Wrong person

—“Wrong person,” I said to a lady driving a white Chevy Eclipse, similar to the car of my months-ago aquacise instructor.
“Right car, right build, female, but wrong person,” I said.
That was in the parking-lot of Thompson Hospital.
Later, in my supermarket: “If you were who I thought you might be,” I said to a pretty lady wearing a mask; “I’d be saying hello. Right clothes, right hair, right build, but wrong person.”
She smiled; she was wearing a mask, but her eyes told me.
“If you were who I thought you might be, I’d be singing happy birthday. Today is the other lady’s birthday.” (Today being Wednesday, September 30th.)
“Well my birthday is Sunday,” she said.
“Well happy birthday,” I said — and I’m glad I said something.
The reason I mention these things is because 10 years ago none of them woulda happened. Me talk to a female? Impossible and furthermore DISGUSTING!
It may very well be my contacts think I’m nuts, but they smile at me.
“Yes, I thought you were worth talking to.”
So do it. I got a smile: and it seemed they ate it up.
Men don’t do this. If I try to strike up a conversation I get defensiveness = “are you crazy?”
Ladies, on the other hand, seem to love it. They seem thrilled I thought they were worth talking to.
I learn this 70 years late. If my attempt bombs, oh well…. No charm for them! Try someone else.

Mowing

—When I was 11 or 12, my father tried to interest me in mowing lawns.
He arranged someone to have their lawn mowed, and I would be the mowist.
I lacked confidence, and had no idea how to do anything. I went and mowed the lawn with our humble Craftsman push-mower. Motor? Are you kidding?
The one who mowed our yard in Erlton was me. And we weren’t usin’ no Briggs & Stratton.
When finished I had to contact the owner to get paid. I had no idea what to charge.
Furthermore that meant talking to a complete stranger, and I avoided people.
This, of course, made my father extremely angry. He was a child of the Depression, and was driven to “Get a job.”
My inability to interface with people was just “rebellion” to him. No “you can do it” from my father.
The fact I was so out-of-it with social contact meant I was DISGUSTING (his words).
Finally, guessing, I charged the lady $5. And it was only a suggestion on my part.
I guess my father gave up after that. His son (me) wasn’t the least bit interested in making money. I was just another mouth-to-feed, and be angry at.
That lawn was the first and last non-Hughes lawn I mowed.

• “Erlton” (‘EARL-tin’) is the small suburb of Philadelphia in south Jersey where I lived until I was 13. Erlton was founded in the ‘30s, named after its developer, whose name was Earl. Erlton was north of Haddonfield (“ha-din-feeld”), an old Revolutionary-War town.

Spinning in their graves

—“So why always Lehigh Valley RailTrail when I hike my imaginary Killian, as I used to do?”
I’d say that to my friend at the kennel that used to daycare Killian.
(Killian is gone since mid-August.)
“Because every time I hike there I meet pretty ladies. I let ‘em talk, and they smile at me.”
My sanctimonious Sunday-School superintendent neighbor, and my hyper-religious parents, all spin in their graves.
So many ladies this time I don’t know where to start.
First was a leggy brunette with baby-carriage doing calisthenics trailside.
“Am I allowed to say hello?” I asked, as I approached.
That’s an opening line, an attempt to start a conversation.
It fell flat.
I kept walking, then “have a nice day,” she chirped.
“Too late!” I thought to myself. “I tried to start a conversation, and it seemed you didn’t want me to. No charm for you, honey!”
When I returned later she was still there, lay-down calisthenics instead of standing.
“I figgered you’d be gone by now,” I said to her.
She giggled and smiled.
“Oh, wanna talk this time, eh? I coulda just walked by and avoided you all together, but I thought you were worth trying again.”
I didn’t say that, but that was what was happening.
The fact I tried again made her feel good. She wasn’t avoiding me this time.
Many more male/female encounters happened afterwards, including ladies being walked by their dogs.
Couples passed me on bicycles; the wife says hello, and the husband doesn’t.
That’s the way it usually is; I guess the men feel threatened by the fact I’m male. Some competition I’d be, except I encourage ladies to talk.
Later another pretty lady approached, said hello, and passed me.
“Didn’t I see you in here before?” I asked her after she passed.
She turned and smiled, at least 10 yards past me.
“I come here on my lunch hour. Get some fresh air.”
Not stunningly attractive, but enough for me to avoid her 10 years ago.
“And yes, I’m glad I said something. You smiled at me.”
At trail’s-end I thread a narrow walkway, and I heard ladies behind me on bicycle.
“On your left,” one chattered. There are two passageways; the bicycles could take the other.
One, then a second, then a third passed. Then a fourth, and finally a fifth, far behind.
“Any more?” I asked that one.
“Nope,” she said. “I’m the last one.”
Walk complete, I could get into my car and drive back home.
Far-away the ladies were hanging their bicycles on racks on their cars.
“Now,” I thought to myself, as I motored toward the parking-lot entrance…..
“Blow the horn at ‘em. Let ‘em know you enjoyed meeting them.” 10 years ago I wouldna, but this time I did.
They all waved and smiled at me. I was makin’ ‘em happy.
“Go to Hell, Bobby! Go directly to Hell! Do not pass ‘go;’ do not collect $200. Fiery furnace for you, Bobby!”
(If it’s fun it’s sin!)

• “Killian,” a “rescue Irish-Setter,” was my most recent dog. He made age-11, and was my seventh Irish-Setter, an extremely lively dog. A “rescue Irish-Setter” is usually an Irish-Setter rescued from a bad home; e.g. abusive or a puppy-mill. Or perhaps its owner died. (Killian was a divorce victim.) By getting a rescue-dog I avoid puppydom, but the dog is often messed up. —Killian was fine. He was my fifth rescue. (Yet another dog lost to canine cancer.)

Technology run rampant!

—“Oh will you shaddup!”
“Not you,” I said to the pretty girl delivering my outdoor takeout at Applebee’s restaurant in Canandaigua.
“I’m talking to Siri in this car. I asked Siri on my iPhone to call Applebee’s, and got an Act-of-Congress.”
No longer can I have Siri just make a phone call. It’s gotta blow at least five minutes analyzing and reviewing Applebee’s before it makes the call.
Thankfully, pretty girl was bringing my takeout as Siri began yammering.
I just bought this newer car. My iPhone was “paired” to it.
“Call Applebee’s in Canandaigua,” I said into my iPhone.
My car took over. Siri’s response wasn’t the Siri I usually hear.
So began an arduous litany of recommendation, star-evaluation, and explanation preceding the actual call.
Yada-yada-yada-yada, followed by “oh will you shaddup!”
“Last time I try that!” I said to pretty girl.
“Next time I disconnect Bluetooth before I enter this car, and hope Siri hasn’t been re-programmed to increase verbiage.”
If that happens, I call Applebee’s without Siri — I use my iPhone contacts, hoping it doesn’t deluge me with new Siri verbosity.
Technology run rampant! Every day I delete a slew of spam e-mails, and scammers demanding my Social Security number, credit-card, checking-account, wallet, etc. under threat of jail.
Siri was a nice idea, but now I can't just call a restaurant. I hafta endure a torrent of verbiage.

• Just yesterday I blogged pretty girl. I told her she was pretty, and the fact I did that after my childhood is amazing. It was her eyes: they were gorgeous. I think she liked it.

I said that?

—“I hafta say this, if ya don’t mind.”
I said that to a pretty young girl delivering my outdoor takeout at a local restaurant.
“I notice your eyes; I can’t help it. I’m sorry, I’m 76 years old, and you’re a pretty girl.”
She smiled, and her eyes flashed.
I said that? After the childhood I had?
“No pretty girl will smile at you!” Yet this pretty girl is smiling at me.
And it wasn’t her other physical attributes I looked at — it was her eyes.
“You’re smiling at me. Mask or not, I can tell!”
More flashing eyes.
And no matter what anyone says to me, that’s a flirt.
A lot has changed since my wife died eight years ago. I got so I can flirt = talk to all women, who previously intimidated me.
My silly dog, now gone, got me there. He wasn’t scared of pretty girls, so he dragged me into meeting pretty girls.
“If I’d known you were out here, I woulda dragged him away.”
Then “oh what a pretty dog. Can I pet him?”
Then “here I am talking to yet another pretty girl.”
As I said to a friend later, I think the fact I noticed her eyes first was what made her feel good.
No Trump grab-ass. (Checkin’ out the merchandise.)
I think I made her feel pretty; it looked like I did.
That’s the key, readers. Make ‘em smile or make ‘em laugh; both of which make us all feel good.
And now after 70+ years I finally can do it.
It looked like I charmed that girl = got her endorphins flowing.

New wheels

Last ride? (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

—“How come yer buyin’ a new car?” A friend exclaimed. What’s wrong with what you got?”
“Nothing really,” I answered. “I could keep it another year or two, but my kid-brother in Boston, who recently retired and became part-owner in a used-car dealership that flips cars, suggested he could get me a newer car.
My brother delivered the car Wednesday afternoon. He drove all the way from Boston with my new car on a trailer. His partner came along to help, and cow-tow when commanded.
My brother retired from helping run an electricity power plant. But not yet from being a boss-man.
My previous car was eight years old at 113,000 miles, and was starting to rust. A few minor things didn’t work, and it was filthy.
So after the usual pot-shots and brotherly snide-remarks I said do it.
He bid a 2017 lease-return Ford Escape, and that’s what’s pictured.
Leather seats, and a blizzard of gizmos; the Titanium model, not “Titanic,” as my wife’s brother’s first wife would say.
Brother-to-brother, $1,000 for his dealership.
Seemed fair. He told me the amount he needed, and it was $2,000 less than I expected.
I’m getting a $25,000 used car for $22,000. My figures are probably wrong, but what he needed was way less than what I thought it would be.
Plus it’s brother-to-brother; he’s not just flipping a car. He tested it himself. His buyer is the guy who changed his diapers.
My old car has been stone reliable. Two batteries, two tire-sets, and a complete exhaust-system.
“You got a good one!” my service-guy says. Same Ford dealer I bought it from.
“No,” I thought to myself. “That car got a good owner. One who followed service recommendations, and didn’t scrimp.”
That Ford dealer probably took me to the cleaners when he sold me that car. I bought it not long after my wife died, and was in no shape to play the car-purchase game.
My brother demanded I test-drive my new car as soon as he arrived. All I did was drive it to my nearby town park so I could use their Porta-John.
Fevered machinations began. The license-plates on my old car were removed, along with a few other things I hadn’t got to yet. I already had removed a lot.
I hate to let my old car go. It’s been extremely reliable, but is filthy inside thanks to my previous dog, and the difficulty of arranging interior detailing.
I had it detailed once, but that dealer now only does their own cars. I’d do it myself, but various other things impinge: lawn to mow, laundry to do, bills to pay, and mainly writing. Also a dog to walk when I had one.
PRIORITIES MAN! Cleaning the interior of my previous car was back-burner.
Since it’s a Massachusetts car, my brother couldn’t sell directly to me. We had to involve a local car-dealer, my hairdresser, who also flips cars.
$450 for my hairdresser, plus fees, plus sales-tax equals $2,241.40. The gumint gets most, and my hairdresser is doing me a favor.
“So what do you think?” My brother asked.
“Don’t know yet,” I said. “Every time I go to drive it: ‘gimme the keys!’”
He then wanted to use some distant restaurant to which I never been, and then drive some roundabout route to get directly back to my house afterwards.
“I live here, and you don’t!” I shouted. “It’s the route I’d take if I could ever drive this thing.”
We also coulda had supper in Canandaigua, but heaven-forbid I suggest someplace other than that far-away restaurant he found via Google.
It's a nice car, but rather intimidating = gizmos I’ll never use. I felt so prior century I wonder how I attract ladies as well as I do.
All I want it to do is reliably cart me from pillar-to-post, and stay outta the shop!
We “paired” my iPhone to my new car. “Easy as pie,” my brother’s co-owner said. “Everything is right here on your steering wheel.”
“Same as my old car,” I commented. “I get a Bluetooth phone-call, and I cut it off by mistakenly hitting the wrong button. I hafta pull off the road to answer a Bluetooth, usually by ‘try it and see what happens.’
Don't forget you’re talking to a stroke survivor. I run on what’s left, and it ain’t all eight.
And everything involves computers. I’m using one right now, and I know how computers like to throw hairballs atcha.
What happens when my keyless-start fails? Call Triple-A!
“If anything can fail, it will,” I said.
Even the back tailgate is electric. What if I hafta go manual? Call Triple-A again, and those Ford service-guys drain my wallet.
My impression is this car proves I’m completely out-of-it yet I have many lady-friends.
“Yeah,” my brother bellowed. “At least two blogs per week celebrating his lady-friend exploits.”
“Well yes,” I commented. “You didn’t have the parents I had. They weren’t telling you ‘no pretty lady will associate with you!’”
That it’s happening to me is mind-blowing.

“The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on...” (Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám)

• “The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on...” in Omar Khayyám’s Rubáiyát is a line I gleaned thanks to Houghton College’s liberal arts education. Class of 1966, and I never regretted it. (Too many things like that remain.)

Another smiler

—“Here she comes, Bobby,” I thought to myself as a pretty jogger walked toward me on Lehigh Valley RailTrail.
“Say hello,” I thought to myself. “You’ve done it hundreds of times since your wife died. If that bombs, they lose! I coulda charmed ‘em.”
“Seems you were running when you passed earlier,” I said.
“I was,” she smiled.
There you have it, readers. “No pretty lady will smile at you,” versus one just did.
We stopped to talk.
“I run part-way, then walk part-way,” she said.
Yada-yada-yada-yada. At least five minutes.
But yes, “I thought you were worth trying to strike up a conversation, and here you are smiling at me!”
I’m not used to this = convinced in childhood no pretty lady would ever hang out with me.
“I used to run myself. That was 50 pounds ago.”
“So why did you quit?”
“Well, my wife died eight years ago, I had a stroke 27 years ago, and now this left knee is no longer the one I was born with.”
“Gotta say hello to my silly dog, who I just lost. His ashes are up by that mile-marker.
We hiked this trail hundreds of times, and he loved it. He’d sniff everything, and bark off into the woods.”
As always, it was me ending our conversation. “No pretty lady will talk to you,” yet they wanna keep talking.
And she was smiling at me, eyes flashing! Strike up a conversation, especially with a lady. Make ‘em feel good!
Sorry I keep celebrating this.

• Currently dogless, I try to walk as many times per week as I woulda when I had a dog. I prefer Lehigh Valley RailTrail because I always encounter some pretty lady smiling at me.

Still married, sorta

—How do I say this maintaining taste and decorum?
My wife died over eight years ago, and much to my surprise I made many female friends since, even pretty ones.
MARKED FOR LIFE, I say, regarding my early childhood. My holy-roller parents and hyper-religious Sunday-School superintendent neighbor convinced me no female would ever smile at/talk to/associate with/or hang out with ME — except the asexual frumps they lined up to “straighten-me-out” (their words).
Now, 70 years late, I find myself attracting ladies, even pretty ones.
“You’re funny,” they tell me = make ‘em laugh.
Plus ladies love talking, and I encourage that. Talking with ladies is much more fun than men, who often pull that macho crap on you, or get defensive.
Every time I hike Lehigh Valley RailTrail, it’s the ladies that smile at me and say hello. The men don’t.
But I’m still married, sorta.
Friends wonder how I got a female to marry me despite being “marked-for-life.”
Special case, I always say. She liked me as soon as she saw me. “I like the way that guy thinks.”
My wife also had a difficult childhood, mainly her mother. Her father liked her. Both parents were difficult for me, although my mother mellowed as I got older. She realized my father was turning me off.
Another friend whose husband died nine years ago, also feels “still married.”
Her husband was a prize; they liked each other.
“Someone might come along that might change my mind, but I doubt it,” she says.
The fact her husband was so well-suited also factors in.
I could say that’s true in my case, except who I am now makes me wonder. My wife was an excellent match in that she understood what I said. Figures-of-speech, obtuse concepts, philosophy.
But I doubt she could live with who I became. Flirtatious, and I enjoy female company. I wonder sometimes if she was right for me.
My bereavement counselor says she was step-two in recovery from a dreadful childhood.
Step one was my college, the first religious institution to not declare me evil and stupid. Some professors wanted me in their class — unlike most students I could think. I had a habit of skewering conventional wisdom with viable criticism. “That Hughes kid has a point!”
I’ve made many lady-friends, way more than I expected.
But I have yet to meet anyone comparable to my wife.
Flirting is fun, but that’s as far as I go. I love makin’ ‘em laugh, or make them feel pretty, but I can’t get physical.
I don’t want the girl to think I’m a lecher, and I’m still attached to my wife.

• My college was Houghton College in western New York, from where I graduated with a BA in 1966. I never regretted it, although I graduated a Ne’er-do-Well, without their blessing. Houghton is an evangelical liberal-arts college, and was the first religious institution to not consider me rebellious and Of-the-Devil = a threat.

Celebratin’

—“Yer gonna stand there and talk to me without wanting to go back to work?”
I said that to pretty *****, my pharmacist, after she gave me a flu shot.
“Sure!” she said. This contradicts my upbringing: “no pretty girl will smile at you!”
“Marked-for-life,” I always say. I expect pretty ladies to wanna avoid my company.
“If there’s one thing I learned since my wife died,” I told *****; “it’s to strike up a conversation, especially with women. It may bomb, but if so, it’s their loss.”
“I wouldn’t be a pharmacist except I like meeting people,” she said. And ***** is not an easy smiler, but she was smiling. Even behind her mask. I could tell.
And I had just hit her with a long explanation of train-chasing. I give her my train-calendar, and she tells me her son (age-5) loves it.
That explanation probably sailed right over her head, but she smiled anyway. I was talking to her; I think that’s what women want most.
Especially with a guy who listens, and not some on-the-make geezer.
Let ‘em talk; they’re likely to say something I wanna hear.
A simple exchange of emotions: e.g. “I don’t know how someone as tiny as you can have children?”
Or “my son loves that calendar; ‘mom, look at this!’”
“So why at age-76 do I continue to do these train-chases in Altoony? It’s your son’s bashful reaction, and you too.
We’re making him happy, although I like it too. Been doin’ it since age-2.”
Finally I got up to leave. “Back to work!” she said, sighing. And it was me ending things, as always. Pretty ***** had kept listening to me, and wouldn’t leave.
Sorry readers. After 70+ years of avoiding people, and believing no pretty girl would talk to me, I celebrate too much.

Youtharama

—During my teen years my hyper-religious parents made me hang out with a group of teenagers allied to my church.
This was probably a mistake, since all the others were ne’er-do-wells like me, evil and disgusting. Hardly people that would “straighten-me-out!”
Our group was led by an adult who may have been a Dupont Vice-President. (Dupont rules northern DE, and I am somewhat native — moved there at age-13 from south Jersey.)
That guy, and his wife, had a “burden” for us, because most adults in the church considered us disgusting.
I still remember a church deacon sanctimoniously telling me I was “degraded.”
For which reason I immediately established the founding chapter of DYA (“Degraded Youth of America”) in my high-school.
It countered my high-school chapter of Youth-for-Christ (YFC), which I also was forced to join.
Our leader would drive us all up to Philadelphia (from Wilmington) to attend a Youtharama gig.
I suppose “Youtharama” is a takeoff on “Cinerama.” Youtharama began in 1956; an attempt to bring religion to youth, an outreach of Percy Crawford, a Philadelphia radio-evangelist.
What a wonderful idea, except we ne’er-do-wells pursued less boring options.
Youtharama wasn’t interesting to us.
Jokes, and singing, and finally an alter-call, wherein zealots in the crowd all got up to “go forward.”
By so doing they hoped to persuade the average attendee to also go forward.
What we did instead is sneak out to ride Philadelphia’s Broad-Street subway.
It wasn’t far, and didn’t cost much.
Riding a subway was much more interesting to this railfan than religious posturing.
Another diversion was to sneak elsewhere in the building to drop spitballs in people’s drinks.
This actually happened, readers. A reception-dinner was being held elsewhere in the building, and we ne’er-do-wells were in a balcony above the reception.
We could drop spitballs in people’s drinks. The spitballs were made from Youtharama programs.
Despite our evil tendencies, that adult leader left his mark. I saw him years later after he left Dupont to found an antiques store with his wife in Wilmington.
No contact, but I think they recognized me.
Meanwhile my sister married and then divorced one of my fellow ne’er-do-wells. He became a hippie.

Cheese-hound

The slices at right are what went on my grilled-cheese sandwich. They are equivalent to what Killian would get. (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

—Every two weeks on Friday Yr Fthfl Srvnt has stewed-tomatoes and a grilled-cheese sandwich.
I no longer have my tomato-lady, who used to can tomatoes grown in our garden.
She also made whole-wheat bread from scratch, and I used that for my sandwiches. (No bread-machine either. She kneaded it herself.)
Since she died, I had to start buying canned tomatoes from my supermarket, and supermarket bread also.
I still eat whole-wheat bread, which contradicts my preference for enriched white bread as a child. Sprouted multi-grain etc. It looks like bread flecked with seeds.
That’s my wife’s legacy. She made me who I became. Yrs Trly is a child of east-coast suburbia, while my wife was the rural outback of western NY.
Now I live in a very rural setting myself; my nearest neighbor being 200 feet across the road. I don’t know his name, although I talk to him often.
Side-neighbors are unknowns 400-500 feet away.
It’s what my wife wanted: return to her rural roots, and now I’m rural myself.
Ever since I lost Killian, I no longer buy so much cheese. Killian was a cheese-monger.
Any cheesy meal signified cheese for Killian; chili, pizza, a grilled-cheese sandwich, etc.
Killian loved cheese. “Looka this, big monkey.” I’d hold up the cheese, and out he’d come.
Chomp! Chomp! Chomp! Chomp! Down the hatch!
What I'd slice off for a grilled-cheese sandwich is how much he got.
So here I am slicing extra-sharp cheddar for last night’s grilled-cheese sandwich. I looked into my living-room where Killian woulda jumped onto my Castro-Convertible……
No Killian; the dog that kept “Helluva” in business.

• “Helluva” brand cheese.

“Hello Killian!”

Over the embankment, and in the woods, are Killian’s ashes. (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

—A month has passed since I put down Killian.
His previous owner came out to help me disperse the ashes.
We dispersed them along Lehigh Valley RailTrail, where Killian and I walked so many times.
We dispersed them at the mile-marker pictured above so I’d know where I put ‘em. That mile-marker is in “the Cathedral-of-Trees,” a section where the abandoned railroad-grade threads overhanging trees.
Killian loved that trail; any trail really. Lehigh Valley RailTrail is 6-8 miles from my house, and Killian barked the whole way there. He knew where he was going!
I always let Killian lead on my 15 foot extendable.
In the Cathedral-of-Trees he’d go off to the side to bark into the woods. I never saw anything, but CRITTERS BEWARE!
I got the same thing driving home from Canandaigua. I pass a pasture with 20-30 black-Angus cows. “You tell ‘em, big monster.”
“Bark-bark-bark-bark-bark! The master wants me to bark.”
“Get off my planet! Mean vicious cows! Who do they think they are? They’re not allowed out there!”
Killian wasn’t a killer, but he was very much a hunter. He’d chase a bunny-rabbit, but not kill it.
Most of my dogs — Killian was Irish-Setter #7 — would grab that bunny-rabbit and shake it to death.
I remember how proud my first dog was when she snagged her first squirrel. Food for the table! That’s what dogs are for = help feed the boss-dog! (And share the kill.)
No way do excoriate a dog doing its job. Here I am walking along and all of a sudden BAM!
They’re hunters; let ‘em hunt!
And Killian loved hunting. Nose to the ground, and into everything. “Gotta move quickly too, so I can check out everything.”
I’ve hiked Lehigh Valley RailTrail many times since, and without Killian.
But every time I pass that mile-marker: “Hello Killian!”

• My first Irish-Setter (late ‘70s, name was “Casey”) snagged at least 30 squirrels, ten of whom she caught after being hit by a car. She’d sneak up on ‘em.

Faire Hilda in repose!

—RE: “Keep doing this as long as you can.”
That was my opening line in a feeble attempt to start a conversation — and it wasn’t much.
I was hiking by myself on Lehigh Valley RailTrail the other day, dog-less of course, and a tall blonde girl jogged past with her dog.
I didn’t say anything, but then she came back the other way.
I stopped and “keep doing this as long as you can,” I said.
In other words: “talk to me, PLEASE!”
She stopped to talk = AMAZING!
Stopping a pretty girl counters the infamous Hilda Q. Walton, who convinced me all males, including me at age-5, were SCUM.
Had my hyper-religious parents come to my defense back then, Faire Hilda woulda crashed in flames.
But they heartily agreed.
“NO PRETTY GIRL WILL TALK TO YOU!” followed by “GO TO HELL, BOBBY! DO NOT PASS ‘GO;’ DO NOT COLLECT $200; GO DIRECTLY TO HELL!”
No four-legged chick-magnet; just me and that pretty girl.
She was wearing a “Roberts lacrosse” tee-shirt.
As far as I know Roberts Wesleyan college, like Houghton, is a religious college. (Houghton is where I attended college: Class of 1966.)
I figgered I better not say anything, since I don’t wanna prompt religious posturing.
I’ve had it happen. Tell another Houghton-grad I’m also a Houghton-grad, and they fawn all over me. Celebration of our common superiority as Christian versus non-Christian.
I’m almost anti-religion. Friends wonder how in Hell’s name I attended Houghton when I’m agnostic.”
“Compromise with my father,” I say. He wanted me to attend Moody Bible Institute in Chicago, to become a Bible-beater like him.
(My father attended Moody.)
But at that time Moody wasn’t a four-year college, and I wanted a college degree.
Our compromise was to allow me to attend Houghton instead of Moody, since Houghton was also religious.
Houghton made my father mad as Hell, since they didn’t “straighten me out” = beat me into becoming a Bible-beater.
None of my siblings could attend Houghton. Houghton was verboten after me!
I realize now my opening line was just a gambit. It’s a repeat of something I said earlier to another pretty jogger.
It’s lame; but the girl stopped.
I also immediately mentioned my dog’s recent passing. Perhaps saying that made her more inclined to tarry.
“I hereby say hello, hoping you’ll talk to me.”
And now, with the background I have, the fact a pretty girl would stop to talk to me is amazing.
Except it’s become normal. A simple exchange of emotions = “talk to me” followed by “I’m sorry.”

• Sorry readers. ALL-CAPS, bold-face, underlined. I wanted to avoid stuff like that, but FAIRE HILDA IN REPOSE!

From dust, to dust

—Another long hike on Lehigh Valley RailTrail in honor of my recently deceased dog.
“Hello Killian,” I always say as I stop at the mile-marker where me and Killian’s previous owner dispersed the ashes.
“From dust, to dust,” I always say.
“Wildest, craziest, neatest Irish-Setter I ever had,” and I start crying.
Why-oh-why did this dog mean so much to me? Killian was extraordinary.
A tall blond girl jogged past as I walked in. Her dog was running with her — a large black poodle.
I passed her again as she jogged back.
“Keep doing this as long as you can,” I said; “and I just lost my dog.”
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“Who knows how many times that dog and I walked this trail? He barked the whole way here — he knew where he was going, and I’m six-to-eight miles away.”
“What breed?” she asked.
“Irish-Setter,” I said.
“How old was he?”
“Age-11, and I thought he was good for 15-or-16. Spunkiest, healthiest dog I ever had.
His ashes are at that mile-marker so I’d know where I put ‘em.
That marker is in the ‘Cathedral-of-Trees,’ were he’d bark into the woods. I never saw anything, but ‘CRITTERS BEWARE!’”
“Are you gonna get another?” she asked.
“Probably,” I said.
“But I'll never have another Killian. He was extraordinary.”
“I wish they’d last until 40 or so,” she said.

• September 14th is one month since I put Killian down: August 14th, 2020.
• The “Cathedral-of-Trees” is where the old railroad-grade passed through woods, which overhung the railroad. It was Lehigh Valley Railroad’s old extension to Buffalo, abandoned a few years ago.

T-bucket

EXTREMELY well-done. (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

—“SHADES OF THE ‘60s. Ed ‘Big Daddy’ Roth LIVES ON!”
So said retired bus-driver *** *******, an actual friend, not just a Facebook “friend.”
I put the above picture on my own Facebook so I could screenshot it for my brother ****, who like me appreciates hotrods — I think he does.
**** is not in my iPhone e-mail contacts — not yet.
All I could do is post it to my own Facebook, so I could screenshot it and e-mail to him via this laptop.
Every week I eat out one night per week with other bereaved friends. I’m the token male; all the others are widows.
I been doing it for years. Another guy ate with us a while, but disappeared.
Last week we patronized “Eddie O’Brien’s Grille and Bar,” a restaurant in downtown Canandaigua.
Finished we returned to the parking-lot to get our cars.
Yrs Trly noticed the canvas-top of the car pictured poking above the surrounding cars.
So what do we have here?
I kept walking, and BEHOLD, the fabulous T-Bucket pictured above.
“This thing is worth a photograph,” I said to myself as I unholstered my iPhone.
I thereafter studied the car, a hot-rodded Model-T pickup; although you couldn’t truck anything in a pickup bed only four by three feet, and only a foot deep.
The bed was covered, and had a gas-cap on top. “So that’s where the gas goes,” I said to myself.
The steering-column was almost vertical, putting the steering wheel in your lap like a dinner plate.
Enter my brother ****, stage-right, a Chevy-man like me.
“Only one problem,” he’d say. “It ain’t the Chevy SmallBlock.”
Correct; the center header-pipes aren’t siamesed. They would be on a Chevy SmallBlock.
So it looks like Ford’s small-block, introduced in the ‘60s.
Given my ‘druthers I prefer the turtle-deck T’s over the pickups.
But this car is extremely well done, even if it is a pickup.
It even has disc brakes up front, although I wouldn’t expect much braking out of bicycle tires.
I could do without the flames, but it’s extremely attractive.
Regrettably it would be just a toy, but great fun to tool around in, or just display in car-shows.
Relive those hoary days of teendom when we kroozed the streets hoping to avoid cherry-top.
As I approach age-80, hotrods lose their attraction. But this car could change my mind.

• One could say the car pictured is something Roth would do. But it’s not far out enough — it's too conventional.
• For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) Yrs Trly drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service (RTS) in Rochester, NY, a public employer, the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs. *** ******* was a fellow bus-driver. My heart-defect caused stroke October 26th, 1993 ended that. I retired on medical-disability, and that defect was repaired. I recovered well enough to return to work at a newspaper; I retired from that almost 15 years ago.
• The car pictured in this link is a “turtle-deck T.”
• “Cherry-top” is the police. Early patrol-cars had a single rotating beacon on top, with a red translucent housing. Lit up it looked like a cherry.

Shoulda kept my mouth shut

—“Well, we all gotta go sometime,” my contact said.
“What, pray tell, does that have to do with what I just said?” I asked myself.
Mixing post-stroke aphasia with my newfound penchant for conversation can crash in flames.
I had gone into the new Weggers in Henrietta following a dental-appointment. I’d try to purchase my over-priced espresso coffee-beans, which I ran the Canandaigua Weggers out of.
I also needed cauliflower florets, and frozen asparagus spears, so I'd look for them too.
A guy was taking a large “family” bag of broccoli florets out of the freezer-display. Enough to feed a family of five in Bangladesh for a month.
“Yeah; that’s what ya gotta buy,” I said, except my speech was beginning to stumble.
He looked at me for explanation.
“The smaller bags don’t have the bigger florets the larger bags have,” but my speech was getting eratic.
I doubt he understood a word I said, so “we all gotta go sometime.”
Conversation is exhilarating! It contradicts the way I was brought up = “NO ONE WILL TALK TO YOU!”
But I hafta remember my speech often jams.

• “Weggers” is Wegmans, a large supermarket-chain based in Rochester where I often buy groceries. They have stores in both Canandaigua and Henrietta (NY).
• I had a stroke October 26th, 1993 from an undiagnosed heart-defect since repaired. I pretty much recovered. Just tiny detriments; I can pass for never having had a stroke. It slightly compromised my speech = difficulty finding and putting words together.

Hiking the rail-trail in honor of Killian

—“Volunteer for a what?” I asked a lady hiking Lehigh Valley RailTrail.
“Volunteer” was emblazoned on her teeshirt.
“Monroe-County Parks Department,” she said.
“So you guys are probably responsible for this rail-trail,” I said.
“Yes, and isn’t it beautiful?”
“I used to call that area over there ‘the cathedral-of-trees’,” I said, pointing to where the old railroad grade passed through overhanging woods.
“Me and Killian walked this trail many times, and I just lost Killian.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“He’s in here, I said. “Up by the mile-marker.”
“Did he run away?”
“No, cancer,” I said.
And he loved hiking this trail. He’d bark the whole way here, and we were six-seven miles away. He knew where we were going.
“Silliest, craziest, neatest Irish-Setter I ever had. The dog that made my socializing possible. I wouldn’t be talking to you if not for Killian.
He’d pull me toward you, then lean into you wanting to be petted. A ‘people-dog’.”
“So how old was he?”
“11,” I said.
“So you gave him 11 good years,” she said.
“NOPE! Only two,” I said. “He was rescue.”
I had to leave — I was tearing up.
“That’s okay,” she said. “I understand.”
“Wildest, craziest, neatest Irish-Setter I ever had,” I mumbled.

SKIP!

—“Uh-oh, ‘Disconnect-from-Reality’ again. Why can’t he just get over it?”
SKIP!
The reaction I get to “Disconnect-from-Reality” is similar to what I’m told when I say I have a slight aphasia, an after-effect of my long-ago stroke.
Difficulty getting words out, or putting thoughts together in my head.
“You talk just fine!” I’m told.
“My brothers hear it. Just because we’re not lifelong acquaintances doesn’t mean my slight difficulty speaking doesn’t exist.”
I have to tell people I may lock up, or hafta ask them to slow down or repeat. Usually I get understanding, but sometimes it’s “you talk just fine!”
“Why do things seem more real tonight than six weeks ago?”
I asked that to myself last night.
“Disconnect-from-Reality” has happened twice: first 26 years ago after my stroke, then eight years ago after my wife died.
I was in the real-world, but it didn’t feel real.
“I feel like I been hit by a PeterBilt,” I said after my stroke.
I had just chased a restored railroad steam-locomotive with my brother down in WV. I was so excited my doctors thought it a stroke-effect.
I’d say at least six years passed before I began to feel life was real. For a long time I was just going through the motions.
“Is it because my dog is gone? That I no longer have a dog around to distract me?”
There was a no-dog period after I put Scarlett down. Things were not as “real” during that time.
For the longest time I just went through the motions after my wife died — and that was over eight years ago.
Dogs to walk, both my camera and lawnmower failed, laundry to wash, computers, eat-outs with fellow bereavers.
I did all this, but felt disconnected-from-reality.
Is this a mental function to avoid thinking about what terrible things happened?
Congratulations if you read this far.
Maybe before I kick the bucket I can “reconnect-with-reality.”

• I had a stroke October 26th, 1993 from an undiagnosed heart-defect since repaired. It slightly compromised my speech. (Difficulty finding and putting words together.)
• My wife died of cancer April 17th, 2012.
• My brother and I are both railfans.
• My most recent dog was “Killian,” a “rescue Irish-Setter.” He made age-11, and was my seventh Irish-Setter, an extremely lively dog. A “rescue Irish-Setter” is usually an Irish-Setter rescued from a bad home; e.g. abusive or a puppy-mill. Or perhaps its owner died. (Killian was a divorce victim.) By getting a rescue-dog I avoid puppydom, but the dog is often messed up. —Killian was fine. He was my fifth rescue. (Yet another dog lost to canine cancer — five so far.)

Toilet unplugged

—“I think it actually works,” I said to myself as I flushed the toilet in (our) my main bathroom the umpteenth time.
It didn’t overfill nor gurgle, and it actually flushed.
Last Friday I began preparing supper, stewed tomatoes and a grilled-cheese sandwich.
Sadly, my tomato-lady died over eight years ago. We used to grow tomatoes, and my wife canned ‘em.
Our garden is now fallow, and I buy canned tomatoes at the supermarket.
The supermarket tomatoes are whole or diced. They have to be chopped up in my food-processor.
One tomato wrapped itself around the cutter-blade, so I had to take action.
Insanity began. I mistakenly poured the tomato-slurry into the food-processor housing. I thereafter emptied the slurry into a sauce pan, but lost a lot on the floor.
I sopped up the spilled tomatoes with paper-towels, so now I had many soggy paper-towels.
What I usually do with soggy paper-towels is flush ‘em down the toilet, which could take three or four paper-towels per flush.
The spill generated six or more, which I balled up and put in my toilet.
BIG MISTAKE! = My toilet plugged.
I got my plunger, and filled a bucket of water. I’ve unplugged that toilet many times.
That toilet would drain slowly, but it wouldn’t flush.
Lots of plunging amidst eight-to-twelve more buckets of water.
That toilet was plugged royally. I expected a plumber would hafta snake out the sewer line.
That toilet is one of three. The other two worked, although the one next to my bedroom is Lo-Flo, and likes to plug.
The third is in my garage. It works, but it’s distant.
So now I had two working toilets, although one is plug-prone, and the other is distant.
I let the dysfunctional toilet sit. Hopefully a night of sitting would disintegrate the clog.
No such luck! The next morning the toilet bowl was empty, but filled when I flushed. Given a full bowl of water, it would flush, followed by “gurgle-gurgle.”
The gurgling came from a nearby sink. Like maybe the clog was downstream from the toilet.
Another day passed with gurgling and water buckets.
This weekend had Labor-Day, so I couldn’t call my plumber Monday. So let it sit another day. At least I had two working toilets, and I hadn’t overflowed the nonworking one.
Then I used and flushed my bedroom toilet, and suddenly it too was plugged.
I plunged that one, and it flushed a bucket of water.
Later I tried the main toilet, and it flushed just like normal. No gurgling, no overfilling.
I tried it again, and it flushed just like it should.
That toilet plugged three days ago, and now suddenly it worked.
I could celebrate my success in getting it unplugged, but to me it was luck.

• RE: “our……” —The house I live in was designed by my wife and I. We originally designed in two bathrooms, but added a third in our garage in case my wife’s aunt (deceased) had to immediately hit a toilet after a long trip to our house.
• Occasionally my kid brother (from near Boston) would phonecall while I was trying to unplug a toilet. He’d wonder if the toilet was electric. (A smarty-pants!)

Three little flirts

—1) “You may hafta get their attention,” I said to an attractive girl standing in front of me at my pharmacy.
I stepped in front of her to ring the bell on their counter.
“I’m not in line,” she said; “just waiting for them to fill my prescription.”
Pretty ***** appeared from behind shelving. “Nothing for you,” she said, seeing it was me.
Long discussion followed about how I was now outta my prescription pills.
She filled my prescription, knowing my doctor would authorize it.
Meanwhile, “pretty girl” waited quietly behind me. I said goodbye to ***** as I began leaving.
But I forgot “pretty girl,” and walked out without saying goodbye.
I shoulda.
It woulda made both of us feel good.
“Yes, you are attractive; so I hereby say goodbye.”

—2) “Can I say hello to your dog?”
I said that to a pretty lady at the gas-pump behind mine, and on the other side.
She’d let her dog out of her car to pour water into his dish. The dog was gorgeous, but a Labrador-Retriever, not an Irish-Setter.
“I just lost my dog,” I said, as I slowly started walking toward them.
“I miss him terribly. I need to talk to a dog,” I said.
The dog started toward me as I offered the back of my hand.
The dog had been swimming at Kershaw Park at the north end of Canandaigua lake.
“I gave up Kershaw, and my dog loved Kershaw,” I told her. “Too many people, and they all wanna greet my dog. There is a pandemic.”
Yada-yada-yada-yada. Not smashingly attractive, but she smiled at me.

—3) “Gotta say hello to ****** before they leave,” I said to myself.
A week ago a landscape-service came to my house to do yardwork. It’s owned and operated by the children of my YMCA aquacise-instructor. They also have a crew.
Work finished, “I haven't met ****** yet,” a girl. Perhaps she’s just their accountant, but I bet she also smashes trees.
****** was inside the truck. I said hello, and she turned and smiled.

—What matters here is ten years ago none of this woulda happened. I woulda avoided all three, including ******.
Back then I was still convinced “NO FEMALE WILL EVER TALK TO YOU;” male either.
What a wonderful thing to tell a five-year-old little boy, that I am disgusting.
At this point my friends tell me to GET OVER IT!
“Marked for life,” I retort. “And now, 70 years late, I find my badmouthers were all WRONG.
Finding this out is exhilarating, and I celebrate it too much.

• “Pretty *****” is head-pharmacist at my pharmacy. I go there because we became friends — much to my amazement.
• I just lost my current dog, “Killian,” a “rescue Irish-Setter.” He made eleven, and was my seventh Irish-Setter, an extremely lively dog. A “rescue Irish-Setter” is usually an Irish-Setter rescued from a bad home; e.g. abusive or a puppy-mill. Or perhaps its owner died. (Killian was a divorce victim.) By getting a rescue-dog I avoid puppydom, but the dog is often messed up. —Killian was fine. He was my fifth rescue.
• For years I did aquatic balance-training in the Canandaigua YMCA’s swimming-pool, two one-hour classes per week — plus a third hour on my own. The one-hour classes were led by my “aquacise-instructor.” —Thanks to COVID-19, that aquatic balance-training has been discontinued, not forever I hope. I have lady-friends there, also much to my amazement.

Strike up a conversation

—If there’s one thing Yr Fthfl Srvnt learned since his wife died it’s strike up a conversation; people love to talk, especially women.
If I crash in flames, try again with someone else. You’ll quickly find someone who loves to talk.
Yesterday I hiked Lehigh Valley RailTrail in honor of my dog, who I just lost.
I hiked the distance my dog and I woulda walked, about 2.8 miles. A bicyclist was resting on a rock where I turn around. Would I get there before she left?
I did. She was fiddling her Smartphone, so I asked her what it was.
Off we went = ice broken = yada-yada-yada-yada.
And she kept smiling at me: “No one will talk to you! You are DISGUSTING!” Yet this lady wouldn’t stop.
She coulda cut us off, and got back on her bicycle. But NO! We were talking = having fun. She loved it! Not gorgeous, but she kept smiling at me.
I had similar encounters in my past since my wife died. Months ago I started talking to another lady and she wouldn’t stop. We talked at least 20 minutes, and she kept smiling at me, lighting up the surrounding woods.
I could see it: “This guy is really interesting!” She became embarrassed we were having so much fun it wasn’t fair to her husband back home.
It was me who cut her off, as it usually is, but we were striking sparks. All I had to do was keep talking, and she wouldn’t leave.
No grab-ass, no being forward, just talk.
And I discover this doesn’t happen just with women.
Men are less inclined, especially if young.
Returned to my car, a guy was parked next to me, and he was setting up his bicycle to ride the rail-trail.
Do I say anything or not?
“Yer gonna get mauled by mosquitoes,” I said.
Yada-yada-yada-yada = Off we went.
His wife-daughter-whatever was with him, and she started yammering with me.
After the rail-trail I went to a supermarket to hit my in-store pharmacy.
A guy pulled in with his giant Ford pickup, and parked behind me. He got out of his truck and “ding-ding-ding-ding-ding!”
“The sound of a Ford product telling you ya left your key in the ignition,” I commented.
Off we went. He heard what I said, then “let ‘em steal it. It’s a work truck.”
“I got a story if you wanna hear it,” I said as we walked into the supermarket.
He stopped in his tracks, and wheeled around.
“NO ONE WILL TALK TO YOU!” Versus he wanted to hear my story.
“My kid brother has a GMC truck. He left the key in the ignition, and his truck locked us out. We had to get triple-A, and we were down in PA.
At least Fords have that keypad in the door, and you can be damn sure I have that code in my wallet.”
As always, it was me cutting off my conversation with that bicycle-lady. “I'd like to be able to eat my breakfast before 4 PM, and I sure am glad I said something.”
She smiled — how many times have I concluded a conversation with that?

She kept smiling at me

—“If it’s fun, it’s sin,” is how I was brought up.
My parents were hyper-religious and overly judgmental, although my mother mellowed as I got older.
Next door was the infamous Hilda Q. Walton, my Bible-beating Sunday-school Superintendent who told me “NO PRETTY LADY WILL ASSOCIATE WITH/TALK TO/SMILE AT/BE INTERESTED IN YOU!”
Tell that to a five-year-old little boy, and have your parents agree, and you’re marked-for-life. Frightened of women = “I can’t talk to her.”
Today I walked Lehigh Valley RailTrail alone, without Killian. I did the distance Killian and I walked — maybe 2.8 miles.
“Where’s Killian?” a jogger who knew us asked.
“GONE,” I said.
He tapped my shoulder as he passed. “I’m really sorry,” he said. “I feel your pain.”
A lady on bicycle was resting on a rock where I turn around. She wasn’t gorgeous, but she kept smiling at me.
That’s all it takes: some lady smile at me and I’m done.
We jabbered at least 25 minutes: various topics = I drove city bus, she attended Catholic school, what Smartphones we used, I had a stroke, but mainly we no longer watched the TV-news.
“If I am correct a really bad hurricane devastated Louisiana. But I’m not sure since I gave up watching the news.”
She kept smiling at me. Every time that happens, Faire Hilda spins in her grave.
“DO NOT PASS ‘GO,’ DO NOT COLLECT $200; GO DIRECTLY TO HELL, BOBBY!”
“So here we are sinning, and it sure is fun.”
She laughed — we couldn’t break away from each other.
She kept smiling at me!
One thing I learned since my wife died eight years ago is strike up the conversation, especially with a female. If I crash in flames, it’s their loss.
No charm for them!

• My most recent dog was “Killian,” a “rescue Irish-Setter.” He made age-eleven, and was my seventh Irish-Setter, an extremely lively dog. A “rescue Irish-Setter” is usually an Irish-Setter rescued from a bad home; e.g. abusive or a puppy-mill. Or perhaps its owner died. (Killian was a divorce victim.) By getting a rescue-dog I avoid puppydom, but the dog is often messed up. —Killian was fine. He was my fifth rescue, and was recently put down because of bone-cancer.

My fabulous memory

—“How does he remember this stuff?” My sister yelled.
I wrote a gigantic trivia quiz for my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary in 1991.
The party was in south FL, and by then my parents were in assisted-living (I guess) in an apartment we children called “the last motel.”
My quiz asked the name of the Fire-Chief in our little south Jersey suburb during my childhood (the ‘50s).
“Philpot!” my father snapped.
“He knew it!” I shouted.
“How does he remember this stuff?” My sister yelled. Me or my father, I don’t know who. But I been told I have an incredible memory.
I guess I do, but what I always said was “how can I forget?”
In 1956 I dressed up for Halloween as Elvis Presley, complete with charcoal sideburns.
The infamous Hilda Q. Walton, my hyper-religious Sunday-School superintendent neighbor, sanctimoniously declared Elvis to be the “bane of western civilization.”
How can I forget that: etched in my mind til the end of time.
Ed Sullivan had Elvis on his TV program, but only pictured from the waist up.
Swiveling hips were Of-the-Devil back then.
My how things changed!
What passes for music now is continuously repeating the F-bomb to thunderous jabbering — totally devoid of pitch.
At least Chuck Berry and Little Richard could carry a tune.
The last rock ’n’ roll album I bought was by Def Leppard with “Photograph.”
Now I listen to Bach and Beethoven. And the good radio is oldies from the ‘80s.

So now for a fond memory from long ago.

In 1959, 1960, and 1961, at ages 15 through 17, Yrs Trly was on the staff of a religious boys camp in north-eastern MD.
My job title was Counselor-in-Training (CIT), but I also was stable-staff.
Since I was willing to muck stalls and teach horsemanship, everyone else on stable-staff could play cowboy. I hardly could ride horseback at all, so was assigned a nag.
The camp was on Chesapeake Bay, which allowed excellent canoeing. All the camp had were canoes — sailing was after my time.
Most memorable is when me and another staffer “borrowed” a canoe, so he could go out onto the bay and smoke his beloved Marlboros. (Fortunately I never smoked.)
That staff-member was kitchen crew, the most sinful employees on the staff. How they were hired by Bible-beaters is beyond comprehension.
How they hired me is also beyond comprehension, a disgusting agnostic. But I could spin a good story — as I’m doing now.
It was dusk, and the bay was placid = no wind. Plus no speedboats to roil the surface.
Far away in the distance a giant 50,000 foot thunderhead loomed. It was probably deluging northern DE. Lightning flashed cloud-side, but we were too far away to hear thunder.
That image is still in my head. Lightning-bolts cloud-side, but silent.
Images like that I never forget. Perhaps my sister would, but that thunderhead is goin’ to my grave.
Along with “Big-Daddy” Don Garlits at Cecil County Drag-o-Way in 1965, a P-51 Mustang flying aerobatics at Geneseo airport, and restored Nickel Plate steam-locomotive 765 doing 70 mph on the old Chesapeake and Ohio railroad in WV.

• RE: “Don Garlits at Cecil County Drag-o-Way in 1965……”—He laid rubber the entire length of the quarter-mile dragstrip, and his car was so loud you had to cover your ears. Flames fifteen feet high came out of the header-pipes, and when he finished the race you smelled model-airplane fuel = nitro-methane. He was racing a 900-pound unblown fuel-burning Chevy. The Chevy red-lighted, but Garlits beat him anyway!

Oscar

63Z eastbound through Lilly PA. (Photo by BobbaLew.)

—63Z is the empty trash train returning to the east-coast megalopolis for another load.
Norfolk Southern crewmen call it “Oscar,” after Sesame Street’s “Oscar,” who lives in a trashcan.
The train is going through Lilly (PA) on Norfolk Southern’s Pittsburgh line to Harrisburg. It’s climbing the west-slope of Allegheny Mountain, a fairly easy climb.
The railroad was originally the Pennsylvania Railroad.
The trash-train stinks = rotting garbage.
Often the railroad will add helper-engines to eastbounds to maximize train-weight. They get added to the front and/or rear of the train. (Helper-engines also get added to westbounds.)
Helper-locomotives have to be disconnected, which can be done on-the-fly with “Helper-Link.”
Adding helpers also takes time. The train has to be stopped to add the helpers.
Even though helpers were needed to get over Allegheny Mountain, the Pennsylvania Railroad became extremely successful. Many midwestern railroads were merged into Pennsy to feed the railroad in Pittsburgh.

“How about that overpass in Lilly?” my brother asked.
“Not very photogenic,” I said, having tried it years ago with my Altoona railfan friend Phil Faudi.
My opinion counts for nothing with my brother driving. We go where he wants to go, and I tag along.
“Five-tracks again? Brickyard again? Post-office bridge again? Can I ever get you to try any of my locations?”
“Where to, Robert-John? How about Jackson Street bridge next to Tunnel Inn?”
“The tunnels never work.”
So, under the overpass in Lilly.
I don’t want that bridge in my photo, so out with my cannon (telephoto) and tripod.
63Z looks like it will hit me, but it’s about 200 yards away. (Friends worry I’m too close to the railroad.)
Just shaddup-and-shoot. You never know if it will look good, and this looks pretty good.

• Years ago the first person I chased trains with was my Altoona railfan friend Phil Faudi. (We more or less lost contact.)
• The Pennsylvania Railroad had tunnels atop Allegheny Mountain.
• “Robert-John” is of course me, Bob Hughes (Robert John Hughes).
• My telephoto-lens looks like a log; I call it “the cannon.”

Que Sera, Sera

Wildest, craziest, most sociable, most-people-friendly dog I ever had. (iPhone photo by BobbaLew.)

—“So long Killian!”
Yesterday (August 31st) we said goodbye to the most fabulous Irish-Setter I ever owned; “we” being me and Killian's previous owner, *** *****.
That would be “Killian:” Irish-Setter #7, rescue #5.
We dispersed Killian’s ashes along Lehigh Valley Rail-Trail, in the “Cathedral-of-Trees,” where Killian would drag me off-path so he could bark into the woods.
I never saw anything, but CRITTERS BEWARE!
*** had Killian nine years, me Killian’s final two.
“Sorry ***, I’m gonna be a blubbering idiot. Killian was incredible.”
Killian was a people-dog. He was leery of other dogs, but with people he’d rush up and lean into them = “PET ME!”
I always say Killian was the one who got me able to talk to pretty girls.
As a child I was convinced I was disgusting. No pretty girl would ever talk to me!
For 70+ years I was scared of pretty girls, but Killian wasn’t, so I shouldn’t be either.
Lunge — nuzzle! Followed by “oh what a friendly dog;” then “here I am talking to yet another pretty girl.”
Now I can do it without Killian = childhood reversed.
70+ years late I charm the ladies. I’m not scared anymore.

From dust to dust.

• Killian was my fifth dog lost to canine cancer. (I also lost my wife to cancer; eight years ago.)