks. You cannot believe how some of these judges who run powerful election machines run a really crappy court. They act is that judges who run for election are beholden to the lawyers who run their campaigns and that makes these Judges inherently biased and there is no attempt at a level playing field. If the Governor appoints a crony who made it on to the panel, that is OK with me. Once appointed that guy or gal is beholden to no one and can exercise their best judgement without worrying about campaign contributions or getting fired.

These same people who want to scratch the Missouri Plan have no apparent problem with a Republican President Appointing ALL the Federal Judges but the big push will come in two years when we have a Democratic President and then... then we will see a big big push for the voice of “the people”. Whenever anyone talks about elections as being the voice of “the people” what they are really saying is the voice of “the money.” We have a good system here and in a lot of other states that have adopted The Missouri Plan. Do not let money take over our judgeships. If we put these guys up for election we are further undermining a system which we simply cannot afford.

Concert Review Number 12: Peter Case at The Focal Point: November 9, 2007

But the Focal Point... it has been there for a long time. it has a strong KDHX bohemian feel to it and is connected through a door or two to the bathrooms and bar of the Maya Cafe which provide a place to get a drink for the show. It is a cool little space with hard wood floors, movable uncomfortable theatre seats and folding chairs in rows like church. It looks like it seats about 125 comfortably and for old people who like to sit and see an artist it veers towards ideal. Just hip enough and no real lack of comfort and certainly no element of fear. Perfectly insulated for the aging rocker or folk.

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And this show was full of that genre of music fan. At 46 your diner reviewer was in the “young” part of the crowd. It was a crowd like I had never seen at a music event. Even the recent upscale Dylan event at the Fox didn’t have such a consistent element of older men and woman, struggling and posing (this is probably unkind and unfair) to be “individuals” and a room full of middle aged and late midlife “individuals” allowed a sameness that could only be described as sad. Gray pony tails and beards seem required and the women... the women all had their hair colored or dyed or whatever you call it varying unnatural shades which in the dim light you had to wonder whether the color was intentional or just the result of a bad dye job. We all looked old and more then a little tired even under dim lights but along with all that there is a sweetness to seeing that there are at least some people my age who still view going to see a show as something cool to celebrate.

So enough about that. Peter case (his new CD reviewed earlier in the year in this space) hits town on a semi-annual basis. Normally in the last few visits he could be caught at the dreaded and sometimes celebrated venue “Off Broadway” but tonight he was playing for 15 bucks a head to about 125 people at the Focal Point. No one opened for him and he came on a few minutes late at about 8:10. beatle Bob was firmly ensconced at front stage left and i knew he would have a hard time dancing tonight as did he. We got into a spirited discussion about how great it was to go see a show on Friday at 8:00. He was excited because he could catch another show after-words and I was excited because i could go home and go to bed. Bob had just been to the Americana Music Awards in Nashville and was regaling me with tails of Joe Ely, Jim Lauderdale and the Ryman Auditorium.

I have seen Case at least 7 times over the years and he has always been an endearing, engaging entertainer. He has loved a life consciously modeled on Kerouac and old delta blues players and Woody Guthrie. the mix is sometimes compelling but almost always engaging because he is so passionate and seems to just be a nice guy who writes some very serious songs and has a great heart. He gained some notoriety as a rocker with the 80’s band The Plimsouls (see the movie “Valley Girl” as they are the rockers in the dangerous club Nicolas Cage takes his girlfriend). the Plimsouls had two or three great songs and then petered out in a boring story of alcohol and drug abuse and likely lack of talent but case soldiered on and in the last 20 years has put out a dozen CD’s with some of the best song-writing any American folkie has accomplished. Seriously, it is a great body of work.

Tonight it looked like Case had gained a few (being generous) pounds and even in his bulky shirt, ill fitting sport coat, hat, beard and glasses looked a little chunky. Generally I like my folkies rail (hobo) thin but I will allow a few pounds for someone good. And he is good.

The set list was at follows:
Put Down the Gun
Every 24 Hours
Million Dollars Bail
Driving Wheel
Everywhere I go
Aint Gonna Worry No More
A Reading from his book “As Far As You Can Get Without A Passport”
Crooked Mile
Break
Hidden Love
Bumble Bee (Honey bear Edwards)
You Better Move Fast (Newer Plimsouls song)
Lost In The Sky
Coulda Shoulda Woulda
Freedy Johnston Story
Cold trail Blues
Waterfall (Hendrix Song)
Whiter Shade of Pale (Procol Harum)
Underneath The Stars
Dark Deep Underground
Waiting For The Firelight

The set list shows the diversity of the body of work but without a band he relies almost exclusively on his blues guitar sometimes lapsing into what he calls celtabilly (pronounced keltabilly) which sounds a lot like Richard Thompson. Case played hard for the whole show telling funny stories most related to traveling the country young scared and stupid and some related to the people he toured with. He did not tear it up on guitar but he is an exceptional white blue man and his voice has lost a lot of it’s sustain and upper range making some of his prettiest songs (Turning Blue) impossible.
Still his material and his well selected covers made for a great night at a good venue. For those of you who have not done so, check out a Peter Case show and check out the Focal Point. It looks like it is developing the history of a local treasure.

Record Review 19: Neil Young: Chrome Dreams II

Soooooo... what does a real fan of Neil's have to say about yet another Neil Young CD? Neil turns 62 on November 12th. Including his Buffalo Springfield and CSNY albums he has now put out 50 (that does not include 6 live albums and three compilations) albums over those 62 years. I think maybe...maybe with the exception of Dylan, no one has that body of work. During that time...for the last thirty years and certainly since “Rust Never Sleeps” Neil has been jesus (little j) in the holy trinity of Mike Becker’s rock pantheon along with Dylan and Elvis Costello. His body of work is overwhelming and even as a fan I would argue inconsistent and often frustrating but he has struggled mightily, kept playing whatever was interesting him at the time and kept himself relevant.

So. Chrome Dreams. When you hear the first song :Beautiful Bluebird” you have a fear that we are going to be suffering through (for me at least) another “Prairie Wind” attempt to recreate one of his seminal albums “Harvest.” “Harvest” was a moment in time frozen and one of the things that made it so brilliant was the change of pace it represented from California rocker to Nashville tune-smith. He went the opposite way here from when Dylan went electric at the Newport Folk festival and it was brilliant. He was also at the very height of his creative game and all attempts to recreate “Harvest” (including in reverse order “Prairie Wind”, “Silver and Gold” and “Old Ways”) have been major disappointments. Between the mournful harmonica and the starting lyrics regarding his pickup and bluebird and then the chorus... well I threw up in my mouth a little.

The banjo picking which starts “Boxcar” reminds me of his early, eerie non-hit “Turnstiles” from “On The Beach” or even “Captain Kennedy” from Hawks and Doves and here the CD starts to pick up. This is a good tune and Neil is not mailing it in which is comforting. (At this point I picked up typing a brilliant review which I failed to save so from here on is an attempt at reenactment...it was brilliant though...I swear!) Boxcar rocks and then we move on to “Ordinary People” which clocks in at over 18 minutes. This is classic Neil ranting that we have all come to cherish. It is a picture of America and politics and all that is right and wrong....with horns. “Shining Light” moves towards weak and gay and trite. Once again it could be a bad “Harvest Moon” out take. Skip it other then listening for his voice which is...sweet.

“The Believer” picks up again with a little reggae one drop thing but once again it is just his voice, he mentions songbirds and church bells and being a believer in a girl (stealing from the Monkees?) Other then the cheesy background vocals it works. “Spirit Road” is next and it just kicks ass bringing up “Zuma” road songs and all that is grand and glorious about being a Neil Young fan. It has to be hard to rock hard at 60 plus years but this tune delivers... and then delivers again. It is a song that makes you miss Crazy Horse but it stands alone and is the best tune the CD hands down.

“Dirty Old Man” is self explanatory. it rocks more like “Fuckin Up” or “Welfare Mothers” and frankly that works but then he goes into “Ever After” which other then it’s steel guitar offers me almost nothing. I would argue that he is struggling with the slow paced country songs on this CD. Some of my favorite Neil has been in this genre but this is not it. The tune is much more interesting then the lyrics and though the playing is flawless it is flawed by silly back ground humming and just feels mailed in.

“No Hidden Path” seems self indulgent at 14 minutes after the earlier 18 minute cut. You get the feeling he is trying to deliver a “Cowgirl In The Sand”/”Down by the River” one two punch that is hard to deliver when you are out of your twenties. Still...though long...this song rocks and it is worth repeated listening. The CD topples in on itself with “The Way” which seems like an Omaha..indie rock children's sing along. I am sure it is heartfelt and comes from somewhere beautiful but jeez. On the same album as “Spirit Highway” you need to give me this. I really hate it and it is a downer.
All and all this is a good CD. It has the requisite 3 songs that make it worthwhile and since it is Neil it is always worthwhile even while your wading through the average stuff which I am very harsh about it is still great. You grade harder because it is Neil. I do not worry...i do not think it will hurt his self image.

8 Slingers On The 10 Scale