ThrowBack Thursday

 It was about 1964 and North Dakota's own Lawrence Welk was paying a visit to his ancestral home and a big crowd had come to the Bismarck airport to see him.

Among them were my then-time wife and our two sons.

Welk was moving along a ropeline shaking hands but when he came to my little family he absolutely missed my two year old son, Scott, who then began to cry.

Someone made Welk aware and he returned and hoisted the little boy up to calm him.

A photographer for the local newspaper snapped a picture which he later gave to me.

Move the clock ahead a few years and by then I had divorced, relocated to Indianapolis, and was making a visit back to North Dakota myself.

Here are Scott (with a tooth missing), his brother Troy and I.

By 1971, my ex-wife had re-married and moved to suburban Chicago.

I also had a new mate and we drove up and visited the boys and took them through the Shedd Aquarium before relaxing outside at the shore of Lake Michigan.

Nine years later, I was working in Phoenix but stopped in Washington, D.C. after our news crew covered the Democratic National Convention in New York.

Scott was living in Gaithersburg, Maryland, then and we got together and posed with the U.S. Capitol behind us.

Probably about 1983 Scott flew out to Phoenix and I took him on a tour of some of my favorite spots in Arizona, like Oak Creek Canyon.

That little boy with the missing tooth had grown into a handsome young man.

Living as we did, in two separate families, often thousands of miles apart, we never were close but we always enjoyed each other's company when we did get together.

I last saw him in 2001 when he was helping move the company he then worked for from Los Angeles to Scottsdale.

We got together for dinner shortly before he moved once again to Orlando, Florida.

His mother called on New Year's Day this year.

Scott Alan Taylor died of a heart attack in his sleep at her home in Southern California the previous afternoon.

He was 57.

ROAD TRIP

 I don't know that you could really call it a road trip.

It was more like an afternoon drive.

Which brought to mind golf terms and it would be a short putt compared to a tee-off drive.

At any rate, it was refreshing to get out of the house for an hour or two and see some scenery.

If you click on that photo and enlarge it, you may be able to see the San Francisco Peaks up around Flagstaff in the distance between those two trees on the left.

Or you may not.

We could see them pretty clearly with the naked eye but my "smart" phone camera doesn't really do a good job on long distance.

This was taken from the Thumb Butte area just west of Prescott.

Thumb Butte is the iconic rock formation that is sort of a logo for Prescott.

It doesn't look much like a thumb from this vantage point but from other areas it does.

You'll just have to take my word for it.

This is very near the trailhead for the Thumb Butte Trail.

There are a plethora of trails winding through the forest up here and we saw lots of hikers wending their way through the trees and in some cases over patches of snow.

And many of them were in shirt sleeves on this sunny day when the temperature had topped 60 back where I live but must have been in the 50's up here.

In my advanced and Arizona-softened years, that's a mite bit chilly for bare arms for me.

We wound up our outing with a visit to Dairy Queen for Heath Bar Blizzards.

Judy said it sounded like our grandparents back in the day - a Sunday (though this was Monday) drive followed by a stop for some ice cream.

Oh well, we are grandparents now and in fact, great-grandparents.

I used to hate those Sunday drives when I was a kid.

But times change.

KRIS

 I've been lucky.

My health has been relatively good through the years with occasional minor bumps in the road.

I'm still ambulatory as I approach my 81st trip around the sun in a couple of months.

I don't really mind getting old.

Oh I do occasionally think, "ah, to be 30 again!"

But those thoughts are fleeting.

What I DO resent about aging is seeing my heroes getting older and retiring or worse, dying.

The latest shock was hearing that Kris Kristofferson had retired.

Hell, he's just a kid, isn't he?

Well, no, turns out he's gliding toward his 85th birthday later this year and had been in our ears for over 50 years.

Actually Kris retired late last year but the word just hadn't gotten out until a few weeks ago when he confirmed it.

I always liked this next song that Kris wrote for Johnny Cash.

Heck, I think I *lived* this song, back in the day.

There's another old-timer in this video, Willy Nelson, who at 87 is still singing for his supper.

And the last of The Highwaymen as this group was called, Waylon Jennings, died a young man in 2002.

He was only 64.

So, let's give up a hand for Kris and his pals, one more time.

OH, WOE

 I just turned to the web site of the local paper and discovered alarming, saddening, depressing news: the Iron Springs Cafe in Prescott has closed.

Long-time readers of this blog will remember that it was my favorite eating place and I had written about it here and here and here and probably many other times.

Apparently the beloved landmark closed its doors earlier this month.

Another victim of Covid-19?

I can only presume so.

I am sad, very sad.

No more Bloody Caesars.

No more Gumbo.

No more Blackened Catfish.

No more other taste sensations.

No more fun.

If it is forever, R.I.P., and thank you for so many good times.

THE FRIDAY FUNNIES

 Wella, wella, wella, young fella, it's Friday once again.

That greeting is for all the rest of my thousands of Gentle Readers too.

I hope your week was amusing.

Maybe not if you didn't live, like I do, in the 1 percent of the United States that *wasn't* frozen solid.

My sympathies are with you.

And to help you thaw out and warm up, here's some humor.

And with that heavenly thought let me wish you all an exhilirating weekend full of warmth and cleanup.

And in spite of your troubles, always remember to keep laughing!

Here, kitty-kitty . . .

(Oh-ho!)

"Mother Country" by John Stewart

WAY BACK WEDNESDAY

 Comical Carol, from down in Phoenix, was prompted by my posting an old-timey photo of myself last week, to send me some old pictures from *her* collection.

These are probably from the 1970's and when you notice how much cigarette smoking was going on you might be amazed (as I am) that we are all still alive!

That is Comical Carol herself, though this lovely portrait *doesn't* have her wacky sense of humor on display.

Then there's the famous She Who Must Be Obeyed, exhulting over some weird board game we were playing.

Baseball Steve, in a rare quiet moment *not* in the middle of one of his convoluted stories.

And finally, your sappy scribe.

On viewing these windows into the past I couldn't help but think of an old Bob Dylan song: Everybody Must Get Stoned.

WHAT A DAY!

 Upon checking my calendar today I learned that this is Shrove Tuesday.

And Pancake Tuesday.

And Fat Tuesday.

And Mardi Gras.

Basically it's all the same thing.

The day before Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent.

So have at it, Gentle Readers.

Days of fasting are ahead.

MEDITATING MONDAY

 First of all, let me wish you all a happy Presidents' Day.

(Gadfrey, when will these holidays end?)

I hope you all celebrated Valentine's Day in style.

At least whatever style self-isolation can allow.

I went out early and came back with a Sunday New York Times, a strange kind of blueberry breakfast cookie, miniature carnations, and some dark chocolate lava cake Hershey kisses for "da boss".

She was surprised and delighted.

Much later in the day I followed the BRD's lead and baked an Amish Cherry Cobblestone Cake.

Ta-da!

After it cooled down, I added the glaze but I made too much and, not realizing I could save some of it, dumped the whole thing on the cake.

It's supposed to have a swirly sort of light streak pattern.

As you can see, mine is a little different.

Oh well, for someone with a sweet tooth it was a perfect finish to Judy's exquisite dinner of Bacon Lemon Scallops and Risotto with Sugar Snap Peas.

I said, after eating a piece of the cake, that it tasted like Valentine's Day.

SNOWY VALENTINE'S DAY

 The big winter storm sweeping across the United States and Canada this weekend just skirted my area but enough to leave a light white coating on the hills.

That's Glassford Hill, the thankfully extinct volcano in the heart of our town.

It's not normally snow-covered as it is in this photo.

And to the south the morning sunlight on the snowy Bradshaw Mountains.

In my back yard there was only a dusting of snow in the shaded areas.

(BTW, if you click on the pictures they become bigger and much more impressive.

Meanwhile my long-time friend, Comical Carol, sent this holiday greeting, (perhaps from her cat Harry?)

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone.

And Happy Statehood Day to Arizona, which became the 48th state on this day in 1912 . . 109 years ago.

LA MONJA RESTORED

 Good morning.

It's Judy again sitting in at the keyboard with the latest on our backyard icon.

Back in the late 1980's and early 1990's, when we lived in Mexico, we accumulated many objects to which we became attached.

This was after disposing of a houseful of things in the U.S. before moving to Mexico.

We swore we would not attach ourselves to "stuff" ever again.

Right!

The Monja (a stylized figure of a nun) was a birthday gift to me from Bruce one year.

When it was time to return to the states we couldn't leave her behind.

She has spent three decades in the outdoors of Arizona, winter and summer.

This year she was near disintegration and something had to be done.

She came into the corner of our kitchen and lay across a card table and waited for rehab to begin.

The very rough spots were worked over with a wire brush and an emery board.

Then a thin layer of "patio paint" was applied to her face and thick layers of the paint to the large cracks in the body.

This was repeated again and again.

Yesterday she was ready to leave the house.

She's back on her base in the sun.

For another three decades?

THE FRIDAY FUNNIES

 It's Friday once again and Happy Lunar New Year!

Now if you're feeling properly looney, let us venture once again into that land of silliness and crack open the compendium of humor. 

Okay I can tell you're groaning so I'll quit.

Now just take my advice: enjoy yourselves on this auspicious weekend and always remember to keep laughing!

Here, kitty-kitty . . .

(ohhhhhhhhh . . .)