(formerly Formosa)

Ofttimes, imaginary people will ask me questions that help me to start a paragraph. For instance, this morning a purely hypothetical human, let's call her Vivian Blomquist, said to me, “Dave, where do you go for latest late-breaking news you need for your active lifestyle?” A crooked grin crossed my lean features as I replied. “Vivian,” I said, “I get most of my news from the BBC. I like their hardhitting style and unflinching take on today's modern world we live in. Like today I learned that Taiwan's Minister of Environmental Protection is recommending that men sit down to pee.”

Driving Force

So have you ever done that thing where you've decided to go out for dinner and you're discussing different places you might go and you're working toward consensus and you maybe disagree on what to eat like Italian or Vietnamese or Lebanese and then you think about that one place downtown you both really like and it’s been a while since you went there and it’s Wednesday so they shouldn’t be busy and it’s perfect until you remember how terrible the parking is in that neighborhood so you change your mind? Did your car just tell you where to eat?

In Memorium, and best left there.

I just found out that Gloria Winters died about two years ago. She was Sky King's pretty niece Penny, and she made a man of me. I have no intention, however, of locating and watching any old episodes. It would be disappointing. The influences of your youth often are. Like, I saw some Man from UNCLE and I Spy reruns, and they're pretty terrible. But it varies: Seuss and Kubrick hold up really well, Salinger not so much. It's embarrassing how Catcher in the Rye once perfectly captured my inner being, and now seems so shallow, callow, and snotty. Ouch.

Also umpires, I'm told.

Some musicians have Blind as their first name, like Blind Blake, Blind Willie McTell, or Blind Lemon Jefferson. Some others are blind but it doesn't get top billing; nobody says Blind George Shearing or Blind Jose Feliciano. But the question is, does being blind help your playing, or is it that you're just less likely to go for a career as an airline pilot or film editor? It's said that loosing one sense improves the others, and that may be true. We've all met people without a sense of humor who compensate with a heightened sense of their own importance.