tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25135145446102654922024-02-02T05:02:47.413-08:00BILL FROM NJ SPEAKSRandom - and I do mean random - thoughts and observations.Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.comBlogger26125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-88975475352501052422010-06-05T15:03:00.004-07:002012-03-18T14:52:57.868-07:00BURYING THE DEAD AT BALANGA ON THE BATAAN DEATH MARCH<div align="justify">This story hinges on the cusps of coincidences. In 1960, when I was 13 years old, my family was stationed at Andrews Air Force Base,just outside Washington DC.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQgS9UrqexOYsVafHKJh6Zxo9tUPMDDZJ8momNcYzked-NoOI0NoyHNQI1_zIAjhZRs16Nif5BIXDGk5rOz3pU4BfGBKxj6AZp8ZBfXSuwqm41BrihqsLyJqtz9clMJYtEnDmbTbPA690/s1600/24851+emb.png"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 150px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 216px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5543646966329412642" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQgS9UrqexOYsVafHKJh6Zxo9tUPMDDZJ8momNcYzked-NoOI0NoyHNQI1_zIAjhZRs16Nif5BIXDGk5rOz3pU4BfGBKxj6AZp8ZBfXSuwqm41BrihqsLyJqtz9clMJYtEnDmbTbPA690/s320/24851+emb.png" /></a> Dad used to take me to the NCO Club with him on Saturday afternoons after we had finished our work in the yard of our new home and on any other chores my Mother had dreamed up for us to do. At the Club, I was introduced to my first mixed drink - a Roy Rogers - and to my father's friends, who found in me a new and receptive audience for their reminisces, and who, after a few beers and several mixed drinks of their own - regaled me with some fascinating stories about World War II. Since we had been stationed in Japan in the mid-'50s, I already had a well- developed interest in the War and, as it turned out, one of my Father's friends told me of how he had survived the Bataan Death March which followed the fall of the Philippines in April of 1942 and prompted General Douglas MacArthur's famous quote "I shall return." What I remember most about these stories was the sing-song nature of the Japanese speech patterns.<em> "<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error">Iti</span></span></span></span> <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error">eades</span></span></span></span>, boy-<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error">san</span></span></span></span> <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">tounae</span></span></span></span> day-<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error">sho</span></span></span></span>."</em> It is especially ironic at how beautiful the rhythms are and how horrid the images are expressed in the language. I am not sure how those words are actually spelled in the Japanese language or what they mean but this is how they sound phonetically to my ear. Beautiful rhythms mixed in with the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">horrific</span> nature of the stories actually expressed by those rhythms.</div><br /><br /><br /><p align="justify">It was the coincidence 0f a Zippo lighter appearing in both of our recollections twenty years apart that appealed to me and was the most telling aspect of both stories. I had seen advertisements in a stack of old Field and Stream magazines at my barber shop that highlighted the durability of the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error">Zippo</span></span></span></span> lighter. Apparently, they were in the midst of an ad campaign about the unusual places that <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error">Zippos</span></span></span></span> happened to turn up and one ad featured a lighter that was still functioning after it was found in the stomach of a dead grizzly bear and another one that had - to my surprise - survived the Bataan Death March itself. This, of course, dovetailed nicely with the story I had been told at the Club by one of my Father's friends about his survival and his <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error">Zippo's</span> survival of long odds in the almost impossible situation on the Bataan peninsula in 1942 and how it was itself an ironic commentary on a story of survival at all costs. What I most wonder, however, is how many <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error">Zippos</span></span> actually survived Bataan or if the story itself was <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">apocryphal</span> . Truth and beauty do not always intersect.People who write about the soldiers involved in warfare always have uncovered the most horrible things that the pressure cooker of war produce in the people who fight in them. As a person who has always had an interest in such things I always remember that as the weapons of war devoloped so did the carnage produced by them. I remember a recurring image of a soldier in the trenches not being able to fall to the ground after being shot several times. He <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">appeared</span> to be strung up in mid-air and looked for all the world like a marionette, an effect that can only be produced by machine-gun fire - a weapon that was introduced to warware around the turn of the 20th century just in time for World War I. It was obviously a popular image as I saw it reported as both historical fact and as a fictional construct several times. I didn't know whether it actually happened but it was very vivid in it's own right.</p><br /><br /><div align="justify">This the story he told me as I remember it from over fifty years ago. Whether it actually happened that way or not is really beside the point:</div><br /><br /><div align="justify"><a href="file://hen/"><em>When</em></a><em> the end came, it came in a rush. We were spread all over the southern part of the Bataan peninsula and there were roughly seventy thousand of us, American and Filipino, left in theater and there was not much fight remaining in any of us as we had been under <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">siege</span> for an incredible length of time."</em><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirIngkgF4-p3Ni43eSTAsq1NLOnZ66k6M7UwH_nipIBNtYccgO86ypjDCBBz8a1O5e-YF_d6qhrZBLpt9xFlUIYDFgwWLGybg17DPUs4cA_pqy6IrySSEHQ1mCQ9bpnfKHYGTBbux49c8/s1600/the+fall+of+Bataan+2.png"><em><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 261px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 229px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5620105782555047506" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirIngkgF4-p3Ni43eSTAsq1NLOnZ66k6M7UwH_nipIBNtYccgO86ypjDCBBz8a1O5e-YF_d6qhrZBLpt9xFlUIYDFgwWLGybg17DPUs4cA_pqy6IrySSEHQ1mCQ9bpnfKHYGTBbux49c8/s400/the+fall+of+Bataan+2.png" /></em></a><em>" We were outnumbered better than five-to-one, with more <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error">Gink</span></span></span></span> soldiers pouring in all the time and we realized that it was going to be either surrender or die. The indigenous population, which numbered some ten thousand in all, were caught between us and the enemy and we decided that surrendering to anybody who happened to come around was probably the best thing for us to do because the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-error">Japs</span></span></span></span> had to get us out of there so their own people could continue to move in and prepare for the big assault on <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">Corridor</span>, the stronghold just off our coast. We were just in the way which was a new feeling for somebody who considered himself a pretty fair rifleman and his country the only invincible power on earth. We were at the base of Mount <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-error">Cabcaben</span></span></span></span> in nearly impenetrable terrain when we started out on our long journey which came to be called The Bataan Death March and, God bless us, it was aptly named. The first thing they wanted us to do was get assembled at a place called <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_15" class="blsp-spelling-error">Balanga</span></span></span></span>. We were to get there on our own from wherever we happened to find ourselves but we had no food or water, and were completely exhausted and it was just starting to occur to us that our nightmare, far from winding down, was just beginning. There were only nine of us left who had survived the final assault at Mount <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_15" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-error">Cabcaben</span></span></span></span> and we began walking across a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_15" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_17" class="blsp-spelling-error">pre</span></span></span></span>-cleared firing area toward <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_17" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_18" class="blsp-spelling-error">Balanga</span></span></span></span> as it was only twelve or fifteen miles from where we were."</em> </div><br /><br /><div align="justify"><em>"We had been employing maximum stress procedures for a long time and followed the example of the indigenous personnel by eating dogs, monkeys, lizards and whatever insects we could find. Eating bugs was a new experience to us but it came under the general heading of any port in a storm because if you are hungry enough, you will eat anything, a lesson we learned in abundance during those terrible times."<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhP5JNxZAcVACkNRuRKk2lUpNItGnlUh-9UhUQcpzFLBUkQV7GbT6p7t0cN2P86pqf_3KxpBuAnNAOBXTSsy9o_HoW459G4xKrkgo68-aEkzFSGGKMkbguNYjH2tuyHV-SgFoqgr3R0p0/s1600/hunger3.png"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 298px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5542448087417449042" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhP5JNxZAcVACkNRuRKk2lUpNItGnlUh-9UhUQcpzFLBUkQV7GbT6p7t0cN2P86pqf_3KxpBuAnNAOBXTSsy9o_HoW459G4xKrkgo68-aEkzFSGGKMkbguNYjH2tuyHV-SgFoqgr3R0p0/s400/hunger3.png" /></a> "Once I saw one of them, a Filipino, eating the meat of a python. I never ate python and I never ate monkey after the first time. Lizard you can keep down but monkey-meat is like eating something that came jumping and swinging out of hell itself and I was willing to go just so far with the max stress routine. The other thing was malaria, which everybody had. But it really wasn't too bad under the circumstances as we were able<span style="color:#ffff00;"> <span style="color:#333300;">to get</span> </span>some sugar cane from the fields which alleviated the symptoms to some extent and what streams there were to drink from probably made us prone to dysentery but most of us were suffering from it in the first place and we had to have water. We had a colonel with us and he had a pass that some <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_18" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_15" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_17" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_19" class="blsp-spelling-error">Gink</span></span></span></span> officer had given him when we surrendered. He showed this pass to anybody we ran into on the road and they didn't give us too much trouble. They searched us and took rings and watches and anything else they could find, but I managed to hold on to my <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_19" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_18" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_20" class="blsp-spelling-error">Zippo</span></span></span></span> lighter, which twenty years later was part of an ad campaign I saw that they were running: <span style="color:#ff0000;">THIS <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_20" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_17" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_19" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_21" class="blsp-spelling-error">ZIPPO</span></span></span></span> SURVIVED THE BATAAN DEATH MARCH.</span> I managed to keep it hidden in the toe of my boot and held on to it for the rest of the war. (I have it to this day). We got to <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_21" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_18" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_20" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error">Balanga</span></span></span></span> that night. We had covered the distance in one day with hardly any strain. When we arrived we heard the enemy had executed about four hundred indigenous military personnel, officers and noncoms. The Filipinos were on their way to <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_19" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_21" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error">Balanga</span></span></span></span> like the rest of us when they were stopped by some <span style="color:#000000;"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_20" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error">Japs</span></span></span></span></span> who were part of an aftermath reaction force. They let everybody go except the officers and noncoms, who were lined up in several columns and then tied together at the wrists with telephone wire. Then they took out their swords and bayonets and killed them.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3lm4AkqqPGNcB74uvWxdDsf-lMY_4dZ7T9oTSPZ_8ktienuj6U96IKOSU9UMZ_hyphenhyphenJDrmTYCS3Lx1SKnqnAgJsL22vZI39iN8b7JizXmKtxP3AKXs-KcMSGk2BMRnqr0yUSCwBMQ_zEq8/s1600/beheading2.png"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 242px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5543226784382317122" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3lm4AkqqPGNcB74uvWxdDsf-lMY_4dZ7T9oTSPZ_8ktienuj6U96IKOSU9UMZ_hyphenhyphenJDrmTYCS3Lx1SKnqnAgJsL22vZI39iN8b7JizXmKtxP3AKXs-KcMSGk2BMRnqr0yUSCwBMQ_zEq8/s320/beheading2.png" /></a> We heard they beheaded most of them. They didn't use any guns and it took about two hours to kill all four hundred. Must have been something to see. We heard it was revenge for something the indigenous personnel had done, but nobody knew what. To tell you the truth I don't think anybody cared. In the situation we were in, which was one of total, complete and utter heat and boredom, wondering what manner of crawling scabby insect we were going to dine on next, the fact of four hundred headless Filipinos was a topic for pleasant clubhouse gossip, something to discuss briefly in mild awe and almost admiration for the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_21" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error">Ginks</span></span></span></span> for at least having a sense of spectacle and to be grateful for in a way because it took our minds off our own problems. But <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_26" class="blsp-spelling-error">Balanga</span></span></span></span> itself turned out to be<span style="color:#ffff00;"> </span>unforgettable. </em><em>Thousands of men were pouring into the town, from every direction, particularly from the South.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9p8kiwu7dGR4Dt_BXK2ZxPMgTHwuD0Ep-LIeKIPzpKWmmiatKbcRvmRc4WH1pXOJmYoVMBP3kIcyayx7UjbtNvcf8qhxtFjQWsvrGSmZryL65m9T7F40PvLz0tDIDKIsEV1AVRVLahy8/s1600/fallen2.png"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 347px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5620288042529652882" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9p8kiwu7dGR4Dt_BXK2ZxPMgTHwuD0Ep-LIeKIPzpKWmmiatKbcRvmRc4WH1pXOJmYoVMBP3kIcyayx7UjbtNvcf8qhxtFjQWsvrGSmZryL65m9T7F40PvLz0tDIDKIsEV1AVRVLahy8/s400/fallen2.png" /></a><br /><em>They put some of us in pastures.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSUKKSE1ui2l8b0iwB-NGMNUx1ePWG94tyf1sn2FEsNPMTvP2R9n4-BC_iKhV3URISUNMA8OtnmPgIyraTcv1gvmVm4DS58SgK05h0XK22XVCpcneRofQ-oHOjrjw8LhxJb0qxk4MJwWA/s1600/route+of+BDM3.png"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 309px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5544735531952883730" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSUKKSE1ui2l8b0iwB-NGMNUx1ePWG94tyf1sn2FEsNPMTvP2R9n4-BC_iKhV3URISUNMA8OtnmPgIyraTcv1gvmVm4DS58SgK05h0XK22XVCpcneRofQ-oHOjrjw8LhxJb0qxk4MJwWA/s400/route+of+BDM3.png" /></a> Others they kept in small yards behind barbed wire. We were all jammed together and it was impossible to sit down and the whole town smelled of defecation. The whole town! We were told to use the ditches to do our business in but they were so full of dead bodies that the smell of the dead and dying kept most of us away. Men with dysentery couldn't control themselves and had to defecate where they stood. Others just fell down and died. All this time in <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_26" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_27" class="blsp-spelling-error">Balanga</span></span></span></span> standing in the pasture and later burying some of the dead I tried to take my mind off of our situation and think of my wife and all I could bring to mind was a scene from our wedding day: we were standing on the lawn of my parents home at Old <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_27" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_26" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_28" class="blsp-spelling-error">Kinderhook</span></span></span></span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNc_iW48ivjg1nLztPmNk_i-cw9F7KgDBidrG4InQPgDiDQSDlzfbl84-Sld-sAbdD61FgBBiSkxF6qt3VL-6c4qmvOqO4P30JYlIUXPXzRD1i7vWBcINQOSnp5bcPzYGxxk568EhOLT0/s1600/BDM+sketch2.png"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 278px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 400px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5544968930985748930" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNc_iW48ivjg1nLztPmNk_i-cw9F7KgDBidrG4InQPgDiDQSDlzfbl84-Sld-sAbdD61FgBBiSkxF6qt3VL-6c4qmvOqO4P30JYlIUXPXzRD1i7vWBcINQOSnp5bcPzYGxxk568EhOLT0/s400/BDM+sketch2.png" /></a> in northern New Jersey, just across the river from New York city, a small group of musicians clustered off to our left playing something romantic by one of the Dorsey brothers and that conjured up a modicum of sanity in a world gone insane : my home and bed, my beautiful wife's hair and lovely hands, but that image kept drifting away and I was too numb or, God help me, unfeeling to care really whether I could bring it back up but still she shimmered there, an image of loveliness standing alone half-profile, in a dim room like a Madonna on a Catholic medallion. Then she and the lawn and the musicians morphed into a horrific scene of men burying the dead, maggots and torn flesh everywhere, the smell of death overwhelming everything and then, abruptly, it all faded away and we were on the move again and the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_28" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_27" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_29" class="blsp-spelling-error">Japs</span></span></span></span> were giving us rice to eat and sending us north but there were guards this time. We continued walking northward to a place called <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_29" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_26" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_28" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_30" class="blsp-spelling-error">Orani</span></span></span></span>. We saw a lot more corpses on the road and some indigenous noncombatants gave us more food and we drank polluted water from streams or puddles or out of leaves or whatever else could hold water. We weren't supposed to break ranks but we did anyway. We had to have water. It was worth the chance, no two ways about it. A lot of men were shot or bayoneted getting water. One of the guards was singing a song, walking along beside us in the hot sun. A sergeant named Ritchie, a demo expert with one of the anti-transit security outfits, broke ranks then and jumped the guard from behind and knocked his weapon into a ditch. Then he straddled the guard and started tearing at his throat. I don't think he particularly wanted to kill the guard. He just wanted to get inside him, open him up for inspection. Then a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_30" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_27" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_29" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_31" class="blsp-spelling-error">Jap</span></span></span></span> soldier came trotting up the line and <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_31" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">bayoneted</span> Ritchie in the back.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGoy6fZVX87SbEHYg6N76JlTDzpiPhfc087sV4idec7dOU7RJPBa9xj41Q8WTaT1KjLiDanz7QwkcYy8oMiNFZVqrpAGKh6xtQangtiEtEeK34k8DngwAjwIfCKkHw7DBpdPIiXr8LNNg/s1600/Bataan-Death-March+by+BS.png"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 210px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5542133495935050002" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGoy6fZVX87SbEHYg6N76JlTDzpiPhfc087sV4idec7dOU7RJPBa9xj41Q8WTaT1KjLiDanz7QwkcYy8oMiNFZVqrpAGKh6xtQangtiEtEeK34k8DngwAjwIfCKkHw7DBpdPIiXr8LNNg/s320/Bataan-Death-March+by+BS.png" /></a> When we got to <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_32" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_28" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_30" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_32" class="blsp-spelling-error">Orani</span></span></span></span> it stank even worse than <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_33" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_29" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_31" class="blsp-spelling-error">Balanga</span></span></span>. Just outside the town though, about a mile outside, I saw something so strange I thought it might be a vision, something brought on by the hunger and malaria. Attached to some trees at the edge of a field were two swings, obviously homemade, just boards and ropes fastened to tree limbs. Sitting on one of the swings, was what I thought was a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_34" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_30" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_32" class="blsp-spelling-error">Jap</span></span></span> soldier</em><em> but maybe it was the glare of the sun or maybe just the distance but he seemed to be a very old man, almost ancient. He wasn't wearing a uniform so I couldn't tell if he was an officer or not. You could always tell a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_35" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_31" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_33" class="blsp-spelling-error">Jap</span></span></span> officer from other soldiers because, as a class, officers were significantly taller then the men they commanded. He was<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGvalvdEAcev5t4PRQ0QR7om0BJhKXs_6bZQOyKVhS5SImee91EVcJOqw_qweFE_NVcAjjE4ZabOwRHvso6_nO157QTgfHlEh7XLQRAU2QIHXNX41fBk0FGReOR0VJgC46qV4ilS1V_Is/s1600/ikiru2.png"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 320px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 262px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5543330023644946322" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGvalvdEAcev5t4PRQ0QR7om0BJhKXs_6bZQOyKVhS5SImee91EVcJOqw_qweFE_NVcAjjE4ZabOwRHvso6_nO157QTgfHlEh7XLQRAU2QIHXNX41fBk0FGReOR0VJgC46qV4ilS1V_Is/s320/ikiru2.png" /></a> </em></em><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><em>looking at us, gliding very slowly on the swing a few inches forward, then a few inches back, his long legs just barely scraping the ground, looking at us and singing a song. At first I hadn't realized he was singing but now I could hear it coming across the field, a slow and what seemed a very sorrowful song. Maybe it was my imagination and maybe just my ignorance of the language but it seemed to be the same song the guard was singing before Ritchie jumped him and got killed for his troubles. And he just sat there, moving a few inches either way, singing that beautiful slow song and his hands loosely gripping the ropes along both sides of his head. If it was a vision, then it was a mass vision because all of us looked that way as we went along the road. But nobody said anything. We just looked at him and listened to the song. A little ways further on we passed one of the village <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_36" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">pacification</span> centers set up by Tech II and <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_37" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_32" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_34" class="blsp-spelling-error">Psy</span></span></span> Ops before the enemy terminated the whole concept. We were only in <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_38" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_33" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_35" class="blsp-spelling-error">Orani</span></span></span> about a day and then we walked to a depot of sorts in a larger town a little farther north called San Fernando, where they stuffed us in a warehouse. There were thousands of us in there, crushed and elbowing and going out of our minds. Nobody could sleep. We were all locked together and the stink was worse than ever because we were indoors. From there we walked to a rail center where they had trains waiting for us. Some of us were given food here and some weren't. We all looked forward to the trains, some dim and still functioning part of our minds thinking of God knows what childhood times we had spent on trains, the Twin Cities Zephyr if you were from the Midwest, or the San Francisco Chief or Afternoon Hiawatha if you were from</em> the West;<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiN_4fKr4gMugebdsdecXAI2n0mkqzfd_gI_8wkRtV6n2zwzEUUucKc-YWwx70eRNs_dvOTq9PHx90U5Wl4LQ08EF1BkKx1v60JIsAQS9BJktVcc4ZERmzSHYSzNOzjiXQKsI63CxQWUXk/s1600/on+BDM%2540.png"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 240px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5544345813307997426" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiN_4fKr4gMugebdsdecXAI2n0mkqzfd_gI_8wkRtV6n2zwzEUUucKc-YWwx70eRNs_dvOTq9PHx90U5Wl4LQ08EF1BkKx1v60JIsAQS9BJktVcc4ZERmzSHYSzNOzjiXQKsI63CxQWUXk/s320/on+BDM%2540.png" /></a> <em>some dim vision of going across the Great Plains on a Union Pacific train and everything is vast and wild and mysterious because you were only ten years old and America seemed as wide as all the world and twice as invincible. We looked forward to the trains but we should have known better by this time. They put us in boxcars. Whatever position you found yourself in when you were pushed into the boxcar, that was it for the whole trip. There were no windows and the doors were closed. It was the warehouse again, this time on wheels. A few minutes after the train started, somebody began to moo. That set us off. Soon we all began mooing and snorting, making noises like sheep, cows, horses, pigs. The <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_39" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_34" class="blsp-spelling-error">Psy</span></span> Ops people never told us about this kind of environmental reaction. Nobody laughed. We weren't fooling around. This was no comic celebration of the indomitable human spirit. No protest against inhumanity. We were cattle now and we knew it. We were merely telling ourselves that we were cattle and we shouted moo and baa in absolute seriousness and total overwhelming self-hatred. We were livestock now. How could anyone deny it? What else could we be but livestock, locked up as we were in boxcars and stepping in puddles of our own sick liquid shit. The ride seemed to take years. It seemed a trek across Asia. When, at last, we were all off the train we walked to the POW camp the Japanese had set up at what used to be Camp O'Donnell but we called it Fort Hirohito, where they processed us with one of our own incremental mode simulators. The march was over and I tried to get back to the small white beauty of my wife. But I had trouble returning. It was April and it was hot, the dawning of springtime in my part of the world but obviously not here, and it was odd that it brought with it a jumbled group of recurring musical images for reasons I couldn't envision, but there was our neighbor, <span style="color:#ffff00;"><span style="color:#000000;"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_40" class="blsp-spelling-error">Harkavy</span>, who we called</span></span><span style="color:#000000;"> "</span>the country squire", drinking Jack Daniel's on the rocks, decked out in his star-spangled pajamas like it was the 4<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_41" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span> of July and playing his fiddle like a damned fool. And there was my mother dusting the piano in the old house like a Pharaoh's widow come to clean the tomb in preparation for some momentous occasion. And there were the musicians again milling about on the front lawn, strangely tinkling away and the minister and guests and our wedding taking place in the background. But it was all fading away in a disjointed jumble of sights and sounds in some dark part of my mind and I had to get back there because it was in <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_42" class="blsp-spelling-error">Balanga</span> that they forced us to bury the dead. </em><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1KQjMVhyphenhyphendZK9hClXMdxExcRPnp06AinyBoyAtdbNOwdOvUl58kUsI3XD0Xhq-OxBlsDk8c6NR2rJ6UxPFDvuR_xI7obuIorRSAnqRipqXFioupMv9DL6qnIR1LDg0bYSUNi1B7tTFpAI/s1600/bataan+burial+drawing0001.png"><em><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 267px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5544731803353496242" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1KQjMVhyphenhyphendZK9hClXMdxExcRPnp06AinyBoyAtdbNOwdOvUl58kUsI3XD0Xhq-OxBlsDk8c6NR2rJ6UxPFDvuR_xI7obuIorRSAnqRipqXFioupMv9DL6qnIR1LDg0bYSUNi1B7tTFpAI/s400/bataan+burial+drawing0001.png" /></em></a><em> It was in <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_43" class="blsp-spelling-error">Balanga</span> that they forced us to bury the dead. It was in <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_44" class="blsp-spelling-error">Balanga</span> that they forced us to bury the dead and I was throwing dirt onto the body of a Filipino when he suddenly moved. Poor little blood-faced indigenous Filipino <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_45" class="blsp-spelling-error">soldierboy</span>. When he started to rise from the ditch. Dozens of dead men around him covered already with maggots, completely covered so that the ground, the earth, seemed to be moving, rotting bodies everywhere and the whole saddle trench about to erupt. When he lifted himself on his elbow. I dropped my shovel and leaned way over the edge of the trench, all those billions of ugly things swarming into the mouths of my dead buddies and their dead buddies and their buddies' buddies and the tough-little brown-little indigenous military personnel. When he tried to extend a hand to me. I leaned way down and then felt something jab me in the ribs. It was a guard jabbing me with his bayonet in a light, casual, condescending and almost upper-class manner like a bloody British officer of the 11th Light Dragoons poking an Indian stable boy with his riding crop. When he tried to rise. I pointed to him, trying to rise, and then the guard did some pointing of his own. He pointed his bayonet at the shovel on the ground and then at the boy in the ditch. It was rather a deft piece of understatement, I thought. He wanted me to bury the little wog</em> <em>anyway."</em></div><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><div align="justify"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></div><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><p align="justify"></p>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-58826309052749883562009-06-23T08:03:00.000-07:002009-06-23T08:22:14.748-07:00CARLY BRIANNA HADDICK - HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATE<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQhgmjJoIim03JVzY-p3bpO5dRc-5BhHCsJP13TgCjvviyfRzYmFtDtT5vfInY_T4IohP8o1cEwI96F8az6-7K1rASk1DpQ5rVac641m5FYeoyiCprhT32wtPzkCk-1cpoPLd8sQ9gbpA/s1600-h/gradution+009.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQhgmjJoIim03JVzY-p3bpO5dRc-5BhHCsJP13TgCjvviyfRzYmFtDtT5vfInY_T4IohP8o1cEwI96F8az6-7K1rASk1DpQ5rVac641m5FYeoyiCprhT32wtPzkCk-1cpoPLd8sQ9gbpA/s320/gradution+009.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350542851265239602" /></a><br />It seems like only yesterday that she was born. Barbara had her by way of Cesarean as Carly was, in med speak, a double footling breech. It is hard to believe that not many years ago she would not have survived.<br /><br />Well, that was cheerful, wasn't it? It seems like only yesterday that she was wholly fixated on dinosaurs. When I got my first computer, 1998 I think, I used a picture she drew of an orange-spotted dinosaur for the desktop picture. I kept it up there for many years.Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-5589870281989274592009-05-28T14:09:00.000-07:002010-02-27T16:04:03.368-08:00. . . AND ON TO ROME<div align="justify">Dad's Italian adventures<em>:</em><br /></div><br /><p align="justify">"<em>It was a whirlwind about this time and the merry-go-round of re-assignments finally placed us in the 5<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> Army just in time for the invasion of Italy in September of 1943.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEic_c9nhHDvKthmMhhFivFCt-YWJkPf33S1k5O5K3JU1AyjeuTGLEPIOG7wJY2E2gxYMLdVowuxONuqEWV9KG5331g3FUIhnKIvr_g7iiXzIldhf8dcqUN7y0a7Jt1117h8KZBZa6sLTYo/s1600-h/italy_invasion_1943.bmp"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 267px; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5343645100740472338" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEic_c9nhHDvKthmMhhFivFCt-YWJkPf33S1k5O5K3JU1AyjeuTGLEPIOG7wJY2E2gxYMLdVowuxONuqEWV9KG5331g3FUIhnKIvr_g7iiXzIldhf8dcqUN7y0a7Jt1117h8KZBZa6sLTYo/s320/italy_invasion_1943.bmp" /></a> I think I already told you we ended up as part of the 5<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> Army because our MOS was Aircraft Maintenance. Again we were alongside of <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">Montgomery</span></span> and his 8<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> Army. They landed on the docks at <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">Taranto</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> and met only token <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">resistance</span>. Monty was able to move pretty quickly up the Adriatic coast and captured the airfields at <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error">Foggia</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> which put our <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">air power</span> that much closer to Germany. On September 9<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span></span></span></span></span></span></span>, we hit the beach in strength at Salerno and the Germans made</em><em> an all-out attempt to push our landing back into the sea. We met an enormous amount of firepower at that beachhead even though the Germans had a big job on their hands trying to disarm the entire Italian Army because King Victor Emanuel was trying to negotiate a surrender and was asking the Allies for an armistice at roughly the same time we were making our landing. We were awfully damn lucky that Hitler did not reinforce his <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error">troo</span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="color:#000000;"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error">ps</span></span></span></span></span></span> </span>as they came very close to keeping us from even landing on that first day. My unit landed on the third day with all the equipment to unload and we were still under one hell of a lot of fire. We eventually got a lot of that equipment to the airfields the British had just captured at <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error">Foggia</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span>. I hadn't seen so much artillery since the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error">Kasserine</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> Pass in North Africa and believe you me, it was one God damned frightening experience."</em></p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzFoN5t0FYoH665zgV-WGm75ogdpjzmgrMwiW8EMlTlx45_-pj_WHAKKf10K7KwjYIE6Oq06OYl4qWGGd_D9TxKExzvhPDXlMRRn409gyhyjQ0EQmLrKHj2SMXTgGhn-eaLIuZPCkwl5U/s1600-h/Mussolini2.bmp"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 280px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5341863746584293378" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzFoN5t0FYoH665zgV-WGm75ogdpjzmgrMwiW8EMlTlx45_-pj_WHAKKf10K7KwjYIE6Oq06OYl4qWGGd_D9TxKExzvhPDXlMRRn409gyhyjQ0EQmLrKHj2SMXTgGhn-eaLIuZPCkwl5U/s320/Mussolini2.bmp" /> <p align="justify"></a><em>"Being under intense fire can produce the weirdest effects. We were off loading jeeps onto the beachhead and Bang! Bang! Bang! three of them in a row got blown up as we tried to unload them. It seemed as if everything they aimed at, they hit and there was something very damed frightening in that experience. We were exposed on the beach and there was nothing we could do. The smell of gasoline and shrapnel from the destroyed jeeps was in the air. Super heated metal has a unique smell so adding that to the mixture of burning rubber and gasoline will produce something you will never ever forget. The guys who ran the apparatus that lifted the jeeps off the landing vehicles were scrambling around in that - stew - and everybody feared that they themselves would blow up with all that crap in the air. Everybody - and I mean everybody - got zinged and dinged a little from all that flying debris and after a while, nobody called for a medic unless they were seriously injured. But those three jeeps being destroyed all in a row really put the fear of God in all of us. Time seemed to stretch out and produce a kind of paranoia and the shells that didn't hit the jeeps, hit the sand so everybody had a stinging sensation in their eyes from the combination of fumes and sand and we were all disoriented as there was very little cover and everything was just happening so <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">God damned</span></span> fast and in no kind of order and enough guys got killed to make that fear very real. But that kind of fear flattens out and you</em><em> weren't able to make sense out of anything after a while. But the absolute worst thing - and this sounds weird - but the worst thing was when you were out of range of all that shelling, the fear returned. When we went back to the ships to get a new load of equipment and all those sounds and smells started to diminish, we knew not to relax because we were just going to have to go back into that hell that was on that landing zone. Non-stop activity was the key to not losing your mind and we didn't want to stop until we could stay stopped</em><em> and that was when the shelling stopped completely. That third day - the 12<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> -</span> ended at roughly 1o o'clock that night and some guys just plopped down on the beach but others just wanted to get the stink of the day off of them and hosed themselves down or just jumped into the water. But the next day's <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">activity</span> needed to be laid out. We had tons of aircraft parts that needed to be ready to be moved forward at a moment's notice. So we forced ourselves to go back to work until we were ready for the next day."</em><br /></p><p align="justify"><em>"We were exhausted but sleep didn't come easy for any of us. For a lot of men this was their first time under fire and this was the end of the Allie's third day on European soil and a partial repayment for Dunkirk. We took a certain amount of pride in that. There was obviously a lot of work to be done, but Lafayette, we had arrived." </em></p><p align="justify"><br /></p><p align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigq3vYAoNJd5m9_TgqzIkwuYwrvnT6wJS9mh9scEPiPDO8NUVdzYCwb5tW_SVPW-R1DoJGpE17Dj9Dv__-TMDvyIS6B1c86vx1FEV6HLDPZerx-cF3EqzhivnhGfdhmZhJQ6hPehfjNa4/s1600-h/mark+clark.bmp"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 360px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 250px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5342584794884454786" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigq3vYAoNJd5m9_TgqzIkwuYwrvnT6wJS9mh9scEPiPDO8NUVdzYCwb5tW_SVPW-R1DoJGpE17Dj9Dv__-TMDvyIS6B1c86vx1FEV6HLDPZerx-cF3EqzhivnhGfdhmZhJQ6hPehfjNa4/s320/mark+clark.bmp" /></a><em>"We figured since the Germans did not oppose the initial landing the British made at <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error">Taranto</span>, they were saving all their firepower for us</em>. <em>By the time we got everything off-loaded, the shelling had all but stopped. I guess the Germans figured they were not going to push us back into the sea regardless of how much hell they poured down on us. By the time we had everything ashore we linked up with the British 8<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> on September 16<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span> and fought our way into Naples, the northernmost port city that could be covered by our bases in Sicily. After we took Naples, things suddenly changed and the Germans began a sort of orderly <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-error">withdrawl</span> rather than their usual bitter end tactics. Since Hitler couldn't - or wouldn't - reinforce his troops it seemed like they began concentrating on building a series of defensive fortifications to prevent us from advancing any further north <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_15" class="blsp-spelling-error">tha</span></em><em>n we already were. <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPu2ojDCldjQm-xKJFlDM8y7Z-Vkm2VSbYdiDAF3_4_Uyk-BvCuWLI9zJpa-NH0JKUC9NWXYWI3mz2CDm2KMsi_tZE1VJU33i6uk-RoVHqwjH-etkyKQA30kCGFKUO9uSQiEvi5PXTHmU/s1600-h/gustav+line.bmp"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 250px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 316px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348426299383825058" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPu2ojDCldjQm-xKJFlDM8y7Z-Vkm2VSbYdiDAF3_4_Uyk-BvCuWLI9zJpa-NH0JKUC9NWXYWI3mz2CDm2KMsi_tZE1VJU33i6uk-RoVHqwjH-etkyKQA30kCGFKUO9uSQiEvi5PXTHmU/s320/gustav+line.bmp" /></a>The winter of 43-44 saw the Germans altering their tactics from resisting us at the beaches to blocking the roads that led to Rome by fighting a rear guard action that resulted in the creation of what was called the Gustav Line that ran from <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-error">Minturno</span></span> in the west to <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_17" class="blsp-spelling-error">Ortona</span></span> in the east, cutting <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">completely</span> across the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_15" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">peninsula pretty much at its narrowest point</span> as well as a series of other interlocking lines that supported one other. We heard that Hitler had replaced the General in charge of Italy and we could believe it. Their tactics completely changed and they used what time they had to construct the pillboxes and other <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">fortifications</span> that we began to face and the resistance we saw stiffened and every foot of progress we made came at a price. And I think what the Germans wanted to do was draw a line in the sand that said , you know, beyond this point you will not go. We ran into major difficulties as we approached those defensive positions in our attempt to move towards Rome. As the 5<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_18" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span> Army attempted to move north from Naples up the old <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_19" class="blsp-spelling-error">Appian</span> way our ability to move became <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_20" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">extremely</span> difficult.</em><em> The <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-corrected"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_17" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_21" class="blsp-spelling-error">Apennine</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> chain to the east of us ran down the spine of the peninsula and those fortifications took full advantage of the rivers that had to be crossed and they flooded the open valleys by diverting the rivers, and of course, the miserable God damned weather that fully favored the dug-in troops and we found ourselves pinched between the coast to our west and the mountains to our east. If ever there was an ideal setting for an enemy to take a defensive posture, this was it - mountainous terrain with the winter setting in."</em></p><p align="justify"><em><em>"Meanwhile, the 8<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span> Army was moving up the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error">Adriatric</span> coast at a good clip and was able to cross the Moro river at the port city of <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error">Ortona</span>, the extreme eastern end of the Gustav Line. The Germans were instructed to prevent the line from being breached and hold the city at any cost. We found out later that the German High Command considered <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error">Ortona</span> to be of such strategic importance they told their men to "fight for every house and every tree" and sent in the battle-hardened First Parachute Division to engage Canadian and New Zealand elements of the 8<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_26" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span> Army in some of the most vicious house-to-house hand-to-hand fighting of the campaign. <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_27" class="blsp-spelling-error">Ortona</span> was one of the few usable deep water ports on the Adriatic coast of Italy, and thus allowed the British to shorten their supply lines which at that time stretched all the way back to <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_28" class="blsp-spelling-error">Taranto</span></span></span></span> where they had come ashore in the first place so it was strategically important to the British also. The battle was so intense the fighting became known as "Bloody December." It was truly amazing what happened to the people who lived in <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_29" class="blsp-spelling-error">Ortona</span></span> who were not able to evacuate or get out of the way and had to stay behind hiding in all manner of ingenious places like barns, <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_17" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">carriage</span> houses, public buildings and the basements of homes that had been destroyed and, therefore, as far as the both sides were concerned, <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_18" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">neutralized</span>. The battle went on for eight days and became known as </em><em>"Little Stalingrad" which tells you all you need to know about how horrible the fighting was. <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_30" class="blsp-spelling-error">Ortona</span> added "mouse-holing" to the nomenclature of urban warfare to describe how holes were blown through interior walls of houses and buildings and grenades were thrown in to clear the space so small groups of advancing troops could move down through the structures from above and be under cover. Once <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_27" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_31" class="blsp-spelling-error">Ortona</span></span> was taken the eastern part of the Gustav Line was now in full breach but, once again, the weather played hell with our plans and blizzards on the eastern side of the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_32" class="blsp-spelling-error">Apeninnes</span> forced the offensive to a halt. When you came right down to it, there were only three possible approaches to Rome and one of them, Highway 5 in the east, was marked by steep slopes and the continuing blizzards made air support out of the question so that way into Rome was not feasible on a number of different fronts. Highway 7, the old <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_33" class="blsp-spelling-error">Appian</span> Way, ran up the west coast from Naples and that was where we were stalled as the Germans had flooded the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_34" class="blsp-spelling-error">Pontine</span> Marshes south of Rome which put that way really a mess to have to navigate and getting to Rome that way would have meant moving a large number of troops all the way across the peninsula in the winter so that was out. What that meant was that both the British 8<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_35" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span> on the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_36" class="blsp-spelling-error">easternside</span> of the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_37" class="blsp-spelling-error">Appennines</span> and the American 5<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_38" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span> in the west were both bogged down by the weather and the obstacles constructed by the Germans at the Gustav Line. That left just Highway 6 at the entrance of the Liri Valley as the only real way to get to Rome but it faced Monte Cassino and that was the linchpin and the anchor of the Gustav Line. Blocking our abilty to advance was the fast flowing Rapido River that rose in the Apennine Mountains and turned into the </em></em><em><em>Garigliano River as it dominated the entrance to the Liri Valley. Elements of the 8th were moved from the Adriatic coast to the valley and the fighting took on a real international flavor as troops from New Zealand and India fought unsuccessfully at the entrance to the valley into January 44 until the New Zealand commander called for the destruction of the ancient abbey that sat on top of Monte Cassino. Because of its historical significance, the Germans refused to use it as part of their defensive strategy but the Allies had never believed that to be the truth as it was ideally situated to look down on our troops. We launched a massive air strike the first week in February and completely destroyed it but this presented a whole new set of problems for us as the Germans rushed crack paratroopers into the rubble and they were able to fend off two major offensives directed at their deeply entrenched positions. As we got deeper into winter, we were no closer to Rome as we prepared for the third major offensive of the campaign. By this time we had 1o divisions committed to taking Monte Cassino and we were still stalemated."</em></p><p align="justify"><em><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcLh9MzXDo7IPUmfFokIgkhoxIGio8xoxyBnDE3g1b_Mmqd-T2AEfr4UB9remTsYIbuz6lXcTVmU4IBb5twRK0MEem1f4MNYvBFABEmDQfi-5vn2RbVC0BI0ziY0iXCTNK0-iZiRt20ec/s1600-h/soldaten_rennend.bmp"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 345px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 216px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348424218556618818" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcLh9MzXDo7IPUmfFokIgkhoxIGio8xoxyBnDE3g1b_Mmqd-T2AEfr4UB9remTsYIbuz6lXcTVmU4IBb5twRK0MEem1f4MNYvBFABEmDQfi-5vn2RbVC0BI0ziY0iXCTNK0-iZiRt20ec/s320/soldaten_rennend.bmp" /></a>"At roughly the same time all this was happening, the VI Corps using both American and British troops made an <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_20" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_33" class="blsp-spelling-error">amphib</span></span></span></em><em><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_21" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_34" class="blsp-spelling-error">io</span></span></span></em><em>us landing behind the Gustav Line at Anzio. The Germans kept us pinned to the beach as they launched counter attack after counter attack. General John P. Lucas was blamed by the British for not being aggressive enough at the beachhead and making no attempt to breakout and meet the German 1oth Army in any kind of meaningful way and accepting the horrendous casualties that accurred as the result of his timidness and was eventually replaced by General Lucien Truscott. It wasn't until the weather cleared and the Germans were thrown into the fourth and final offensive at Monte Cassino and we finally blasted through the Gustav Line that Truscott was able to breakout of Anzio and launch an attack on the German 10th's rear as they were called into reserve to deal with the attack at Monte Cassino. We now had the Germans in full retreat and the way to Rome was now open and we were in position to demolish the 1oth Army when Mark Clark decided not to pursue them and move with the 5th Army into Rome."</em></p><p align="justify"><em>"In one of the great ironies of the war, Rome was declared an open city on June 4, 1944, two days before the most climactic event of World War II: <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_27" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_29" class="blsp-spelling-error">DDay</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> the 6<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_28" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_30" class="blsp-spelling-error">th</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> of June. And my sister, your Aunt Ruth, Lt. Ruth M. <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_26" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_24" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_26" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_26" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_29" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_31" class="blsp-spelling-error">Haddick</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> hit Omaha Beach on <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_26" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_27" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_25" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_27" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_27" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_30" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_32" class="blsp-spelling-error">DDay</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> plus 6. She was an Army nurse, serving in a forward unit taking care of the wounded. I don't know what they called themselves then, but later we knew them from television as M*A*S*H units. On the other hand, I think your Aunt Ruth resented the way the nurses were portrayed as sex objects. </em>Take a look<span style="color:#ff0000;"> </span><a href="http://www.militaryheritage.org/RuthDorsman.html"><span style="color:#ff0000;">HERE</span></a> to see what I call Aunt Ruth's war."</p><br /><p align="justify"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 240px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 282px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5343957515090384338" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHpYR449AjHzPJVRuqskLhg-0T4TkNcxhTMScjGc99SvDE118iPmu6GjFbGYukoqhYHh47cxuqYUVwYPX7LPYQ57HJkDPWbZd1KsyC1t7brJGWxilkSE2YjDoGDRIe_4MzYnI6_h8B0cw/s320/Aunt+Ruth+3.bmp" /><br /></p><br /><p align="justify">.</p><br /></em>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-56062829368871961602009-04-24T14:28:00.000-07:002011-01-04T15:06:18.869-08:00HE DO THE POLICE IN VOICES<div align="justify">Dad told me this story <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error">thusly</span></span></span></span></span></span></span>: </div><br /><div align="justify"><i>"Boy, you <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error">shoulda</span></span></span></span></span></span></span> seen it! They didn't call Erwin Rommel the Desert Fox for nothing and this is a good illustration of why. Here we were, chasing him all over the desert, short on rations, short on water, sleeping in tents and having to post guards to keep the damned Arabs from sneaking up at night and stealing the tents from right over top of us. It was a wise man who acted like he was<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqwqrlUy_oADVHPxIujvaeXrGtxQqJUgr9nRQ94unDv4QZRYi5ztrB_Uu_xpiSzoHQi1ghkJDWJ4CFG1hcxTwBTm8VashNDZdLaN8lKOsJBaYrrTa0vVO5gFlgPuWfBWeBgYzQgekRO38/s1600-h/rommel.jpg"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 269px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5333584994881342370" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqwqrlUy_oADVHPxIujvaeXrGtxQqJUgr9nRQ94unDv4QZRYi5ztrB_Uu_xpiSzoHQi1ghkJDWJ4CFG1hcxTwBTm8VashNDZdLaN8lKOsJBaYrrTa0vVO5gFlgPuWfBWeBgYzQgekRO38/s320/rommel.jpg" /></a>asleep when they were stealing the damned tent because more than one man got his throat cut in the process. This was March of 1943 and we were advancing along the North African coast towards <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">Tunisia near the end of hostilities in the North Africa campaign and it was the prelude to the expected invasion of Sicily. We were attached to the British Eighth Army pushing Rommel's tank corps towards the American 1st Army in central Tunisia. We actually overran Rommel's tanks because he - now get this! - BURIED them in the damn desert lock stock and barrel - tanks, men and all - in an all-out effort to avoid getting trapped between the two arms of a giant pincer movement involving the British Eighth and the American First. Hell, we were in sight of the First before we realized what had actually happened and we wheeled around and played HELL digging the bastards out. The Desert Fox for true! But it was a mess, a real mess. We were all scrambling around like a bunch of beetles on a skillet as Rommel was trying <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">desperately</span> to avoid being trapped and we had a hell of a time trying to tell who was who and what was what. But we finally got it sorted out and squeezed Rommel's Tank corps in that giant trap and, in mid-May, Rommel's tank corps finally surrendered and we had about 100,000 prisoners of war on our hands, none of whom was Rommel, of course, because he and his staff were able to get out of Africa to the Italian mainland where they were safe and that was it for the resistance in North Africa. We thought we were through with Monty as we had heard rumors about General Patton and a proposed new army. But nothing ever works out the way you want it to happen, now does it?</span></i></div><br /><i><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected"><div align="justify">A funny story from those days in the Tunisian desert. We were always on short rations and the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">Bedouins</span> tried to keep a wary eye on their livestock but one day in early spring, damned if we didn't run across a goat out in the open. There were three of us and all we had, aside from our 50-caliber machine guns, was a ball peen hammer and a pocket knife and we knocked that goat on the head with the ball peen hammer and butchered him on the spot with that pocket knife. We would have shot that damned thing to pieces if we had used our machine guns. But for God's sake - all we wanted was something to eat.<br /><br /></div><p align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZL0ZZ403Hd82pQpk3CPq1z_jR-uordH0NM68leRqMPceb_9Py_egGvZOLLwSmJv2TaSDenXb_WCaejyfPcWjSToss8Ygb7GLTynQ-RnC-2QyKOUabXtvE-bHp8jKl7T6-qh_bg9TPQ2s/s1600-h/sicily.jpg"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 241px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332837935268285154" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZL0ZZ403Hd82pQpk3CPq1z_jR-uordH0NM68leRqMPceb_9Py_egGvZOLLwSmJv2TaSDenXb_WCaejyfPcWjSToss8Ygb7GLTynQ-RnC-2QyKOUabXtvE-bHp8jKl7T6-qh_bg9TPQ2s/s320/sicily.jpg" /></a> We always had a problem being Americans as part of a largely British army and after Rommel's surrender in the middle of May we became odd-men-out and ended up as garrison troops guarding all those prisoners of war until the invasion of Sicily opened up and we became real soldiers again. We were detached from the British Eighth in July of 43 and, because we had chased Rommel all over Tunisia, we were considered "combat savvy" and were the headquarters troops for Operation Husky - the invasion of Sicily. We were the first force of Field Army size to see combat in the war. The I Armored Corps was <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error">redesignated</span></span></span></span></span> the Seventh Army aboard the USS Monrovia and handed over to General George S Patton, thus our motto was "Born at sea, Baptized in blood" and after we ended up capturing <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">Me<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiufpmBeBHwekW96MQ3ArkwM98wn82iUijxgDw7UJJiImQTyjML_tf4TE6DqGkBMf64dC-24OCcTQ1_NisHTw4SpJqFr5niuAiWD1p9JcR4XHBTSqxlwoKrCJ_8FuqXPmn4H8e5_q3B52k/s1600-h/PattonImage2.jpg"><img style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 262px; FLOAT: right; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332427526888336578" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiufpmBeBHwekW96MQ3ArkwM98wn82iUijxgDw7UJJiImQTyjML_tf4TE6DqGkBMf64dC-24OCcTQ1_NisHTw4SpJqFr5niuAiWD1p9JcR4XHBTSqxlwoKrCJ_8FuqXPmn4H8e5_q3B52k/s320/PattonImage2.jpg" /></a><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">ssina</span></span></span></span></span>, "Crowned in glory" was added to our motto. We weren't as entirely liberated from that damned Montgomery as we thought. We formed the left flank of the British Eighth but we played a very important part in the liberation of Sicily and ended up doing most of it ourselves and overshadowed Monty, first by capturing Palermo - there's a funny story about that - the General staff gave in to Monty and had second thoughts about Americans capturing the city and our orders to take it were <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">countermanded</span> but Patton told the British those orders were "garbled in transmission" so we went ahead and captured Palermo anyway - and ultimately, we beat the British to the gates of <span style="color:#ffff00;"><span style="color:#333333;">Messina itself. Monty really wanted to liberate Messina but so did Patton because of the stinging remarks the British made about our competence early in the war - they never let us forget that fiasco at Kasserine Pass in North Africa. We got our noses bloodied right out of the chute, which, when you got right down to it, was our first real action in the war</span></span><span style="color:#ffff00;"><span style="color:#333333;"> and the race for Messina was on! There was a motley collection of Germans and Italians in front of us and the Germans had an ulterior motive in their resistance: they wanted to buy time for as many troops and equipment as could be evacuated to the Italian mainland through the straits of Messina and they put up just enough of a fight to get those troops evacuated and then poof! - they melted away. </span></span>Patton was suddenly able to move while the combination of the miserable terrain, and the damnable heat kept Montgomery bogged down as he approached the city from the Northwest and the best Monty was able to do was "<span style="color:#000000;">rendezvous</span>" with Patton after we had already entered <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error"><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error">Messina</span></span></span></span></span> and we finally were able to get out of Monty's shadow by our achievement of those goals and to establish an American - screw the British! - an AMERICAN stamp on the Sicilian campaign.</p><p align="justify">But by then that damned Drew Pearson had told the world about Patton smacking a kid who was in the hospital with battle fatigue - Patton had a really low tolerance for anybody other than tough guys and he always liked to visit the wounded after a major battle - he referred to them as "his heroes." Patton was not very enlightened when it came to psychological problems and when he heard that some kid was in the hospital ward because of his nerves - man, he just exploded, kicked the kid in the ass, slapped him around some and ordered the doctors to send the guy back to his ouftfit forthwith. The whole affair turned into a fiasco for the Allies and public opinion turned against Patton when it was learned that the soldier had malaria. We were never sure that Drew Pearson hadn't made that little item up as that part of the story came out "conveniently" later than the original story. Drew Pearson hated Patton, we all knew that, so we wouldn't put anything past him. What was ironic about this whole mess was that the Germans could not believe that the Allies would relieve a general of Patton's caliber just for slapping around some private and they kept waiting for the other shoe to drop but it never did. Patton eventually regained the status he had before the slapping incident but only after the invasion of Normandy when he was given command of the Third Army. The High Command used his noteriety as a perceived pariah to decoy the Germans. By this time, however, those of us whose MOS was Aircraft Maintenance ended up being re-assigned to Mark Clark's Fifth Army. Patton's old command, the Seventh, ceased being a front-line organization and was used for various mop-up details and Aircraft Maintenance personnel were not a necessity for them. It was like a three-ring circus in those days, for true. We had soldiered with Bernard Montgomery, we'd soldiered with George Patton then, finally, we had soldiered with Mark Clark. There was a big difference in the personalities of those three guys, I'm here to tell you, and we saw plenty of action in 1943 and '44. We thought the invasion of Italy was going to be a cakewalk. I remember what they used to say about Mussolini during that time that he "made the trains run on time." He was deposed during the Sicilian invasion and we opened negtiations with King Victor Emanuel but got nowhere. Italy took the better part of a year to conclude and cost us a quarter of a million men and, as it turned out, our ultimate victory there was overshadowed by the Normandy invasion which took place roughly about the time that Rome fell so what credit we deserved was lost. I remember after the war I was told we missed all the action because we weren't part of the DDay landings and the breakout! I don't think we missed a damn thing because when we landed at Salerno three days into the invasion of Italy we were still under one hell of a lot of fire."</span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimvjlAuFFxcTcmxV9xR4sNHWYFYWI2QZulJ_KwDkguQhvPmL-YUeDbVFxgy6eqN6lEBAROsOJfPumwFfkIMx3gn4wWyluYM-NgFPSwvbRFCHrXSFVpxXo39WmJ_AkRnspyNQn9vyG2vyY/s1600-h/Dad+4.bmp"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 199px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5338779897284347778" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimvjlAuFFxcTcmxV9xR4sNHWYFYWI2QZulJ_KwDkguQhvPmL-YUeDbVFxgy6eqN6lEBAROsOJfPumwFfkIMx3gn4wWyluYM-NgFPSwvbRFCHrXSFVpxXo39WmJ_AkRnspyNQn9vyG2vyY/s320/Dad+4.bmp" /></a><br /><br /><br /></p><p align="justify"><br /><br /></p></i>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-47315918595080348172009-04-13T21:54:00.000-07:002009-04-23T17:26:07.873-07:00DAD & THE BLACK ROSE<div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsv63kRjyWWvVi3Mea_YDxSjxRJmmNkkj7yuctvjUYt8Z-_XRpwc6EF4u6fHOq9wDkn5tL5f3-JGCinFleMlroLeGaP6f9XJOYU6Mdk4jspviyiuoyYwuKICt9WQ-YKlYyOHhyphenhyphen5wDbRXc/s1600-h/black+rose.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5325328313914966818" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 240px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 240px" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsv63kRjyWWvVi3Mea_YDxSjxRJmmNkkj7yuctvjUYt8Z-_XRpwc6EF4u6fHOq9wDkn5tL5f3-JGCinFleMlroLeGaP6f9XJOYU6Mdk4jspviyiuoyYwuKICt9WQ-YKlYyOHhyphenhyphen5wDbRXc/s320/black+rose.jpg" border="0" /></a> My father bought our first house when we arrived in Washington DC. Our first house! It meant we, at last, owned ground and Dad was going to make the most of it. He planted several trees around the perimeter of the property. The only one I remember was the mimosa. And he planted flowers, lots of them. But what I remember the most were the rose bushes.</div><div align="justify"><br />My brother Bob helped him on the basement reconstruction project. On alternate weekends, Dad took my brother to the dump and they would come home with all kinds of building materials: scrap lumber, old bricks and pieces of paneling. From all that stuff, he had my brother straightening nails, squaring up the bricks and cutting the lumber into usable <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">pieces</span> to be used as headers for doorways and such. My brother was about 10 and my father wanted him to feel like he was a part of the building project and teaching him about tools at the same time. The only part my brother didn't accomplish was actually installing the door itself - a little too complicated for a 10 year old, my father thought.<br /><br />On the other weekends, he and I would work on the lawn and the plants. We would head out to the woods and look for rich soil to bring home to create an enriched planting base for the flowers. We mixed the soil we dug up with fertilizer and loam he bought from the gardening shop to create a rich base into which we planted our flowers. It was my job to dig up a trench about eight inches wide and eight inches deep, dispose of the rocky detritus across the street in the drainage ditch and refill the trench with the mixture we created for the flowers.<br /><br />You may be getting the impression that my father was some kind of a fanatic, an impression our neighbors surely had but to his sons, to his sons he was a teacher and we learned our lessons from scratch and were intimately involved in whatever project he dreamed up. For my brother, the project was the wall that separated the laundry room from the workshop - the entire wall, floor to ceiling, from framing out the doorway to the finished paneling of the wall itself.<br /><br />My Dad started talking to the owner of the gardening supply place that he frequented. He began gathering information about breeding roses, the darker the better. He confided in me that he wanted to breed a Black Rose, something that had never been done before. The manager of the supply store told him to buy a dark red rose bush and put some black ink in the water but my Dad wasn't interested in "cheating his way to the Black Rose," is how he put it. He experimented with the Black <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Baccara</span></span> and Black Jade varieties which are really red but have dark undertones.<br /><br />He figured that breeding them together would bring him closer to the Black Rose than any other way. He gathered all manner of tools to separate the pollen and used paper hats to keep the germinated plants apart. I helped him with the actual work of germinating the plants but I'm certainly not going to stand on ceremony and say I'm a little bit of an expert here. I'm not. It was my Dad who did all the heavy lifting; I just helped with the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">scut</span></span> work.<br /><br />What I do recall, however, was the pruning I did in the dead of winter.</div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-62847192158891622382009-03-19T06:19:00.000-07:002009-04-23T17:16:30.681-07:00MY FATHERI found this picture of my father on the Internet the other day. I have been thinking of him a lot lately so I thought I would post his picture. I don't recognize it so I don't know where it was taken.<br /><br />He has been gone for better than 4o years yet not a day goes by that I don't think of him<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisY3ykOm6WJ-1n8wbAqnMJbDGN_7yGXQiJlfkOR9dKza0bMLD89oKGMG3zN5NJrUHxhBd2cX1SjYadlIeBtnfOqIqDUU-O9M1ShONzKHVsIBt9JGYZ03VBdTaxE-KXP4D3zsfrT61rvdk/s1600-h/204_120_56_1_141858.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5314889986017308258" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 227px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 319px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisY3ykOm6WJ-1n8wbAqnMJbDGN_7yGXQiJlfkOR9dKza0bMLD89oKGMG3zN5NJrUHxhBd2cX1SjYadlIeBtnfOqIqDUU-O9M1ShONzKHVsIBt9JGYZ03VBdTaxE-KXP4D3zsfrT61rvdk/" border="0" /></a><br />Well, what do you think, Nikki?Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-38546027635535461712009-02-28T19:18:00.000-08:002009-03-04T10:03:45.240-08:00GOOD FRIDAY TORNADO 1974 - PART III<div align="justify">I had put out the candles and was sitting in the dark, brooding. I listened to the wind howl in the middle of a God-awful thunderstorm which, although I didn't know it at the time, was part-and-parcel of tornado weather. My head was spinning. I felt vaguely ill. Then a thought <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">crystallized</span>: Why not call my ex-wife and daughter and tell them I was OK. They lived in Arizona and I knew they would be worried. As soon as the rain let up, I would walk to the corner, a little more than a block away, and use the public phone booth.</div><br /><div align="justify">I know what you are probably thinking. If the phone wasn't working in my house, why would <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJEDmvYB4pykdWygh-oKb72ZQO3S_P-Zt1JaHiRP8E36B06qY7IrktbzjY29Q6bANX4TN_gvjDV72xp5SfwhgvpFTqxVJgnVFVnn_tWLhrliYwvGE-HFE3aIbJis1z6lvuigY9KzdoKlM/s1600-h/phone_booth_66th_04_sized.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5308395720134696066" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 240px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 320px" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJEDmvYB4pykdWygh-oKb72ZQO3S_P-Zt1JaHiRP8E36B06qY7IrktbzjY29Q6bANX4TN_gvjDV72xp5SfwhgvpFTqxVJgnVFVnn_tWLhrliYwvGE-HFE3aIbJis1z6lvuigY9KzdoKlM/s320/phone_booth_66th_04_sized.jpg" border="0" /></a>the phones be working on the corner? I think the events of that day had scrambled me, slightly disconnecting me from rational thinking and the fact that the question never occurred to me speaks volumes about my state of mind at midnight on the day tornadoes ravaged my part of the country.<br /><br />I needed it to stop raining long enough for me to walk that block and put my plan into action. By 1AM, the rain had slowed to a drizzle and I went down the stairs and looked out the door. The air was full of water but it wasn't raining. I could see occasional flashes of lightening but not much else. You don't realize how little residual light there is at night in a city until you are in the midst of what amounts to a complete blackout. I mean, it was DARK. And very very quiet.<br /><br />I walked up the slight hill to the corner, aware of the sound of my shoes scraping the pavement. My senses were alive; I could hear myself breathing. Do you remember the old-style phone booths made of metal, with sliding glass doors that looked not unlike vertical coffins? The sound of the metal doors scraping against the metal of the floor grated on my ears as I entered the booth. When I put the money in the slot and failed to hear a dial tone, I suddenly became aware of the absurdity of what I had just done. Of course, there was no dial tone! Nothing at all was working in this part of the city. I was awash in a sea of strange images. I could still see flashes of lightening. It was starting to rain again. I realized I was on a metal platform in an electrical storm. I saw a kid standing on the corner. </div><br />Huh?<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg92PTgIErRAPx0RHSMkP81YHvNbNG5liaZSbfHqFN1jUBhNQ8BAJCkG2HsyTVXs9PCUW5CbXKSeWo3RsyrfpFmYW0j8DapABEW9O8vDeOPEUbkjFulYe5Sy9TyHM1_uPboUnNathGnLJc/s1600-h/gay+guy2.bmp"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5309392928583030242" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 227px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 320px" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg92PTgIErRAPx0RHSMkP81YHvNbNG5liaZSbfHqFN1jUBhNQ8BAJCkG2HsyTVXs9PCUW5CbXKSeWo3RsyrfpFmYW0j8DapABEW9O8vDeOPEUbkjFulYe5Sy9TyHM1_uPboUnNathGnLJc/s320/gay+guy2.bmp" border="0" /></a>He was wearing a red and gray checked sweater and wore his hair cropped short. I hadn't noticed him on the way to use the phone. Where had he come from so suddenly, I wondered. I stepped out of the booth and walked towards him. There was no traffic, no sound, nothing at all.<br /><br />We exchanged glances. He said, "Do you like sex?"<br /><br />I looked at him in wonderment. How do you answer a question like that? "Yes," I said. "I do."<br /><br />He looked me in the eye and said, "With me?"<br /><br />And on that note, gentle reader, I strode briskly away from the young man in the red sweater and close-cropped hair and left him standing there alone on the corner and walked home in the rain. I went to bed, completely convinced that I had just experienced the last surreal moment of a truly surreal dayBill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-49454045992354679312009-02-24T14:52:00.000-08:002009-03-03T22:18:22.943-08:00GOOD FRIDAY TORNADO 1974 - PART II<div align="justify">Here was the situation as it laid itself out, the first in a series of surreal moments I would face that day. As I was returning from a short business trip to <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Danville</span> Ky on Interstate 64, I was suddenly confronted by a TORNADO that appeared to be coming directly at me. I was listening to Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" on a tape I had in the car but I switched to the radio, looking for news, as I went through a group of survival techniques in my head and decided to pull in under an overpass and figure out what I should do next.</div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieK6FXNnrHZOnx31icnfNB0k8gEsSVlYmBMTdrCbgwsPMBlqG-ytu7ZQyQVnbOzIF-1AmxyglGjtwyuhn-SYnFsXQmoWr8V75zNhYxOfUT02p1aydkmmpeh15fmNi4YPvZphQiPY_ZCC8/s1600-h/louisville++ky.bmp"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5307633629952654658" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 212px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieK6FXNnrHZOnx31icnfNB0k8gEsSVlYmBMTdrCbgwsPMBlqG-ytu7ZQyQVnbOzIF-1AmxyglGjtwyuhn-SYnFsXQmoWr8V75zNhYxOfUT02p1aydkmmpeh15fmNi4YPvZphQiPY_ZCC8/s320/louisville++ky.bmp" border="0" /></a>I paid careful attention to that funnel cloud and soon realized it wasn't that close to me but since it was my first experience with a tornado I had to admit, what did I actually know about these things? I heard on the radio that dozens of sightings, most of which turned out to be <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">duplicate sightings</span>, had been reported across the Midwest that afternoon, but since barely controlled hysteria was the order of that particular day, I was ready to forgive just about anything.<br /><br /><p>My office was in the suburbs of Louisville and it was necessary for me to drop off the company car and pick up my own. I worked in a 6 story office building that was still under construction, 4 floors of which were complete and rented out. The other 2 stories were still incomplete and no work had been done in a couple<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0LW-aBDbTYi5j9rT05yGcyq70gXQoq52ic855HT5EzRHCZl9yJncNFle2Q9Wm8vIauyOdi-96NZT-qc5sLA2s-jncrWSRqA9GPbpuVkEgyR3lAVmGz5b7xuRi70yegRO4fGB92sHyBMM/s1600-h/tornado_generic.bmp"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5307343749598218962" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 132px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 250px" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0LW-aBDbTYi5j9rT05yGcyq70gXQoq52ic855HT5EzRHCZl9yJncNFle2Q9Wm8vIauyOdi-96NZT-qc5sLA2s-jncrWSRqA9GPbpuVkEgyR3lAVmGz5b7xuRi70yegRO4fGB92sHyBMM/s200/tornado_generic.bmp" border="0" /></a> of weeks. We liked to eat lunch on the unfinished 6<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">th</span></span> floor as the elevator opened on to a single large room that was completely enclosed in glass and it provided a good view of the Ohio River and the Louisville skyline.</p><p>The people in my office were clustered around a radio, murmuring at one another and they greeted me like a long lost brother, home from the war. We listened together for a while, getting no further new information and decided to go up to the 6<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">th</span></span></span> floor to see it we could see anything. It was very dark and there was a greenish tint to the sky and I thought of the book "Darkness at Noon." It wasn't quite 4 o'clock but it looked like early evening. There was no wind, which was strange in itself because, as quickly as I can explain this, a new tornado suddenly appeared in the general direction of where I lived, the bottom of which was one large dust cloud, and, as we watched, it quickly sat down on the Water Treatment Plant, scattering debris in all directions and, just as quickly, seemed to lift itself off the ground and dissipate. I had never seen anything like that before. </p><p>We broke up and started for home, never mind that I was headed to where I had just seen a tornado. I lived in an old neighborhood off Bardstown Road in an old house that had been beautifully carved into 4 apartments. I had the second floor front. I dreaded what I thought I was going to find when I got home.</p><p></p><p></p><div align="justify"></div><p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAMqr_LbGrAkKh3oOZimG3ZHggkinoYT1qNhHKLNZQ5TKDps5ka1k8Ef1vAziRZI8xHANmFRmm6rRqfiYW3rqw3ALI4PHEn1_vMdnmRpzdhXh_-dq7Rbd3YBHuHD0O8Ov06PEtAuCNEwM/s1600-h/750px-Dumas%252C_AR_Tornado_Damage.png"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5307584849289218482" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 350px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 240px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAMqr_LbGrAkKh3oOZimG3ZHggkinoYT1qNhHKLNZQ5TKDps5ka1k8Ef1vAziRZI8xHANmFRmm6rRqfiYW3rqw3ALI4PHEn1_vMdnmRpzdhXh_-dq7Rbd3YBHuHD0O8Ov06PEtAuCNEwM/s200/750px-Dumas%252C_AR_Tornado_Damage.png" border="0" /></a> The traffic, of course, was horrific. What was normally a 15 minute trip seemed to take forever. I was about 6 blocks from home when I first saw evidence of the tornado's destruction. The stores and houses that I passed on my way to and from work every day were now demolished. A hardware store and a couple of small markets, a few coffee shops and an art <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">gallery</span>, a convenience store and some gas stations and the historic Fern Creek Baptist church, all of which had lined both sides of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Bardstown</span> Road were now heaped in the middle of the road, with the odor of gasoline and smashed bananas in the air. The police had set up a temporary roadblock and no cars were allowed to pass. I had to park on the edge of that mess and start walking towards my house.<br /><br />You could see the course the tornado had taken as the road became clear and there was considerable damage to my right in the direction of Cherokee Park. A tornado has strange patterns of destruction. At the center of the park was an ancient tree on which Daniel Boone had carved his initials. I found out later, the tornado, bearing down on that tree, had suddenly reared up and jumped right over top of it, preserving the old landmark in yet another surreal moment that day. It looked like it had gone down the street parallel to my street, which was Tyler Parkway, and debris was blown into the yards but there was only superficial <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">damage to the houses. As </span>I approached my house, I could see a tree limb sticking out of my dining room window that came from God knows where but that was all the damage I could see. I climbed the stairs and entered my apartment.</p><p align="justify">There was no electricity, no water, no phone, no nothing. I lit a couple of candles that I scrounged up and tried to assess the damage. The tree limb I had seen from outside was in the closet off the dining room that held my winter stuff - all ruined - and my custom-made bowling ball was shattered. I pushed the tree limb back through the window and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">thumb tacked</span> an <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">over sized</span> towel on the broken window frame to keep the rain out. I swept up the broken glass as best I could. By this time it was raining hard, a major-league electrical storm, and I had just made it home without getting very wet.</p><p align="justify">I sat down in a chair and hooked my leg over its arm. I rubbed my eyes. I was sitting across the room from the window that had a ridiculous bright green beach towel in it, festooned with thumb tacks, and trying not to think about anything, anything at all, but all I could do was wonder what more could possibly happen that day.</p>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-31020480625955390162009-02-16T21:49:00.000-08:002009-03-02T11:27:25.089-08:00VIETNAM 1967<div align="justify">During the summer of my sophomore year at college I was a Good Humor Man. I was issued a white shirt, white pants and a black bow tie, assigned a route and sold Popsicles and ice cream bars out of the back of a truck.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEit7CXM1vMi_6d3Y68bHGEjojpfEuR9r0cDf9irzY-DTepGM8JHmDT6RW8ogkPC8S_3kTsN79gpF7gX8lZJJltR9KTN3whEuhsexN2qFFxleIvZ3Ct9Ryc6HvePFmFgBOy40Btu7C9GXIQ/s1600-h/Good+Humor.gif"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5303873135934179826" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 205px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEit7CXM1vMi_6d3Y68bHGEjojpfEuR9r0cDf9irzY-DTepGM8JHmDT6RW8ogkPC8S_3kTsN79gpF7gX8lZJJltR9KTN3whEuhsexN2qFFxleIvZ3Ct9Ryc6HvePFmFgBOy40Btu7C9GXIQ/s320/Good+Humor.gif" border="0" /></a></div><br /><br /><div align="justify">I had a bank of three bells on a rope with a hand pull that announced my arrival on the block by my pulling on the rope and producing a rhythmic series of tones, which is the best I can do at describing the sound that was made.</div><br /><p align="justify">My chief competition for business was Mister <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Softee</span> who played a recorded song through a loud speaker as he moved slowly through the neighborhood. If you have young children, you may be familiar with the song he played, especially as you sat down to dinner. My other competitor was Jack and Jill and he pushed a button and created a sound not unlike a door bell. Frankly, the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">cacophony</span> of bells and loudspeakers and buzzers more than a dozen times a day as we all passed through the neighborhoods on our routes must have driven parents crazy.</p><p align="justify">And it wasn't just the neighborhoods I trolled, it was public swimming pools, break time at farms that employed migrant workers and manufacturing plants full of blue-collar guys who just loved their cold ice cream on a hot summer day. My boss wondered why I was ordering so many half gallons of ice cream because bulk sales were handled in another department. I had to explain how I was paying the guys on the gates of those farms and plants with half-gallons to gain entry to sell ice cream bars to the men. </p><p align="justify">This was the summer of my content and I was having a blast, making almost $500 a week, my wife and I having no idea what to do with so much money. Boy, I' m telling you we were a couple of 2o year old college students living high on the hog that summer . . . </p><p align="justify"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:130%;color:#990000;"><strong>Until one day in the middle of August.</strong></span></p><p align="justify">My boss came looking for me and found me at lunchtime when he saw my truck parked in front of a pizza parlor and told me to hurry home as my mother needed me. My father had been in Vietnam since the previous November and, with my boss being so mysterious, I had a pretty good idea of what was going on.</p><p align="justify">My mother told my brothers and I that she had been visited by the Base Chaplain who told her that Dad had suffered a heart attack. I couldn't resist a guilty smile. Here he was, 45 years old, in a war zone, and he had a God-damn heart attack!</p><p align="justify">Remember the old World War II movies when women would receive a telegram that started WE REGRET TO INFORM YOU . . . .? well, by the time of the Vietnam war era, we were much more civilized than that.</p><p align="justify">Two days later, after no word at all except for that one visit from the Base Chaplain, a staff car pulled into our driveway and three men emerged: a minister and two well-dressed officers. They talked among themselves for a second, put out their cigarettes, and as all of us peered through the curtains with a growing sense of dreadful anticipation, the three of them walked toward our front door and knocked.</p><p align="justify">This was the first time my mother and brothers and I had been together all at once since my father left for <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Vietnam</span>. Without Dad, there wasn't much "togetherness." My father was the cement that held our family together and, without him there, we were not very close knit. My father had more than 20 years in the service and mandatory retirement loomed at 30 years. In order to get to 30, he had to accept an overseas assignment and he hadn't been able to decide what to do. I was in college, my brother Bobby was a junior in high school and our youngest brother Ricky, was a freshman. He had the option of taking a three year tour in Europe with his family or go to Vietnam for a year. He was a senior NCO and if he chose the one year in Vietnam, he would receive his money tax-free plus receive bonus pay for being in a war zone. It turned out to be a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">no-brainer</span> from his point of view. He would make enough money in that year to help pay for our college and still have enough for a down payment on the house he and my mother planned to buy when he retired. He wanted to help design and build it. When we were transferred to Washington DC after our stint in North Dakota, he bought a house and built a workshop in the basement. From that workshop, he built a laundry room for my mother and a rec room for the family with knotty pine cabinets on the rec room side of the basement. He was fond of the words "knotty pine." He found them to be beautiful.</p><p align="justify">Those men at the front door? They were that proverbial World War II telegram.</p><p align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8yXoM9HyUM41YPdHCT86OE4EmlLKpDaQnu58jv5iyus2nIBKmE9O-1x8y3KyrbhJNITKtK3c2eBKVDXwYccfjCPp1GtMt4KJ9f6MhsFiPnYbi1RjOwEJ9f6fb8hMemce4tl3zpmlAGEw/s1600-h/VIETNAM+WALL.gif"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5303877639815090194" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 300px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 224px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8yXoM9HyUM41YPdHCT86OE4EmlLKpDaQnu58jv5iyus2nIBKmE9O-1x8y3KyrbhJNITKtK3c2eBKVDXwYccfjCPp1GtMt4KJ9f6MhsFiPnYbi1RjOwEJ9f6fb8hMemce4tl3zpmlAGEw/s200/VIETNAM+WALL.gif" border="0" /></a> <p><br /><blockquote><a href="http://thewall-usa.com/info.asp?recid=20609"><span style="color:#ff6666;">Another brick in the Wall</span></a></blockquote><p></p>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-63489499217671043322009-02-07T10:25:00.000-08:002009-02-22T21:44:53.377-08:00MT FUJI<div align="justify">When we live<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggvAKPWHz-Zenah7bS-g7uorbND7oSn4v7rtk1NDyp0SdD6M4sIcR4wO-rjDtaQEewc41LbW-ps6raGA2UXt8vk8Vruc5aLdlwFeF4OjOyzSYp5TN5TVpkDWME-3eHVTvY0FnqK2FO8wg/s1600-h/mt+fuji.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5302853137477419746" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 280px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 180px" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggvAKPWHz-Zenah7bS-g7uorbND7oSn4v7rtk1NDyp0SdD6M4sIcR4wO-rjDtaQEewc41LbW-ps6raGA2UXt8vk8Vruc5aLdlwFeF4OjOyzSYp5TN5TVpkDWME-3eHVTvY0FnqK2FO8wg/s200/mt+fuji.jpg" border="0" /></a>d in Base Housing on Tachikawa Air Force Base we could see Mt Fujiyama from our front yard. Since "yama" means mountain in Japanese, Mount Fujiyama was redundant and Mt Fuji was how she was known to all. We became aware of the adage about Fuji after a while: <i>A man who travels to Japan and does not climb Fujiyama is a fool. A man who climbs her twice is a bigger fool.</i>.<br /><br />My parents climbed the mountain in 1956 as I have the climbing poles they <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidtrQhHUPdONtJ2jCw6N64SpKsfXonA9Mc3qlvcYFo1mrfseMoQ8p8QqyF6Pu_sn27LYY5eMamqAkCeO4SvOPv2zxkdlHqYaQ-VNBJnjMIHnDUVBofKuHY71wdNBujbQVRvY1lk3cYaaA/s1600-h/Base+Housiing3.gif"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5302918912183163890" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 280px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 215px" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidtrQhHUPdONtJ2jCw6N64SpKsfXonA9Mc3qlvcYFo1mrfseMoQ8p8QqyF6Pu_sn27LYY5eMamqAkCeO4SvOPv2zxkdlHqYaQ-VNBJnjMIHnDUVBofKuHY71wdNBujbQVRvY1lk3cYaaA/s200/Base+Housiing3.gif" border="0" /></a>used in my closet. The mountain is climbed by passing through various stations and at every station your climbing stick received a brand, showing that you had arrived there, and at the summit you received a final brand and a pennant to attach to the stick.<br /><br />My father died in Vietnam in 1967 and my mother, who is 81, now lives in a nursing home.<br /><br />Memories memories.</div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-89047112550302998512009-01-23T14:35:00.000-08:002009-02-24T15:36:35.209-08:00WORD OF THE DAY<div align="justify">SNEAK THIEF</div><div align="justify">Function: <i>noun</i></div><div align="justify">Date: circa 1955</div><div align="justify"><i>: How my Mother used to refer to our Japanese maid whenever she couldn't find a missing keepsake.</i></bi></bi></div><br /><p align="justify">In my previous post, I sketched in our Asian tour of duty. When we first arrived there, our family lived in the <b>Rice Paddies</b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPm5bFodNvaqfCSf2gr4XRensWeK3XveaqhW42kRtm_sBhkB9c6iVSEC0iWUDqiA0Yzm5ic074tbx9GouCVLLTw7YJzgym069fGDCVjvWwyICksw3uedgDK1wdjy3q9o8UXvAkbzRJrXo/s1600-h/TachikawaStudent.gif"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5302843255183994418" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 190px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 200px" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPm5bFodNvaqfCSf2gr4XRensWeK3XveaqhW42kRtm_sBhkB9c6iVSEC0iWUDqiA0Yzm5ic074tbx9GouCVLLTw7YJzgym069fGDCVjvWwyICksw3uedgDK1wdjy3q9o8UXvAkbzRJrXo/s200/TachikawaStudent.gif" border="0" /></a>, a hastily constructed group of cottages on land 30 miles from the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Tachikawa</span> Air Force Base purchased for just that purpose while housing and facilities to support dependant families were built on the base. We lived there, cheek by jowl, with 20 other families who arrived there on various ships that had arrived from San Francisco and Seattle. We lived there for 6 months before the building project was finished.</p><p align="justify">The new housing was a series of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">rowhouses</span>, 6 two-story apartments with a one-story apartments at each end of the structure for the enlisted <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">personnel</span> and single- family structures for the officers. Ironically enough, we lived right next to a fenced in structure where the base commander, a one-star general named <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Hudnell</span> lived. His son Billy was in my second grade class and I was welcome at his house. In his front yard was a meandering creek with foot bridges<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDXoAyEe_H1yC-wUKDURfzTpjd1fc4my62phHAUaxJUKH1P1lyydBfvtLMW9mfMXH6noe5zFvOeUO7YflfjTE6cQnWedy7R3vdktPen2xx0x62iJaLUHhy1WFYgN4eVK07fwQ-V7fzrJo/s1600-h/JAPAN.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5303251145735067266" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 158px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 250px" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDXoAyEe_H1yC-wUKDURfzTpjd1fc4my62phHAUaxJUKH1P1lyydBfvtLMW9mfMXH6noe5zFvOeUO7YflfjTE6cQnWedy7R3vdktPen2xx0x62iJaLUHhy1WFYgN4eVK07fwQ-V7fzrJo/s200/JAPAN.jpg" border="0" /></a> crossing with <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">koi</span> in the creek. A really beautiful place.</p><p align="justify">This was less than 10 years after the end of World War II and several hundred people had been displaced by the base and had constructed rude housing within walking distance from the base. They had ingenious ways of making money. They took beer cans, cut them open, producing small pieces of sheet metal which they bent into various items like trains and cars that they <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">handpainted</span> and sold to the base personnel. They also bought solid colored Christmas ornaments and hand painted them with scenes of Christmas and Santa Clauses and sold them too. It has been 50 years and we still have 20 or so of these ornaments as prized family possessions.</p><p align="justify">The Japanese nationals who lived in those structures had jobs on the base in different <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">capacities</span>, some worked as laborers for the military but many others worked as maids and gardeners for the people stationed there. Imagine enlisted personnel with a maid and gardener! This was a first for them.</p><p align="justify">We had a full-time maid who cooked and cleaned and provided day care because my mother worked as a bookkeeper for the NCO club. My mother was slightly paranoid and, whenever she couldn't find a small piece of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">jewelry</span> she used to call the maid a "<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">sneakthief</span>."</p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmUGa9hQkv9wXvm_j3lPs7woqDmYoNtmXw7BIo1x8I785a9JnzIhYZbZu0dIp5CUsmP5f34IEV6AL0ZnRj6oMYgQ71dvHK8O5FyawnlkKnrAVlQuu6Q3BPiwiYINOTqYZnmv9m0_y9FZs/s1600-h/TACHI+LADIES3.gif"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5303106188707090210" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 250px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 189px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmUGa9hQkv9wXvm_j3lPs7woqDmYoNtmXw7BIo1x8I785a9JnzIhYZbZu0dIp5CUsmP5f34IEV6AL0ZnRj6oMYgQ71dvHK8O5FyawnlkKnrAVlQuu6Q3BPiwiYINOTqYZnmv9m0_y9FZs/s200/TACHI+LADIES3.gif" border="0" /></a>I'm not sure if Betty-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">san</span> was a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">sneakthief</span> or not but we were forced to let her got when my mother caught my father taking pictures (without film) of Betty-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">san</span> topless! I was just old enough to have a glimmering of understanding of what was involved in that little escapade.Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-63516411347542598432009-01-16T17:46:00.000-08:002009-02-25T23:29:04.255-08:00WHAT CONDITION MY CONDITION IS IN<div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGH_56sUTT0iao_3kjpp7RbDvrf7vulF2goQ2jnCAXLn2lr465hyphenhyphenMxy3-dknlop3fVADegzMR37Ozw_S70oPHgKQP1uH4dJnMhU4d6C6mgjnGlag5PN1r_7F68ULzW4VhKHqofpFL9BSQ/s1600-h/SAC%2520sign.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5292271730284620274" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 263px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 154px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGH_56sUTT0iao_3kjpp7RbDvrf7vulF2goQ2jnCAXLn2lr465hyphenhyphenMxy3-dknlop3fVADegzMR37Ozw_S70oPHgKQP1uH4dJnMhU4d6C6mgjnGlag5PN1r_7F68ULzW4VhKHqofpFL9BSQ/s200/SAC%2520sign.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Forgive me Father for I have sinned, it has been nearly four months since my last post. Jesus, on how many levels can a nice Jewish boy like myself blaspheme!<br /><br />I continue to lurk and occasionally post on several different crossword blogs, particularly on Rex Parker's, if and when the spirit moves me, mixing pieces of my life when they intersect with things that are related to the puzzle at hand. I <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">couldn</span>' t resist when Minot North Dakota reared its head one day last week and a Commenter posted that his grandfather was a rabbi in that community in the 1910s and he couldn't imagine a Jewish enclave in that part of t<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicNA_GRhL9bCEUfXZ-Aoaw5PCFTe3YMv9fRW1AgQMDp5Q3MkIkl1M1wXJqDIIyDysPthQkxEikXMEmAG8YwNmY1_1RgszJZ8LCjFeqUcqJAKg_S5gsY96wZcJy5TfeLwTXYX7Ahs3a1eU/s1600-h/SAC+LOGO.png"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5292863533178039874" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 188px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 181px" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicNA_GRhL9bCEUfXZ-Aoaw5PCFTe3YMv9fRW1AgQMDp5Q3MkIkl1M1wXJqDIIyDysPthQkxEikXMEmAG8YwNmY1_1RgszJZ8LCjFeqUcqJAKg_S5gsY96wZcJy5TfeLwTXYX7Ahs3a1eU/s200/SAC+LOGO.png" border="0" /></a>he world.<br /><br />Well, it just so happens that I have first hand knowledge on that subject as that was where my family was stationed after we returned to the United States after spending five years in Japan as part of the US Occupation Forces. My father was a career military man in the Air Force and we were one of the first families to accompany a serviceman to the Orient in the 1950s.<br /><br />My father went over first and that left my mother, a 27 year old mother of three sons, ages 7 (me), 5 and 2 to get our household goods packed up, shipped to Japan, and to drive from Dover Delaware to Seattle Washington to meet the USS <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Gaffey</span>, a refurbished troop ship, and sail away with her three children to meet her husband in Yokohama Japan. All this in the pre-Interstate days in a 1952 Mercury. Not bad for a country girl from <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Easton</span> Maryland!<br /><br />After our tour of duty ended in 1958, the emphasis in the world had shifted from containing the Japanese<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqJ4k2fcEUiELj6beH2HNN9Az3S9oYK7ZfQ5z7JECLbeFVznul7ZNg8qJtVh-n-Ii47TXeucoeVaU6QIeDbuKfQydqtKLOA9LoFjcjI9EoAkVMYOR7GSUdI1KOKtrJj4GHojJNAq9ROgE/s1600-h/GI+JEW.gif"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5306355299807828882" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 200px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 155px" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqJ4k2fcEUiELj6beH2HNN9Az3S9oYK7ZfQ5z7JECLbeFVznul7ZNg8qJtVh-n-Ii47TXeucoeVaU6QIeDbuKfQydqtKLOA9LoFjcjI9EoAkVMYOR7GSUdI1KOKtrJj4GHojJNAq9ROgE/s200/GI+JEW.gif" border="0" /></a> to confronting the Russians. Since my father's area of expertise was aircraft <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">maintenance</span>, sending him to where the airplanes were made a lot of sense. Minot (the natives pronounced it MY-nut) Air Force Base was part of the nuclear umbrella that protected the United States. My family had spent the majority of our time on the East Coast which meant we were <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">surrounded</span> by Jews. We believed that being in the Upper Midwest would leave us cut-off from our people.<br /><br />We were right and wrong. The Jewish community was sparse, true, but, we found out, close-knit. We joined Temple Beth <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Israel</span> in nearby Eastwood Park and found people who were just like us - far from home and disconnected. The natives were sympathetic to our plight and friendly.<br /><br />This post was prompted by a random comment posted on <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">RexParker's</span> blog that sparked a memory.</div><br /><br /><div align="justify">Go figure. </div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-8275303990808266162008-09-26T18:21:00.000-07:002009-02-15T00:32:25.239-08:00RELAPSE CITY REDUX<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRMOI0F1BkrAFxScHRTZDgzTnaPxmI7zOCLG7LawCB9M7IsO7eeEvMsvDygxqhub7G_egFy2_w8f1hGv-FoAlM7yB33fJfuSRzYAED8HFyDuXit_ck1zSTDAuON-r0HX2VgUW2vOAO_CI/s1600-h/RELAPSE+CITY+REDUX2.gif"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5302936973867259666" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 165px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 163px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRMOI0F1BkrAFxScHRTZDgzTnaPxmI7zOCLG7LawCB9M7IsO7eeEvMsvDygxqhub7G_egFy2_w8f1hGv-FoAlM7yB33fJfuSRzYAED8HFyDuXit_ck1zSTDAuON-r0HX2VgUW2vOAO_CI/s200/RELAPSE+CITY+REDUX2.gif" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><div align="justify">Well, it continues<br /><br />My health continues to deteriorate. Over the last several weeks, I have lost the ability to concentrate on typing and my confusion continues to grow. My fingers are not cooperating.<br /><br />The funny thing is that my ability to do crossword puzzles remain. I am extremely proud of the fact that I am able to solve the Friday and Saturday NY Times crossword every week and have done so for a while. Anyone who knows the crossworld knows what an accomplishment this is. I don't say this to boast about my abilities as a solver but to demonsterate that I haven't lost my ability of mind, just my ability to express myself about the puzzles.<br /><br />I am an isolated individual. I have trouble walking and talking. And the ability to communicate about the NY Times puzzle, particularly through Rex Parker's blog, is important to me. Aside from my wife and two children, this is the only place where I can communicate. And now I have lost that. It has taken me a little over an hour to get this far along in this post and I am exhausted.<br /><br />I stopped timing myself a long time ago, more because I enjoy the <i>process</i> of doing the puzzles than being able to gloat over my time. Be assured that I don't begrudge Orange or the others for their speed - I just don't share their interest. I enjoy the puzzles My Way, the same way they do. However when it occurred to me that I was never going to be a serious competitor to Tyler Hinman, I lost interest in my times.<br /><br />When I was in college, I came to that same general conclusion about my abilities as a pool player and quit the game. Just quit. Number 1 or nothing! That was very short sighted of me. I don't intend to quit doing puzzles because of lack of speed.</div><br /><div align="justify"></div><br /><p>I'm rambling so I'll bring this post to a close. Goodbye for now. More later.</p>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-38695778941101741912008-06-29T08:47:00.000-07:002008-07-02T18:01:07.484-07:00FAREWELL LINDA G<div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigbUWlzeEzhYj_z3T2UFuKgH2W-YUajrhAhPKTx0j8jZpkORYaSzeAee2Mi3PUDDA98qwsaINptDTlgOhc7Yw6pfQ1EUXNOfQtDsbsAijSudqFdM-SZD-AgfdR5wmonv9xNEX-MUnwgRI/s1600-h/Linda+G+2.bmp"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5217465203331723490" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigbUWlzeEzhYj_z3T2UFuKgH2W-YUajrhAhPKTx0j8jZpkORYaSzeAee2Mi3PUDDA98qwsaINptDTlgOhc7Yw6pfQ1EUXNOfQtDsbsAijSudqFdM-SZD-AgfdR5wmonv9xNEX-MUnwgRI/s200/Linda+G+2.bmp" border="0" /></a> To the crossworld, Linda G wrote about the New York Times crossword puzzle every day in her blog <b>Madness ... Crossword and Otherwise</b> and, incidentally, about her family and her job. Or was it the other way around. We learned this week that she will no longer be able to continue her blog. She had gone into hiatus earlier this year and came back just a little shaky because job and family were more important to her than writing about crossword puzzles but that she would try to keep all three balls in the air at once. She apparantly lost that battle.</div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify">She used a photo of Ava Gardner as her avatar and, since I never met her, that is how I pictured her. A celebrity photo has never been put to better use.</div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify">I solve the Times puzzle every night before I go to bed and my first stop to check my answers was her blog. She was not one of those <b>Super Solvers</b> who blew through the puzzle in less than 5 minutes. As a matter of fact, I have no idea how long it took her to complete the puzzle - she never said. I learned the expression " I declare this puzzle solved" when she reached the end of the line and could not finish. This didn't happen often but enough to humanize her. I shamelessly appropriated the expression for myself .</div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify">I was introduced to some other blogs through her site, most particularly Robert Loy's <b>Green Genius</b> where he wrote about his family and country music, Anna Southward's <b>A View from my Window</b> where she presented her poetry and graphics (N.B.: <b>A Crossword Pantheon Moment</b> this blog) and Wendy's <b>I estivate, therefore I am</b> a blog about the music of the Boomer Generation and my youth.</div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify">So Goodbye Linda. I hardly knew ye. And every time I see Ava Gardner, I will think fondly of you.</div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-91656909059882218762008-06-21T20:22:00.000-07:002008-07-02T20:49:23.752-07:00RELAPSE CITY<div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB40Uv_emtf8E4V30CGZLrMhN4cfa8rPBALTMc5g0DLscjXSwpcjIniI6079YwSVz4IKg0bFokO2vwJGv4t367xzep1tVMkiuztkyBxOpfbof54_RHjkmOuuZXjaSbiy8v7iztByVz15Q/s1600-h/the+raven+2.bmp"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5214547241850907538" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB40Uv_emtf8E4V30CGZLrMhN4cfa8rPBALTMc5g0DLscjXSwpcjIniI6079YwSVz4IKg0bFokO2vwJGv4t367xzep1tVMkiuztkyBxOpfbof54_RHjkmOuuZXjaSbiy8v7iztByVz15Q/s320/the+raven+2.bmp" border="0" /></a> When I was a senior in high school, we were called upon to memorize 10 lines of poetry. Being something of a wiseass, I decided to do <b>The Raven</b> by Edgar Allan Poe which was considerably longer than 10 lines. When it was my turn to recite, I accomplished the feat with just a couple of stumbles. Most of the poem has stayed with me to this day. Oh, I can't recite all eighteen or so verses, but, if prompted, I can rattle off 15 or 20 lines.<br /></div><div align="justify">All this is apropos of one of the quirks of my Multiple Sclerosis. I say <b>My Multiple Sclerosis</b> because one of the real oddities of this disease is the nature of its symptoms. MS is a disease of brain lesions and how one is affected depends on just where on the brain the lesions are located. In my case, the left side of my brain has the lesions and I have generalized weakness on my right side and my speech center is affected.</div><div align="justify"> </div><div align="justify"> </div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify">I could very well be paralyzed or blind so, all things being equal, I got off lucky.</div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify">When I was first diagnosed, I had a real problem with talking and maintaining my balance. I was fond of saying I had to relearn how to walk and talk and crawl on my belly like a reptile. One of the first things that dawned on me was that reciting poetry and talking were two entirely different processes. I'm not sure why that occurred to me but it did. Perhaps you are aware that certain singers, such as Mel Tillis, stutter but have no problem singing because singing and reciting poetry are right brain processess and speaking is a left brain process.<br /></div><div align="justify">I figured out that I could talk with a minimum of trouble by memorizing wh<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi11Q0B_pdDn1JzQU8WpuEZGFWOqQZKADVYlt0XLCZYVH4B3puQsOSHUS3OuBHCkPHcv7l39zWq67MpkQjsbeQbyg8-UmD8p3FzvcNpBi_Tg-02LIePu7NhlcARkRuYwZkVPriFUMOksbU/s1600-h/the+raven.bmp"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5214550041766179346" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; WIDTH: 280px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 263px" height="398" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi11Q0B_pdDn1JzQU8WpuEZGFWOqQZKADVYlt0XLCZYVH4B3puQsOSHUS3OuBHCkPHcv7l39zWq67MpkQjsbeQbyg8-UmD8p3FzvcNpBi_Tg-02LIePu7NhlcARkRuYwZkVPriFUMOksbU/s320/the+raven.bmp" width="280" border="0" /></a>at I wanted to say, then saying it. That is a very exhausting enterprise but, to some extent, it works at least in the short run.</div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify">All of the above leads me to this: I had a relapse a couple of weeks ago and had to be hospitalized for a few days. My doctor stablilized me and I was released, on crutches and stuttering up a storm. I am an outpatient and am taking physical therapy for my balance and speech therapy for my speaking. When the brain lesions "heal" I will be back to "normal," whatever that is. </div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify">Anyway, I missed about a week of doing crossword puzzles but my doctor - who is also a fan of puzzles - tells me that returning to them is good therapy. So I am back.</div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-16485719287133637862008-05-11T10:12:00.000-07:002008-05-17T19:28:36.178-07:00A CROSSWORLD PANTHEON MOMENT<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2xGj32S1UHx0z4qA75VjuOUmUwvDGNDv9wJQTQJy2QSrsAtiAp1LM3_Vy4Gwwd6m6AC8fPVlS8I6PatwtujS3n2b858myezFVSQUSY_LyKzC1tC0WZGYDCJh3IMHiZb6iQpjH6CANtwc/s1600-h/CrossWorld2B.jpg"><span style="font-size:0;"></span><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5199179671110765298" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 226px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 223px" height="320" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2xGj32S1UHx0z4qA75VjuOUmUwvDGNDv9wJQTQJy2QSrsAtiAp1LM3_Vy4Gwwd6m6AC8fPVlS8I6PatwtujS3n2b858myezFVSQUSY_LyKzC1tC0WZGYDCJh3IMHiZb6iQpjH6CANtwc/s320/CrossWorld2B.jpg" width="39" border="0" /></a> We in the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">crossworld</span></span> are Word people. We like the look of them, the feel of them, the way they roll off our tongues. They are old friends.<br /><br /><p align="justify">Certain words tend to re-occur frequently in puzzles and are known to the community of solvers as "<span style="color:#cc0000;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">crosswordese</span></span></span>." They are usually 3 to 5 letters long and have more vowels than <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">consonants</span> which are helpful to those who actually construct puzzles.</p><p align="justify">Anna Southward has constructed a graphic that deliciously displays these words in a beautiful variation of a traditional crossword puzzle grid. Some of these like ABIE, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">ESAI, </span></span><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">ENO and EERO</span></span> are proper names unfamiliar to most people. And others like ASIA, EEL and TIARA are familiar to everyone.</p><p align="justify">Depending on how many of them show up in an individual puzzle, what they all have in common is the way they bring a fleeting smile or, perhaps, a grimace to the faces of those among us who work a lot of puzzles.</p><p align="justify">Anna's website is called "<span style="color:#cc0000;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">The View</span></span> From My Window</span>" and features not only graphics but poetry that illustrate the graphics. There is something about the interplay between the two, particularly in a haunted pair entitled "<span style="color:#993399;"><span style="color:#cc0000;">LIPS</span>."</span></p><div align="justify">It is a wonderful place to visit and I have done so many times. She describes her site as "random musings in words, pictures, and color. Just for fun." I am hoping the site will be updated soon as<em> </em>I am looking forward to seeing which direction her work is going to take.<br /><br /></div><p align="justify"><a href="http://windowview-annielee.blogspot.com/"><span style="color:#cc0000;">Here</span></a> is the link for you to visit for yourself. Enjoy</p>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-52696321968585252722008-04-23T15:55:00.000-07:002008-05-09T16:06:03.506-07:00CROSSWORDS REVISITED<div align="justify"></div><br /><div align="justify">Well, I am part of a community now. I am a regular contributor to Rex Parker's <a href="http://rexwordpuzzle.blogspot.com/"><span style="color:#ff0000;">blog</span></a> on the subject of crossword puzzles . As a result, the number of rules that I had no longer exist.<br /><br />Granted, I still use my trusty Cross pen. But the varying difficulty of the puzzles throughout the week obviate the need for some of the other rules. I am not as strict as<em> </em>I once was <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUu309MuraAwv_hD_Z8E8ddF4daLH91U67S80AQfPblVlm9-CTk6jBNVvgAB95NkKRxw2GJ6Nt7b_KsiM_ZPKDO2gshZvI1HT6fvdjz6uMT5BWWJOsmizA6p9zQ0xTzPtN1L3sAtw1gOI/s1600-h/Rex+Parker2.bmp"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5192823628064484290" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUu309MuraAwv_hD_Z8E8ddF4daLH91U67S80AQfPblVlm9-CTk6jBNVvgAB95NkKRxw2GJ6Nt7b_KsiM_ZPKDO2gshZvI1HT6fvdjz6uMT5BWWJOsmizA6p9zQ0xTzPtN1L3sAtw1gOI/s200/Rex+Parker2.bmp" border="0" /></a>on where I start. The difficulty of the Friday and Saturday puzzles forced me to try to find a toehold anyplace within the body of the puzzle. I still use my trusty Cross pen for Sundays when I still do it in the newspaper.<br /><br />Tradition, don't you know.<br /><br />I like the idea of being able to discuss puzzles with others. We are all language mavens to some extent or another. I like being part of this community which is mostly about language itself and reading the comments of other solvers is truly a wonderful thing.</div><br /><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify">The tangents we go off on!</div><br /><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify">During this past week there was a discussion on the need for a new word to describe what I like to call meta-cluing, that is a clue that points to the language of the clue itself rather than what the clue describes. Recently we had a clue which was <span style="color:#cc0000;">BIT OF COCOA</span>? and the answer was <span style="color:#cc0000;">SILENT A</span>, which is an example of this kind of cluing.</div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify">So, come on over if you have an urge to participate - or just lurk around the edges - of a spirited discussion of our native tongue!</div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify"></div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-85956029450575392582008-02-25T16:18:00.000-08:002008-02-28T11:10:07.470-08:00GOOD FRIDAY TORNADO 1974On Good Friday of 1974, a string of tornados swept through the Midwest causing millions of dollars in property damage and taking several lives. I was living in Louisville KY at the time and, ironically enough, was in the mobile home financing business.<br /><br />There may be some things more susceptible to wind damage than mobile homes but I’d be hard pressed to think of what they might be.Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-17536294474864280872008-02-19T09:18:00.000-08:002008-02-19T09:34:02.926-08:00STATE OF MY HEALTHOne of the nicest things about having a blog is the ability to run off at the mouth about anything that pops into my head. Today, it is atrial fibrilation.<br /><br />Several years ago, I had a bout of this and was hopitalized for a week. It was shortly after my diagnosis of MS and they were taking no chances. I was stabilized and released.<br /><br />It is back.<br /><br />Due to my stress level, I was put on Coumidin and am having blood work done every week. My financial position precludes them from hospitalizing me again.<br /><br />More about my stress level and financial situation later.Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-38742696197446236912008-02-15T17:57:00.000-08:002008-02-16T11:13:16.523-08:00THEATER OF HUMILIATION REDUX<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzFXd3FPlA511ajbfnjbHbJQRUZT_QhNx44yMBzQvM9K7DUifr5XEaSdnJHX6HGG8i0dc_izQWYm7emlTcY2j3m42ftBFLSZ8R-CVd6tEPGwmiLnjtt85LVpokjSaV8GDSqqgTpR6oR9o/s1600-h/alan+burke2.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5167403390623841538" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzFXd3FPlA511ajbfnjbHbJQRUZT_QhNx44yMBzQvM9K7DUifr5XEaSdnJHX6HGG8i0dc_izQWYm7emlTcY2j3m42ftBFLSZ8R-CVd6tEPGwmiLnjtt85LVpokjSaV8GDSqqgTpR6oR9o/s200/alan+burke2.jpg" border="0" /></a>I am not a fan of Dress Bets. You know, those sports bets you make that, when you lose, you have to wear a dress or something equally ridiculous. I never understood the need to belittle another person for sport. <div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify">And yet, this sort of thing abounds on Television today and has always been a part of Our Nation's viewing pleasure. Alan Burke, Joe Pyne, The Gong Show, American Idol - all a part of our shared experience. To write this off as "morbid curiosity" misses the point. I think something deeper is at work here but , for the life of me, I don't know what it is. Right-wing talk radio is part of this phenomenon. </div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-12154239864951590162008-02-15T07:06:00.001-08:002008-07-30T19:16:50.002-07:00MULTIPLE SCLEROSIS<div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7kEqMHq5d5bbsmIQb7Ioui4dZNfNTZ1EUf-yx2WhFBK9sw1MkEHgcW8UHGHeN-G2JnbHAl9h6UK2lUUM30Sz2363sSWvq3vRY7JMWrZbwkyXJ9pP7Wa4PeNVRK45bi65rYyDe1xRd6xw/s1600-h/911+Tourist+guy.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5167313252145200354" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 548px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 276px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" height="276" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7kEqMHq5d5bbsmIQb7Ioui4dZNfNTZ1EUf-yx2WhFBK9sw1MkEHgcW8UHGHeN-G2JnbHAl9h6UK2lUUM30Sz2363sSWvq3vRY7JMWrZbwkyXJ9pP7Wa4PeNVRK45bi65rYyDe1xRd6xw/s400/911+Tourist+guy.jpg" width="455" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br />On Sunday, September 9, 2001, I was doing the NYT crossword puzzle while my family was at breakfast. I solved it in 41 minutes, a record time for me on a Sunday puzzle. I couldn't wait for my family to get home so I could tell someone.<br /><br />When they finally got home, I discovered I was unable to speak clearly enough to make myself understood. When I tried to stand up, my right foot flopped around. (<em>I later learned this</em> <em>condition is called drop foot</em>). I didn't know what was happening but I chalked the whole thing up to fatigue as I wasn't working at the time and was having trouble sleeping.<br /><br />On Monday, September 10, my right leg was no longer under my control and I had to make my way from the bedroom to the living room by holding on to the furniture. I called my doctor's office and was unable to communicate well enough to make myself understood. I handed my wife the phone and she told the nurse what had been happening and, all at once, one word came to my mind - <em>STROKE!</em></div><div align="justify"><em><br /></em>The doctor's office told my wife to get me to the hospital immediately which she did. By this time, my condition was worsening. I was unable to get out of the car and had lost the ability to talk .<br /><br />The rest of the day was spent in an almost endless series of tests. One of the first of them eliminated the possibility of a stroke which seemed like good news at the time. Meanwhile, my mental confusion grew.<br /><br />The next morning, Tuesday, September 11, 2001, I was taken to Radiology for more tests. By this time, I was not able to concentrate at all. I seemed to be in and out of active consciousness.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9FrgTPuVgPVzep-ZwFoSS07JX8EzAzksh86VaVkH7wZpwXwLSwNUbvRq2RKC5PC6DHbucjvSBYw8bvkdG34wQNjVvY_MkOL2Hs-hZJtQUHZAr8LpWRqEa8199m2buSfyzIdqTDHqQAAU/s1600-h/world-trade-center-dvd-poster.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5167313539908009202" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 142px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 208px" height="33" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9FrgTPuVgPVzep-ZwFoSS07JX8EzAzksh86VaVkH7wZpwXwLSwNUbvRq2RKC5PC6DHbucjvSBYw8bvkdG34wQNjVvY_MkOL2Hs-hZJtQUHZAr8LpWRqEa8199m2buSfyzIdqTDHqQAAU/s200/world-trade-center-dvd-poster.jpg" width="142" border="0" /></a>What I do remember was the hustle and bustle of a busy hospital on a Tuesday morning and, curiously, people talking about airplanes and the World Trade Center. I remember thinking about the plane that had crashed into the Empire State Building back in the 30s.<br /><br />Then<em> </em>I became aware of silence. There didn't seem to be any people close at hand. I was hooked up to a machine and I could hear voices dimly buzzing at a distance. I learned later that all the staff went into the waiting room when the second plane hit. As I drifted in and out, I tried to make some sense out of what I <em>was </em>hearing<em>, a </em>jumble of dull urgency and some anger and a new thought entered my mind - <em><span style="color:#006600;">terrorism</span></em>.<br /><br />I awoke and was back in my room.</div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-11797563562085860832008-02-14T11:38:00.000-08:002008-02-15T16:18:52.419-08:00I LIKE TO WATCH - PART II<div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisPJXmWnU23pDBF2urrRhwvLh8Enezv-xW9TR4IJoeEXFLreqkqns4H-4eICz95wcUDlmMXA_yhq3As7jRcUeJsEw6K_7OE_47WNkS9ODk4P-0pXX6BJhf24ysTch0wIoUOxLTNPnArr8/s1600-h/QFAD2.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5166923629891976338" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisPJXmWnU23pDBF2urrRhwvLh8Enezv-xW9TR4IJoeEXFLreqkqns4H-4eICz95wcUDlmMXA_yhq3As7jRcUeJsEw6K_7OE_47WNkS9ODk4P-0pXX6BJhf24ysTch0wIoUOxLTNPnArr8/s400/QFAD2.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="color:#000000;">I do not watch reality shows. In any form. I have never watched American Idol, Survivor or any of their clones.</span><br /></div><div align="justify">I call programs of this sort <span style="font-family:times new roman;font-size:180%;color:#ff0000;"><em>Theater of Humiliation</em></span>.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000000;">In the 50's there were shows like Queen for a Day and The Alan Pyne Show that my mother enjoyed watching. <span style="font-family:courier new;font-size:130%;color:#ff0000;"><strong>Queen for a Day</strong></span> was on at 4 o'clock in the afternoon and my mother insisted that I watch it with her. It was her favorite show and I</span> <span style="color:#ff0000;">HATED</span> it</div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-1164556587284356422008-02-13T15:57:00.000-08:002008-05-09T16:07:59.860-07:00CROSSWORD PUZZLES<div align="justify"></div><div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuph8cVaOyPzkdSTTIKJhNFOl15EC9QeVP4os-L9wVIosMfidstV3517P4udOmvMpAYgash3jhlYcgTUqQAuMCy8rpVMipzZdKAOCWXlZjbzNeBIo9x1qiWGMHJuOH5s8EE222dXloFuE/s1600-h/Cross+Pen+logo.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5166624085987851282" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuph8cVaOyPzkdSTTIKJhNFOl15EC9QeVP4os-L9wVIosMfidstV3517P4udOmvMpAYgash3jhlYcgTUqQAuMCy8rpVMipzZdKAOCWXlZjbzNeBIo9x1qiWGMHJuOH5s8EE222dXloFuE/s200/Cross+Pen+logo.jpg" border="0" /></a>I like to do crossword puzzles. No, I <span style="color:#ff6600;">LOVE</span> to do crossword puzzles. I started doing the daily puzzle in the Washington Post when I was about 10 years old and was absolutely thrilled when I first finished one. I graduated to the New York Times Sunday puzzle about 10 years later.</div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify">Crosswords are the most idiosyncratic of pursuits because of their solitary nature. Over the years I have developed <span style="color:#ff6600;">"rules"</span> for solving: I do them in pen, my trusty gold Cross pen my father gave me for my high school graduation. I must start at the very top or I don't start at all. I do not go below the lowest point I have reached in the puzzle. I do not look up answers.</div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify">In the last 15 years I have totally completed the NYT Sunday puzzle all but a handful of times.</div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify">My personal best time is 41 minutes for the Sunday puzzle and 3:45 for a daily one.</div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify">More about Puzzles at another time.</div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-76416921767493303672008-02-13T11:03:00.000-08:002008-02-15T15:52:19.132-08:00I LIKE TO WATCH<div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkMoAE3qap9U1ekHOq_QazJLPFJSSegDfSGgbCemrbI55wt64A7i-6rQrepvU9V0hset9Z4brAwZhdjDe6mJyDjq-JwwzxyKZaJiIfZ88NYC8Rrru2p7tE6FqgYbJLM2LTbIB8A28rNpY/s1600-h/television-painting.gif"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5166546948375215042" style="FLOAT: left; MARGIN: 0px 10px 10px 0px; WIDTH: 150px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 149px" height="142" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkMoAE3qap9U1ekHOq_QazJLPFJSSegDfSGgbCemrbI55wt64A7i-6rQrepvU9V0hset9Z4brAwZhdjDe6mJyDjq-JwwzxyKZaJiIfZ88NYC8Rrru2p7tE6FqgYbJLM2LTbIB8A28rNpY/s200/television-painting.gif" width="150" border="0" /></a></div><div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkMoAE3qap9U1ekHOq_QazJLPFJSSegDfSGgbCemrbI55wt64A7i-6rQrepvU9V0hset9Z4brAwZhdjDe6mJyDjq-JwwzxyKZaJiIfZ88NYC8Rrru2p7tE6FqgYbJLM2LTbIB8A28rNpY/s1600-h/television-painting.gif"></a>Frankly I think I watch TV way too much. I AM disabled so I can excuse it to myself but, if the TV is off, it seems to be staring at me.<br /><br />I watch as many <span style="color:#ff0000;">LAW & ORDER</span><span style="color:#000000;">'s</span> as I can but only the Original not CI or SVU. In a curious way, the characters seem to be family and I enjoy them.<br /><br />Now that I think of it, I really do watch too much television </div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513514544610265492.post-12151881018963270382008-02-13T06:05:00.000-08:002008-02-15T16:35:34.288-08:00OH, AND ANOTHER THING . . .<div align="justify"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipyJC3Fhsteju_HhcKR-2GJlzEXziYTeHN2FL00glbmS1PVvmu7MhUWqthR_d0xNRF5zteFtKKwVCbucsIXfn8s9mxaDmDFpSvdLVhurP2EJy857mlvuF2MhxkWSrVM7GvGBwTNVxPjMY/s1600-h/jail-cartoon.thumbnail.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5166938155471371474" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipyJC3Fhsteju_HhcKR-2GJlzEXziYTeHN2FL00glbmS1PVvmu7MhUWqthR_d0xNRF5zteFtKKwVCbucsIXfn8s9mxaDmDFpSvdLVhurP2EJy857mlvuF2MhxkWSrVM7GvGBwTNVxPjMY/s400/jail-cartoon.thumbnail.jpg" border="0" /></a> I think I am just talking to myself here.<br /></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify">I would like to add this tidbit. In my former life as an accountant I was convicted of embezzling $35,000 and sent to Delaware State Prison. I was sentenced to 7 years but only served 4 months and was released on parole as they had no room for me at the jail. </div><div align="justify"><br /></div><div align="justify"></div><div align="justify">All this happened more than 20 years ago</div>Bill from NJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10103923612595508277noreply@blogger.com0