Goin down the road

Sold our house in 2 hours, and are moving to sunny BC (I think). I'll keep you posted.

Begbie

I have been castigated by my ex-best friend for loving the film Trainspotting, because it "...shows there's something wrong with you". That's an opinion, a crappy one, but I'm not going to be your brain-cell monitor, Al. We've all known a Begbie. The good-friend, crazy as a loon psycho who's probably 5'2" and 125 pounds. I knew two: Don Wr., a bike mechanic who you wouldn't want to set off. But a generally quiet and friendly guy. Who beat the crap out of 3 Angels and threw them out of his shop. Or Bernie Cole, the only person I ever saw who did some psychotropics and wanted to go looking for a fight. And found one... the f'ing idiot. Last time I have ever seen him.

Look out walmart

The retail business in the major port city of Fiji has a thing or two to teach the rest of the world. Actually, it was a lot of fun going through the markets and seeing stuff both from another era and another dimension. The major retail store hires Stompin Josh Connors to lure them in.

Moe, Mickey and Ken

Moe Berg was educated at Yale, and was an amazing linguist. It was said he could learn to speak any language on earth colloquially in 30 days. He was also in love with baseball, and baseball won out. He was a second-string and bullpen catcher for many years in the 40's and 50's. He was a man of much ritual and rules defining his space. The strictest rule was that nobody could touch any of his 10 daily newspapers until he had read it. After someone else had read even an article, he wouldn't read it. He died in 1972, and his last words were "How did the Mets do today?" Mickey Rivers was the quintessential laid-back, jive-talking, black centre-fielder who perennially clenched a half a cigar in his teeth. He removed it to go to bat, of course. . His favourite pastimes when not reading the Racing Form or actually going to Belmont, were a little drinking whiskey and having a lot of late having fun. Ken Holtzman was a Yale-educated, erudite and somewhat intellectual Yankee pitcher. Mickey and Ken probably had nothing in common, and no one can actually remember what they talked about, if anything. But, they were inseparable, on the road, in the clubhouse, and on the plane.

Two people form a bond out of seemingly nothing and feel an unusual unspoken closeness, and another, 30 years earlier, played ball for $3k a year when he could have been at the top of most any field he chose. He felt "at home" at the ballpark, in the clubhouse, and performing all those miniscule and meaningful rituals of the game. I certainly understand Moe Berg in that way of thinking at least. Nowhere else I know can you meet some genuine characters, oddballs and invisible geniuses.

Playing a silly little game of catch with Robbie Roblin on the evening of a day that had been hot, between the third and fourth, planning where to light up and have a few after the game.n'The BUS squad. Everybody knew the most important was the 6th, so everyone got really into it for a while. The banter, the no have Robbie used to say that he didn't have a clue what made me tick "...but "I'll give anyone four bucks who can tell me" ,The ineffable bond that forms somehow, in different ways and different times during the summer. After that, you'll run through a fence to win, and all petty complant just evaporates. That entrance into a new state of mind that came from stepping onto a freshly raked infield. It just all goes away. For 90 minutes at least. Lucky are those who love and live the life.

The Men in Black

Last night, I had to watch an airplane all night. In the hangar, a peregrine falcon had escaped from his trainer and was roosting in the rafters. All the other birds were scared shitless, and I sure didn't like the look he gave me. The trainer came in later to try to retrieve the falcon, but he wouldn't return. In his truck, he had another falcon and a Harris Hawk. Most impressive

bird I ever saw. Then, the Men in Black with the ear-pieces and Glocks showed up and the fun was over.

Sydney

Sydney, Australia. We had 2 days there and it seemed a very wealthy place. People were down to earth and friendly. We saw Russell Crowe and Hugh Jackman's place near Bondi. Very ordinary looking town houses.