February 1, 2009 - Sister Lakes Michigan

The ice firshermen have departed the frozen lake where they had huddled on uptruned empty plastic buckets. The sun is bright on the flat expances. The icecicles on the eaves are dripping - the temperature is rising above freezing for the first time in several weeks. There had been a record snow fall this winter - 59 inches - but during the week after New Years the temperature rose and it rained all week and all of the snow pack melted. Everything that is out there now fell during the last three weeks.


On Round Lake once one of the summer residents built an ostentatous abode every one else had to follow suit. Now three story cabins barely fit on their lots. The primative cabins built only a generation ago now look so punny. There would have been condominiums too if the residents association had'nt suscessfuly banned the developers. Now they are safe - there is unlikely to be much new construction this summer.

My brain hurts!- TF Gumby

Gumbys are extremely dim-witted,loud, sometimes violent

Men that are all uniform
They are called 'Gumbys' because 'Gumby' is their surname,

One year after he was on "The Howdy Doody Show"

They gave Gumby his own show. Gumby ran in 223 episodes

Made for TV Gumbys usually stand with their knees bent

All Gumbys wear the same eccentric costume :

Trousers rolled up to the knees

Gumboots, also known as Wellington boots or 'wellies'

A knitted tank-top tucked into the trousers
It's Gumby and his pals Pokey, Prickle, and Goo

Their most defining and famous article of clothing:

A hat made from a white handkerchief

The unofficial term for this is 'Sidcup'.

Dictionary of words for things there are not yet words for

Hosted by Bob Nicholson, who had played Clarabelle the Clown

Replacing Bob "Captain Kangaroo" Keeshan

Usually it is Michael Palin who is remembered in the role

For X Rated Gumshoes

Blago is out

Quinn is in

Beaware of

Where the dogs

Go - Don't eat

That yellow snow

From the subjective standpoint, a person is in a stage of agency when he defines himself in a social situation in a manner that renders him open to regulation by a person of higher satus - Stanley Milgram

January 30, 2009 - Caribou, Homewood Illinois

Ugh - will it never ever get warm again - 16 degrees with a high of 19. Will the groundhog see it's shadow?

We understand something by locating it in a multi-determined temporal continuum. Existence is no more than the precarious attainment of relevance in an intensely mobil flow of past, present, and future - Susan Sontag

One must tear at the fabric
Of the thing
Stick one's hand into the warm viscera
Of the thing
That new killed smell is the essense
Of the thing
No prostetic device will ever get you
As close to the thing so that
You are one with the thing

Gumshoes, Sleuths and Snoopers -- This database provides an in-depth look at 185 detective and mystery novels originally published during the period 1930-1960. It is the result of a collaborative effort in which volunteers from near and far provided detailed information about plot, setting, characters and other thematic factors for each title.

Gumshoes (1935): Hotel house detectives Monte Collins and Tom Kennedy are after the crooks responsible for a series of thefts. They are distracted by a radio program which causes them to look for a man in a fur coat. After insulting a number of guests wearing fur coats, they wind up in a tussel with a trained gorilla. A purloined Poe plot not quite up to the standards of C Auguste Dupin.

TODAY - Frank O'Hara


Oh! kangaroos, sequins, chocolate sodas!
You really are beautiful! Pearls,
harmonicas, jujubes, aspirins! all
the stuff they've always talked about


still makes a poem a surprise!
These things are with us every day
even on beachheads and biers. They
do have meaning. They're strong as rocks.

The original "gumshoes" of the late 1800's wore shoes or boots made of gum rubber, the soft-soled precursors of our modern sneakers. Like sneakers, gumshoes were much quieter than leather-soled shoes, and at the turn of the century "to gumshoe" meant to sneak around quietly as if wearing gumshoes, either in order to rob or, conversely, to catch thieves. "Gumshoe man" was originally slang for a thief, but by about 1908 "gumshoe" usually meant a police detective, as it has ever since. - The Word Detective

The reason that protective footware is so un-fashion conscious is due to the folks bringing them to you - most of the overshoes are contained in the small consumber segment of the $2 billion protective equipment industry - you know fireman's overalls and those cute vests that santitation men wear. Is it any wonder. NEOS, Servus, Ranger, Kamik, and  Muckboots are all brands of Norcross Safety Products. Their major competitoris LaCross Footware.

January 29, 2009 - Caribou - Homewood Illinois

9:34AM - 23 degrees - wind out of the southwest at 11 mph - humidity 78%



And those self-appointed fashion Nazis who claim wearing rubbers makes you a wanker are just wrong. For two hundred smackers you too can be stylish and protect your footwear without carrying  around a gym bag full of extra shoes. And they are also simply wrong to claim that teetering on one foot making the change over is the only way even if it may be true that there is no way to teeter gracefully. Now there is fashion conscious overshoes. Hurray!





SWIMS the 'nouveau galosher' - as elegant as Al Capone. They even polish your shoes as you wear them. And such luscious colors - pearl, bubble gum, combat green, purple, violet, burgundy, lemon. No need to feel like your wearing combat boots.

Milton Marx (1893-1977) known as Gummo is the unknown Marx brother - even less know that was Zeppo. Groucho, Chico and Harpo got their monikers playing poker in Galesburg Illinois. Gummo although the first of the boys to appear on stage dropped out of the act while serving in the military during the First World War. He was named Gummo supposedly either because of his legendary ability to sneak up on others backstage or because he was so sickly as a boy and frequently had to wear overshoes during inclement weather.


Hold that trophy high over your head
Show those teeth - hopefully they're white
Yes, yes - it's a win - bend the arm
At the elbow, with clenched fist pointed
Skyward - pump - like your blowing
This train 's whistle - it's called
Tooting your own horn, but it's
Not an original visual metaphor
Not with you anyway regardless
Of how spontaneous it felt

But I / know what he will say: / he's the fire hydrant of the underdog - James Tate

January 28, 2009 - Caribou - Homewood Illinois

Burr - oh but it's cold outside (18 degrees) with a light flurry of lake effect snow. And the fake fire (well not really fake, it is real - but gas and not wood - it is the logs that are fake) is toasty. Now it is warming up - up into the twenties and the salt on the streets makes them slushy and the metal awnings of the strip mall heats up and the water drips steadily from the eaves.

Gillette is undertaking the most significant renovation of its World Shaving Headquarters in its 100-year history. When complete, the 33-acre site, located in South Boston, will house P&G/Gillette’s Research and Development, Engineering,
Manufacturing, Marketing and business support.

To mark the significance of this endeavor, the Company is launching a
single-phased design competition for a signature sculpture or landmark icon to
mark the entry to the World Shaving Headquarters complex.

And on her first try at design competition my niece get a merit award - just out of the money by one. Way to go Aska! [Joanna Borek-Clement]

Social bonding is a mundane process
So much is accomplished with mutual
Grooming. It's not so much a stimulating
Conversation as it is lice picking

Democracy so much depends on the inane
Anti-intellectualism is as much democracy
Enabling as poverty is

Yes ... We no longer have any inner voices. We know too much these days: reason tyrannized our lives - Robert Musil

January 27, 2009 - Caribou Coffee, Homewood Illinois

I've already settled into a routine - first to the Caribou, then to the library and then to finish the day off I am off to the Flossmoor Station. There is some variation - I alternate between the Homewood and Flossmoor libraries.

The Caribou (Da Bou as Chet calls it) is second only to Starbucks in number of company operated coffehouses (500 and 3,600) but half of their operations are in Minnesota and second is Illinois with 67 stores. 43% of the coffeehouse in the US are chain operations (more than three locations). When Caribou becomes ubiquitous I shall cease coming here too. And if you are to find the Universal Spider Starbucks would be a good place to look.



And last night I went to let Wrigley in the back door and she came in as sat on her haunches and waited for the command to proceed up the three steps up into the kitchen/dining area but I had forgotten the command - it was a simple word, that I knew, but I could not remember what word it was. . It's OK if you happen to forget some one's name (well not exactly OK but it happens) or mabe  you've forgotte a vocabulary term (the name of something - say the cardboard spool in the center of a roll of toilet paper) that OK too; but this was just a simple command and all I could think to say was 'go' and that was not it. I hope this is not an omen of things to come. Finally I waved by hand and said 'go' and she went. It turns out that a hand motion is taught along with the word command and either one works. I could now shut the door and it was cold outside but I still could not remember that word. This morning Ila let Wriggly in and Wriggle sat and Ila said 'release'. Yes, that's it 'release' and why could I not remember that simple world last night?

I got a new computer - an IBM X60 with tablet. I am still learning. I can mostly hit the right keys but have yet to begin playing with the pen. And with this tiny screen I shall need to get new glasses too. Oh well, every technology has its own challenges and its own creative opportunities.

The end result truly
Reflects the work only
When the work itself
Cannot be seen

If much effort is on view
Then the result is the effort
And sometimes that is what
Was desired. The result
Is the effort itself - oh, adulation

The need of human beings to transcend "the person" is no less profound then the need to be a person, an individual. But this society serves that need poorly - Susan Sontag

January 24, 2009 - Caribou - Homewood Illinois

On the road again - on track - the Southwest Chief to Chicago. First stop La Plata in two hours

Almost all advertising engages
In some aspect of deception
Can't come by sales honestly anymore
And just altering the nature of the lie
Seems to allay all the cynicism
Previously aroused and this is truly
Redemption in action and it just might
Be a proof in the existence of God
His dream of enlightenment itself

And we are under way - rocking and rolling - pitty-pat, pitty-pat - under the overpass picking up speed - woosh woosh - and the sun is coming up - clickity clack, clickety clack - over the points as the tracks separate straight on towards St Louis or to the left and up to Chicago and we head for the river crossing - screech-ech-ech - as the train articulates to make a perpendicular crossing of the River - Picking up speed rolling along the bottoms next to the bluffs - toot toot. Breakfast is being served and has been since 6:30 - up in the dinning car - first come first serve - toot toot.

I'm once again getting
An itch as every mile
Titillates my wanderlust

A low bank of clouds - the winter wheat has been planted - the sun is hiding out - a dusting of snow - this land now awaits a thaw.

---

Leave them in peace. We can always shot them later - Joseph Stalin

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CURRENT READING:
-
Robert Musil - The Man Without Qualities
-
James Tate - Selected Poems (1991)
-
Susan Sontag - Styles of Radical Will (1969)
-
James Weinstein - The Long Detour - The history and future of the American Left
-
Thomas Blass - The Man Who Shocked the World - the life and legacy of Stanley Milgram
-
Donald Antrim - Elect Mr. Robinson for a Better World
-
Marco Iacoboni - Mirroring People - The new science of how we connect with others

January 16, 2009 - Coffee Break, Kansas City Missouri

The snow comes smothering with a high of twenty-two but this is the tail end of the storm almost now to Springfield and extending laterally from Emporia to Columbia. There was only a dusting as I awoke and the sun came up. Then it got serious and I knew that if I were not to get stuck in my room I had to get out now. I barely made it up the hill and then wondered why I had, but was already in the midst of the rush and by then to have turned back was more difficult that to plow ahead and so here I am at the Coffee Break once again Light snow the forecasts said.

Mr. Mick is still around left all alone from four in the afternoon when Dave goes to work and ten when Brenda finally gets home and as attentive deficient as he seems to be, he is a adapting well He lies in his bed and abides his time. And when someone finely comes in he slides across the wooden floor his little paws a scratching – tickie tickie tickie. Maybe he’s a keeper.

Its really coming down. I hope it doesn’t snow all day. I check the radar image on the Weather Underground and this storm must have been saving the best for last – it looks like it should be over within the hour. The tail end is now at St Joe. But god, still it doesn’t look as if it will ever let up.

Galoshes – 98% of the shoes purchased in the US are imported and Americans buy on average seven pairs a year and a pair of galoshes or other protective footwear every other year. This is about half what they purchased twenty years ago. Will the economic downturn be good for the protective footwear industry – I suspect it will. It would be interesting to see the data for 1920-1940. What I would expect to see is a typical bell curve. I would have had a pair if I didn’t maintain the rule that everything I have must fit in a back pack (by choice I am without a home) – its not a fashion statement but a practicality – them galosh is to damn bulky. One sixth of the typical American’s apparel budget is expended upon the acquisition of footwear.

God, theres goes another AH pacing the floor talking business on his cell phone. Isn't it enough for him to be agitated must he infict the rest of us too. I don't mind Spencer Tracy pacing in the waiting room waiting for his little dividend but he didnt have a cell phone either. And what they have to say is always so inane and probably totally unnecessary.

The Johnson Family and the Snoops
Never intermarry
You know a Johnson when you see him
You know a Snoop when you hear one
He was a Johnson
She was a Snoop


A Johnson minds his own business
A Snoop makes it his business
All Snoops are shit
God bless you Mr Johnson
There are never enough
The Snoops are rapacious

He passed and I never saw him again
That is the wayof the Johnsons
And You can’t get rid of a Snoop

Universal reason says there is only one rational mode of thought Anyone who argues against you must be either mistaken (in need of the facts), irrational (needing to have their reasoning corrected), or downright immoral – George Lakoff