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MORE VINYL & THE GHOST OF THE TURNING POINT

Wednesday, March 29th, 2023

     Here I go being late with another blahg.  Really, I had an excuse.  I’ve been working hard to finish the last of the audio podcasts for my book, “Pippa’s Passing.”  Also, after living with the book for six months I decided that there was another ending or continued ending that was begging to be told.  That made a 21st chapter and I wanted to finish writing it and then create an audio podcast of the alternate/continued ending.  I have begun posting the podcasts on various sites.  So far 17 chapters are available from wherever you stream podcasts.  Here are links to some of them: 

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/pippas-passing/id1677898737?ign-mpt=uo%3D4&mt=2

https://open.spotify.com/episode/2xVZwJaI60VflRZTXaSOOH

https://www.audible.ca/pd/Pippas-Passing-Podcast/B0BYV211CC?qid=1679495429&sr=1-1&ref=a_search_c3_lProduct_1_1&pf_rd_p=b278ed0a-c3b2-4491-808c-7cb2190a487c&pf_rd_r=DYK9XZ95DVYDZ3684VPK&pageLoadId=osNGLY5Vv3qxvIPu&creativeId=0d6f6720-f41c-457e-a42b-8c8dceb62f2c

https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/f11c6714-419f-4033-aad6-15cfb125eaf9/pippa’s-passing

 

     In previous blahgs like 12 MONTHS -12 RECORDS -12 SONGS   and 12 MONTHS – 12 MORE RECORDS – 12 MORE SONGS, I posted about records I had purchased over a period of time and then shared some tracks from the albums.  I thought I would revisit that theme.  Over the past year I’ve probably purchased another 12 or more records from thrift stores or record stores and haven’t shared any of it.  I’m about to rectify that by posting about some recent additions.  I’m only going to post about 7 right now but I’ll look through the stack near my stereo and see if I can do a part two for this blahg.  So here we go, in no particular order.  Okay, there is going to be one particular order and that will be the last album that I will post about at the end after a ghost story. 


    The first up is an album called “Ben Bagley’s Irving Berlin Revisited.”  This was released in 1967 on the MGM Records label.  The reason why I purchased it was that I’m a huge fan of the late great jazz artist Blossom Dearie.  The album features two songs by her that I had never heard.

Irving Berlin Revisited

Berline Revisited rear cover

 

From the album here is Blossom Dearies singing on “It’ll Come To You”:

The second selection of Blossom Dearie from this album is “Wild About You”:


    Next up is a mix between dixieland and ragtime.  It’s “Those Fantastic Charleston Years” by the The Charleston Hot Peppers.  This was put out on the Polydor label in 1962.

Those Fantastic Charleston Years by The Charleston Hot Peppers

Those Charleston Years Rear Cover

From that album are two selections, with the first being the title track “Charleston” :

When my daughter heard the above track she said it reminded her of “It’s A Wonderful Life” with Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed dancing on the gymnasium floor as it opened up to reveal a swimming pool beneath and Stewart and Reed eventually fall into the water.  Great scene and a great memory.

   And now we have “When Buddha Smiles”:

   

   It’s back to the vocals again but this time it’s Mel Tormé.  I have posted links to Mel in previous blahgs such as THIS IS 100, PART TWO and MY UNBELIEVABLE LIFE- STARRING ME.  I didn’t used to be a big fan of Mel’s but I remember when my children were younger we went camping and we had a portable radio.  A station we listened to did a respective that evening of Mel Tormé and I was hooked.  When I was in Ottawa recently, I picked up the album “Mel Tormé Loves Fred Astaire.”  That’s part of the ghost story I will tell later but right now it’s about the music and Mel.  This album is a reissue on the Bethlehem label from 1977.

Mel Tormé - Loves Fred Astaire album cover

Mel Tormé – Loves Fred Astaire Rear Cover

The original album was “Mel Tormé Sings Fred Astaire” issued on Bethlehem in 1956.  Still, it’s Mel Tormé and up first is a swinger with Mel singing “Something’s Gotta Give”:

Let’s slow things down and listen to Mel sing “A Foggy Day:”

  

   It’s time to swing again and we’re back to dixieland, “Real Dixieland!”, an album by the Rampart Street Paraders.

Real Dixieland ! - The Rampart Street Paraders

The Rampart Street Parades rear jacket

This album actually appears to be a compilation of tracks taken from two other albums, “Rampart And Vine” (1955), and “Dixieland, My Dixieland” (1956) both on the Columbia label.  I’m going to start things off with “Sugar (That Sugar Baby O’ Mine)” from the Rampart and Vine album:

And now one that swings, from the “Dixieland, My Dixieland” album, here’s “After You’ve Gone”:

  

   Continuing on with the Dixieland theme, I want to talk a little about The Firehouse Five Plus Two.   Here’s a quote about this band from the Wikipedia entry:

The Firehouse Five Plus Two was a Dixieland jazz band, popular in the 1950s, consisting of members of the Disney animation department. Leader and trombonist Ward Kimball was inspired to form the band after spending time with members of the Disney animation and sound department and finding that they had a lot in common as jazz aficionados. The lunchtime chats escalated into a full on lunchtime jam session as Kimball, an amateur trombonist, and animator Frank Thomas, a pianist, would find they “sounded pretty good all by ourselves.”

The band was also formative in creating the Good Time Jazz label under fellow aficionado Lester Koenig, who managed all the band’s releases from 1940’s The Firehouse Five Plus Two Story, Volume 1 to 1970’s Live at Earthquake McGoon’s. Walt Disney was approving of the band, letting them play at the company’s Christmas parties, at Disneyland, and other social functions, on the single condition that they never fully leave their jobs at the studio.

I think I may have another Firehouse Five Plus Two album somewhere so I’ll look around and see what I have and maybe post about it in the future.  Maybe I just bought the same album again.  Who knows?  Obviously, I don’t!  The album I picked up recently at a thrift store in Ottawa is “The Firehouse Five Story, Vol. 2”. 

 

The Firehouse Five Plus Two Volume 2

Firehouse Five + 2 Rear Cover

First up is a jazzy song that asks the question, “Who Walks In When I Walk Out?”

Of course, if you’re going to have a song by the Firehouse Five Plus Two then you have to have a song associated with a Firehouse.  Here’s “Firechief Rag”:

 

   The next album from which I want to offer up samples is one I picked up at a local pawn shop in Belleville.  Greenbacks Pawnshop has a huge selection of used records.  I picked up the 1962  album “Billy Eckstine & Quincy Jones – At Basin Street East” for $10.

 

Billy Eckstine & Quincy Jones – At Basin Street East

“Billy Eckstine does some fabulous singing on this album backed by the Quincy Jones Orchestra.  The very first track on the album is a favourite of mine entitled “Alright, Okay, You Win”:

I often catch myself singing “Alright, Okay, You Win” because I remember seeing Joe Williams sing this on a tribute to Frank Sinatra back in 1990.  Check out this video of Joe Williams’ performance:

This next selection from “Billy Eckstine & Quincy Jones – At Basin Street East” is a bit of a cheat because I can offer up four songs because they’re all included in a Duke Ellington medley.  Here are “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore”, “I’m Just A Lucky So And So”, “Caravan”, and “Sophisticated Lady”:

 

   Now for the Ghost Story.  In the middle of March this year, I took a week of holidays and over a couple of days, my wife and I went to Ottawa to visit a friend and to check out record, dvd, and thrift store haunts.  One of the places I love to visit is “The Turning Point” which has a large selection of used DVDs and records.  Here’s a shot of the store from the front:

In case you couldn’t tell from the photo, they profess to being “Ottawa’s #1 CD Store”, “Ottawa’s #1 Record Store”, and “Ottawa’s #1 DVD Store.”  Oh yeah, and they’re haunted!  True story.  I think my friend Bryan and I were there about 5 or so years ago and the owner mentioned it to us at the time but I don’t think I ever believed him.  Now, I’m a believer. 

   Here’s a shot of the upstairs where they keep all of their used records:

   Notice that all of the records are stacked upright and the centre aisle has trays of these stacked records.  I had gone through one section looking for some Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen that my son didn’t already own but to no avail.  I ended up picking up the Mel Tormé record I mentioned earlier in this blahg.  When I go to record stores I’m also on the hunt for old Dixieland Jazz albums so I had just walked past one of these trays of stacked records and I said aloud to my wife “I wonder if there’s any Dixieland Jazz around here.”  Suddenly, half of one of the stacks flipped forward and because I was facing the rear of the stack that was flipped, I ended up seeing the back cover of this album:

Dixieland Jazz Artists Rear

Needless to say, I was a little taken aback but was determined to buy this record recommended by a ghost.  The official title of the album is “New Orleans Dixieland Superstar Jazz Artists” by, of course, New Orleans Dixieland Superstar Jazz Artists.  Here’s the front cover:

New Orleans Dixieland Superstar Jazz Artists front cover

I don’t know the year of the record but research suggests that Shalom Records operated between the late 1960s to sometime in the 70s.  After finding this treasure, I went downstairs to pay for my purchases and to tell the owner about my encounter with the ghost.  He wasn’t surprised in the least.  He said this sort of things happens a lot and sometimes it’s a very convenient ghost.  The owner said on a number of occasions someone would come into the store and ask for something the store didn’t have but then the very next day someone would bring the item in.  That too, happened more than the owner cared to say.  Well, it worked in his favour and mine because I now own this record and can offer up selections.  The first is a number with a vocal by Sweet Emma Barrett on “Sister Kate”:

 Unfortunately there are no songs on this album with ‘ghost’ or ‘spirit’ in the title but we do get “The Saints” which is of course the great dixieland standard, “When The Saints Go Marching In.” 

   That’s it for this time.  I don’t know if there really is a Ghost at The Turning Point but I’d like to think there is or else the owner has an invisible helper.  Okay, just one more from this ghost gifted album that I paid for.  I’ll close with another great standard, “Way Down Yonder In New Orleans.”

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HOW WAS YOUR CHRISTMAS?

Saturday, January 14th, 2023

     How was your Christmas?  You know I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t have a story to tell.  That’s what these blahgs are all about:  stories from me.  Sometimes what I have to say might make you laugh or smile or wonder why I haven’t gone off my nut before this.  Maybe my story might pale in comparison to yours but I’ll continue to offer up my stories and we’ll see how mine stacks up. 

   This Christmas of 2022 was the whitest I’ve seen in years.  I was reflecting on that with my wife and realized in the past five or six years that we have had a green Christmas or light dustings of snow that didn’t amount to much.  In fact, the last time we had a huge snowfall was on Christmas in 2017 because I wrote a blahg about it:  BEING SICK ON CHRISTMAS IS NO FUN, BUT HERE WE GO.  That year I had to shovel out the end of my driveway so my wife could take me to the hospital with the worst sore throat I’ve ever had.  I don’t care to relive it so read that blahg at your leisure.

   I’ve posted before about my lawn display of Christmas inflatables and things really looked nice until the major snow came and buried everything and I couldn’t find them again until the New Year.  I don’t have any pictures of my display from Christmas 2022 so I’ll offer up some photos from inside the house instead.  

   First up is our Christmas tree.  We get a real tree every year but there are no local Christmas Tree farms open in our area.  So, this is the second year we’ve purchase a tree from the local Firefighters.  It cost $60 but it goes to a good cause.  Here’s a photo of this year’s tree:

Notice that the star at the top is different this year.  When we plugged in our old star it would not light up and when I tried to put in replacement bulbs, they all burned out.  Here’s what our star topper has looked like in previous years: 

Our old Christmas tree topperWe had that old star for a long time so it might have outlived its lifespan.  My wife went to Canadian Tire and bought another one of the same shape and size but it shone in a bronze colour and I didn’t like it.  I stopped at Walmart the following day and purchased the current one.  I think it’s nice and the shining whiteness made it feel more like Christmas to me.  Maybe I can get the old one working again or we might just stick with the replacement.  Bonus marks to anyone who noticed that my 2022 tree was taller and thinner than the one above in a photo from 2018.  I’ll talk more about the tree later

   I like nutcrackers.  There, I’ve said it.  There’s something about them that makes me want to collect them and display them at Christmastime.    Here’s another photo from 2018 when I displayed most of my nutcrackers:

2018 NutcrackersThat wasn’t all of the nutcrackers because I had to put some of the nutcrackers on a speaker and others on the floor.  This year I decided to build a little shelf to put on the cabinet in the photo so that nutcrackers would be on display up the wall.  Here’s the result: 

The Nutcrackers 2022You can see that there are still some on a speaker and others on the floor.  Hockey NutcrackerThroughout 2022 I bought about a dozen used ones at thrift shops and they stayed on my piano during the year until joining the above collection.  My daughter Abbie gave me the hockey player nutcracker on the second shelf for Christmas and which I picture on the left.  I think he’s fun. 

   The other thing we take pride of in our house at Christmas is our mantle display of Christmas related figures.  Here’s what that looked like in 2018:

Mantle Display 1-2018

It’s a challenge to fit everything on the mantle and I usually buy two or three more and try to fit them in.  Here’s what the display looked like this year: 

Mantle Display 1

Mantle Display 2

Mantle Display 3

Mantle Display 4

Click on any of the above photos to get a larger view.   Then you can really see some of these treasured figures close up. 

   Now, let’s talk about what happened to our Christmas.  The plan was to have my daughter Emily and her husband Charlie drive down from Toronto on December 24th and bring my son Noah with them.  Well, it started snowing December 23rd and didn’t stop until late Christmas night on the 25th.   The roads were closed out our way and the major highway between Toronto and Belleville was also closed.  I had a large snowdrift in front of my garage door to the top and I had to dig it out to get at my snowblower.  On Christmas Eve, Abbie and I walked out in the falling snow to the end of our driveway and by then it was knee high.  Here’s a video of Jeanette and I heading out Christmas morning to clear the driveway again: 

Emily, Charlie, and Noah did not get to our house until December 26th so we held off opening presents until that day.  I had stopped at my Mother’s house on December 23rd to bring the 28 pound turkey to my house to cook and bring out to her house on Christmas day.  It was cooking for 7 hours in my house and it smelled awesome.  The bird, like us, did not make it to Christmas dinner at my Mother’s until December 26th.  Jeanette, Abbie, and I nibbled a little at it Christmas day with instant mashed potatoes and a little of the stuffing that was inside the bird.  On December 26th we had the turkey proper at my Mother’s with real mashed potatoes, stuffing, carrots, peas, and turnip along with rolls and three different kinds of of pie (pumpkin, apple, and pecan if you’re interested).  Besides my children, my wife, my son-in-law and my Mother, we had dinner with my brothers Dan and Todd and my friend Tom who had no place else to go.  It was just as good on Boxing Day as it would have been on the real Christmas day.  

   Now back to the tree.  In 2019 I wrote a Christmas themed blahg called MEATS AND CHEESES AND BABY JESUS.  In that blahg I debuted a new Christmas entertainment with the same name as the blahg.  Here’s an excerpt from that entertainment:

   I should add that I also have a tradition of disposing of the Christmas tree.  At the bottom of our property is a creek that runs fast and deep in the spring after the snow melts.  Our annual live Christmas tree, after its stint in the house, rests out behind our garage until I can get to the creek in the spring and chuck it in.  It’s swept up in the current and disappears.  I tried following a tree one year and got about half a kilometer before the creek took a bend through a farmer’s field and was carried out of sight.  In my imagination there is a Valhalla for our Christmas trees down where the creek ends or maybe it manages to make its way to the sea.  More likely there’s a dam of trees somewhere along the creek route overflowing and flooding the farmer’s fields or perhaps the basement of his farmhouse.

This year’s tree was no exception to the tradition of launching the tree into the creek in the New Year.  It didn’t quite work out as planned but I recorded a video of my attempt to properly launch the tree:  

I went back the next day and the tree had dislodged itself and was on its final journey.  Thus ended Christmas.  I guess the theme here is that all good things come to those who wait or Christmas is just as good the second day round.  I hope you enjoyed yours!

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THE NEW YEAR’S DAY 2023 FALSE DUCKS VIDEO RAMBLE

Tuesday, January 3rd, 2023

Scott January 2, 2023      It’s January 2nd, 2023 and you know what that means?  It means that I’m a day late posting my 2023 False Ducks Video Ramble.  I recorded this on New Year’s day but I’m just getting around to posting it.  That’s pretty good for me.  At least I’m not months late which seemed to be the theme of posting blahgs here in the fall of 2022.  Oh well, all is forgiven…at least by me.   Maybe that’s a resolution to be more forgiving of myself.  We’ll see.  The photo at right was taken a few minutes ago.  Forgive the hair, I just got up from a nap.  I won’t comment yet on the ramble.  Just listen and enjoy!

  

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WHAT IS 60?

Saturday, December 24th, 2022

     Three months ago today, I turned 60.  What is 60?  I know it’s twice 30.  30 years ago it was 1992 and Jeanette and I had moved back to the Belleville area from New Market.  We had our two year old daughter Emily with us.  Another 30 years on and we have three children and they’ve all graduated from University.  Emily is married to Charlie.  60 is also 3 times 20.  I turned 20 in my first year of University.  Frank Sinatra played Ottawa on September 11th of that year.  I would rather have been at that concert than have been at Trent in September.  That’s a long story I won’t retell.  Jeanette, my wife, and my diploma are the best things that ever happened to me at Trent.

     This blahg got sidelined for a few months.  I started writing this blahg in mid-October and now it’s December 23rd and I’m finally getting back to it.  It’s been an incredibly busy few months so I think I will wrap up the general theme and get back to the point of things.  When I started writing this two months ago I had plans to link it all to a poem I had written several years ago.  Let me post that poem then comment on everything.  This poem is from September 5, 1986: 

to old one

I imagine one day
I’ll be old —
and knowin’ me
one day will be about
all I can hack —
so I’m writin’ this to my old self
not what I was
but what I’ll be
for that one day

I’m tellin’ myself
to be happy
bein’ old
’cause maybe by then
I’ll have deserved that
but now I can’t accord any dignity
in addressin’ my old self
and this’ll only make sense
later on
to an old man

but old one,
that’s you or I mean me,
yer ruptured youth
is writin’ to you here
’cause we’re two different persons
you and me
and you know things
I’ve yet to comprehend
and you’ve forgotten things
I’ve yet to live
but that’s ’cause
yer memory and you
are old old one

and there was a time
when I needed you
to talk to me
and tell me
how I got by things or
over ’em or
through ’em
but that’d be cheatin’
and I matured into that truth

but old one
young one
still needs you
’cause I need to know
I’m still gonna be me
but old me
and someone new to talk to
if only in my mind
when we’re one

so know yer youth
old one
and keep in touch
or get in touch
with this
young one
who needs not to know
you’re old old one
but old enough to remember being
young once
and writing to
yer old self
to hear if
you stayed
old
long enough
to receive this poem
written by
yer young one once

   I wrote that poem more than 36 years ago.  I wasn’t married.  I didn’t have kids and I had yet to start any sort of career.  I think I was struggling to find out who I would be.  I imagined having the opportunity to talk to my old self and get reassurances I’d be okay or hints about what was to come and how to get through them.  I never got the hints.  I had to age through it all and figure it out for myself.  There were some rough spots but I’m still here and happily married with 3 great children and a son in law (and 3 cats) so I must have fared well. 

   So why did I get sidelined?  Well, my novel “Pippa’s Passing” has taken a great deal of my focus.  I haven’t found a publisher so I’m trying to do some promotion by releasing chapters online to read at a few sites.  My daughter Abbie has actually taken on this task.  First, I asked her to design a book cover.  I’m quite happy with it but Abbie is not as enthusiastic.  She tends to draw other things and in different styles so she thinks this isn’t her best work.  Here’s that cover, judge for yourself: 

There’s a rationale behind the image on the cover but you have to read the book to understand.  Here are links to sites where the first eight chapters have been posted.  New chapters are posted Tuesday and Fridays:

https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/61632/pippas-passing

https://www.quotev.com/story/15375380/Pippas-Passing/1

https://www.scribblehub.com/series/634916/pippas-passing/

https://www.wattpad.com/story/328479978-pippa%27s-passing

I also decided I wanted to create audio podcast versions of each chapter.  So far, I have completed 17 of the 20 chapters.  It would have been too costly to hire voice talent so I decided I would be the voice of the narrator and main character, Jeff “Pink” Carter.  This meant I had to find computer voices for all of the other characters.  I’m happy with most of the computer voices but I’m a perfectionist and I’ve had to mix in sound effects and music.  Elvis music features heavily in the entire book.  Here is the completed chapter six “Revelations At The Avocado House:”

I’ll continue to work on these and hopefully will find some way and somewhere to post all of them online.  I’m hoping this type of promotion might spark more interest in the book. 

   This will be my last blahg before Christmas 2022 and quite possibly my last blahg of this year.  I have no Christmas messages this year other than the same one I quote liberally each year from Sinatra:  “In this upcoming year, may we find peace in the world and peace among ourselves.”  Oh, and read my book!  Merry Christmas!

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SOME THINGS TO CELEBRATE…TEN YEARS ON

Saturday, June 18th, 2022

     Almost ten years ago, on July 16, 2012, I published a blahg called SOME THINGS TO CELEBRATE…FOR ME, ANYWAY.  I was going to sit down today and publish a new blahg about celebrating things when I thought of the old blahg.  Has it really been ten years since that blahg?  I’ll touch on a few things and compare it to the previous blahg but there’s some new things to celebrate this time around. 

   Ten years ago I touched on the fact that my wife and I had celebrated 25 years of marriage on May 30th, 2012.  Jeanette and I 32 years laterThis year, we made it even further to the 35 year mark.  It was a very quiet anniversary.  I brought home Swiss Chalet and we bought a new Epson printer.  I know, I’m still the romantic.  I don’t have a recent photo of the two of us together but the photo at left was taken two days after our 32nd anniversary on the occasion of our oldest daughter Emily’s wedding.  I think we look pretty good together and we’re still happy with each other…most of the time. 

   Another thing I celebrated in that blahg from ten years ago was the graduation of my daughter Abbie from Grade 8.  This past week, June 14th, 2022, Abbie graduated from York University in Toronto.  That’s a feat in itself because there hadn’t been in person graduation ceremonies the past two years due to Covid.  Below is a photo of her against the K & U in the York University sign. 

Abbie's Graduation 2022

The video below is of Abbie receiving her diploma, Bachelor of Fine Arts Magna Cum Laude, from the Chancellor or York University.  I had to record the video from my seat and aiming at a big screen.  They didn’t want us getting out of our seats to go up front and take photos or videos. 

I look forward to seeing Abbie’s next adventure and I’m sure her screenwriting ability will serve her well. 

   Now for some more personal celebrations for myself.  In 2020 I wrote four blahgs about the singer Linda Keene and traced her career through the media and included music files and a link to a rare acetate I had that she recorded for Gold Star in the early 1950s.  The blahg caught the attention of a jazz researcher by the name of James Harrod who put me in touch with Jordi Pujol with Fresh Sound Records. Linda Keene box set. They wanted to issue a two CD set of Linda Keene’s recordings and include my acetate.  I was also contracted by Jordi to write the liner notes.  Here are some pictures below of the set and some pages from the liner notes: 

 

Linda Keene set

Linda Keene page 1 liner notes

 

You can click on any of the links above for larger images and here’s the link to purchase the set from Fresh Sound Records:  https://www.freshsoundrecords.com/linda-keene-albums/55313-one-more-for-the-road-the-dixie-songbirds-complete-recordings-2-cd-box-set.html.  I believe you can also order it from Amazon.

   The final thing I would like to celebrate is that after nearly ten years, I have finally written and completed my novel, “Pippa’s Passing.”  In my last bahg, from April, PIPPA’S PASSING, I had completed 13 chapters or 57,000 words.  The final count  was just over 116,000 and twenty chapters.  I spent a few weeks editing and doing some rewriting.  I redrafted the final chapter after I had an idea to make it stronger.  I’m very happy with it.  I have been meaning to write this novel for ten years and finally started it in February of this year.  It’s a hard process to describe.  Once I had started, the characters began to speak to me and told me what to write.  I had no conceived notions where the book was going at times but when I sat down each day, the words were there and formed the story.  I’ve always had the beginning and ending over the last decade but I had not idea what direction it would take.  I’m happy with it.  Now I have to send it out to see if I can get it published.  I’m thinking of Coach House Press which is a Canadian outfit that I’ve been aware of for many years.  I think their ideals and mine are well suited.  Wish me luck!  Coach House, if you’re reading this then know that I will be in touch. 

   That’s it for now.  Celebrate something of your own…even if it’s the new day.

 

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PIPPA’S PASSING

Monday, April 4th, 2022

    Hey, has anyone wondered where I’ve been for the last month? Well, I’m going to tell you even if you didn’t want to know.  It’s been a couple of months since I have written a longer blahg.  The last full blahg was SAY IT AIN’T SO…NO MORE WEEPIES at the beginning of February.  I followed that with shorter blahgs about the Freedom Convoy and then telling Russia to get out of Ukraine.  Hey, Russia, get out of Ukraine!  That’s a message worth repeating. 

    I had to go back and see if I had mentioned “Pippa’s Passing” in previous blahgs.  I thought I might have talked about it in either the 2021 or the 2022 video blahgs but I just reviewed those and there was no mention of it.  So, what is Pippa’s Passing?  That is the title of a novel I had promised myself I would write one day.  I have been contemplating it now for more than ten years and finally in February I started writing it. 

     My process for writing it is to write one thousand words a day.  I thought I had read or heard somewhere that the author Somerset Maugham would write a thousand words a day when he was writing.  I’ve also read somewhere that the total was more likely 1500 words a day.  My effort has kept to the 1000 to 1100 word count daily.  So far, I’ve written just over 57,000 words and I hope to complete it with another 35,000 words.  If the average novel page consists of 300-400 words then I’m on track to have a novel around the 225 to 300 page mark.  I think that’s a decent length. 

     So, again, what is Pippa’s Passing?  The story is a memoir of a man who learns that an old love has died and he relates their story together from their first meeting in high-school up to ten years before her death when he last saw her.  It has some mysteries in it and some connections to Alfred Hitchcock’s movie “Vertigo” as well as references to Elvis.  I have written 13 chapters so far and I thought I would debut one of the chapters here. 

     The background to this chapter is that the events follow a break-up between Pippa and the main character Jeff Carter, also known as Pink.  Jeff is a runner and part of the track team.  After the summer of 1978 split with Pippa, a new character is introduced.  He is a foreign exchange student from Quebec named Bastien.  Jeff hates Bastien because he’s now after Pippa and is also competition for Jeff on the track team.  Here’s Chapter 12 titled “The Ogre”: 

 

-The Ogre-

Bastien appeared at my locker the day after we had run against each other in the half-mile practice.  I don’t know what it was about people showing up at my locker.  Pippa had done it on more than one occasion and so had Ben.  I don’t remember ever giving out my locker number but the alternative was that they had been watching me or they had shook someone else down for the information.

“My friend, I believe you and I may have started off on the wrong step,” he began.

“The wrong foot,” I replied.  “The phrase is off on the wrong foot.”  His diction might have been perfect but some words and terms obviously didn’t translate well.

“My apologies, I want only for us to be friends.”

“You said that,” I pointed out.  “You addressed me as ‘my friend’ and now you say you want us to be friends.  Why?”

“We are on the same team.  We attend at the same school.  Is this not what you wish as well?”

No, damn it.  That was not what I wanted.  I had a friend, Ben, and that was enough.  I wanted to tell him I had no vacancies but if he wanted to leave his name and number then I’d get back to him if something opened up.  I also wanted to tell him not to hold his breath.

“Look Bastien,” I started while refraining from directly calling him ‘bastard’, “I don’t need you to be my friend.  If you’re worried that I need one or think you’ve offended me, you can reassure yourself that I’m fine.”  I thought that might send him packing.

“You do not like me very well do you?”  I thought he shouldn’t ask a question that he didn’t want an answer to.

“What’s this all about?”  I decided to be direct.  “Is this about beating you on the track yesterday?  That was not about not liking you.  That was about racing.  Nothing more.”

“Are you jealous of me my friend?”

“I’m not jealous and I’m not your friend,” I answered.  “You’re just another guy around here.”  I gestured my hand to indicate the school.  “And you’re just another guy on the track.  I’m not losing sleep on you wondering why I’m not your friend.”

“Do you lose sleep on wondering why Pippa Brock is not your girlfriend?”

So that was his game.  He really did want a punch in his perfect face.  I wondered how much a bloody nose would contrast against his jet black hair.

“What I am and am not to her is none of your business.  If you want to go up against me on the track then so be it but I’d stay out of my personal business if I were you.  I beat you in the half mile and I can go the distance to beat you here.”  Again I gestured to the school.

“Then Miss Brock would be fair game?”  He looked very smug after saying this.  I was keeping my hands tight into my side.  It was hard to resist the temptation to physically lash out.  I quickly slammed my locker door and started to walk away.  I had only gone a few steps before I turned and decided to reply.

“You know buddy, there are trophies in competitions but just try referring to Pippa as a trophy to her face.  You might not like her response.”  If anyone was going to hit him, I was going to let Pippa do it.  I knew it would have more meaning coming from her.  “Oh, and by the way, the term ‘buddy’ doesn’t mean friend either.  You’re likely to find you don’t have many of those around here.”

I started to walk away but I just had to add, “and stay away from my god-damn locker.”

After that the game really did begin.  He went after Pippa in earnest with a purpose I felt was to throw me off.  I tried not to acknowledge them when I saw them together.  He obviously had heard about Pippa and I.  It was no secret.  People had known at the end of the school year that we were a couple even if we weren’t big on public displays of affection.  I couldn’t help wondering though how much Pippa had told him.  Did he know her other secrets?  I tried to put that out of my head or it would have been spinning again with those ‘if onlys.’

On the track, I showed Bastien no mercy in the distance runs.  I got to the point where I’d even leave Ben behind.  I needed the win.  I knew the thoughts of Bastien and Pippa together was getting to me and I had to channel it into my running.

One of the events in the Tri-City tournament was the Tri-Mile run.  It didn’t mean we were running a single three mile race but rather there was an elimination challenge of three one mile runs.  One contender from each school would compete in a one mile race, or four laps around the quarter mile track, and the winner from each would face up in a fourth race.  It was possible that one school could have winners in all three individual races and then face off against their own teammates in the final.

Ben, Bastien, and I were selected from our school to compete in the Tri-Mile runs.  Ben and I were fairly good in the distance runs and surprisingly Bastien had been improving his endurance.  I was sure that he wanted to best me and prove he was the better man as he was already making time with my girl.

Pippa had become a staple at practices.  She was there every day to cheer on Bastien and cheered even louder after I had beaten him by shouting “you’ll get him next time” or “you almost got him that time.”  I wanted to remind her there was no almost in running.  You won or you lost.  Even coming in second was not winning.

Around the school it seemed true that I was losing out against Bastien when it came to Pippa.  She didn’t even glance my way anymore in the one class we did share.  I had been determined to find a way to get back in her good graces but she seemed to be moving further and further away from me.

One morning she was at my locker again.  I gave it serious thought at that moment to request a locker change or to begin carrying everything with me and give up my locker altogether.

“Jeff, can we talk?” she asked with no introduction to why she was even there.

“Are we talking now?” I responded.  I guess my hurt was showing.

“Listen, despite whatever’s going on between us…”

“You mean whatever’s not going on between us,” I said cutting her off.

I thought Pippa might walk away.  She crossed her arms but she stood firm.

“Jeff, I’m trying to talk to you.  At least hear what I have to say.”

“Go ahead.”  I crossed my arms and mirrored her stance.

“I started to say that despite whatever is not going on between us, I always thought you were a decent person.  Why have you been so mean to Bastien?”

Oh, sister, I thought, you just asked a loaded question.  I had a number of reasons I could have given her at that moment but I didn’t think I needed to justify my hatred of him to her.  Instead, I chose to answer her question with one of my own.

“Tell me something, Pippa, why do you care so much about a phony like that?

I expected her to react or to walk away but she stayed where she was and remained calm and collected.

“Do you think I don’t know he’s a phony, Jeff?”  No one was giving answers.  We were just answering each other with more inquiries.  “It’s better to know what someone is and work on changing it than to accept someone as honest and then be disappointed by them later on.”

This was where I wanted to slam my locker and walk away like I did with Bastien before.  Pippa was obviously still wearing her hurt too.

“Listen Pippa, there’s really only one reason why I don’t like the guy and that’s because you do.  I still love you.  I haven’t stopped.  If you’re with Bastien now then that’s your business but don’t expect me to be happy about it or be happy for you.”  That’s when I decided to turn and make my exit.

“You’re an ogre!” I heard her exclaim.

I kept on walking.

A few days after my exchange with Pippa, I had to present something I had written for presentation in our Creative Writing class.  We had been studying a unit on fables and fairy tales and were required to write something in that genre.  I had been inspired by Pippa’s parting words.

I saw the assignment as an opportunity to pour my heart into my writing.  I wasn’t writing it for Pippa but rather as a showcase as to how I felt.  My story was “How To Love An Ogre.”

I had written the story in the first person narrative because I knew that no one better could represent the Ogre but himself.  The story was about a princess who was tired of the demands of royal life and the expectations of her royal parents.  She was tired of unlikely suitors or the possibility of arranged marriages.  The princess used some of her wealth to have a tower built and she willing locked herself away from everybody and everything.  I felt this was unique because most princesses get locked away against their will.

The princess had sought out the ogre to guard the tower against anyone seeking entry.  His responsibilities did not include keeping the princess inside.  The princess could come and go as she pleased but when she was inside, the Ogre kept everyone else out.  In time, the Ogre came to love the princess for who she was and what she wanted.  Above all else he was a friend to the princess who had no other designs on her.

In my story, the Ogre spoke about how lovely the princess was and how he had loved her the first time he saw her but was happy just to be near her.  Over the years, the friendship grew between the Ogre and the princess and the Ogre felt being her friend was enough even though he secretly loved her.  He knew he was only an Ogre and probably didn’t deserve better.  Being near the princess was sufficient for the Ogre.

In the end, the princess finally found true love and married.  The Ogre did not become a prince nor did he become handsome by any magic.  He remained an Ogre and his true beauty was inside.  When the princess had a daughter, she eventually sought out the Ogre and introduced the Ogre as the princess’s best friend.  In time, the princess’s daughter came to love the Ogre as her friend as well.  It was enough for the Ogre.

After I read the story aloud there was a round of applause from everyone in the class.  Pippa was staring at me and I could see tears on her cheeks.  After class she approached me.

“That was beautiful, Pink.”

I was Pink again.  I had moved the needle.

“Thank you,” I said back to her.  I didn’t want to push my luck by asking about the Pink designation.

“Can I walk with you after school?” she asked.

“Okay,” I said hesitantly.  There was hope in my heart and I tried not to relay it in my voice.  Was this how our relationship was going to restart?  I knew there was power in words but I had never thought that it could move mountains.  Hadn’t she been rock hard against me in our last confrontation?

“Good, I’ll see you out front, later.”  She gave me a little wave and turned.

I couldn’t wait until the end of day.  Maybe she was on the verge of forgiving me.  Maybe she was going to dump that bastard and come back to me. I should have guessed what was coming.

Pippa found me after the last bell rang.  We left the school and I turned left and she turned right.

“Where are you going?” I asked.  “I thought you wanted me to walk you home?”

“No, I’m walking you home,” Pippa responded.

“I thought you had a curfew?”

“Not since before my Birthday.  I think mom trusts me a little more now after everything that’s happened.”

But nothing had happened.  I had never been revealed to her mother as Steve Wilson or Pink or Jeff Carter.  Ours had been a private break-up before her mother even discovered we had been together.

Pippa hooked her arm in mine and started to pull me in the opposite direction of her way home.  “Lead the way, Pink.  I have no idea where we’re going.”  Neither did I.  She was clearly in charge.

“You liked my story?”  I thought that was a safe place to start.

“Like I said, Pink, it was beautiful.  I’m sorry I called you an ogre.  I said I never wanted to hurt you again and I guess I did.”

“We both did,” I pointed out.

“Let’s not talk about that Pink.  I want to talk to you about Bastien.”

I tensed up.  Why did we need to talk about him?  I thought this was about us.

“What about Bastien?” I asked with caution.

“I want you to be nice to him.”

I stopped and stared at her.  She couldn’t be serious.  I thought we had had this out.  I didn’t like the guy.

“Pink,” she continued, “I know you don’t like him.  I’ve heard that you and Ben refer to him as ‘that bastard’.  I want you to know why I like him.”

I wanted to unhook my arm but it was the only touch we had shared in over a month.  I wasn’t about to let her go.  I started to walk again and I was prepared to drag her along if she didn’t move her feet with mine.

“Go ahead, I’m listening.”  I was aware that I was not sounding sincere.

“You said he was a phony.  I told you I knew that already.  The thing you don’t know about Bastien is that he’s capable of being sincere and caring and honest.”

“And I’m not?”  I had stopped walking again.  This time Pippa started forwarded and pulled on me.

“This isn’t about you or about me, Pink.  Bastien’s only here for the school year.  I know he’ll be gone by next summer.  Until then, I think I want to be with him.”

Shades of ‘Grease.’  Now Pippa was the John Travolta character committing to a limited time romance because she knew there would be no strings attached at the end.  I didn’t think she was capable of that role reversal.

“Does he know all of your secrets?”  I had to ask that question.  If he had that same intimacy with her then we truly were finished.

“No, he doesn’t.  That’s why I want to be with him.  I’ve carried my secret around for a long time now and you were the only boy I told and look how that turned out.  I can just be me with him.  He gets to see Pippa Brock as a girl with no baggage.  I can just be me.”

“And when he’s gone?” I asked.

“Well, by then, maybe I’ll have become so used to being me, the way I want to be, then it’ll be second nature to me.”

“And then?”

“And then, Pink, I find my next dream.”

“This is where I get off,” I responded.

“Hunh?” she asked puzzlingly.

We had been walking and talking and finally we were standing in the street outside of my house.  Ours was a bi-level home.  It was a typical one-storey house and the front door opened onto a landing with stairs that led both up to the main floor and down to the basement.   My parents had a bedroom on the main level at the back of the house and both Rod and I had bedrooms in the basement at the front.  Our windows were at ground level and faced the street.

“This is where I live.”  I pointed to the window on the right.  “That’s my bedroom there.”

“It’s nice,” Pippa observed.  “But what about what I said about Bastien and I?”

I wanted to tell her that her current dream was a nightmare that kept me up at nights.  The thought of any relationship between her and Bastien haunted me to no end.  The thought of any relationship with Pippa that didn’t include me was even worse.

“That’s your dream Pippa.”  I didn’t feel like adding the hokey bit about her following that dream wherever that dream may lead.  My comment about ‘this is where I get off’ was going to have to be the answer for our relationship as well.

“I know you told me that you still love me Pink and I still love you.  But we can’t be together.  You’re part of everything I’m trying to move on from.  You don’t have to be happy for me but you’re a nice guy and I was hoping you could move on too.”

Oh, the nice guy routine.  That’s exactly what every hopeful love struck teen does not want to hear.  I had to be quick and think of something that would impress her to see me how she once viewed me.  I needed that opportunity that would drive Bastien away and bring Pippa and I back together.

“Okay, Pippa, I’ll make you a deal.  If Bastien can somehow get to the finals in the Tri-Mile race and if I get to the final and if we run against each other and if he beats me, and those are a lot of ifs, I’ll bow out gracefully.”

“And if you win or you both lose, Pink?”

“Then forget about me forgetting about you.”  I wanted my own terms.

“But Pink, this is about moving on.  I don’t want to be with you anymore.”

“I know,” I replied.  “But that’s your dream and I’ve got my own that includes you and I gotta follow that dream to find the love I need.”  I guess I couldn’t resist the hokey urge after all.

“Have fun trying,” she said and turned and walked away.

“Oh, I will!” I shouted after her.

The following week was the Tri-City tournament and we were the host school that year.  Practices had been intense leading up to the event.  Ben and I put extra hours into our training for the Tri-Mile.  We would meet up on weekends and in the evenings.  Ben and I were very strong in the distance running.  I was glad that we would each get separate chances to prove ourselves in the mile run.  The only thing I was not enthused about was the possibility of running against Ben in the final.  I had been outpacing him in some of the practises but I wasn’t sure if I could beat him when it came to a head to head.  I was sure he had learned well and was holding back on something that he would release in the competition.

Bastien continued to improve as well.  Sometimes Ben and I would go to the track in the evening and would encounter him running laps.  He wasn’t always alone.  Sometimes Pippa was running along with him.  That nightmare I had been experiencing was taking on more dangerous visions.  I had not seen her run since the Harrier.  She certainly had never offered to run with me.  On those occasions, Ben and I would wait off at a distance until they were finished before we would take to the track.

Pippa obviously wanted her dream to be with Bastien so much that she was prepared to put the effort into training him.  That only fueled my hatred for that Bastard more and I was damn sure not going to let go of my dream.

I started a game of intimidation by mixing my on-field running with doing laps around Pippa’s neighbourhood.  I would pass by her house, loop around adjoining streets and jog past her house three or four times before heading off home.

Pippa took up the challenge and soon after I would spot her with Bastien as they included going down my street as part of their training routine.  She looked good in jogging shorts but the sight of Bastien with her took away from that vision.

The day of the Tri-City was another warm fall day.  I wasn’t sure who scheduled the dates for these events but they obviously consulted some reliable weather almanac.  The track itself had been well groomed and was sporting new chalk lines for all of the events.

Our school did better in the Tri-City events than we had in the All-City.  Collegiate was not one of the schools competing.  In addition to our school was the aforementioned Bayside as well as Centennial Secondary.  Our athletes were ready and even though the Park brothers were off in Toronto opposing each other, we still had a talented roster.

Many of our new talent finished first and second in their events.  Bastien swept in the short track events in which he participated.  He had the speed and, thanks to Pippa’s coaching, he had developed the endurance.  He grinned stupidly after every win and I was looking forward to my opportunity to wipe that stupid grin off his face.  I also wanted to show Pippa I wasn’t done yet when it came to her.  She had said she still loved me.  That was an opening I was prepared to exploit.

I had not told Ben about the deal between Pippa and I.  His relationship with Sandra put him in a difficult position.  His girlfriend had been clear with him that the topic of Pippa was off-limits.  Ben would not be asked by either camp to solicit information to be passed on.  I wasn’t even sure the deal I thought I had made was binding by either side.  Pippa hadn’t exactly agreed.  She had only asked me what the outcome would be if neither Bastien nor I won the Tri-Mile or if I was the victor.  I was the one who dictated my intention if I was the winner.  I only assumed with the effort Pippa had put into Bastien’s training that she would hold me to the other part of the deal if Bastien bested me.

The day of the tournament, resplendent in our blue jerseys, I thought I should take Ben into my confidence.  Bastien had been successful in the short track sprints and Ben had become suspicious when Bastien had dropped out of the half-mile race.  I had suspected that Pippa had advised him to excuse himself and to concentrate on the longer Tri-Mile.

There were only two semi-contests for the half-mile and these, like the preliminaries for the Tri-Mile, had been spaced throughout the day.  I had run my half-mile leg earlier on and had been triumphant.  Bastien and Ben and one competitor each from the other two schools had been scheduled to pair off in their heat.  At the last minute, Bastien had been scratched from the race.  Ben and an athlete from Bayside took first and second respectively.  The final in the half-mile would consist of Ben, myself, the Bayside runner from Ben’s race, and the Centennial runner who had placed second behind me.

Ben approached me after his heat.  He hardly looked winded and I wondered what competing against him in the half-mile would be like or if we both managed to get into the finals of the Tri-Mile.

“What do you think that was all about?” Ben asked me.

“What was what all about?” I answered innocently.

“You know damn well what.  Bastien drops out of the half-mile and you don’t blink an eye.  You know something, don’t you?”

I decided to tell him what I suspected and how it tied into my deal with Pippa.

“And where do I fit into all of this?” he asked after I had told him everything.  “What if I beat both of you?”

“I have a contingency for that.  I expect that you’ll give us both a challenge.  If you win, you win.  May the best man win and all that, you know.”

“But you want to be the best man, don’t you?”

“Ben, I’m not going to lie to you, I want to beat that bastard more than anything.”

“It won’t get you Pippa back.  It sounds like even if you do win against Bastien then you’ve got an uphill battle with her.”

“Let me worry about that.  You just run as well as you always do.  This doesn’t really concern you.”  I wasn’t trying to be dismissive of Ben but the deal I had proposed didn’t really include Ben.  If I had to lose to Ben it would be better than losing to the alternative.

“The hell it doesn’t!” he exclaimed.  “You’re my friend and I’m dating Pippa’s cousin.  I’m going to get it from all sides.”

“Not from me you’re not.  I’m only asking you to run your race and maybe one other little favor.”

“What’s that?” Ben asked with skepticism.

“Between the pair of us, let’s beat that Bastard!”

I didn’t know if I had allayed any of Ben’s concerns.  I knew he wouldn’t throw his race.  He wanted to win the Tri-Mile for himself and I was sure he’d provide great competition to both Bastien and I.

Ben and I squared off in the half-mile final and I could tell he was in it to win.  I didn’t really care.  I had yet to run my leg of the Tri-Mile and I had to save something for that race.  I gave it my all and if Ben did beat me out at the finish he was sure he had won it squarely.  For my part, I wasn’t sure that he hadn’t.

Ben had run his Tri-Mile preliminary earlier in the day and had finished easily.  Bastien, after dropping out of the half-mile had a tough go of it in his Tri-Mile heat.  Bastien only managed to just beat out his Centennial opponent to move on to the final.  It was stacking up to be a first for the Tri-Mile with all three semi-finalists coming from the same school.  It only hinged on me running away with the lead in my contest.

Both of the athletes in my leg of the Tri-Mile had not competed in anything else throughout the day.  They were fresh and they looked lean and ready to compete.  Lined up against them at the start I could see both of them on either side of me ready to put me through my paces.  After hearing the starting gun I fell in line behind both as they took an early lead.

You have a lot of time to reflect when you’re running four quarter-mile laps.  Although I was concerned with the other athletes racing against me, I was also consumed with hatred for Bastien and a singular goal to get to the final and put him in his place.  I had to win my race because my single purpose was that Bastien’s place would not be at Pippa’s side.

I held the third spot for the first two laps before I began to challenge my opponents.  This was more than a race to me.  My future with Pippa depended on me not losing.  The competition against Bastien for my girl depended on me finishing in first.  I didn’t care about the other racers.  Second and third were the only options I was prepared to leave for them.  For me, coming in second was not winning.

I took the lead in the fourth and final lap and easily breezed in for the win.  I was elated.  Bastien, Ben, and I would meet up later against each other.  As I saw it, there could only be one outcome and that was with me being victorious.

I had watched Bastien off-field whenever he had completed a race.  Pippa was there.  Students had been given the chance to be excused from classes if they attended the tournament to cheer on their home school.  It wasn’t mandatory and there were some who didn’t attend in the school or at the track.  That wasn’t Pippa.  She was there in Bastien’s corner like a prizefighter’s manager.  I couldn’t bear to watch.

My thoughts of Pippa were ever present throughout the day.  How could she be with a guy like that?  I had been asking myself that question for many weeks.  I hadn’t liked the answers she had given.  She said he was capable of being sincere and caring and honest.  She said it was better to know what someone is and work on changing it.  She said she could be herself with him; a girl with no baggage.  She said I was part of everything she was trying to move on from and that I didn’t have to be happy for her but hoped I could move on too.  She also said she still loved me.  I thought that if she could say that to me while being with another guy then brother, that’s when I go to work with a clear conscience.

The time for the Tri-Mile race finally came.  My head was swirling with all those answers from Pippa that didn’t add up to me.  I was ready for the race but I was having a hard time clearing my mind.

“Gentlemen, it is an honor to have you as my competitors,” Bastien said as he, Ben and I took the starting positions.  That Bastard and his near perfect grammar was all smiles.  I was harboring such hatred for him that I saw his statement not as a compliment but as a challenge.  I think Ben might have said something complimentary back to him but I was quiet and focussed on the race ahead.

There was one false start as I bolted ahead a split-second before the starter’s pistol.  We three had to line up again and I was given a caution.  I had to settle down my mind.  I was so anxious to get ahead and stay there.  I couldn’t give Bastien an inch.

The next start was successful and we were away down the track.  I had found a moment of calm before the second start and tried to focus on all of the rules of running.  I had to pace myself.  I had to leave a reserve for the last lap.  To hell, with all of that, I thought.  I had to beat Bastien.  I had to show Pippa up in her little game.  She would be mine again.

We all kept pace with each for the first two laps.  Ben and Bastien were on either side of me so I could easily see both of them.  Bastien began to pull ahead in the third lap and Ben and I kept pace with each other.  We had seen this before and knew that the final lap was where we’d make our move.

On that third lap, I kept Bastien in my sights and focussed on not losing any further ground.  I had lost so much ground to him already since he had arrived at our school.  I had lost my girl to him.  Pippa was my girl.

Moving into the fourth and final lap I began to reflect on everything.  It all came pouring in.  Pippa had said she still loved me.  I had written the Ogre story and she had called me ‘Pink’ again.  Then I remembered I had only written that story because she had called me an Ogre.  The Ogre in my fairy-tale was sensitive and did what the Princess asked and he continued to love her even though he knew she would never be his.  Then it hit me, I was the Ogre in my own story.

I had been referring to Pippa as my girl.  I had been determined to upset her plans with Bastien for my own gain.  She was the prize to be won.  That was all wrong.  Hadn’t I told Bastien that there are trophies in competitions but he shouldn’t try referring to Pippa as one?  I had forgotten my own words.

I began to realize maybe it wasn’t Bastien who should be the focus of my anger.  I should have been angry with myself.  I hadn’t been thinking clearly at all.   Ever since I had met Pippa I had only focussed on how to be near her and eventually make her mine.  I had been patient and then thankful and then stupid.  After our split I had transformed into a consumed individual who had lost sight of living my own life.  Pippa had been my life and here I was racing to stop her from getting on with hers.  I couldn’t separate out whether I had done this to myself or it had all been Pippa’s fault.

While this had all been playing out in my head, my body had instinctively done its job and I had caught up with Bastien.  Ben was there alongside of us.  I snapped out of my reverie and focussed on not winning.  It had become clear to me that I had to follow through with one thing I had told Pippa when we last met.  This was where I got off.

I began to ease my speed but not overtly.  I had pulled ahead but then I slowed and pulled back until I was even with Ben and Bastien.  Ben gave me a look and I shook my head ever so slightly from side to side.  The gesture was not lost on Ben.  He sped up and took the lead only enough to allow Bastien to move ahead in time with Ben’s steps.  Around the last corner I made another effort to regain the lead so it wouldn’t look like I was deliberately trying to lose.  Ben and Bastien and I kept up a back and forth in the home stretch but we allowed Bastien to cross the finish ahead of us.  I knew I was going to owe Ben an explanation.

There was suddenly a throng around Bastien with Pippa in the center with him.  Ben and I walked around a little bit and kept throwing glances at each other.  How was I going to tell Ben that I had given up?  It was bad enough that I had let Bastien win but I had communicated silently to Ben that I wanted him to do the same.

My hatred for Bastien had abated.  It wasn’t his fault I felt that way.  I had played into the old jealousy game.  Bastien and I were both pawns.  Wrongly, I began to think Pippa was the reason for all of this.  I knew I had been stupid and loved her blindly and the one solid ‘if only’ that ran through my mind was ‘if only’ I hadn’t loved her the first time I saw her.

Everything swelled up inside me and I could only see that my story with Pippa was finished.  I saw an opening in the crowd around her and Bastien and I approached them.  I was empty and angry all at the same time.  I blamed Pippa.  I had proposed the agreement and now she had what she wanted.  I wasn’t prepared to let her off that easy.

“Is that the deal you wanted or should I have thrown in my shirt?” I asked angrily.  In a final gesture to our finished relationship, I whipped off my jersey, threw it at her feet, and walked away.

 

I have finished Chapter 13 but the next Chapter will be out of sequence and will probably frustrate the reader to no end.  I had written the first 7 chapters before I read them to my wife.  She has enjoyed them and likes the story but then she’s also my biggest fan.  I can’t wait to finish this book and look at having it published.  Until then, you’ll all have to stay tuned.

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RUSSIA: GET OUT OF THE UKRAINE!

Tuesday, March 1st, 2022

This is going to be another quick blahg.  Russia needs to get out of the Ukraine!  We need to support the Ukrainians any way we can and then later go after Putin for war crimes.

Little despots who try to annex other countries have always failed in the past.

The world is watching!!

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FREEDOM CONVOY…NOT SO MUCH…GO HOME!

Wednesday, February 9th, 2022

    This blahg will be very short and very precise. I’m not any kind of political activist but it bothers me here in Canada to see what’s happening with the so called “Freedom Convoy” in Ottawa, Alberta, and blocking the bridge between Detroit and Windsor. When I see protesters in our area, I have a tendency to roll down my window and shout at them. That’s not helping the cause, I know. My wife doesn’t like it when I do it. But sometimes you have to use the platform you have to speak out. That’s why this blahg will be political today.

    First, let’s talk about Freedom. The protesters in these convoys and blockades and occupations say this is about Freedom. Take a look around, if you don’t see iron bars in front of your face then I’d say you already have Freedom. Yes, you have the Freedom to say you don’t like the vaccines or the mandates but don’t make the rest of us pay for your Freedom of making a poor choice. Many of these protesters deny the science behind vaccines but most of them are not scientists or health care providers or researchers. They keep spouting the same incorrect lies and clap-trap that we’ve heard from Americans and Donald Trump. We don’t need that. America has its own problems and Donald Trump is one of them. I’m glad he’s not in power anymore. He’s an idiot and a racist. That’s all the time I’ll spend on him.

   These protesters and truckers in the convoys and occupations are making the rest of us pay for having done the right thing. Vaccines are the right thing. Vaccine passports and mask mandates are the right thing. The majority of us are tired of the mandates but we do what we have to do to keep ourselves and everyone else safe. Again, we are the majority and we don’t picket or protest or upset other people’s lives. No one should reward the Freedom Convoy because the rest of us, the majority, are not asking for a reward for having done the right thing. The only way we get through this is for everyone to get a vaccine, if you can, and not protest against the majority of us who know what is right and do what is right.

   Lastly, this is a message to politicians. The Federal Conservative party want to cave to the demand of the protesters. They want our Prime Minister to end mandates or repeal them. That’s wrong! We don’t negotiate with terrorists and when you’re protesting and terrorizing everyone because you’re in the minority and wrong, we shouldn’t negotiate with you! Stand strong Prime Minister Trudeau. I support our Prime Minister in not meeting with the Freedom Convoy. Again, don’t negotiate with the minority. The majority stand behind you!

    In Ontario, Doug Ford has done very little. There will be a spring election and it will be time to vote him out. He has powers in his tool-kit to deal with the protesters but he doesn’t use them. He should be in the media every day decrying the actions of the protesters and the Freedom Convoy and telling them to go home. If he can’t or won’t do that, it’s time for Doug Ford to go home permanently and let someone else lead who knows that the majority are the voices you need to listen to. Majority equals votes and right now, you’re not likely to get them!

    That’s enough for this blahg. Stay safe and keep up the good fight. Vaccines work and mandates work. I’ll roll down my window anytime and say that. That’s my Freedom.

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SAY IT AIN’T SO…NO MORE WEEPIES

Tuesday, February 1st, 2022

    I guess the correct title for this blahg should be: “SAY IT AIN’T SO…NO MORE THE WEEPIES.” Scott January 2022Earlier in this month I posted my 2022 False Ducks Video Ramble, THE 2022 FALSE DUCKS VIDEO RAMBLE, in which I mentioned that Deb Talan and Steve Tannen, known collectively as The Weepies, have split up.  I hadn’t heard any news of the duo throughout 2021 so I checked their Facebook page earlier this month and read the following post: 

The Weepies final shows EVER are coming up in January 2022!

It’s been a time of big change all around for sure. Before the pandemic we realized we had to go our separate ways. We are both so grateful for the time we spent making music, putting it out into the world, and sharing it with all of you. It was magical, and we’re both forever changed and enriched by that time. As we move on to other creative projects we hope that you, like us, will treasure the era when we made music as The Weepies.

Thank you for the support through the years. We’ll see you in the days ahead.

All the best to all of you.

Deb & Steve

What a punch to the gut!  I checked out their Wikipedia entry and found that the following last line had been added: 

Talan and Tannen got married in 2007 and had their first son in October that year.They went on to have two more sons later. They later divorced, which was finalized on New Year’s Day 2020

Again, what a punch to the gut.  Readers of this blahg will know that I’m a huge fan of The Weepies and had seen them twice in concert in Toronto.  I wish them the best but I’m still deeply saddened by this news. 

   I guess the biggest thing for me, besides the fact that there won’t be any more new The Weepies albums, is that I won’t get to see Steve and Deb live together again.  Perhaps they’ll tour Canada again separately and I’ll probably go to their individual concerts but I’ll never see The Weepies live again.  I saw them twice in Toronto back in 2016 and 2018.  Here is a picture when they played The Drake in 2016:

The Weepies at the Drake in 2016

   I wanted to take some video of the concert but I couldn’t shut off the bright light on my cell phone.  I decided to record part of the concert from my pocket but I only managed to record part of the song “Jolene” sung by Steve and part of his next song about a Jig.  Here they are:

 

 

   I did manage to find the following video online that someone posted from that concert in Toronto.  This is The Weepies performing “Ever Said Goodbye”:

I wish had recorded more and especially some of Deb Talan’s great vocals.   She sang a couple of songs from her yet to be released CD “Lucky Girl” when she was in Toronto but I could only find the following video of one of those new songs, “Butterfly”, from her Detroit, Ohio concert two nights prior to the Toronto concert. 

  

   Here they are The Great Hall in 2018:

The Weepies at The Great Hall Toronto 2018

   I did record the entire audio of the recording and I thought I would post the entire concert here for download.  Here the link:

https://www.mediafire.com/file/o18w68858tn7zva/The_Weepies_-_2018-04-17_The_Great_Hall%252C_Toronto%252C_ON.rar/file

 

Here are a few individual samples.  First up here is “Hideaway”:

 

Next is Steve’s great version of “Sing Me To Sleep”:

 

Deb Talan closed the show with the following stirring version of “Stars”:

 

   I thought I would take the time to post some of their other live performances.  YouTube has many excellent videos of The Weepies in live performances so I thought I’d re-post some of them here so you can get a feeling of what we’ll all be missing out on now that they’ve separated.  First up is a rare slow tempo version of their song “Be My Thrill.”  This was previously done uptempo so I’ll offer up the official music video of that song followed by the slow tempo version.  The slow live version is from their appearance at the Oregon Zoo on August 20th, 2011. 

 

Also from 2011 is The Weepies performing “Gotta Have You” from their album “Say I Am You” at the Troubadour in West Hollywood, CA on August 17, 2011:

  

   Staying with 2011 here are The Weepies (Deb Talan, Steve Tannen, Jon Flaugher) performing “I Was Made for Sunny Days” on a beautiful summer evening at the Britt Festival, Southern Oregon – August 23, 2011.  I love  “I Was Made for Sunny Days” and find myself singing this infectious song:

 

   The Weepies went back again to the Troubador in West Hollywood, CA on August 14th, 2016 and here’s “The World Spins Madly On” from that concert: 

 

   Here is a compilation video of The Weepies at the Kirkland Performance Center in Kirkland, Washington on May 17, 2018.  It features the songs “Hideaway”, “Walk On”, “Crooked Smile”, “I Don’t Know Why”, “Old Coyote”, “My Little Love”, “Wish I Could Forget”, and “Sing Me To Sleep”:

 

   Here’s another compilation video from 2018 when The Weepies appeared at Sony Hall on December 16, 2018.  This compilation features clips from the songs “Walk On”, “Growing Up”, “Little Bird”, “All That I Want”, “Gotta Have You”, and “Sirens”:

 

   Jumping back to 2015, this is a full version of “Sirens” from their last album performed live at the State Theater, Falls Church, Virginia on June 21st, 2015:

 

   Another one from 2016, this time it’s a full version of “All That I Want” from their performance at The Wilbur Theatre in Boston, MA on December 11, 2016:  

 

   The following is not a live performance but the official video of “Sunflower” incorporates video of a live performance by The Weepies at an unknown venue: 

 

   I wanted to post a couple of videos that I never got to hear The Weepies perform live but are fantastic songs and something rare and unique from them.  The first is “Mend” from the soundtrack of the movie, “Wish I Was Here”:

The second is from a compilation album of Springsteen’s Born To Run album recreated on ukulele by various artists.  I love Steve’s vocal here on “Backstreets”: 

 

   I am sure there are more live videos out there to be discovered.  I’ll keep on looking.  Farewell The Weepies.  I wish Steve and Deb the best. Thanks for all of the music!!

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THE 2022 FALSE DUCKS VIDEO RAMBLE

Tuesday, January 25th, 2022

    What a busy January this has been!  Scott Henderson on the last day of 2021I recorded this Video Ramble nine days ago and I haven’t even had a chance to post it.  Since then the temperature has dropped even colder and we had a wicked snow storm last week.  I had a Covid scare last week and was home for a couple of days waiting on the results of a couple of rapid tests.  Both were negative but then our furnace conked out again on Friday night and again Saturday afternoon.  This is the third time in the past two weeks.  Let’s hope they have fixed the problem this time.  My Father used to do this for a living but I’m not the son who inherited any of that knowledge.  Speaking of my Father, he passed away on January 19th, 2019.  On January 20th of this year, I remembered the anniversary of his passing.  I think that’s okay because I really don’t want remember his passing but rather his life.  Love you Dad! 

   Have a look at the 2022 Ramble video and I’ll highlight some things below.

  

The Cool and Lam series are the following books written by Erle Stanley Gardner as A. A. Fair.  The series consists of the following 29 books (now 30, with the discovery of an unpublished work in 2016).  I have read 1-9 in the following list plus number 30 as it was written to be the second book in the series but was left unpublished until 2016.  So, I’ve read exactly one third of the books in the series.  This is from the Cool and Lam Wikipedia page:

  1. The Bigger They Come (1939)
    Donald Lam is hired by Bertha. His first assignment is to serve a subpoena on a man that nobody can find. This first entry in the series turned on a real loophole in the extradition laws of the State of Arizona which made it possible, under certain conditions, to commit a murder without being punished provided one remained in Arizona. After its publication, a public outcry caused the Arizona Legislature to convene in special session to plug the loophole.  Gardner had used this device earlier in his ‘Ed Jenkins’ stories, locating the loophole in California law (this time, fictitiously) so that Jenkins (though a known crook) could operate in California without being extradited for crimes in other states.  The Cool and Lam stories were written under the pen name “A.A. Fair”, and Gardner’s authorship was not revealed till the 1940s.
  2. Turn on the Heat (1940)
    William Morrow and Company, January 1940
    Dr. “Smith” is looking for his wife who left him 20 years before. It was made into a 1958 TV pilot for an unproduced show called Cool and Lam.
  3. Gold Comes in Bricks (1940)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1940
    A blackmailing gambler, a corrupt lawyer, and an expert in salting gold mines, all are grist to Donald’s mill.
  4. Spill the Jackpot! (1941)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1941
    Set in Las Vegas. A runaway bride and a slot machine-fixing ring seem to have no connection. Bertha loses the weight, and falls in love! But…
  5. Double or Quits (1941)
    William Morrow and Company, December 1941
    Detectionary: “First—the missing jewelry. Second—the client found dead in his garage, and Cool and Lam are trying to get from an insurance company double indemnity for the lovely widow.” Bertha begins fishing.
  6. Owls Don’t Blink (1942)
    William Morrow and Company, June 1942
    Donald has two intertwining cases: finding a lost girl and bringing to justice a murderer. Set in the French Quarter of New Orleans. America has entered the war, and Bertha thinks she has helped gain Donald’s immunity from the draft.
  7. Bats Fly at Dusk (1942)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1942
    Donald has calmly volunteered for the Navy to fight the Japanese, and Bertha fumes. She works on a case involving a blind man and a pet bat, with help from Donald via telegram. Donald’s —Police Detective Frank Sellers—is introduced. Bertha gets in over her head and quits; Donald flies down on a military pass, solves it, and flies back. Bertha only finds out later.
  8. Cats Prowl at Night (1943)
    William Morrow and Company, August 1943 
    Bertha must locate a client’s missing wife, who controls all his money. No signs of Lam are seen at all, though he is heard of. She manages somehow, but almost fails. Frank proposes to her.
  9. Give ’em the Ax (1944)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1944
    Donald returns, and takes control of the agency. The case is of a wife cheated with car insurance and blackmail.
  10. Crows Can’t Count (1946)
    William Morrow and Company, April 1946
    A case involving both stolen and smuggled emeralds, the latter half of which is set in the nation of Colombia.
  11. Fools Die on Friday (1947)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1947
    Donald Lam tries to put “psychological handcuffs” on a potential poisoner, but things do not work out the way he planned. “Fools Die on Friday is about the best of the series since the first two. Perhaps since the very first. 
  12. Bedrooms Have Windows (1949)
    William Morrow and Company, January 1949
    Case involving “a pocket edition “, in which Donald himself is suspected by the police of a serious crime. Sleazy nightspots, dubious photographs, a stay at an auto court goes wrong—could there be blackmail? More spice than usual. Gardner originally wrote this series under a pen name because he wondered if some of the plot points he intended to use with Cool and Lam would be bad for his image. However, laxer standards in the 1940s and on made him decide to admit writing the series.
  13. Top of the Heap (1952)
    William Morrow and Company, February 1952
    Previously, Bertha has complained that Donald had been getting the agency in over its head lately. Donald then promptly shows the agency was used as a cat’s paw to prove a phony alibi, in a case involving gangsters, gambling houses, Point shaving, a former stripper, a money laundering scam, and phantom gold mines. Bertha is mad enough to try and dissolve the partnership. Available in the Hard Case Crime series.
  14. Some Women Won’t Wait (1953)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1953
    The question is: did Donald’s beautiful young client poison her rich and decrepit husband, or didn’t she? Set in Hawaii. Bertha tries to dance the hula.
  15. Beware the Curves (1956)
    William Morrow and Company, November 1956
    Suspect in the murder is trying to figure out if it is safe for him to return to his beloved six years later. The victim was her husband who had sent the suspect to die in Amazonia to marry her.
  16. You Can Die Laughing (1957)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1957
    Donald clashes with a client, with whom he has a written contract to locate a certain woman. He thinks the client is lying to him, but takes the case.
  17. Some Slips Don’t Show (1957)
    William Morrow and Company, October 1957
    Set in San Francisco and environs. Practically everyone ends up on a plane at one point or another, so almost anyone could have caused that guy to be found dead in his motel room. Donald knows it wasn’t him. The worry is: do the police know that? Fancy footwork with fake keys and real claim checks could help.
  18. The Count of Nine (1958)
    William Morrow and Company, June 1958
    A rich dilettante “Explorer” finds his poisonous blow gun he had brought back from the Amazon used for a murder. Or so it seems … This one is notable for two things: First, Gardner re-uses a favorite trick from his Perry Mason series; juggling duplicate bits of evidence. Instead of guns or bullets, Lam has a more interesting set of twin jade Buddhas with a ruby in the forehead. It will pay the reader to watch closely who has which, and when, and why. Secondly, the key plot point has a resemblance to G. K. Chesterton’s Father Brown story, The Arrow of Heaven. This may be unintentional, but arguably, Gardner has come up with a more imaginative use of the concept.
  19. Pass the Gravy (1959)
    William Morrow and Company, February 1959
    Stacked blondes, hitch hikers and trips by several people to Reno to gamble are incidental to the two main points. 1. What are the legal issues surrounding the exact way the assets of a spendthrift trust are to be distributed? 2. And what are the exact legal circumstances surrounding the death of a man with a double indemnity policy on his life? If he is dead.
  20. Kept Women Can’t Quit (1960)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1960
    An armored car is robbed while one of the two guards are inside having donuts and coffee and ogling the waitresses; and when Police Detective Sgt. Frank Sellers catches one of the robbers, he is accused of pocketing the loot for himself. Naturally, he puts the pressure on Donald to solve the case for him, gratis, and get him off the hook. Much money floats about – in fact, a little too much. Whose? (At this time, thousand-dollar bills were still in fairly wide circulation, making it possible to use only a little space to hide fairly large sums.
  21. Bachelors Get Lonely (1961)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1961
    Industrial espionage, a Peeping Tom, little is what it seems. More than one woman falls for Lam in the course of this investigation, due to his habit of playing square and treating them like human beings. Sgt. Sellers is a little dense at first, taking Lam for the Peeping Tom. The investigation moves to Arizona at one point.
  22. Shills Can’t Cash Chips (1961)
    William Morrow and Company, November 1961
    Bertha lands a nice, respectable insurance adjustment claim, and hands it to Donald. Donald uncovers assorted ulterior motives, pretends to be an ex-con, hot-wires his own car to impress a gorgeous witness and gets leaned on by a gangster. Then one of the parties involved ends up dead.
  23. Try Anything Once (1962)
    William Morrow and Company, April 1962
    A worried heel of a husband is hand-wringingly anxious to keep his late night visit to a motel with a cocktail hostess quiet. Unfortunately for him, the deputy D.A. in a hot murder trial was found dead in the motel pool the same evening. The resulting investigation will expose the husband. Donald smells a rat lurking within this story, but finally accepts the fat fee offered to keep Bertha happy. The attempt to protect the client has unexpected side effects, including several women removing their garments for one reason or other, a horrifically false accusation against the straight-shooting Donald and the exciting courtroom climax he engineers in the above-mentioned trial.
  24. Fish or Cut Bait (1963)
    William Morrow and Company, April 1963
    When Cool and Lam are hired for day-and-night coverage of a harassed woman, a tortuous tale involving a high-class ‘escort service’ unfolds. Donald is dismissed from the case, but inserts himself back in self-defence after the madam comes to an untimely end. He must convince the police it wasn’t him.
  25. Up for Grabs (1964)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1964
    Insurance again, this time a company that wants to set up an ongoing project to expose phony whiplash claims. Big ongoing retainer, big fees for each claim – Bertha’s eyes glitter at all the legit dollars up for grabs. Donald is packed off to a dude ranch in Arizona to investigate the plaintiff in the first claim, with stern instructions not to stir this one up. It’s not his fault someone’s wife ends up dead in the Sierras, or that Sgt. Sellers is so annoyed at his ‘amateur’ interference that he throws away a key piece of evidence at the scene of the death.
  26. Cut Thin to Win (1965)
    William Morrow and Company, April 1965
    Gardner has Lam himself review the case – from the back of the 1966 Pocket Books edition. Bertha has her doubts about taking a certain case, “…but I talked her into it when our client laid twelve one-hundred dollar bills on his desk. ‘Fry me for an oyster’, Bertha said. ‘It’s your baby, and you can change the diapers’. Less than a week later, Sgt. Frank Sellers announced he was going to take away my license, Bertha Cool announced that our partnership was dissolved and my secretary was crying on my shoulder. ‘Donald, please – please be careful’. ‘It’s too late to be careful now’ I told her. ‘I’m dealing either with a crooked lawyer, a jealous boyfriend, a scheming daughter, one hell of a wealthy father or a combination of any number of them. When you go up against a combination of that sort, you can’t be careful'”.
  27. Widows Wear Weeds (1966)
    William Morrow and Company, May 1966
    Blackmail was a dirty business, and Donald Lam liked to stay clear of it. But for his partner, Bertha Cool, no business was too dirty to handle at the right price. And the price for this job was certainly right. What was wrong, though, was a payoff for pictures that weren’t worth a dime, a free dinner that cost the blackmailer his life, and more than a couple of double-crosses that framed Donald Lam quite neatly for a charge of murder.
  28. Traps Need Fresh Bait (1967)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1967
    Someone is advertising for a witness to an auto accident in such a way as to seem to be suborning perjury. Also, an earlier claim was settled with evidence obtained in this way. The client wants Cool and Lam to find out what is back of it all. Gardner kept up with the law, and knew of the implications of the recent Miranda Rights decision of the Supreme Court for gathering evidence. He believed he had found a loophole allowing evidence improperly gathered under the new rules to be admissible, if obtained investigating another incident, such as a private detective searching a flat without permission. When Donald introduces the loophole, it brightens up Sgt. Sellers’ day no end.
  29. All Grass isn’t Green (1970)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1970
    Dope smuggling and a witness who is both more, and less, than he seems. It all starts when a client wants to find a missing writer – just to talk to him. A little digging (with descriptions of tracing techniques) shows his girlfriend has vanished too, and the trail goes south, to the Mexican border. Crossing the trail, going north, is a shipment of cannabis. Unsurprisingly for this business, someone ends up dead and the whole thing lands in court. Sorting out who did what and why taxes even Donald Lam’s talents to the limit. Lam shows his considerable ability in courtroom manoeuvring, which reminds the reader that he was a lawyer once.
  30. The Knife Slipped (1939)
    Hard Case Crime, December 2016
    Originally written to be the second book in the Cool and Lam series but rejected by Gardner’s publisher, The Knife Slipped was found among Gardner’s papers and published for the first time in 2016. Assigned to prove a philandering husband’s infidelity, Donald Lam uncovers a scheme to enable a certain type of municipal corruption. As well as a dead body.

 

   I won’t talk about the Weepies in this blahg.  I’m saving that.  I do mention Dottie Reid who will also be the focus of an upcoming blahg but here’s a teaser of her singing with Muggsy Spanier and his orchestra on “More Than You Know”: 

 

   In my previous blahg, 2021 – WHAT DID I ACCOMPLISH THIS YEAR?, I posted about attending the Transformers convention in December in Mississauga.  I was lucky enough to be selected for the annual script reading when I auditioned for the character of Tripredacus even though I didn’t know who  that was.  Later research from the Transformers Wiki for Tripredacus, https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Tripredacus, explains that he’s a character from Transformers Beast Wars.  Here’s their explanation: 

Tripredacus is a slimy “Battle Master” who prefers to emerge from underground to attack Maximal fortresses in the dead of night, tenaciously crushing all before him, spreading plague-like destruction wherever he goes. The weapons of his composite members form a slashing mega-missile launcher that he uses to tear his way into battle.

Tripredacus is composed of the three-member Tripredacus Council:

  • Ram Horn
  • Sea Clamp
  • Cicadacon

 Abbie had recorded the audio of the script reading and I finally got it from her last week and here’s the reading: 

  

  That’s about it for unpacking the 2022 Ramble.  It’s still cold but I’m still going strong.  Enjoy the day!  Enjoy your life!  Live, love, and be happy!

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