Thursday, September 23, 2010

Me & Lulu

Me and my best friend Lulu Stehle, standing in parking lot of St. Francis DeSales Church with our school uniforms on. This is about the age I was when Sister Mary Bernice banged my head on the blackboard when I couldnt do a math problem.

Lil Me at Prospect Park

At Prospect Park Kiddie Pool
(Excuse old goober on edge of pic)

Lil' Me

Always a jokester..with twin-sisters (the bookends) Patty A & Donna B, and little bro Gary in the middle.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Wooley Mammoth

Hall of Vertbrate Paleontology, NYS Museum...Lifesized reproduction of the American mastedon, with skeleton in foreground. This skeleton was found at Cohoes, NY  in 1866. It stands 8' 11" tall at the shoulder and is 14' in length.

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Mini-Me





597 Congress St
Troy, NY
Circa 1959?

Saturday, September 4, 2010

Two Prayers



O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle -- be Thou near them! With them -- in spirit -- we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it -- for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.

Go here for short story version of  The War Prayer; http://www.ruby-sapphire.com/war_prayer.htm

The Fish Prayer; 
Dedicated to this fish; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fGOjZjM0xQ

O Lord our Father, Our brave Fishermen of all the waters in all the lands of this Glorious Nation, idols of our hearts, implore you with this humble prayer- please now hear them;

O Lord our God, help us to bring forth every living creature of the sea up out of the waters gasping for air, twisting and writhing in agony. Make large our catch and swell with every living thing our nets so that we may make a living from their capture, and to delight in as we watch them twist and turn helpless and in agony, torn from their watery homes into unbreathable air, gasping and mouthing their silent screams that we cannot (or will not) hear,….and not a tear will we shed as we watch them suffer and struggle to be free. Help Us to TRAP them Mighitily O Lord, in GREAT numbers weighed by the tons and not in mere pounds, so that we can make BIG our profits off of their sales, to be consumed by the greasy-fingered blood-sport lovers and flesh-eaters of the world. We beseech You to Allow this for us, as in your Great Wisdom have provided to us, to be removed up from their ocean homes and picked apart, tossed and sorted, boiled alive and in some cases eaten alive, for the sole purpose of enriching ourselves and satisfying the worlds unquenchable gluttonus thirst for the flesh and blood of every creature and living thing of the sea. Make plenty the waters with Your Living Bounty so the oceans will be full of fish and every manner of every water-living thing,….For this we Pray you, to make more easily and readily our daily kill, as You in Your Infinite Wisdom so Wisely Ordained.

Friday, September 3, 2010

Old Brown Truck




I bought this truckfor a coupple a' hundred bucks from a Down-on-his-Luck gambler while living in my car in the parking lot of Don Laughlins Riverside Resort and Casino back in the early 1980's BEFORE the big boom. There were many other down and out gamblers living (and working there also) so I was never alone, as a matter of fact, after I bought this truck , it became like home to some of us, and years later, I wrote a poem for the

Old Brown Truck
a Friend of Mine
Whos Parts I knew So Well
Oh Brown Truck
If You Could Talk
The Stories
You Could Tell,

Oh Brown Truck, for me and mine,
A Haven for the Homeless

For Pops, and Joey and Billy and Me -
You Kept Us From Aloneness

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

San Francisco Summer of Love Anniversary Celebrations

Geeze, I was there for the original SOL but I didnt know they held celebrations each year! Cool http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sItcTpDSWBw