The absolute absurdity of it all. You could say this little “nugget” is truly my “Life in a nutshell”… The next time someone tells you there’s a plan to all this… “there’s a reason for everything…” tell them Dale say... BAH, HUMBUG!

Personally, I blame that verbose, oversold wanna-be “novelist” Nicolas Sparks for giving us ridiculous sentiment like this. Give them this little story, because maybe… just maybe, life is about as arbitrary as it gets….

On the way home today, as I’m leaving my usual parking spot in front of my work, I’m happily enjoying the prospect of doffing my Walmart brand necktie and thinking about making a nice chopped salad and seeing how that buffalo ranch and chicken might taste… along with a couple of cold, Cerveceria Modelo Mexico-s. (Trump wall or no wall).

As I round the corner from Iowa avenue to Vine Street, I hear this terrible screeching sound… like someone spinning their tires around a corner. I quickly stopped at the stop sign, and looked all around me, expecting some hot rod to flame out around me (well, it was near the High School, and one expects things like that occasionally). But, there was no one. No one in front, behind or on either side of me. I continue to make my right-hand turn….and that earsplitting screech came back.

I realized with horror the sound was coming from what sounded like under my hood. Immediately I thought the worst! My engine had just blown up! Um… no. There were no “imminent engine failure” lights (A “feature” of BMW’s I found. Apparently, rich folk like to know when they engines’ burn up…). I stopped, and everything seemed normal. Gas, had gas…. Flux Capacitator… um, fluxing.

I turned the wheel, and I heard the faint squeak, and I knew that it was 1. Me. And 2. Related to the wheels. Great! It’s probably some power steering belt. (Adding up the cost for a mini-Cooper Serpentine belt, minus the national debt, plus the square root of pi = ah, crap! I’m broke!) I decided the best course of action is to not stop the car, and continue driving as long as the car will move… and try to get home.

However, as I’m driving… I revise my self-diagnosis. It appears the problem must be related to the tires, or the breaks, as the squawking appears only when the car is in motion. It does get worse when turning corners. Ah-hah! I think, it is the breaks! It sounds like when your disc brakes are at the end of life, and give you that little warning “squeak.” But, this was no squeak. This was a definite squawk.. Possibly more like a squeal!

Calculating how much new front disc brakes on a mini will cost… I sadly think my last reserves of savings soon to be depleted. Possibly, I could find someone local to fix breaks. However, there were few, if any local mechanics that are willing to change the oil on my jalopy… how would the break thing go? (Replaying several scenes from the movie “Doc Hollywood.”)

As I pull into my usual parking spot in front of my apartment, I decide I will take a hard look at the front wheels. It seemed the sound was definitely coming from the driver side front… and was fully expecting to see smoke, or possibly calipers dangling from under the car.

Why the picture of the walnut? This is what I found lodged in the right, front disc break of the tire. Seems some squirrel decided this would be a great place to hide his prized walnut, while awaiting the winter solstice. The entire unearthly sound was caused by a walnut, lodged between the tire and the brake, and was rubbing against the disc as the tire was rotating.

After prying the nut with a long screwdriver, it was freed from its mechanical prison. Hoping no damage was done to the breaks, I took the car for a drive and observed no ill effects.

Problem solved. Deep breath! And I had a very, very long laugh.

A Pocket Full Of Lonesome.   The Pre-Extended Play (EP) CD of the Project:  The Whole Shebang! 

The CD consists of these song:

Intro-Motif

Bang on Those Things

Midlife Crisis

Could be Scary

I Need a Drink

Left her in La Valle

Put ‘er there

They Call me Lonesome…

Driving to Vegas. 

The first song is called “Intro-Motif” as I believe all epic journeys should have an introduction.  I would like to think of this project as just that, a journey.  A Motif is by dictionary definition:  (noun) A recurring subject, theme, idea, etc., especially in a literary, artistic, or musical work.

Here, the motif is a song called “My Checkered Past… having the time of my life.”  I imagine this song as two lovers, aged and sitting on the porch arguing about he having to go off…and leaving her alone… to do the thing that he loves;  In this case, of course, playing music.  However, you could assign this story to almost any good story. 

I think of the movie, Casablanca… where the battered and weary, cynical character of Rick (Bogart) in that moment when he finally gives away his heart… and go off to fight the evil Nazis, and leaves his one true love behind to the man that loves her (that she does not), so that he can finally do that thing that makes him a true citizen of the world. 

Well, the theme here is about someone that is world-weary… heartbroken in so many ways… still finds the will to fight on, in spite of his flaws, to be the person he was meant to be.  I love that sort of story, more than nearly any other…  

"come on home, she says…

You’re too old to play,

But I’m having the time of my life.

Life is a tragedy, Love is a fantasy,

But I’m having the time of my life.

The world’s growing colder,

And I’m getting older,

I have no other choice…. 

A time of my life… “

The song to be featured on the CD, The Whole Shebang, will include the entire song… which will be the longest of them all.  It will have the intro (from here)…  a short piano interlude, and then a really hard… and heavy guitar Jam…  Finally, the Latin-inspired finality of the song.  I think this will be my favorite of the project…  I finally get to create an entire musical movement.  At least, that’s my fervent hope!

The next six songs will be essentially the same on the final project.  There might be the entire “scary” intro included, which is a good two-minutes and forty-five seconds long… and frankly, it kinda really scared me.  Don’t listen to it in the dark and alone… it really will give you the creeps…  (Hint, it features the words: Radioactive sodium Isotopes from a scared radio announcer). 

This part: Pocketful of Lonesome represents some of the older songs in my catalog… written around the period of 2000-2013 (or earlier).  Most of these songs are well established, and edited over a long period of time.  Some have been through several alterations.  The Bang those things song, for example, was much different, and included a few naughty phone messages from lady friends… which had nothing to do with banging on drums. 

The song “Could be Scary” was a song I re-did from the age of a band called “Prophet” from the 1979-81 years of my life.  The words were written by Kenny Lange (then, the drummer for the band), and the music I wrote.  I always wanted to re-imagine the song and add my own touches to it, and decided to just go ahead and record it.  This one is my favorite, sonically, on the project.

I included the acoustic version of “I need a drink,” which was originally done on the Checkered Past release in 1998.  I changed around some of the words, and made the arrangement my own.  This one without the drums…  but, I did keep the funky bass lines… added a harmonica, and what I hoped sounded like a blues-dobro-ish slide guitar.  It is about drinking, after all. 

Left her in La Valle, is based on a true story.  There really is a town called La Valle, Wisconsin.  Quaint small town along a beautiful bicycle trail… and a nice little wayside called “The Trail Break”  which has (and I swear this is true), the best thin-style pizza on the planet. 

The song “Put ‘er There” is a re-do of a song I had written for a movie-project for Ka-tet films of Madison, WI.  The movie short was called “One Night Only.” The movie was written by my favorite bard, and good friend, Scott Rawson.  

I included the songs “They call me Lonesome…”  from  my other CD release done in 2003.  I re-mixed the song and decided to include it here.

Also the same for the last song… a musical called “Driving to Vegas.”  I wrote the song not long after some very good friends and I took a long road trip to Las Vegas for nothing more than fun and adventure. 

I included an intro to this song which is very special to me.  The intro will be separate on final project…as the song will be re-done too. 

The intro was recorded sometime in the winter of 1975, at a talent contest held at the Sauk City (Wisconsin) High School gymnasium.  I was 16 years old at the time.  I sang a song, solo, by Ringo Starr called “It don’t Come Easy.”  And another musician friend of mine’s mother (unknown to me at the time) recorded the whole show.  Many, many years later, I received a cassette tape in the mail right around Christmas.  No return address.  I played the tape, and the entire show, including the intro was caught on a crude, bad-sounding personal tape machine. 

I still have the tape… I cleaned up the audio as best I could, and decided to include it here.  The musician friend of mine that so thoughtfully sent me the present died of a heart attack before I got a chance to thank him. 

Newer Stuff:

The 2^nd half of the project will be newer songs… perhaps not as developed as the first ones.  It seems like these songs will be much darker and more cynical than the first batch.  I think this is due to my perception of the world becoming darker…and myself become older.  And less willing to change… 

There are a few exceptions, I hope.  One song I’m working on is actually about a sex toy.  Yes, I went there.  It’s called “The Little Red Rocket.” And I have a pretty catchy chorus already…  I have not noted it on the “planned project.”  But I like the concept and the music so much (very much rockin’) that I might have to include it.  I’m hoping I can employ a lady friend of mine to supply some much needed vocals on the chorus.

Same for a song I’ve been working for years..  at the request of a friend of mine.  She reminded me there are no good rock songs about “Debby”   So, I’ve been steadily working on a rockabilly-style song called “Lil’ Debby” (after the desert, of course). 

The song “Ipso Facto Recoil” started out as an instrumental… but I put a fairly Armageddon-like story behind it… and a happy guitar lick, immediately becomes a scary song.  It’s a story about a possible Presidential Candidate that decides he wants to end the world… 

Ipso Facto, stupid mutha-f***ers,

Push the button and the sky. Turns. Red.

Ispo Facto, call it Armageddon,  

Kiss your babys, you’ll be better off dead.

And also, I’m working on a song called “The 3^rd day of my sobriety.”  Which is about a man that decides he’s going to battle his addiction.  He makes it to six months before…  well, I’ll let you figure that out.  Dark, indeed.

(Being Single Sucks!)  


Okay.. so, no... I'm glad that you said a big NO to going out with me.. even if it was to a minor type date..(nice dinner and maybe a movie)  and I thank you for at least being honest.  And not like most of the women I've contacted here... that tell me we will meet up... and then make excuses at the last moment. 

Here's the thing.  I'm not really attracted to you, either.  I'm really looking for a "little people" kind of woman.  Someone under 4 foot and 11 inches tall...  sort of a circus-freak kind of girl.  And especially, if she's been involved in, like.. the adult film industry..  Yeah, that's what I'm looking for.  

And, sorry to say.. that is not you.  So, we are all good. 

I hope you find the guy you're looking for.. and meanwhile, we shall continue onward...  

The Greatest Lies:  2016 edition.

I’m from the Government.  I’m here to help.

We will work in a bipartisan manner. 

I did not have sex with that woman. 

I promise I’ll pull out.

We did not plagiarize that speech!  

Crappy T-shirts:

Oh, Lord. Help me… I have become the OLD MAN BACHELOR. I’ve recently noticed I very much enjoy my old, hole-ly, quickly-disintegrating “work out T-shirts.” I’ve discovered this while doing laundry. I have more crappy workout shirts than I do the requisite Polo and golf variety that more becomes my age. – Let’s face it, when you step lightly over 50-something, those Iron Maiden tour shirts that look brand new are a definite scream for intervention.Still, I’d like to think I’m still a step or two away from when they write my name in the collar, so that leaves little in choice of home-casual attire.

As long as I’m not wading out in public (Good heavens, like that would make any difference amongst the hoi polloi and Donald Trump supporters), I slip on my old Wisconsin T-shirt I once absconded from my then-GF, Melinda (Sorry Mel, it’s about all I have left to remember you by) and I feel great! There’s little left of the shirt, really… in fact, it sort of reads: W con n, now.

That shirt, my old 505 blue jeans, a turntable full of scratchy Glen Miller songs, a laptop full of words I’m assembling in some sort of order I’d like to someday call “A Novel,” and a glass of tart orange juice, picks me up on a cloudy, soupy rainy Saturday morning.

This is 1st draft excerpt from the introduction to my proposed Novel (Working title) 

I am dead. 

The “books” from this novel so far are: 

Sunday afternoons with Death (Intro) 

Missed Deadline

That time when I died

A time of Faust and Roses

Sunday afternoon with death.

Death and taxes. Inescapable. Formidable. Regrettable.

Death. It’s going to happen to all of us. There is no escape. Everyone we know. Our families. Our friends. Ourselves. We will all one day die. Pass from this plane of existence. (as it says in the Bible: “Sleep with Kings”) So, why can we not talk about it? Why can’t we lift the darkened vale just a bit to peer underneath?

Sometimes I think I should have been an undertaker.  “Undertaker,” now there’s an odd word, if ever.  Well, the reason I think I should have been one is my odd, nearly morbid….not obsession….more like, fascination (and that isn’t quite right, either) with the big D.  Anyone that has a real obsession with death should probably get some sort of help through a professional.  No, for me it’s that death, in all his personas and I have been….and not quite the word…. “acquaintances” since I was very young. 

Let’s get this part out of the way, right now.  No, I’m not a Wikken, Warlock or Satanist….or anything “ist.” I don’t sit around with skulls in my living room.  I’m not agnostic, nor atheist.  I’m a devoted follower of God and the Bible.  I believe that Jesus Christ is my savoir.  To me, it’s the only thing that makes sense, in a topic that has no sense.

I believe in heaven and hell…. However, that last part is a little tricky… and maybe we’ll get to that later.  Before anyone climbs on my back about any of this.. These are my beliefs.  They don’t require you to believe as I do, or even agree.  I’m just making a statement here, so as you know where I am coming from, religiously. 

Okay, where was I? Oh, yah…  young boy: 

My mutual acquaintances with death began at a very early age. I remember I was very young, but I think at least 9 or 10. My bedroom was just off from our kitchen area downstairs. I awoke to my father making terrible retching sounds in the other room. I rose from my warm bed and put on my rabbit slippers and shuffled into the kitchen.

There I saw my father bent over the sink and throwing up into the chrome kitchen sink. I can still hear the terrible sounds he made. He looked over and saw me looking at him (probably with wide saucer-eyes… because in them he was like Superman, Spiderman, Batman and Albert Einstein all wrapped into one) and he wiped his mouth with a handkerchief. Yes, men back then used those.

He spoke in a groggy voice that I shouldn’t be up and should get back to bed. I told him I was scared. He wiped his mouth again and I remember he smiled at me and then took me back to my bedroom and tucked me back into bed.

I asked him if he was going to die. “No, I’m not going to die. Well, someday I will. But not for a very very long time.”

That night I couldn’t sleep because I kept thinking my dad was going to die and leave me with my mother. You see my time with my dad was always short but nice. He was always doing stuff… fixing things; televisions, radios, the car in the back yard, the roof on the garage. But he was always away working. As you can tell, my dad was my favorite.

As things turned out he did die only a few years after this. I was 13.

And that year (my year of “death” as I called it, but it may have been more than one year) was a cruel one for sure. I had found our pet cat dead and frozen solid in our garage one of those cold winter mornings. My dog was run over by a truck while chasing me as I was crossing the busy main street in Reedsburg. And my pet hamster finally gave up the ghost after spinning in his wheel for 3 long (screeching) years.

After my dad, there was my Grandmother. Sweetest, gentlest, cooking-est, little Swedish lady you would have ever known. Then of course Danny. The very first close friend caught it coming home from a party in Loganville.  We were barely 16. He and another friend of mine hit the end of a bridge abutment on hilly highway 23 and nearly split the truck he was driving in half.  My other friend lived, but Danny did not.  I miss Danny even after all these years. 

Then it seems as if life sailed along, with me mostly involved in me. School.  Music. Guitars. Girls.  Marriage.  My son was born and then everything was all about him…and diapers… and formula…and babysitters….and toys…. And Christmas… 

We were all too busy growing up to worry about such life and death matters.  And it Seemed to me, that part passed by so fast.  As the old folks (such as myself) like to say, "in the wink of an eye."  

Then, invariably….  Death came knocking again. This time stronger. Closer. More insistent. Like an old wolf at the door, “I have left thee alone as thee hast wished… but now I must do my work.”

First there was Cindi… best friend of my wife (and if I were to be honest, one of mine too) lost in Mississippi, reportedly the victim of crime. I never could find out what happened to her. Then it was friends of friends. Then their parents. A car accident here. A little cancer there….

(To be continued) 

Hogsback trail and Vampire Valley -The Curious Disappearance of Jeremy Morton

Reader: I was not a man that believed in ghost stories.  I was what you might call “true unbeliever.”  Even when I was a kid, sitting around the campfire with my two older brothers and younger sister as they tried their best to scare me.  When they told me about the by-now overdone bloody hook hung from the handle of the passenger-side door story, I just laughed at them. 

I never thought much about UFO’s, ghosts, the supernatural, or anything the goes bump in the night.  For me, a straight as an arrow Police recruit, the only malevolence I ever saw was in the heart of evil men.  That is, before I spent the last two years digging into a supposed closed case of Jeremy Morton.  It was four years ago, and two before I took over the reins of the Reeseville, Indiana police department that he had disappeared. 

I'm sure you heard about it at the time.  It was in all the papers.  We even had the television people come down to visit us for a spell.  

This is the entire text, handwritten and found on a park bench two years ago.  

To whom it may concern,   

It’s been one long, strange trip from here to there and back here again. 

As I sit on the park bench, I’m staring straight ahead to the entrance of the bike trail.  There’s a large wooden sign right next to me.  It has arrows on it: This way to the Business District, this way to the municipal pool and camping; that way to Hogsback state trail.

I watch as a young couple disappears into the trees that overhang the trail.  Blissfully they peddle off on a sunny Sunday afternoon.  I sigh.

I have yet to work up the courage to ride that trail again.  I can’t even bring myself to ride a bike yet.  The Doctors tell me I have to be careful, you know?  Brain injury and all.  I haven’t yet, but right now I’m trying to get everything scribbled in this old notebook.   It’s like trying to remember the dream you had last night before it all fades away. Though the dream was so real, it dwindles more and more with time.  But this was no dream.  I still say it was real.  I know it was real. 

But I’m also thinking of her, the love of my life…. lives; Clarissa Saunders Morton. But I have to make sure I have this down on paper before I completely lose it.  When we first met she said “Say my name again: It’s Clarissa.” 

Her name sounded like warm summer rain drops splashing against a window pane.  I close my eyes for a moment.  

Sorry.

I don’t care what the Doctors here in 2017 say.  I know in my heart that I had lived with Clarissa for thirty five joyful years.  She was my wife. We raised a family, two boys.  We kept a farm and raised chickens and cows.  We cultivated wheat and corn.  We had horses and loved to dance together at the carriage Inn which was just across the field from our home.  The year was 1887.