Tussit Chronicles 110925
It is another Sunday morning. Wake up and live. After I get moving, I look for something to put on my blog. The idea is to do as little work as possible. This is the guiding principle of the universe … nature will find a way to do a chore with as little effort as possible. With the blog, enlightened laziness means an archive post with few links. Many of these links need to be revived using the internet archive. This process is painfully close to being work.
This is November, which means 30 days of dead. Somebody puts up a Grateful Dead download every day in November. For years I faithfully downloaded every one, only to realize that a substantial percentage were crap. This is the dirty truth about the GD. For all the ethereal vibes, there is a lot of boring crap. … I listened to deadhead babbling before I got to see them. That night at the Omni was late 1973, post PigPen, definitely after the glory days of the band. Of course, I kept trying.
Truckin’ – New Speedway Boogie is the TDOD offering for today, and it sucks. Which is a shame. I like those two songs. A love song for the Altamont concert, what’s not to like? Still, this rendition is clearly from the later days of the band, and just doesn’t have the Jerry juice that the faithful demand. I was going to say that Deadheads live for, but that wouldn’t have made any sense.
The GD were originally the Warlocks, but had to change it because of someone else using the name. It is one to the freakydeaky parts of rock mythology that Lou Reed was also calling his band the Warlocks, and had to rebrand. What if Pigpen had come to rehearsal with an S&M novel, and decided to call his band the Velvet Underground? Or Andy Warhol saw the future of hard drugs, and decided to call his band the Great Dead Junkies. We will just never know.
Three posts from the November archive were considered today. Thanksgiving Letter is from Margaret and Helen. They were a blog sensation in 2005 … these old ladies from Texas who sent folksy posts about their liberal politics and bacon grease. The last M&H post was October 2024, JD Vance thinks bullet proof glass will abortion proof our vaginas.
In 2016, there was a lot of noise being made about Donald J. Trump. While some of it was true, a great deal of it was total nonsense. There was this tsunami of negativity about the orange haired wonder. After a while, it got tough to tell what was true, what was true but you gotta understand, and what was total bullshit. Then I came across one item that was easy to debunk, but which was widely believed by the Hillary Happy Public. This item was the notion that DJT was endorsed by the KKK.
Of course DJT won the election, and America melted down. The various media actors were lamenting the normalization of caucasian stupidity supremacy. One episode in our national reality show was an article in the New York Times about a man in Ohio named Tony Hovater. He enjoyed being white entirely too much. It is only the last part of the second article that I saw the missing piece of the puzzle. Mr. Hovater ranting about the federal reserve. I realized that this was not a threat to america. Instead, this was the guy in the break room who will not shut up and get to work.
The pearl clutchers said that the NYT took what was dangerous and made it seem normal. This put the future of democracy at risk. The truth was the opposite. Tony Hovater is normal and boring, and the NYT tried to make him look exotic and dangerous. … Mr. Hovater seems to have faded into the background. You have to set google search for the last year to find anything. The ADL takes a break from normalizing genocide, to profiling a whiteboy group that Mr. Hovator was connected to. … Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. Russell Lee took the social media picture in October 1940. “ Jack Whinery, homesteader, and his family, Pie Town, New Mexico … Photograph shows Jack Whinery (1907-1994) with his wife Edith and their five children, Wanda, Edith, Velva, Jack and Lawrence in his father’s lap. ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
Joni Mitchell
Tuesday is Joni Mitchell’s 82nd birthday. Roberta Joan Anderson was born November 7, 1943, in Fort Macleod, Alberta. For this birthday tribute we will revisit four previous posts. one two three four … A facebook friend went on a Joni Mitchell kick. First it was a link to an interview, which youtube has cancelled. Then it was a quote from The Last Time I Saw Richard. A lady said Blue was her favorite album all all time, and a man enthusiastically agreed.
Given the apples and oranges quality of her catalog, it would be tough to pick one album as a favorite. I soon realized that fbf was going to be thirty soon. I am sixty. These are two different perspectives on the craft of Joni Mitchell. One has driven through the storm, not knowing what was next. The other is presented with an almost complete body of recorded work.
I have known about Joni since high school, and been a devoted fan since 1976. Joni’s most popular album, Court And Spark, came out in 1974, eleven years before fbf was born. Who would be the equivalent female musical force from 1943, when I was minus eleven? The answer is nobody. (Coincidentally Roberta Joan Anderson was born on November 7, 1943.) 
After the comment about Blue, I listened to For The Roses. Joni’s craft is like a cluster bomb … there are lines that you never fully felt, bomblets waiting to explode in your gut. Let The Wind Carry Me has one of those hidden threats. “Mama thinks she spoilt me, Papa knows somehow he set me free, Mama thinks she spoilt me rotten, She blames herself, But papa he blesses me.”
The first thing I heard by Joni was Big Yellow Taxi. It was on The Big Ball, a 1970 mail order sampler from Warner Brothers. This was when Joni shacked up with Graham Nash. The next year saw Blue, followed by For The Roses, and Court And Spark. I always thought Joni was someone he should like, but somehow didn’t. It wasn’t until 1976 that I broke through the barrier, and became a Joni Mitchell fan. Seeing her in concert did not hurt.
On February 3, 1976, I took a study break. (I scored 100 on the test the next day). Joni Mitchell was playing at the UGA coliseum a few blocks away, and the door was not watched after the show started. I found a place to stand, on the first level of the stands. The LA express was her band that night, and created a tight, jazzy sound, even in the UGA coliseum. Tom Scott pointed at Joni, said she was crazy, and drew circles around his left ear. The one line I remember is “chicken scratching my way to immortality” from Hejira.
The Hissing of Summer Lawns might not be her best album, but it is certainly her bravest. Court And Spark was a commercial success. Instead of producing a bestselling followup, Joni took a ninety degree turn. Summer Lawns, for all its eccentric sparkle, confused the record buying public. The gravy train took off in another direction.
In those days, 96rock played a new album at midnight, which people would tape. On the night of the Lynyrd Skynyrd plane crash, the album was Hejira. This was followed by Mingus, another curve ball. Finally, Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter appeared, and did not make a good impression.
The eighties, nineties, and aughts appeared. Joni and I lived our lives. 1996 saw a frightening interview in Details magazine. It was startling to see that for all her granola glory, Joni Mitchell might not be a very nice person. In a pot and kettle moment, David Crosby said “Joni’s about as humble as Mussolini.” Music is a tough way to make easy money.
More recently, there was a long interview on Canadian television. She is not mellowing with age. The cigarettes have not killed her, even if her voice is not what it once was. The recent albums that I have heard are strong. There seem to be more on the way. Maybe the facebook friend will have the “what is she going to do next” experience after all.
A few weeks ago, I was at the library. I had a story to take home, before going over to the biography section. There I found Reckless Daughter: A Portrait of Joni Mitchell. At least with fiction, you know you are dealing with a made up story. With biography, you have to use judgment.
It is a familiar story. Joni was born in the frozen north, was a rebellious girl, and got pregnant. She gave up the daughter for adoption, only to be reunited many years later. Joan Anderson gets married to, and divorces, Chuck Mitchell. Joni sings, writes, tunes her guitar funny, becomes a star, gets too weird to be popular, makes and loses money, smokes millions of cigarettes, and becomes an angry old lady. There is a bit more to the story than that. Reckless Daughter fills in a few of the blank spots.
Millions of cigarettes might be an exaggeration. Joni started smoking when she was nine. When she was a star, she was almost as well known for her constant puffing as her pretty songs. When Joni was in a Reagan era slump, she was going through four packs a day. Just for the sake of statistics, lets call it two packs, or forty fags, a day. Multiply forty by 365 and you get 14,600. If she started at 9, and had her aneurysm at 72, that gives you 63 years of nicotine abuse. If you assume that there were forty fags a day for 63 years, that gives you 919,800 smokes. IOW, while seven figures is not out of reach, it is rather unlikely that Joni smoked more than 2,000,000 cancer sticks.
The author of Reckless Daughter, David Yaffe, is a problem. He talks about the mood of America in 1969, four years before he was born. Mr. Yaffe goes to great lengths to show us that he knows about making music. Some readers will be impressed. There are mini-essays on Joni songs from her golden years, the time between Ladies Of The Canyon and Hejira. And gossip, gossip, and more gossip. Joni is well known for her celebrity lovers.
We should make the point that I enjoyed Reckless Daughter. The inside stories are fun, and pages turn over without too much head scratching. Maybe this is a statement about the career of Joni Mitchell. You enjoy the music for many years, and then complain about the details. Reckless Daughter follows the trajectory of other celebrity biographies. The star is born, takes up a craft, gets a break, becomes successful, goes over the mountaintop into a long decline. With Joni, nothing after Mingus was well received. The chanteuse was broker, and angrier, by the minute.
On page 13, Joni hears Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini by Sergei Rachmaninoff. This is the piece that makes her want to be a musician. One page 129, we learn the story of A&M studios in Hollywood. At one time, The Carpenters were in studio A, while Carole King was recording “Tapestry” in studio B. Joni was recording “Blue” in studio C, which had a magic piano. One time, Carole King learned of a break in the studio C booking, and ran in. Three hours later, “I feel the earth move” was recorded.
A few years later, Joni was on the Rolling Thunder tour with Bob Dylan. One of the concepts was support for Rubin “Hurricane” Carter, whose story can be found elsewhere. Joni became disillusioned with Mr. Carter. When Joan Baez asked Joni to speak at a benefit concert, Joni said she would say that Mr. Carter was a jive ass N-person, who never would have been champion of the world. Joni later got in SJW trouble for posing in blackface, for the cover to “Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter.”
On page 251, we learn that Bob Dylan does not dance. Other items include “Free man in Paris” being written about David Geffen, and Jackson Browne writing “Fountain of Sorrow” about Joni. Mr. Browne is a not-well-thought-of ex of Joni. As for Mr. Geffen…. Joni stayed at his house for a while, at a time when Mr. Geffen was in, and out, of the closet. Did they make sweet music together? … So this book report comes to an end. Joni is recovering from a brain aneurysm, and will probably not produce anything else. The book is going back to the library, and I will move on.
Joni Mitchell has product to promote. She gave an interview to New York magazine, where she smoked a few cigarettes and expressed a few opinions. There were enough attention getting comments to make the news.
“When I see black men sitting, I have a tendency to go — like I nod like I’m a brother. I really feel an affinity because I have experienced being a black guy on several occasions.” She proceeds to tell a story about dressing like a down and out black man as a way of dealing with an obnoxious photographer. “I just stood there till they noticed me. I walked really showily, going, Heh heh heh. It was a great revenge. That was all to get his ass. To freak him out. I had to keep him on the defensive.”
Gay-mafia-made-man David Geffen was a target. “I ask her about a painting, visible in a vestibule, on the way to her laundry room, of a curly-haired man with a banana lodged vertically in his mouth; turns out it’s Geffen, and she painted it. “Before he came out. He’s never seen it,” she says, before explaining: “He was using me as a beard. We were living together, and he’d go cruising at night. He was very ambitious to be big and powerful, and he didn’t think he would be [if he was openly gay].” By 1994, the two had fallen out over her insistence that he didn’t pay her enough in royalties.”
The product is a four cd boxed set, Love Has Many Faces: A Quartet, A Ballet, Waiting To Be Danced. There was a single one star comment about the joniproduct. Al Norman Seems like a collection of Joni’s forgettable tunes February 3, 2015 ~ “My wife loves Joni Mitchell, and never listens to this set. Seems like a collection of Joni’s forgettable tunes.” This comment was sponsored by Head and Shoulders. “100% flake free hair & A GREAT SCENT”
You just can’t get away from capitalism. Ms. Mitchell heard “… on the radio, a record executive “saying quite confidently, ‘We’re no longer looking for talent. We’re looking for a look and a willingness to cooperate.” As interviewer Carl Swanson notes, “For now, she’s hoping that people buy her boxed set, with her self-portrait on the cover. To that end, she gives me a Joni Mitchell tote bag with one of her paintings on it to carry my things home in. Get the word out.”
Joni Mitchell gave an interview recently to a Canadian Broadcaster. She is famously Canadian. The chat was in her California living room, which is littered with her paintings. Many of the paintings are things like Saskatchewan at forty below. Mrs. Mitchell alternates between painting and music, which tend to balance her cigarette fueled mind.
The CBC interview is paired with a more formal chat in Toronto. She could not smoke during the Toronto interview. The Toronto interviewer is just a bit smarter than Jian Ghomeshi, who endured the second hand smoke in California. Mr. Ghomeshi said things like “The song “Woodstock” defined a generation.” Mrs. Mitchell was in a New York City hotel room that famous weekend.(Spell check suggestion for Jian Ghomeshi: Joan Shoeshine)
There are some juicy quotes. Art is short for artificial. When listening to Joni songs, you should look at yourself, and not at her. Free love was just a gimmick for the men to get laid. False modesty is pointless. Sylvia Plath was a liar, or maybe it was Anne Sexton. (James Dickey said that Sylvia Plath was the Judy Garland of American letters.)
A fearsome foursome gets in the game. Someone screamed, on a live album. “Joni, you have more flash than Mick Jagger, Richard Nixon, or Gomer Pyle combined!.” Years later, the fan introduced himself to Mrs. Mitchell.
The conversation mentioned Bob Dylan. He is from Northern Minnesota, and not quite Canadian. Apparently, Mrs. Mitchell kicked up a fuss with some comments in 2010. ” Bob is not authentic at all. He’s a plagiarist, and his name and voice are fake. Everything about Bob is a deception. We are like night and day, he and I. … Grace [Slick] and Janis Joplin were [sleeping with] their whole bands and falling down drunk, and nobody came after them!”
Did Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell ever tune up together? Joan Baez, a similarly named contemporary, is well known for dating Mr. Zimmerman. Ms. Baez did sing at Woodstock.
Mrs. Mitchell doesn’t exactly take back her comments about Bob Dylan. ““I like a lot of Bob’s songs, though musically he’s not very gifted. He’s borrowed his voice from old hillbillies. He’s got a lot of borrowed things. He’s not a great guitar player. He’s invented a character to deliver his songs. Sometimes I wish that I could have that character — because you can do things with that character. It’s a mask of sorts.”
In a kill the messenger moment, Mrs. Mitchell lashed out at the interviewer from the 2010 piece. It is odd, since he didn’t ask any trick questions. Black and white transcripts are tough to deny. “The interviewer was an asshole.” (The body part is bleeped.) “I hate doing interviews with stupid people, and this guy’s a moron” “His IQ is somewhere between his shoe size and (unintelligible)”.
The troublesome 2010 interview was conducted with John Kelly, a Joni Mitchell tribute artist. “JK: Drag does have a power, though — that netherworld of a thing you can’t quite know, which makes people nervous. JM: Drag wasn’t always counterculture. In his memoirs, Nixon talked about the Harvard and Yale men in power who would put on these plays where they dress like women, and Milton Berle did a kind of “hairy drag.” Becoming a gay thing made drag go underground.” Did Mick Jagger and Gomer Pyle ever do drag with Richard Nixon? … Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. Russell Lee took the social media picture in February 1939.
“White migrant family in trailer home near Edinburg, Texas” ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
Climategate
This content was published November 27, 2009. … By now, many of you have heard about “climategate”. It seems like someone hacked into a computer at an English research institute, and found some emails. A few of the emails have been released. With years of correspondence to go through, only a part of which has been released, there is lots of room for mischief. If the hackers are smart enough to steal those emails, they are also smart enough to fake a few.
I am not a scientist, and all this makes my head spin. There is the suspicion that a lot of the people making noise don’t understand the science, but are making noise to support already held views. There are big money interests who would like to see talk about global warming go away, so they can work without interference. These interests have lots of money to buy off journalists, who then produce prose like this: “AGW (anthropogenic global warming) is about raising taxes; … about a few canny hucksters who’ve leapt on the bandwagon fleecing us rotten with their taxpayer subsidised windfarms and their carbon-trading; about the sour, anti-capitalist impulses of sandal-wearing vegans and lapsed Communists who loathe the idea of freedom and a functioning market economy.”
The discussion has leaped out of the frying pan of science, and into the fire of politics. There is an international conference in Copenhagen soon, and the timing of “climategate” is curious. … Two words stand out in this discussion, believe and prove. I wonder if they are appropriate. AGW is not really a matter of believe or not believe. Since the industrial revolution, man has made an enormous change in the atmosphere. This ecosystem has evolved over billions of years, either by accident or intelligent design. Man has made profound changes in the last two hundred years.
Chamblee54 crunched the numbers last July: “The atmosphere on planet earth is a marvel, quite possibly unique in the universe. It supports a wide range of life forms, from amoebas to Bruno. This blanket of gas evolved over a period of billions of years. Man has possibly changed it more in the last two hundred years than nature did in four billion before that. … Those numbers don’t mean too much like that, so let’s put them into another form. Comparing 200 years to four billion years just takes a calculator. That is like comparing one minute to 38 years. What God created (or nature evolved, or however you explain it), in 38 years, industrial man has nearly ruined in one minute.
Here is the breakdown. Divide 4 billion by 200 and you get 20 million. Divide 20 million by 1440 (the number of minutes in a day) gives us 13888 days. Dividing 13888 days by 365 gives us 38 years. Even if the earth is less than four billion years old, the fact remains that industrial man has destroyed in almost no time what took a long time to create. … The second weasel word in the current blabberfest is prove. There is a difference between prove and indicate. If the emails are genuine, they would indicate that some scientists in England cooked the books on their research. As to the larger issue of what industrial man is doing to planet earth, they prove nothing.
This content was published November 18, 2008. … Yesterday, after exploring east Atlanta, PG and Uzi went to dinner. They alternate between Piccadilly and S&S , and this was a Piccadilly week. PG always thinks of the antique store called Pick a Dilly. That might explain some of the clientele. … Lenny was a friend of Uzi, who had checked out of the hotel a few years ago. Lenny was inclined towards a philosophical viewpoint. He tried to write these nuggets down. One of the problems was that Lenny never did understand the concept of the tab key.
He would type the quote, the source, and any other information into one cell of a database. PG had time on his hands, and offered to try and straighten out the mess. … Now, one problem is Microsoft Works. The database that Lenny used was in works. The only operating system to employ works was Millennium Edition … the Edsel of the Microsoft showroom. When you tried to take something in works, and move it to another system, you were liable to get a screen full of jibberish. (According to spell check, this is properly spelled gibberish)
So, the email arrived. PG tried to open the file using an open office database, and the thing closed immediately. PG thought he heard the computer laughing at him. Next was a bootleg copy of microsoft windows 97 office suite. Funny how suite is pronounced like sweet, but is anything but. The database was not amused, and word showed a screen full of gibberish. … Next, PG tried notepad. This did show some text in between the acres of code. PG copied this into a trusty wordpad file, and started to edit. After a while, there were a few quotes in legible form.
PG then sent this email to Uzi: excellent i haven’t had a family turkey day since i had parents. as for the files, they are not opening smoothly. i might could work around some of the issues, but it might be easier if i had a copy of works when i had my first computer, i used works, and then tried to take the files to my job to use the word based computers there. word computers do not like works (even if it is at work, as in job. this can get confusing)
If you could find a copy of the works database file and send it to me, that might make this project easier I opened one file with notepad, and was able to cull these from the mass of jibberish: The best things and best people rise out of their separateness ; I’m against a homogenized society because I want the cream to rise. Robert Frost · How many a dispute could have been deflated into a single paragraph if the disputants had dared to define their terms. Aristotle · The government of the United States is not in any sense founded upon thty . Clarence Darrow … Is this the sort of thing i can expect to find? a quote, and then a source for the quote? PG … Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. John Vachon took the social media picture in March 1941. “Schoolchildren getting ready to go home. Norfolk, Virginia ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
Mick Fleetwood
This content was published . … I read the autobiography of Mick Fleetwood. If this had been a made up tale of fiction, no one would believe it. Mick is not the manufacturer of enemas, nor the namesake of a Cadillac Model. The possibility does exist that he has used those two products.
John Mayall gave his guitar player, Peter Green, some studio time as a birthday present. “The Green God” used a rhythm section from the Bluesbreakers, Mick Fleetwood (drums) and John McVie (bass). At the end of the day, Mr. Green wrote “Fleetwood Mac” on the can holding the tapes.
Before long, Mr. Green started his own band, and named it after the rhythm section. (Does anyone know the bass player and drummer of the Atlanta Rhythm Section?) Fleetwood Mac started as a blues band, and became popular in England. Mr. Fleetwood celebrated by getting together with Jenny Boyd, who became his wife. Miss Boyd is the sister of Patti Boyd, the wife of George Harrison, aka Layla.
The first Fleetwood Mac album in the USA was “Then Play On.” The first show in Atlanta was at the Oglethorpe University gym, and by all accounts was a wild night. I saw the sign advertising the event, but did not attend. Grand Funk Railroad was the opening act.
About the time of “Then Play On”, Peter Green started to get a bit weird. He dropped out of the band, but Jeremy Spencer and Danny Kirwan were still playing guitars. For a little while. Jeremy Spencer took a walk outside a Los Angeles hotel, and got recruited by the Children of God. Danny Kirwan had some issues, and decided to leave the band. Bob Welch stopped by for a few years, joined by Christine Perfect McVie, the wife of John.
The band was managed at this time by Clifford Davies, who by all accounts was a nasty piece of work. A man named Bob Weston had joined the band, and lasted until he had an affair with Jenny Fleetwood. Mr. Weston was fired, and a tour canceled. Clifford Davies decided that he owned the name Fleetwood Mac, and hired a group of players to go out and do shows. Fleetwood and the Mcvies were not amused, and Mick Fleetwood took over as the manager of the band.
By 1974, the band was pushing along, and selling about 300,000 copies of each album. On Halloween night 1974, Fleetwood Mac played at the Omni with Jefferson Starship. I was at the Municipal Auditorium that night, seeing Jackson Browne and Bonnie Raitt.
In late 1974, Mick was looking for a studio. He came to a place, and an album came on the speakers. Mick was impressed by the guitar player. Soon after, Bob Welch left the band, and Mick thought the guitar player he heard at the studio was a good fit. (The band never did auditions, just asked people they liked to join). The guitar player was Lindsay Buckingham, and his girlfriend/musical partner was Stevie Nicks. This was the band that set sales records.
The first album with Buckingham/Nicks, simply titled “Fleetwood Mac”, became a phenomenon. The band was soon headlining in stadiums, and was on every FM radio station in the land. The band went into the studio to record a follow up. The second album took over a year to produce, and saw the McVies and the Fleetwoods get divorced. Buckingham and Nicks split their common law arrangement. Out of the turmoil came “Rumours”, which has sold roughly thirty million copies.
On August 29, 1978, I got to see Fleetwood Mac at the Omni. Mick Fleetwood was on top of his game, pounding the skins with a glee that could be seen from the cheap seats. Fleetwood was a highlight, standing two meters tall and creating havoc on the drum stand.
The book tells the rest of the story. Fleetwood’s father had died earlier that summer, and Mick was devastated. The band was straining under the pressures of super-duper-stardom. Mick attempted a reconciliation with his wife, which was a painful failure. There was an affair between Mick and Stevie Nicks at this time. The idea that Mick Fleetwood could perform like he did that night tells you what a trooper he was. … Pictures today are from Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library. The social media picture was taken March 5, 1948. “Fox Theater, “Voice of the Turtle” ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
The Church Sign
This content was published October 16, 2013. … Religion is very personal.. When you have a miserable experience with Jesus, it will not go away because of glib expressions of “faith”. When you put a sign by the road, you don’t know who is going to see it. You don’t know how they are going to be feeling.
I was driving to dinner one night, when I drove by Briarcliff United Methodist Church. The facility is on a busy road. They have a sign in front, with a message that changes from time to time. This night, I was in a bad mood. I was thinking about people who have humiliated me for Jesus. The sign in front of BUMC said “When was the last time you prayed?”
The concept of prayer is collateral damage in my struggle with Christians. As I became alienated from biblical religion, the idea of a person talking to God seems performative, selfish, and self aggrandizing. (Jesus might agree with me.) There is something about having an angry bully snarling “I’m going to pray for you brother” that makes the concept of prayer repulsive.
There is another thing to consider here. Pushy Christians assume that they have the right to grill you about sensitive personal issues. The idea of saying this to passing motorists is disrespectful. It is none of your business if I pray.
I looked up BUMC on the internet when I got home. They have a modern website. The top tab on the menu said “Prayer Requests.” This is for people who want someone to pray for them. Maybe you can leave a prayer non-request. Ask them to respect discomfort with their religion, and don’t put intrusive messages by the roadside.
Further down on the website is an email address (church@briarcliffumc.com.) While not expecting a miracle, I decided to send them an email. Here is the text of that message.
You have a message board in front of your church. The message when I went by was “When was the last time you prayed?” I was offended by this message.
I have had a tough time with religion. I have been humiliated many, many times because of Jesus. I have heard about your scheme for life after death thousands of times, and simply do not agree with it. An intrusive roadway sign is not going to change my mind.
My belief is that my opinions about God are none of your business. If I trust you, then we can have a discussion. Having a rude sign by the road side is not going to help me trust you.
Even though it is none of your business, I am going to answer your question. Even though I was talking to God, and not to you, I am going to repeat what I said. “God please help these people to have respect for their neighbor, and take that awful sign down”.
This content was published
October 24, 2013. … It had been a week since I drove past the Briarcliff United Methodist Church. The church sent a thoughtful email, in response to the complaining message. The traffic on Briarcliff Road was just as rude as ever. I took a look when he drove past the church. The new message this week: “In what missions did U last serve?”
Maybe BUMC didn’t have a YO to spare. Maybe they are trying to appeal to the text message crowd. Maybe a Synagogue borrowed the OY.
When the Jesus worship church talks about missions, they usually mean an effort to convert people to their brand of religion. This is a part of Christianism that many find tasteless. This product promotion frequently turns into a violation of the third commandment … the injunction against improper use of a sacred name. When you create ill will, you are speaking in vain.
When I got home, I decided to create a graphic poem. I did not feel like writing fresh text. A decision was made to use public domain content. A search of the book of Psalms located a short chapter, with a number that is popular at this blog. Hence, the current presentation of Psalm 54.
While this effort was in production, I thought about the mission I was on. The idea was to rescue this text from the improper way in which it is used. The Bible should be a source of beauty, not a weapon to bludgeon people into agreement. Psalm 54 is a text, written by a human being, not a message from God. When you make a God out of a book, you do no favor to either Yahweh, or the book.
In the end, the effort had mixed results. The text has an air of vengeance. God was supposed to get even with your enemies. The idea that your enemies might be the children of God is forgotten.
On June 10, 2018, Briarcliff United Methodist Church held its final Sunday service. The building is currently used by The Globe Academy. Traffic on Briarcliff Road only gets worse. … Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. John Vachon took the social media picture in February 1942. “Williston, North Dakota. Farmers’ union meeting with the county commissioners to protest the selling of land to corporation farms in Williams County and to discuss the protection of family-size farms” ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
Joey Ramone
This content was published October 13, 2024. … I Slept with Joey Ramone is the story of a six foot five geek, who was only good for singing gabba gabba hey. Jeffrey Ross Hyman had issues. Aside from his goofy appearance, Jeff had severe OCD. He would injure his foot bad enough to require several hospitalizations. Somehow, Jeff got to play in some bands, going glitter as Jeff Starship. Eventually, Jeff Hyman, John Cummins, Douglas Colvin, and Tommy Erdelyi became Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee, and Tommy Ramone. Music was never the same.
ISWJR was written by Mitchel Lee Hyman, Jeff’s younger brother. His stage name was Mickey Leigh. Mickey was the first roadie for the Ramones, and will always be in his brother’s shadow. The two had an intense relationship. Jeff and Mitch went from being best friends to mortal enemies. This sibling rivalry is a key part of the story. The book, despite the commercial title, is about Mickey as much as Joey. The subtitle is “A punk rock family memoir.”
Mickey Leigh is still alive. The co-author is Legs McNeil, who assembled Please Kill Me. ISWJR is told through Mickey’s eyes. It is uncertain what role Mr. McNeil played. Some say that Mickey Leigh could not type a page of text if his life depended on it.
PKM was an “oral history of punk rock,” meaning they taped a bunch of people talking. Mickey was one of the talkers, and Joey was not happy with what Mickey said. Another voice tells about Dee Dee Ramone falling on the sidewalk outside CBGB. Dee Dee said it was not a good idea to get hit in the head when you were drinking… it might cause brain damage. That is not an exact quote. Dee Dee Ramone did not “just say no.”
The Ramones made their fifteen minutes last for twenty years. They went down to the Bowery, and found this bar called CBGB’s. The owner kept his dog inside, and dog shit was everywhere. The Ramones got a following, a record contract, did tours, recorded albums, became sort of famous, started a movement (other than the bar dog’s bowels,) but never had a hit record. This lack of commercial success was highly annoying.
The first taste of big money was Budweiser using “Blitzkrieg Bop” in a commercial. Mickey played an uncredited part in the song. When the Budweiser money started to roll in, Mickey was struggling to pay the rent. Mickey tried to get some money out of the band, which refused. This caused many years of Joey and Mickey not speaking.
For a while the boys in the band (pun intended, at least for Dee Dee) were pals. Then Joey had a girlfriend, Linda. Johnny stole Linda from Joey. Johnny and Joey hated each other from then on. Johnny was always a bit of an asshole, as was Joey. At some point, Tommy had enough, and was replaced by Marky. He drank his way out of the job, and was replaced by Richie.
In 1983, The Ramones played at the Agora Ballroom in Atlanta. I was in the audience. By this time, the Ramones had been going on for nine years. They were not the next big thing anymore. Somebody played a tape of cheesy Coney Island music, and the band came on stage. Joey hunched over the microphone, tapped himself on the head with a baseball bat, and the band did “Beat on the brat.” The band went through the motions, playing another show, probably identical to every other Ramones show ever played. Punk rock just was not trendy anymore.
It was an all ages show. If you wanted to drink, you had to go up to the balcony. You were on your own going down the stairs. Downstairs was full of young people, many in costumes, having a hot time. The balcony was the same rock and roll drunks that were at every show ever produced.
ISWJR does not have a happy ending. Joey had health problems throughout his life. Being a drunken-coke-freak rock star did not help. He came down with Lymphoma, and was starting to do ok. Then, Joey fell and broke his hip, and they had to adjust his medication. Soon, the cancer was back with a vengeance. Joey and Mickey called a truce to their squabbling before Joey died April 15, 2001. Dee Dee and Johnny quickly followed. The Ramones would have been a great oldies band, if only.
Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. Marion Post Wolcott took the social media picture in June 1939. “Two of Pauline Clyburn’s children, rehabilitation borrowers, Manning, Clarendon County, South Carolina” ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
The Last Furman Bisher Column
This content was published October 12, 2009. … I had different interests when I was a kid. I would get into something for a while, then move on to something else. In 1965, it was baseball and football. The Atlanta Journal had a column every day by Furman Bisher. I thought he was a very good, very funny writer. … Yesterday, the fishwrapper printed the last column by Furman Bisher. Many, many things had changed in those 44 years. The well crafted prose of Furman Bisher remained the same.
In 1965, Mr. Bisher produced six columns a week for the afternoon paper. Typically, five of them would be on a single subject. The sixth one would be a collection of one or two liners, separated by three dots. These mix and match columns were always signed “selah”, an untranslatable Hebrew word from Psalms. When asked why he did that, Mr. Bisher said “your guess is as good as mine”. … In one of the columns signed selah, Mr. Bisher talked about sports cliches. His least favorite one was about a ballplayer “who can do it all”. ” Lets see one of them have a baby”
The morning Constitution and the afternoon Journal were separate papers. The Journal had a saturday TV section printed on green paper, making the world look red when you put it down. The saturday paper also had a weekly ad from Lester Maddox, a restaurant owner who dabbled in politics. The next year, Lester would be elected Governor of Georgia. Lester called the Atlanta Constitution “the fishwrapper”. … In 1965, the Braves played a lame duck season in Milwaukee. The Crackers played one last season in the brand new Atlanta Stadium. It did not have -Fulton County in the name yet. The people of Atlanta were so proud of that facility. The next year, the Braves set up shop in Dixie, and were horrible. The Falcons played their first season, and were even worse.
Before long, I found other things to be interested in. Furman Bisher continued to plug away. A young man named Lewis Grizzard came to work at the fishwrapper, and Mr. Bisher was his boss. Eventually, Lewis Grizzard took a job in Chicago, a frosty exile from warm Georgia. A few years later, Mr. Grizzard came home, and became an institution. The only problem was his heart. Lewis Grizzard left us on March 20, 1994. … Mr. Bisher is 90 today, and in good health. The fishwrapper continues to shrink, and may not outlive one of it’s best writers. … Furman Bisher went to the press box in the sky March 18, 2012. The fishwrapper will print the last hard copy newspaper December 31, 2025.
This content was published October 12, 2009. … The GM plant in Doraville shut down. The vultures are circling the acreage. Some want to build a new stadium for the Falcons. Others want a residential/commercial “mixed use project”. This area needs either one like a submarine needs a screen door. … I have an idea for the GM property. The government should build a water reservoir on that land. Perhaps we could divert Nancy Creek and Peachtree Creek to get the water. Maybe we could pump out groundwater. This may not be the right answer. I am neither an engineer or a scientist.
The environmental impact of having an auto plant on the land for fifty years may be too great to overcome. The land may be too small to make much difference. No doubt the expense would be great, and it might not be cost effective. … Something needs to be done about the water crisis in Atlanta. We have a metropolis of five million people getting water from an overgrown trout stream. Our governments have failed us. They have allowed rampant development, without any thought given to where the water is going to come from.
It is time to quit whining about Alabama and Florida, and find another source of water. There are not going to be any cheap solutions. If the Tennessee River is accessed … a very big if … we will need a pipeline through the mountains to get the water to Atlanta. We might need to use every bit of unused land in the area to build reservoirs, and it still might not be enough. If the Doraville reservoir was in place now, we could be saving all of this rain we are getting. Put it away for a dry day when we need it. … The next drought could start tomorrow. We are going to need bold, expensive measures to solve this problem. The water shortage could do to Atlanta what the levee breaking did to New Orleans. The time to prepare is now. … In 2025, little has been done to prepare for the next drought.
This content was published October 26, 2008. … The trip to lower Tennessee went smoothly. Yes, there was an SUV shining his bright lights and encouraging more speed, but that is expected for Cobb County. I had driven for a living in this area, and found the house with little problem. … It had been fifteen years since I last saw the hostess. I was warmly greeted, and given a plate for the store bought grapes. Food was the focus of this evening, not costumes, athletic drinking, or hooking up. There was even a cake called “Better than Sex”. Getting older can be boring, but you are not going to go hungry.
The hostess had a prosthetic backside, draped by a hospital gown. There was a witch, a young terrorist, and a blogger wearing a ralph lauren tie. The prize for best costume went to the father of the hostess. His costume had been put aside by the time I arrived. … On the surface it sounds boring, but I had a good time. You could eat until you found someone to talk to, and soon there were people to listen to. Before long it was time to go, and get lost in the subdivision on the way out. … Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. Marion Post Wolcott took the social media picture in November 1939. “Some of the Wilkins clan at dinner on corn-shucking day at home of Mrs. Fred Wilkins. Tallyho, near Stem, Granville County, North Carolina.” ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
Free Bacon
This content was published October 23, 2015. … There was a tweet. Perspicacious One @JessSmith_TPC LOLOLOL Can’t make this stuff up @EWErickson President’s Speech Defending Obamacare Nearly Kills Innocent Woman. The medium is something called The Washington Free Beacon. Free Bacon is a typo.
TWFB has some interesting stories. One entertaining example is “Pro-Iranian Regime Journalist Defends Controversial Tweet. Former translator for Ahmadinejad called WSJ editor ‘Iranian House Negro’.” The offending tweeter owns a fashion blog, the house of majd. Rumors that Mr. Ahmadinejad is a model cannot be confirmed.
A more believable story is Netanyahu’s Mission: To Head Off Iran Sanctions Relief. The thought of a deal between Iran and the West is very troubling to Israel. An important distraction to the Palestinian tragedy would be removed by the rehabilitation of Iran. One interesting section of the story mentions 9/11 labor supplier Saudi Arabia. “Saudi Arabia, another key U.S. ally in the Middle East, is also deeply worried about any sign of a deal between Washington and the kingdom’s arch-rival, Iran.” … Free Bacon is the order of the day in the last story we will look at. USDA Celebrates Forcing Kids to Try Kale, Chard, Collard Greens. “The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) extolled a local elementary school in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. for making its students try broccoli gratin, Tuscan kale, and beet hummus, as an example of the department’s efforts to fight obesity.”
This content was published October 8, 2008. … During the debates, John Sidney McCain III has repeatedly touted Nuclear Power as a solution to our energy needs. Perhaps this talk needs a second look. … There is a lot of money involved in Nuclear Energy. The plants are very expensive to build. There is a lot of potential for profit, and opportunities for moneylenders to earn interest. With this much at stake, it is not unreasonable to think that someone is paying JSM to promote Nukes.
With billions of dollars invested, the banks are going to make sure they get a return on their investment. With this much money involved, Big Government is going to get involved. This is also a factor in the safety issue. … Yes, Nuclear Power is safe. However, there is a need for constant oversight. The potential for disaster is immense. The process needs to be heavily regulated. With the companies trying to show a profit, the temptation to cut corners, and bribe the regulators, is going to be there. With global … and potentially domestic … terrorism a fact of life, the nuclear fuel needs to be constantly watched. Again, this is a job for Big Government. Nuclear Power=Big Government
While Nukes are nominally safe if handled properly, the potential for disaster is huge. There are stories of materials so toxic, that a mass the size of a softball could give the world cancer. While the systems can work well, the potential for corruption, corner cutting, and old fashioned human error cannot be forgotten. … Money is not the only scarce commodity required in bulk by Nukes. Water is also required in vast quantities for a Nuclear Power Plant to operate. The energy from a nuclear reaction is converted into electricity by boiling water to power steam turbines.
This is the same steam technology that has been used since the start of the industrial revolution. The nuclear reaction produces vast amounts of heat, which water is used to cool. With water an increasingly scarce commodity, the allocation of vast amounts for a Nuclear Power plant must be questioned. … It should be noted at this point that I am not a scientist. I am just a slacker with internet access. It is also true that coal fired power plants have horrendous environmental issues, and pump millions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere. I honestly don’t know what the answer is.
I recently spent a week at a community with solar power. There were constant reminders to use the juice sparingly. I tried to recharge my cell phone, and the system was not strong enough to do so. While solar can reduce the dependence on “the grid”, it is not going to completely replace it. We could do well to use less energy. We have gotten spoiled, like the man who wants an emerald green lawn in October. Part of the answer would be to live simply, so that others can simply live. … Pictures today are from Georgia State University Library The social media picture was taken February 22, 1955. Standard Oil service station in Buckhead ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
Oscar Wilde
October 16 is Oscar Fingal O’Fflahertie Wills Wilde’s birthday. On that day in 1854, he appeared in Dublin, Ireland. Oscar is one of the most widely quoted people in the english language. Some of those quotes are real. Since Oscar was a published author, it should be easy to verify what he really said.
One night in 1974, I was talking to someone, and did not know who Oscar Wilde was. The man was horrified. I quickly got educated, and learned about a misunderstanding with the Marquess of Queensberry. Soon the “Avenge Oscar Wilde” signs made sense.
Mr. Wilde once made a speaking tour in the United States. One afternoon the playwright met Walt Whitman. Thee and thou reportedly did the “Wilde Thing.”
The tour then went to Georgia. A young black man had been hired as a valet for Mr. Wilde on this tour. On the train ride from Atlanta to Columbus, some people told Mr. Wilde that he could not ride in the same car as the valet. This was very confusing.
After his various legal difficulties, Oscar Wilde moved to Paris. He took ill, while staying in a tacky hotel. Oscar looked up, and said “There is a duel to the death between me and my wallpaper. One of us must die. It will be him or me.” (« — Voyez-vous, ma chère enfant, me disait-il, il y a un duel à mort entre moi et mon papier de tenture. L’un de nous deux doit y rester. Ce sera lui ou ce sera moi. ») Soon, Oscar Wilde passed away.
This birthday celebration is a repost, with pictures from The Library of Congress. Marion Post Wolcott took the social media picture in September 1938. Coal miner (Polish). Capels, West Virginia.” ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
One More Chat About Racism
It was a typical morning. Work on pictures, and listen to audio product. I was tired of youtube suggestions, and chose to listen to RISK. The first story is a South Asian lady, Nimisha, going to have lunch with her Jewish mother in law, Elaine. The two ladies have an uneasy relationship. Before the wedding, Elaine asked David, her son, if Nimisha was black. (Did David have a black girlfriend before this?) Nimisha was upset when she heard about this. Now Nimisha was going to have lunch with a RAY-SISST. It is not known if Nimisha ever called Elaine a racist to her face.
I am tired of hearing people referred to as racist. Since there were plenty of other shows to listen to, I turned off the story. A few minutes later, I wondered what I was missing, and turned on the story again. Soon enough, Nimisha complained about going to lunch with a RAY-SISST again. I pushed forward, and listened to the next story. It was about an experience at an AA meeting in Los Angeles. I wanted to share the story with a friend in the AA program. Here is the email I sent with the link.
This is a link to a story. It is an AA war story. It starts at 20 minutes. There is another story here. The first story in this show is about an Indian lady, who does not like her Jewish mother in law. At ten minutes into the show, the bride says “I am going to have to spend the day with a racist.” At this point, I turned off the show in anger. I am sensitive to the term racist, for perfectly obvious reasons. I did not want to listen to the rest of the show. When I decided to send you the link, I had to listen to the part of the show around the 20 minute mark, so I could know when the war story started. I set the timer for 18 minutes, and listened to the end of the mother in law story. There is a twist in the story, and everyone is friends now. The bride says “I am ashamed of reducing her to her racism.”
David, Elaine, and Nimisha went to a deli in New York. Nimisha (who seems to have other entitlement issues) is militantly vegetarian, and not pleased with the deli. At one point, Elaine orders a sandwich “bigger than her fist,” and starts to, accidentally, spit bits of meat in Nimisha’s face. Next, Nimisha looks at Elaine, who has tears in her eyes. Elaine thanks Nimisha for coming to lunch. Nimisha looks at her hand, which has an engagement ring once owned by Elaine. Nimisha realizes that Elaine is more than her comment about race, and is actually a pretty good lady. End of story. Elaine is much more than a racist, she is the mother of David.
The real fun starts when I post the email to RISK! Podcast Fans Discussion Group on facebook. People are proud of calling *others* racist. When you suggest that this is not a good idea, they get angry. WAAAAA!!! He said I can’t say wassist!!! WAAAA!!! I have heard the r-word many times. I was not in the mood to hear a vegetarian princess repeat that slur about her mother in law.
As you may imagine, the facebook conversation got ugly. The 2018 post has TLDR quotes from this discussion. When people want to be seen as fighting racism, they behave badly. “The behavior described in the story was racist. I don’t know you or your circumstances, but your words so far seem to imply that you’re more offended by the word “racist” than actual racism.”
“you’re more offended by the word “racist” than actual racism.” This is a common comment in social justice discussions. “Imagine it happening all the time, simply because of the color of your skin. What you’re experiencing right now is *nothing* compared to what people of color experience daily.” The simple truth is that two wrongs do not make a right. Insulting a white person, by calling them racist, will have little impact on creating economic opportunity, or curtailing police brutality. Saying racist is merely a couple of kids on the playground swapping insults. To pretend otherwise, to confuse name calling for effective social justice action, is an exercise in self delusion.
People in discussions about racist/racism often feel the need to demonstrate their distaste for racism. Usually it is without being asked. People just assume they need to signal virtue, and are offended if someone abstains. “Being racist is wrong. Full stop. I’m not sure if we’re on the same page about that, but in case my thoughts weren’t clear, there they are.”
When you challenge the performative nature of racist citing, you can expect feedback. “I don’t understand this post. But i fully support the continued and loud-mouthed calling out and labeling of racists wherever they be, regardless of some feathers getting ruffled. Had the protagonist of this story been correct in her assumption, i wouldn’t be holding it against her. In this case she made an assumption and was corrected by facts, but i certainly don’t hold the using of that term against her.” ” “ritual condemnation of racism” is a funny way to put it, as if condemning such is a kind of bigotry. It’s not a “performance” when I condemn it. Um… I MEAN it.”
Why are people, mostly white, so eager to demonstrate their distaste for what they perceive as racism? This virtue signalling is to be loud, and must be seen and heard by others. Maybe this virtue signalling is not done for the benefit of others. Maybe the white savior is trying to reassure themself that they are not racist. They are like the homophobe who badmouths gays to cover up for his own repressed homosexual desires. Is the white savior a closet racist?
The problem with anti-racism was published by chamblee54 a few years ago, when a dark skinned man was POTUS. It discusses the closet racist concept, and other ways in which anti-racism is detrimental to society. After a 2014 repost, chamblee54 received a remarkable bit of confirmation. An anonymous commenter, speaking from an .edu address, said “why don’t you get your white sheets and come out.” Since this comment was made by a white cis male (the last time I had contact with them), it might not be appropriate to respond “I am so sorry that you felt racially targeted by me. Can you please help me understand what I did to make you feel that way?”
I made one last comment in the facebook thread. It is unlikely that he changed any minds. The concept that the word racist is offensive to human beings, and should be used with caution, is alien to many people. It might be compared to telling a person sixty years ago that saying the n-word is a bad idea. Here is the closing comment. “There is going to be a blog post about this discussion, which will answer a few of those questions. Or, and this is more likely, merely raise more. I have known many, many POC. Friends, enemies, good people, terrible people, and a thousand levels in between. In the end, it is my experience. I don’t even understand it myself. I cannot expect someone who reads a facebook thread to understand my life. I just get tired of the promiscuous, boastful, performative use of the r word. Nothing good comes of it.”
In typical blogger fashion, I gave two links. “This post Are my attitudes about race any of your business, might help explain a bit of this.” “Here is another post that might help, James Baldwin and the six letter word. (This post makes an amusing connection between the n-word, and the r-word. The words of James Baldwin were used, perhaps in a way the author would not have intended.) … Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. Esther Bubley took the social media picture in September 1943. “A Greyhound bus that has been stopped while the driver fills the water tank at a gas station on the road between Gettysburg and Pennsylvania” ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
Our Bohemian Lifestyle
This content was published October 31, 2008. … Ten Clues you are too old to Trick or Treat: 1 – You get winded from knocking on the door. 2 – You have to have another kid chew the candy for you. 3 – You ask for high fiber candy only. 4 – You keep having to go home to pee. 5 – People say: “Great Boris Karloff Mask,”And you’re not wearing a mask. 6 – When the door opens you yell, “Trick or…”And can’t remember the rest. 7 – By the end of the night,you have a bag full of restraining orders. 8 – You have to carefully choose a costume that won’t dislodge your hairpiece. 9 – You’re the only Power Ranger in the neighborhood with a walker. 10 – When someone drops a candy bar in your bag,you lose your balance and fall over.
This content was published October 19, 2008. … The answering machine was flashing when I got out of the shower. Even though the internal caller id told me it was Uzi, I listened to the messages before calling. The scheduled entertainment for the afternoon was a walk through little five points. … After a while, the honda was parked behind Manuel’s, and the walk to ElfivePee began. Is the Halloween Festival over, and could we tell the difference? Coming down Seminole Avenue, into the closed off street by the pizza places, the thought came to go to the Vortex. No, that is a bad idea, they may be enforcing the no idiot policy.
The artist was urging the sunday visitors to Buy Art, and help support our bohemian lifestyle. I needed to use a restroom, and thought the Euclid Avenue Yacht Club would be atmospheric enough. Past that was the former Bass High School, now a loft community. When WRFG went on the air, their transmitter was so weak that they could not be heard north of the high school. … Crossing Euclid Avenue required waiting for the cars to pass by. The former Sevananda/A&P/Piggly Wiggly of Miss Daisy fame is now a Rag store. They have stenciled parking spots, across from the mural infested wall of the Variety Playhouse. Uzi was once going to pay to park for a concert there. The parking attendant recognized his friend and gave them a prime spot for free. He does not remember who was playing.
The parade of the hairstyle enhanced trendoids continued down the well trod sidewalks. Uzi was in the mood for a chocolate ice cream from Zestos. I waited outside, and took pictures of ivy falling down in front of a brick wall. We crossed Moreland, and found a bench to sit on. It was across from the former fountain, which now has cactus growing inside. A dog got loose, and scampered down Moreland Avenue, while the traffic screeched to a halt. The pet went down Euclid into oblivion, as Uzi finished his ice cream. Deciding that they had enough hipness for the day, we went back to Manuels, and to the S&S cafeteria in the relative safety of Embry Hills.
This content was published October 28, 2009. … I finished part two of the David Crosby autobiography, “Since Then“. This book is evidence that truth is stranger than fiction. For those who just tuned in, David Crosby was one of the Byrds, and is the Crosby of Crosby, Stills, Nash and (sometimes) Young. … David Crosby (no relation to Bing Crosby) is a part of the counterculture. The hair, the fringe jacket, the drugs, the sex, these are the surface parts of the puzzle. The man has been described as a complex bottle of red wine, taking a long time to mature. The hair is still there, he is in love with his wife (and probably would be dead without her), and smokes the occasional doobie. With any luck at all, the fringe jacket is in a landfill, and not reproducing.
The book has three fonts. The primary one is the voice of Crosby. Comments from third parties are indented, and the co author, Carl Gottlieb, speaks in italics. The story moves in more or less chronological fashion, although there is a bit of cutting back and forth between scenes. … At the start of the book, LA is hit by a major earthquake. This destroys a house Crosby has. If the earthquake doesn’t get the house, the IRS will. An accountant has not done his job, and Crosby owes major bucks to Uncle Sam. If its not one thing, its another.
Moving along, a son given up for adoption finds Crosby, and winds up playing guitar in a band called CPR. Crosby wrecks his motorcycle and nearly croaks. Crosby’s liver goes haywire, and he almost croaks. Ditto heart attack, and arrest for felony gun possession. … One of the last visitors before the liver transplant was Graham Nash. As he is leaving, Nash tells Crosby ”If you leave me alone with Stills, I’ll f***ing kill you”. For all the pretty music in CSN, there are some strong personalities. Stephen Stills is renowned for his attitude. David Crosby is known to have an opinion or two.
Getting back to the David Crosby story…there is just too much to sum up here. At the end of the story, Crosby is still going. He stopped at two artificially inseminated babies, to go with four (at least) kids produced the old fashioned way. The opinions have not stopped coming out. Crosby likes World War W as much as I do. Crosby has always held doomsday views about the American experiment. … David Van Cortlandt Crosby met his maker January 18, 2023. Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. John Vachon took the social media picture in February 1942. “Meeker County, Minnesota. Farmers’ dance in crossroads store” ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
Tulsi And Joe
This content was posted October 16, 2022. … @BrandonLBradfor “The larger your platform the more I think you have a moral obligation to the people that listen to you. I give Rogan criticism but he’s just an idiot that’s willing to talk to people, Kanye is a vindictive, desperate, dumbass, and don’t blame this on his mental health.” @chamblee54 “Actually, Joe R**** is an i**** who is willing to listen to people. Twitter questioned my first reply. I censored the two words that were possibly offensive. If listen is offensive, then I am in trouble.”
Joe Rogan Experience continues to be a popular feature, except with #selfrighteoustwitter. This week saw two guests that stood out. On Tuesday, JRE featured Tulsi Gabbard. On Wednesday, the guest was Rick Rubin. I listened to all three hours of the Rubin show.
Rick Rubin is a music producer, and around cool dude. He played a huge role in the rise of hip-hop, from Bronx parties to a worldwide phenomenon. His podcast, Broken Records, utilizes the long interview format, with music stars of all persuasion. Mr. Rubin is also well spoken, with a pleasant voice. Just turn on the microphone, and get out of the way
Tulsi Gabbard is a bit more complicated. Early in the show, Joe repeated an urban legend about teachers putting litter boxes in bathrooms, for students who identify as cats. The tale has been repeatedly discredited. Joe and Tulsi began talking about trans excesses. This is a legitimate subject for discussion, but had a rude tone here. Soon, I turned off the show in anger.
Tulsi was on JRE during the 2020 Presidential campaign. She did not seem to be electable, but made a lot of good points. Her primary issue was the damage done by wars of choice, and the military industrial complex. This is an issue that Democrats and Republicans, aka the Uniparty, seem to agree on. One gets the sense that the “culture war” issues are a distraction, taking attention away from the massive influx of borrowed warbucks.
Soon after this appearance, I went to a get together at Manuel’s Tavern. I mentioned that I liked Tulsi Gabbard, and her anti-war position. A voice at the other end of the table started to angrily shout. Tulsi Gabbard was a Russian asset, and a terrible, terrible person. This seems to be a popular opinion in Democratic circles. Genuine dissent must not be tolerated.
At some point in the conversation, Tulsi got onto the military industrial complex, and the War in Ukraine. Tulsi thinks we are headed for a nuclear conflict. A NYC psa was shown, about instructions for a nuclear disaster. The instructions were like the “duck and cover” drills from second grade. Hiding under your desk was going to protect you from radiation. Today’s non-planning for a potential nuclear war may mean the end of civilization as we know it.
Chamblee54 has written about Joe Rogan. Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. Marion Post Wolcott took the social media picture in March 1940. “Hired help resting after day’s work in Upwey horse farm. South Woodstock, Vermont.” ©Luther Mckinnon 2025 · selah
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