Glibertarians.com 2019 Archive

Category: Family

  • Grandpa’s Watch

    An Old Watch

    On a small wooden stand in my office, there is an old watch.  It’s nothing special and has no value to anyone but me.  It’s an old Westclox Pocket Ben, which probably cost a couple of bucks back in the 1930s; an old windup tin case watch with a little second hand and a fob hand-braided out of nylon string.  The crystal is cracked, and the watch will run when wound but only for an hour or so.

    It’s an old, cheap, busted watch, with a market value of zero.  But Bill Gates couldn’t buy that watch from me.  It was my grandfather’s watch, and aside from a few old letters and postcards my mother saved, it’s the only tangible thing I have from him.

    Back in The Day…

    When I was a little tad, there were several figures that loomed large in my young life.  My Dad, of course, and his father, my Grandpa Clark; our neighbor, who had the farmstead down the road, Brownie, a WW1 veteran who was a great surrogate grandfather.  But my Grandpa Baty figured very high among that lot.

    Grandpa in 1915.

    It is no understatement to say that Grandpa was, as they put it in those days, “a bit of a character.”  Born in 1896, he had attended college and obtained a degree (exactly at what level, I never have known) in business, and worked in a bank in Waterloo for a few months around the time of the Great War.  But he found he hated being indoors all day, and so went back to the family farm and ended up taking it over from his father; he was a farmer and carpenter for the rest of his life.  He was widely known around northern Lynn County for his dry wit, his skill at shoring up old barns, and his uncanny ability to pull harvests of corn and soybeans out of the dry, sandy soil of the old farm.

    The Baty family farm was a century farm, having been homesteaded by my great-great-great-grandfather, one William Baty, in the 1830s.  It was passed on in turn to his son Thomas Jefferson Baty, who served in the Civil War; then to my great-grandfather, Andrew Jackson Baty, and thence to Grandpa.  My mother was fond of pointing out that when she was growing up during the Depression, that farm families may not have had much money but they always had enough to eat; she was also fond of paraphrasing a Patrick McManus quote, pointing out that her family was among “…the landed gentry of eastern Iowa during the Depression; we owned the wall we had our backs to.”  During those hard years Grandpa kept a bunch of laying hens, a milk cow and a few pigs, and they got along just fine.

    The farm was fifty acres of sandy bottomland along the Wapsipinicon River in northern Lynn County, Iowa.  I spent a good part of my youth wandering around that old farmstead.

    When I was a little kid, I remember watching Grandpa shave, which he did every day, even if he was just choring around the farm.  I’d watched my Dad shave with a safety razor, but Grandpa used shaving soap with a badger-hair brush and a straight razor, which he touched up on a leather strop before each use.  I thought that was pretty cool.  Grandpa always wore his old hickory Key bib overalls, and he always had his old pocket watch stuck in the bib pocket, secured with a fob he had tied up out of coarse nylon string.  Whenever I remember my Grandpa, I remember the smell of his shaving soap and the sound of that watch ticking.

    The Great Outdoors

    A string of Minnesoda fish, 1968.  Grandpa, Mom, Dad and me.

    Like most of my family, Grandpa didn’t care much for hanging around the house.  With a good fishing river only a ten-minute walk from the house, there just wasn’t any reason not to go try to catch a mess of smallmouths for supper.

    Not content with his friendly little stretch of the Wapsi, Grandpa accompanied my Mom, Dad and I on adventures fishing in Minnesota and Wisconsin.  A family friend had a cabin on the edge of the Red Lake Indian reservation, and it was a favorite destination.  While he was a better-than-average angler, Grandpa always opined that the best part of fishing was just being outdoors, along the river, on a nice day, with his family.

    Grandpa taught me how to roll cornmeal and strawberry jam doughballs for carp bait.  He taught me that those same doughballs made decent snacks.  He taught me how to cook up corn dodgers to pack along for solid fare in a cold camp.  He taught me how to start a fire with two sticks, as long as both were matches.  He taught me the importance of dry socks before even the Army did.  He taught me more outdoor lore than anyone except my Dad, and I’m happy to say that the most important lesson, just how great it was to be outdoors and not mucking about inside, has stuck with me better than all the others combined.

    Spinning a Yarn or Two

    Ever heard of flying snakes?  Grandpa had them on his farm, or so he told me when I was seven or eight years old.  One summer day we spent the better part of the afternoon tramping around the place looking for flying snakes, which he had convinced me really existed.  We didn’t find any.  When we returned to the house, my Mom called me away for a moment, explaining, “Grandma wants to talk to Grandpa for a minute.”  I remember not being quite able to make out words, but I had the distinct impression that Grandma, a tough old farm wife, was giving Grandpa a damn good piece of her mind.

    But his wife’s disapproval would never stand in the way of a good yarn.

    On one visit Grandpa handed me a badly worn chunk of what appeared to be hard black rubber.  “I was out working on the tractor,” he explained, “and this fell out of the sky and hit me on the head.  I saw on the news last night that one of the Apollo spaceships flew over yesterday.  I think this fell off its steering wheel when they went by.”  This was a stretch too far for me to quite believe, even coming from my Grandpa to the eight-year-old me, especially when I noticed later that Grandpa’s ancient John Deere was missing a chunk of the hard rubber coating for its steering wheel that was suspiciously the same size as the chunk off “the Apollo spaceship.”

    Endless were the tales of Grandpa’s adventures.  Fish would poke their heads out of the river and talk to him.  Once a raccoon woke him up and warned him that the neighbor’s cows were in his cornfield.  He was on a first-name basis with every squirrel on the farm and conversed with them all regularly.  In that case I suspect he may have been telling some sort of truth, as after I started hunting in earnest, he reminded me of the rule that all my cousins and I had to follow, namely that no squirrels were to be harmed on his place.

    A Work Ethic

    But most of all, Grandpa was a man who couldn’t abide other people butting into his business, whether those people carried a government-issued title or not.  He was an old-fashioned sort of man who minded his yard, his farm and his family, and didn’t bother anyone if they just left him alone.

    Watching Grandpa fish, 1970

    My first paying job came along when I was about ten years old.  I had a brand-new pellet gun and took it along when we were down at the farm visiting the grandparents for the weekend.  Grandpa eyed the pellet gun and asked me if I was a good shot.

    “Pretty good,” I bragged, full of ten-year-old bravado.

    “Good,” Grandpa grinned at me.  “Come on.”

    We walked across the barnyard to where Grandpa’s corncrib sat, full of the recent harvest.  “I’ve got some problems with rats,” he told me.  “Sit quiet here on this old tractor tire and watch for a while, and you’ll see them.  I’ll give you, oh, a dime for every dead rat you can pile up.”

    “OK,” I said, “I’ll get a bunch.”

    I made five dollars that weekend, my first foray into the gig economy.  This would have been around 1971, when five dollars would keep a kid in pop and candy bars for quite a spell.  I was happy to have the cash, Grandpa was pleased with the pile of dead rats (although not so pleased that he didn’t leave it to me to bury them out in the cornfield) and my folks were pleased that I had learned a lesson in exchange of value.

    A few years later, I was about thirteen, and Grandpa offered to buy me a bottle of pop in town if I’d help him rig up the galvanized metal chutes in that same corncrib; the corncrib had two sides, and Grandpa’s little PTO-driven elevator would dump the corn in through a hatch in the roof, through the chutes to one side or the other for storage.  We spent about an hour rigging the Rube Goldberg contraption up; when we finished, Grandpa flashed his characteristic grin at me and said, “those cobs will go through that like shit through a tin horn.”

    I realized then and there that I must be growing up, as Grandpa would never swear in front of a woman or a child.

    Grandpa put in his last corn crop the year before he died at 78.  He worked, always, well past the age that people nowadays think of retirement; but I honestly don’t think the idea ever occurred to him.  He gave up carpentry for hire about the time he turned 70, but he honestly loved farming and saw no reason to quit; he loved muddling around the place, plotting next year’s allocation of land to field corn and popcorn for the popcorn works at Vinton.  He enjoyed fiddling with his ancient John Deere Model A, patching up the fences and occasionally sneaking down to the Wapsi for a spot of fishing.  He had a simple life but a great life.  He taught me more than I have time to tell you here, but all of that is paying off now that I’m the Grandpa.

    And Then…

    Grandpa’s Watch

    The summer I was fourteen, in 1975, Grandpa died, of complications of diabetes.  It’s useless to think about how these days, improvements in treatment may have resulted in a longer life for this man I loved and admired; that was then, he died, and that was that.

    But for the fourteen-year-old me, it was a hell of a bad time.  It was the first time I lost anyone I loved.  Since then, that instance has come along more often, but that was the first time.

    A few months after the funeral, Dad and I were out fishing.  We walked down a favorite northeast Iowa trout stream, fishing as we went, until we came across a spot Grandpa had called a favorite.  It made me feel bad, and I said so.  But Dad, with wisdom typical of him, said I shouldn’t feel bad.  He had, after all, loved and admired his father-in-law, as so many people did, but he also knew the way to see things.  “We should feel glad,” he said, “that your Grandpa was here to enjoy these days with us.  He’d want us to keep doing that.”

    So, we did.

    That’s how Grandpa left us.  Last year, after my Dad passed, Mom dug out Grandpa’s old pocket watch, which she had put away all those years for this moment.  “I want you to have Daddy’s watch,” she told me.  “Take care of it.”  I promised her I would; now Mom is gone too, but my promise to her holds.

    Now, once in a while, I take the old Pocket Ben off the stand, wind it up, put it to my ear and listen to it ticking for a few minutes…  And suddenly, I’m a little kid again, sitting on my Grandpa’s lap at the kitchen table, hearing his watch, smelling his shaving soap, and listening to one of his tall tales.

    That’s a great feeling.

  • A Chronicle of the Insurgency, Part Five: At Home with the Hasturs

    Anti-abortion activist waging war on vulnerable women. Stay classy, The Guardian.

    Previous Parts: One, Two, Three, Four, et cetera.

    Junior stood on the sidewalk back against the building wall with his “Abortion is Murder” sign. Most of the passing college students looked at him with disgust. A few were visibly angered and mouthed or muttered insults or flipped him off. He ignored them and kept scanning the crowd for possible threats. A fat dyke waddled by, the saggy jowls of her thighs flapping against her knees. She fixed him with a porcine look of hatred.

    “That one?”

    “No, Dad. Look down at her ankle.”

    “Phylactery? She’s one of them?”

    “No, monitoring bracelet; she’s Operation: Rescue This! She’s not going to risk a probation violation.”

    The dyke flipped them the bird with both hands, and stomped angrily down the sidewalk to the applause and cheers of a few onlookers.

    “There. The tall girl with the stringy hair. Wave your sign, Dad.”

    “Ohhhh…” Hastur pumped his “Satan Loves Abortions” sign up and down eagerly. Nothing.

    Junior expertly rotated and tilted his sign to flash the sunlight off it so as to attract the girl’s attention. Suddenly she noticed the protesters and began to run towards them, screeching. Junior planted his feet apart and crouched down, tightening his grip on the thick cardboard tubing supporting the sign.

    “Remember, you can only block them if they attack you or your sign. We can’t defend each other.”

    When the girl was three feet from them she reached up to grab at Junior’s sign. He quickly tilted the top of the tube backward. She sensed the trap that had been set for her, and turned to Hastur.

    Hastur waved his sign back and forth. “Jesus hates abortions, but Jesus loves you,” he called. That did the trick.

    Becky can’t believe that she’s under arrest for stealing something that made her angry.

    The girl crouched and jumped at Hastur’s sign, timing her jump so that she reached apogee when the sign waved closest to her. She grabbed the poster board and held on as she fell. Hastur wasn’t anticipating an attack that violent and precise from a Human female. The tubing slipped through his hands until the bottom hit the ground. He regained his grip, but that only caused the sign to tear in half as the girl fell. She stuck her landing and scarpered off with the posterboard, screaming “this is why Womyn can’t get abortions in this state.”

    Sad, eight-bit synthesized music played and the message “Player 2 replay level?” appeared in the air ahead of them. Everything else dimmed and stopped.

    “Volleyball lesbian, Dad. She’s the toughest one on this level. You want to try again?”

    “Let’s move on to the next level before your mother gets here.”

    “Wow, you mean she… Well, she didn’t abort me.”

    “So what’s the next level,” asked Hastur quickly. Junior was growing up too damned fast, and his first meal hadn’t helped things.

    Best timeline, ever. Amirite?

    “Rooftop Koreans. We’re on top of a dry cleaning business, but we’re controlling the looters at the electronics store across the street. The electronics guys are protecting our building. Don’t shoot anyone unless they are actively breaking in, or carrying loot out.”

    An array of weapons appeared in the space in front of them.

    “Which one do I want?”

    “Shotgun. Go easy on the ammo. It takes them a while to bleed out.”

    Hastur picked the pump action twelve gauge with buckshot, and Junior chose the Mini-14 Ranch Rifle, with the Super Deluxe Tacticool upgrade which he had unlocked through numerous in-game rewards.

    “Ready?”

    “Ready.”

    “This just in. The Simi Valley jury in the Rodney King police brutality case acquitted all four officers of assault and acquitted three of the four of using excessive force. The jury could not agree on a verdict for the fourth officer charged with using excessive force.”

    Suddenly the boom boxes on the street below shut off. There was a moment of eerie silence, and then a low roar punctuated by shouting, and the sounds of glass breaking and of solid things beating on clangy things. A police cruiser sped by the intersection with lights and a brief siren whoop – getting the hell out of Dodge.

    “Dad! There. Crowbar guy. Wait until I tell you.”

    “Clang, clang, clang!”

    “Stop or we’ll shoot,” yelled Junior. The skinny Korean in the blue polo repeated his words in slightly accented English.

    “One.. two.. three. Now, Dad!”

    The fat Korean in the yellow polo fired his shotgun.

    “Great nuclear Azathoth,” swore Hastur, his words immediately repeated by his avatar to the puzzlement of the blue-shirted Korean. “That thing kicks like a Shoggoth.”

    “Hold it tight to your shoulder. The button under your [untranslatable] sucker on your [untranslatable] tentacle controls what your character says.”

    A crowd of people swarmed the entrance to Park Electronics and sheltered in the terrazzo entranceway underneath the marquee. A few faces turned and pointed at the rooftop. Junior squatted down and motioned for Hastur to do the same.

    “Clang, Clang, Clang!”

    “Can I shoot again?”

    “We’d lose the level. There isn’t a clear shot at the door with all those bystanders, which is why they started up the crowbar again.”

    Their strategy session was interrupted by three loud and annoyingly perky tones. “Dum. Doop. Doo!”

    Junior twitched his tentacles and the word “pause” appeared; the scene darkened and the action stopped. The rooftop scene cut to a white background with a blue logo consisting of a “W” inside a circle.

    “Designated visitor Myra incoming,” said an ice princess voice.

    “Myra?”

    “That’s how the WartCo AI pronounces it. I haven’t figured out how to fix it.”

    “Dad…” Junior rolled his multiple eyes. Definitely his mother’s son in that regard.

    The WartCo logo contracted until it was a small blue dot in the center of the screen. The dot was replaced with a circular moving image which grew until it filled the screen. The image showed a buxom young woman tugging a rolling suitcase down an urban cobblestone alleyway. The woman walked out of the street scene and into Hastur’s rec room. The street scene cut to the WartCo logo on a white background.

    “Wartyvision,” whispered a chorus, followed by a muted “Doo. Doop. Dum.”

    “Mom!”

    “Honey!”

    “Hi, boys. Who wants pizza? Fresh from the oven at Armand’s?”

    “Best mom ever,” observed Hastur proudly.

    “And how,” replied Junior.

    “Junior, take the stasis box from your mother and go set the table.”

    Junior tentacle-hugged his mother and took the suitcase from her before exiting.

    Hastur also tentacle-hugged Moira, but in a distinctly different fashion than his son had done.

    “Somebody missed me.”

    Hastur made a surprisingly small and needy noise.

    “Me, too,” she whispered. “Just wait until Junior goes to bed.”

    “So how was your day,” boomed Hastur.

    “Good. You should have seen the face on the Armand’s guy when I put the pizza in the ‘suitcase’ and started rolling it. ‘Hey Lady, you wrecked your pizza.’ It’s Capitol Hill, they’ve seen weirder.”

    “Junior’s birthday, amirite?”

    “Yes,” she said, somewhat sheepishly.

    “Mom, Dad, everything’s ready.”

  • Crackpot Corner: The STEVE SMITH Conspiracy?

    Dobbshead!

    Have you ever noticed that STEVE SMITH doesn’t like to talk about the Yeti?  There must be something there, something that he doesn’t want us looking into.

    Well, what race of humans are descended from the Yeti?  Of course, the Yetisyn, also known as the Subgenii.  But why, WHY would our local cryptids want to keep us away from the slackful?  Is it just because of the high infiltration of douchebags since the fires of the ’70 burned out?  Or is it something darker… pinker… could STEVE SMITH be a member of The Conspiracy?  Could he be shaping the Glibertarians to use as a weapon to drive away the X-ists and snuff out the word of “Bob?”

    Obviously, there is a connection, STEVE SMITH admits he’s a blood relation.  But did you notice which members of the commentariat didn’t pass through the fires of the Englibbening?  That’s right — the (Stark) Fist of Etiquette and Agile Cyborg (who obviously drank deeply of the vaginal fluids of Connie Dobbs).

    So, was STEVE SMITH purifying his church?

    Or are we the baddies?

  • The Jerk in the Circle

    I’m part of a circle. We’re going to have to go back eight years to understand what that means. My daughter was two and the wife was itching to return to her company. So we found a decent nursery school in our neighborhood. Finally, I could cut down on the 50 and 60 hour work weeks.

    Orientation for the nursery school was on a Saturday morning. We tried to dig out a dress for the kid that wasn’t covered in snot, puke or whatever that last stain was. The wife was smoking hot in her navy blue business suit. I was smoking not in my jeans and sweatshirt. The nursery was only a five-minute drive away, so of course, we were five minutes late.

    While my wife looked for a parking spot, I stuffed the kid under my arm and sprinted into the lobby. “Orientation 2F”. The room was packed with parents sitting on the wood floor, black-haired rugrats perched on their laps. With a Sumimasen, I squeezed my white butt into a gap between two families. In the front of the room, a buck-toothed lady with perky breasts was leading the orientation.

    A couple of minutes passed before my wife slid the door open and slithered inside. “Your shoes!” she whispered in my ear. In my haste, I hadn’t realized I was supposed to change into slippers at the genkan. I discretely covered my feet with my jacket, hoping no one had noticed. My kid farted. I hoped no one had noticed. It smelled really bad. I hoped…

    The room was decorated with finger paintings of elephants and monkeys. The gulag rules were being emphatically explained by Ms. Perky Breasts. “I can handle this”, I thought to myself. I leaned back on my elbows, enjoying the show. A boney hand squeezed my shoulder. I turned my head and was met with the mole-covered face of a bald father in a rumpled business suit. “I translate for you.” This I definitely could handle. A deftly delivered Kekko desu, despite being polite, is remarkably similar to the English “F*** Off” and I must’ve nailed it because he pouted and turned back to listening to Ms. Perky Breasts.

    An hour and a half later, we rose from the floor and tried to rub life back into our seized up knees. A formal group bow of gratitude to the leader and orientation was finished! I got the kid bundled up in her coat and scarf as she squirmed and protested. But we weren’t ready to leave yet. My wife had disappeared. I scanned the room looking for her and Ms. Perky Breasts captured my gaze. “Mama,” my daughter squeaked, as she tugged on my jacket sleeve and pointed. In the corner of the room, there was a cluster of women yapping away, one of them in a navy blue business suit. These were mothers that had run into each other at the pediatrician and playground a few times, and now they were shooting the breeze with the intimacy of veterans at a Normandy reunion.

    They were forming a circle. There are university circles, high school circles, and retiree circles. A university circle will often have a common theme like skiing or karaoke to unite them, but the main point is just to share time with others. At a nursery school, a circle is simply a group of parents that agree to support each other and plan activities for their children to do together.

    That was eight years ago. The same six women that formed that cluster in the corner after orientation are now close friends. Our kids play with each other after school. We go camping, hiking, and grape picking together. We have dinner parties at each other’s houses where the women engage in boisterous conversations well past midnight over empty wine bottles and half-eaten plates of fried rice and gyoza. They are united by the desire to help each other become better parents. It was a support network that formed organically and voluntarily.

    There are no laws requiring diversity or inclusivity in our circle. In fact, at times we are discriminatory and intolerant. One mother tried to join our circle a few years back. Her mistake was demanding that I only speak in English to her child. One of the mothers in our circle overheard the conversation and iced her out from that moment forward. It was their turn to say, “We can handle this.” And they shunned her in the terribly effective manner that only Japanese females can. The point of the circle is to bring us together and that woman’s demand was a thumb in the eye of our unspoken charter. I’m grateful to be part of a group of people that treat my family as equals and not some resource to be exploited. My gratitude runs deeper than the gratitude I had for those perky breasts eight years ago in orientation.

     

    Here’s a link to my kid and one other kid from our circle jamming on the electone.

    *Thanks to Couch Potato for the editing help.

  • What’s It Like to Be Minimalist?

    Firstly, what is Minimalism? Minimalism is a value system that at its root is a focus on things we value most and cutting out everything else that does not and that only serves to distract us. In so doing we create freedom, more time for family and experiences. We take away debt, stress and jealousy. It is simply a way of living where we are invited to be more intentional about how we spend our time.

    Minimalism is supported by a few common ideals: simplicity, quality and multi function for the possessions we do keep; fiscal responsibility; rejection of consumerism and a high consumer literacy (knowing and recognizing sales tactics that contribute to mindless consumerism). Minimalism is more than decluttering and re-organizing. It is purposeful living. Keeping things that only add value and bring joy to your life. That makes things rather broad. The way people live a life of minimalism can run a large spectrum. Some folks have tiny houses, others a backpack of 51 items, others have 2 cars, essential possessions, and a simple house in the suburbs.

    No alt text
    Nicodemus and Fields Milburn

    In the summer of 2017, my wife and I both stumbled upon minimalism separately. She read Joshua Becker’s The More of Less: Finding the Life You Want Under Everything You Own and I heard Joshua Fields Millburn on Tom Woods’ Show (episode 775). We watched Joshua Fields Millburn and Ryan Nicodemus’ documentary, Minimalism: A Documentary About the Important Things on Netflix (currently still available). After watching the documentary together we both agreed to try minimalism. To be honest, we did not find it too drastic as we already subscribed to some of the tenets. We were always financially responsible. A few years prior, we we began to me more intentional in our buying decisions and in our giving as we felt a need to live a little closer to Jesus’ teaching of simplicity and generosity. We felt like minimalism was a good tool to help us reduce our materialism and align ourselves more fully with Jesus’ teachings on possessions. Having said that we began the process of going through our possessions to determine what to keep, give away, and throw out. How did we decide what to keep and what to give away? In general, most minimalists will say that an item that you keep must contain value, serve a purpose, and bring joy.

    We chose to minimize room by room. We started with our bedroom. The easiest things to minimize are duplicates and things you don’t use. Despite thinking we were already living simply, and despite four moves in the previous 5 years in which we donated unused items each time, we still filled 3 or 4 trash bags with clothes and 2 more trash bags with stuff we threw away. And that was just our bedroom. We were in shock. In one way we were shamed by the waste and accumulation, but we were also pleased with what we were able to cut out of our lives. Surprisingly, this past summer we went through our closets again and gave away an additional 2 more trash bags of clothes! How? Well, the other major stumbling block to minimalism is “Just in Case Items”. I found it really hard to let go of just in case items. I didn’t want to waste money replacing something I got rid of it. But the truth is, if an item is “just in case,” it is already unused. It won’t be missed.

    This is probably more the art style than life style, but minimalism is pretty tough to search for in stock images

    The next room we tackled was the kitchen. I largely stayed out of that, but be warned minimizing common areas/possessions without your family or living partners can result in mistakes and anger. Anecdotally, minimalist Joshua Becker relays an episode of minimizing his kitchen without his wife and throwing away a football Jell-O mold only to discover later that his wife was searching all over for the mold because it was for his young son’s sports themed birthday party. In our kitchen, once again, duplicates were an easy item to toss. Why we went through four moves with two rolling pins is beyond me. We focused on keeping items that we actually used. We also looked at replacing some of the things we had with multifunction items. For example, my wife ditched our white and red wine glasses and replaced them with glassware that works for both.

    Technology is a great benefit for us on our minimalism journey. I love to read, but rather than have a ton of books around the house, I have a ton on my Kindle. Rather than having boxes and boxes of photos like my parents, I have digital photos and I scanned in my parents’ boxes of photos many, many years ago long before I became a minimalist. It is also much easier to tag and organize digital media. Our kids are not at the point that they are churning out artwork, but when they do Becker suggests takings pictures of any special crafts our kids make that will be thrown out or replaced by their newer artwork. That is a huge space saver.

    This Christmas we adopted the need, want, wear, read approach to gift-giving. It helped restrain us and my in-laws from buying things we do not want or buying the kids too much. It’s nice knowing that when gift giving time comes around each of us will be getting only 4 gifts. I think it will help the kids as they get older and make their own lists to be very selective and thoughtful about their requests.

    So nearly two years in and minimalism is a keeper for me and my family. We are still working at it as evidenced by the paring down we did again this past summer. It did take some will power to overcome some of our old ways of thinking, but embracing minimalism certainly makes us happier and less stressed. Our house is easier to clean and more organized despite a 3 year old that loves to make messes. The age appropriate toys that we have for our toddler are minimal but treasured by him. None of his toys are gathering dust. And that really helps reduce the clutter.

    A Random Note:

    -Minimalism also makes it easier when you find a snake in the house to go room by room moving stuff and checking to make sure there are no more motherfucking snakes in the motherfucking house.

     

    Further Reading:

     The Minimalist.com Podcast

    Minimalism: A Documentary about What is Important Netflix, Amazon Prime, Google Play

    The More of Less: Finding the Life You Want Under Everything You Own by Joshua Becker

     Becoming Minimalist.com 

  • Rich Dead Uncle I Didn’t Know I Had

    In my younger years, before the lottery was a thing, the only way to really win large sums of unearned money was from a dead relative.  As most of us liked our relatives, we did not want them to die.  Or at least, that was my experience.  Now that I’m a bit older my brother has a few cousins and such that when they pass I’m not flying home for the funeral if you get my drift.  Anyway, I used to use the formula, a rich dead uncle I didn’t know I had providing an inheritance.  Life is stranger than fiction, so it is little surprise to me last year that I found myself in almost that exact situation.

    My wife’s dad was Chinese.  His parents were part of the Chiang Kai-shek’s nationalist government and apparently were in the diplomacy game going back several generations at least.  The family, in general, has a colorful history.  Allegedly, the grandparents were around when Anastasia screamed in pain, to steal from the Stones.  As there is jewelry that’s been spread around amongst the cousins, supposedly traded by some Russian Princesses for Chinese Visas to escape the whole March Revolution thing.  The wife’s ring has been authenticated as being made by the jeweler who worked primarily for the Russian royal/noble families.

    There’s also the family tale that after WWII when the family was escaping the ancestral homelands and the Chi-Com’s, my wife’s grandmother almost had to smother my wife’s dad to death.  The family was hiding in a ditch, and dad-in-law who was an infant drew in a breath and was about to start crying so his mother had to cover his mouth and keep him from doing so, because if the family were found, they’d have at best been executed on the spot, at worst been put in some sort of camp.  Tough decision for a mother to have to make, but I guess you can always make another kid.

    After they escaped, part of the family stayed in Taiwan, and part of it spread out into Hong Kong, Canada, the US, and South Africa.  There’s a cousin who dated minor European nobility and then simply disappeared one day like 30-35 years ago and has never been heard from since.  There’s speculation that he was some sort of espionage agent, that he was kidnapped for ransom and then killed because the nobility wouldn’t pay up, or that he got sick of the Euro-trash bullshit and faked his death while financing it with money he scammed.  He’s sort of a family DB Cooper figure.

    It’s a different cousin that this is about though.  My wife didn’t even remember he existed.  He was an ‘Uncle’ that visited once when she and her brother were young, and then went back to his residence in Hong Kong and Vancouver, BC, Canada.  Basically, everyone forgot about him because he didn’t stay in contact.

    Turns out this was because he was a no-shit hearing voices psychotic who despite that had made enormous amounts of money.  He died intestate last year and we were notified because my wife, her brother, and two cousins of theirs are the only living relatives of his and thus they were in line to receive the money.  Like an 8 figures estate worth of money.  However, they were warned that they might not get all of it.  As my wife put it originally, “This could be anywhere from a nice dinner out to quit our jobs.” I was more bemused than greedy.  It’s a true windfall.

    Of course, even free money comes with strings and we found out what those strings were.  A woman named Vivian* was the strings and hoooo-boy was there some strings.

    Auntie Viv, as I began to sarcastically refer to her, was a piece of work.  Good old Uncle Kevin** [Sidebar: my wife’s father’s generation of kids all hated the commies so much that most of them who moved to America quit speaking Mandarin and named all their kids Anglo names for their first name.  My wife despite being fully half Chinese knows less than I do.  And most of them won’t travel to China because they may still be on lists somewhere and wouldn’t be able to come home] had gotten himself a younger lady.  She had moved in with him, and become his common-law wife.  Or so she claimed when it turned out Uncle Kev was dead.  It was a bit more complicated than that and thus ensued a year’s worth of haggling.

    See, when Uncle Kev passed away like Elvis (on the toilet) the health care agency guys he had hired to come in on a regular basis had found him.  They were there daily to make sure he took his meds and help him deal with a physical health issue he had as well.  The same 3 guys had worked for him for several years and they’d never so much as seen Auntie Viv.

    Because she had moved out several years before, which according to Canuckistani law meant she was no longer his common-law wife for purposes of divvying up the loot and taking his stuff.  So she tried to insist that she’d been living there just in a different part of the house from where the health workers had been.

    Our law-talking dude then discovered that when she filed her taxes, she’d listed a different address altogether.  So for her to pursue it in court, would mean admitting to tax fraud multiple times.

    So her story was then, well, Uncle Kev would sometimes not take his meds and would get violent.  Not directly toward her, but in general and so she left because she didn’t feel safe.  The other residence was her place to run to when Uncle Kev was hearing the voices telling him to do crazy shit and him destroying things to keep from obeying them.  She even cited a police report to explain it.

    Only, when the lawyer dug further, turned out, there was a previous police report where she’d gotten violent with Uncle Kev when she found out he had gotten himself fixed and thus all her attempts at not taking birth control to secure him a child were for naught.  See, Uncle Kev was crazy, but he knew it, and didn’t want to make a little psycho Kev with a woman he suspected may have had motives besides how gooshy he made her loins.  He’d ridden that rodeo before apparently.

    Eventually, she claimed that what she wanted was to establish a mental health charity with the money and that’s why she was fighting for.  And also to keep the house which she could use to run the charity out of it.

    So we made her a proposal; 1/3rd of the estate to her, 1/3rd to the charity, and 1/3rd to us.  She balked at first until her lawyer said, “Look, lady, this is the best offer and if you go to court you’re getting jack shit besides maybe a jail term for the tax fraud. They are being generous so you’re lucky none of them were close to him.  Take the fucking deal.”

    And that is how a Rich Dead Uncle*** I Didn’t Know I Had helped my wife and me pay off our house and set us up to retire much earlier than planned.

     

    *Not her real name

    **Not his either

    ***Not really an Uncle as described was more of a cousin who was old enough he seemed more like an uncle.

  • Retirement

    We all count the time until we can retire, cut the cord, turn out the lights or whatever we call the end of a career. We think about it, make some non-binding plans and dream, dream, ’til we finally fall to sleep. Then morning comes with a WTF? How am I gonna do it? Where am I gonna do it? Will I be able to do it? When? All these unanswered questions.

    Well, maybe for some its too early to even think about such long distance planning but those of you (I’m excluding myself) in your mid-40s, 50s, and 60s will be celebrating your birthday at a restaurant and its gonna be a big 5-0 or 6-0 birthday party and damn, what happened? That was quick.

    We’ve had discussions here about what we want to do at retirement but “Awh, its too early to worry about that” That’s not a helpful attitude so I’m here to help or not. First, answer the questions in the first paragraph. Got that? You’ll be asking yourself these same questions again and again and perhaps the answers will change but that’s OK too.

    When do I want to retire? When can I retire? Where do I want to retire?

    I decided about my 45th birthday that I wanted out at 55. I started looking towards that day and what I had to do to make it happen. Where? I had grown up in the woods of Minnesota, with the fishing/hunting and liked being outdoors, I still had a few friends there, my folks were buried nearby and a brother lived about 30 miles away so that’s where I thought I wanted to be. I owned a house in Texas but really no friends other than those I worked with and the Texas heat was not something that I enjoyed. Nothing permanent was holding me in Texas.

    I was working in the Midwest, living in the Twin Cities and spending time reading the country newspapers and visiting my brother when I could. I found some property that I liked, made a low ball offer that was rejected and kept looking. Found a 40 acre spot, with a terribly run down small house and a yard full of junk that had been on the market for a couple years. Price was high but evaluating the negatives I made an offer of about 1/3 the asking price, keeping in mind those negatives. The owner countered with an offer of about ½, I suggested we split the difference, he bumped me a little and we made a deal.

    I cleaned up everything that was burnable, old buildings/sheds/fences and clothes. I spent the winter hauling van load after van load of trash, mostly metal scraps, every week end for 6 months or more. By spring the yard was cleaned and time to tackle the house. The previous owner was a Copenhagen chewing bachelor and his habits were visible. The house was a kit, 18 X 26, costing 1200 dollars plus delivery and was about 30 years old. The sidewalls were 6’4” and I was 6’5” at the time. The roof was sagging badly, hadn’t been painted since the first time 30 years early and needed a total remodel and upgrade. I kept telling Mrs Fourscore that it was beautiful, she kept checking the yellow pages for psychiatric help.

    Anyway, I got my best friend to help me, we tore the roof off, raised the walls 20” and put new trusses and plywood on. I spent the rest of the weekend shingling and I was on my way. I took a week’s vacation a few weeks later, put on siding on the newly raised walls, new windows, sliding glass door and lastly primed the outside.

    I called my boss that Sunday night, he said, “Good, ’cause I have reservations for tomorrow for you to go to Berkeley, CA, we just bought a store and you ( meaning me) need to complete the deal and stay as long as necessary.” I was there for 5 weeks, remodeling, hiring, training. Fortunately after a couple weeks a good manager arrived.

    I then spent about 4-5 months’ worth of week ends gutting and remodeling the inside of the cabin, as we called it . My wife took back some of her doubts of my skills when she stayed in there for the first time and the shower worked and the lights turned on when she threw the switch.

    So now, we have a small place to live on weekends, modern, clean and warm but not very big. And still 7-8 years away from the magic 55 year mark. For now, though, a place to use for hunting/fishing and relaxing. Still a few years from retiring at this point though. It was great, nearly every week end and vacations would find me at the cabin, relaxing. Deer season came and I had a super hunting shack with all the amenities.

    Then the years rolled on and I explained to my wife that we should build our retirement home, our property was actually in 2 parcels, easy peasey to use the second parcel. It had been an old homestead with a big field and so I chose a spot near the back edge of the field. She was not super excited but after my whining and crying she finally gave in. So I started, two years before the date set for retirement.

    I won’t go into detail about the permitting but it wasn’t fun, had to be rezoned, etc. The good part was at that time there was no requirements for inspections other than an electrical. Had to have a well and septic system permitted. I contracted the basement, I had drawn my plan on graft paper, no blue prints since I was going to be flexible.

    The missus and I had agreed on 3 premises or requirements.

    1. It had to be warm (i.e. well insulated)
    2. The kitchen had to face the east, for harmony with Asian customs
    3. Every room had to have a window, including the basement.

    I contracted the basement block work, went a course higher (13 rather than the usual 12) because I was a pretty tall guy at the time and I wanted all the duct work under the basement ceiling. At that point I started nailing stuff together, every week end, leave work early and put 2 long days in over the weekend. That went on for two years, slowly, slowly a house took shape. I always took my tools with me but left the building supplies and fortunately had no theft.

    I pretty much did everything, I contracted the roof/shingles and steel siding but learned as I went for the rest. Retirement day came, I was 55, we were ready but there were still some finishing to do inside but at least we could live there and I was closer to my project. For a couple weeks dishes were washed in the bathtub, cooking was done on a hot plate and counter top oven. Master bath was finished, carpeting was not yet installed and the basement beckoned

    I finished out the basement and its sort of a man cave. I had planned on a pool table but that space got filled with an extra refrig and freezer and now the computer. Probably took another year to wind up everything, had to build a garage and then another one.

    I made some mistakes that I wished I hadn’t made but not too many. Some things were done twice, some things never have been done.

    Besides the what and where of retirement comes the how. In any case, my opinion is that one must have one’s retirement home paid for before retirement, unless you are fortunate to have a good income. House payments, along with taxes/insurance and maintenance will eat up a lot of most people’s monthly retirement income. On the other hand, there are options available to enjoy without the burden of worrying about your abode.

     

    My wife and I are rather frugal but she does like to travel. Living in the country we don’t need a lot of ‘nice’ clothes. I got by for several years wearing out the clothes I had worked in and mostly wear jeans now. We don’t spend a lot of money at restaurants, maybe a couple lunches a month while we’re shopping. We have dinner out with friends for birthdays and anniversaries but all in all mostly we eat at home. A big garden in the summer provides therapy and fresh food. Mrs Fourscore cans and freezes a few things. We enjoy fresh fish but I can’t get her to eat venison, too bad, ’cause she can really cook. More for me is all I can say.

    Our friends are similar, old, reclusive and comfortable being left alone. We help one another, drink a little coffee and socialize fairly often, more so in nice weather as opposed to winter. It was an easier transition for us because we moved back to where I had grown up and knew a few of the families. Trying to retire in an unfamiliar rural area would have been more difficult as folks tend to leave one another alone unless there is a commonality such as a church or club. We have great neighbors, in that no one bothers anyone.

    A couple of my neighbors shoot a lot. If I don’t hear them shooting I begin to worry that something has happened.

    There has been a lot of Glib discussion about retirement. If you have your place picked out and can negotiate a good bargain think about starting your new life. If it happens to have an abandoned old house perhaps the foundation can still be used, or the well, etc. Don’t worry about the grown up brush, 2 weekends and a fire will solve a lot of problems. All that junk on the outside has kept prospective buyers away and can be used to your advantage.

    10 years pass quickly. We’ve owned this property 33 years now, been retired 27. We had to say good bye to a lot of friends over the years but way better to have had them along the way than have had to live somewhere else with out them.

     

     

     

     

     

     

    The first ten years, 55 to 65, we were pretty much the same, physically. Then some tasks began to take longer, stuff got heavier, places got farther away. If you wait too long you may not be able to do those things you had planned to do when you retired. Good luck to all.

  • Hillbilly B’Day: Or Pop Imparts Wisdom

    Growing up in the foothills of North Carolina, I spent a good deal of time with my maternal grandparents.  Like many rural southern families the week revolved around church and the extended family having Sunday dinner together.  (For those that don’t know, dinner is lunch, and supper is dinner, and breakfast is any time you damn well feel like it.)  My grandparents were, to say the least, colorful characters.  They loved basketball, family, and God and I’m not sure in what order you would put that.  Known to me as Granny and Pop, I adored them.  They spoiled their grandchildren within their means, but mostly it was with food and indulgence.  Pop had a horse a friend stabled and he taught me to ride.  He, allegedly, was something of a star point guard in high school, but showboating in front of a scout and the outbreak of WWII left him unable to attend college.  He was a known by everyone in town and half the people in the county, and when he died 20 years ago, we were at the funeral home nearly 6 hours shaking hands with all the people who came to pay their respects.  By the time I knew him he was a mostly respectable pillar of the church.  But he had some wild moments in his past and one of those stayed with him.

    Behind his house was a large section of undeveloped woodland.  Though at the back of their property was a little dirt road not much more than a trail.  And the cool, inviting, mysterious woods always beckoned to us youngsters.  We were allowed down the road, but there was a path that broke off to the east that we weren’t allowed down.  All we knew was that The Camp was down there.  And while my Pop was a king of indulgence, he had a stern side, and it was clear that violating that rule would earn us a hidin’.  It was important and as the oldest and most adventurous of our passel of kids, I didn’t lead to any peremptory explorations, so the rule stayed inviolate.

    On my 16th birthday, however, Pop told me to come take a walk with him in the woods, which weren’t unusual.  We often did this.  But this walk was different.  We veered off toward The Camp.  I had gained enough wisdom to realize this was a momentous occasion, so I simply followed his lead.  By this time, he had a walking stick that he used for support, though he was grinnin’ his Cheshire cat grin, clearly looking forward to what was to come.

    We got to The Camp and one might think it was a bit disappointing.  A fire-pit, a bit of a clearing near the fast-flowing creek, and a couple of shed type buildings somewhat rudely constructed.  Until I saw the Still.  And then much became clear.  The Camp was where Pop and all his friends had their rig for making ‘shine.  After the war, he’d actually run ‘shine and was part of that whole culture, but by this time in the late 80’s he’d settled down and only made small batches for his friends and a few select others.  The other three or four guys I’d seen him around with were there.  Overalls and trucker hats were still de rigueur for these gents.  I was allowed to wander around a bit before Pop started teaching me a few things.

    Now, this is imparted wisdom from my grandfather and is still, sadly, illegal to do.  So fortunately the statute of limitations is over and even if they weren’t, it’s a bit hard to put a dead man in prison, though ‘the got damn revenuers’ would likely try anyway.  Good luck to them if they do.  You may have notice where I get some of my, shall we say lack of respect, for the law from.  I am merely carrying on the family tradition in that regard.

     

    Preparing the Wash

    He taught me that making delicious white lightning is an exercise in patience, as much art as science, and that it took, like many of the best things, time to do it right.  Distilling is in some ways easier than brewing beer, and in other wars more difficult.  Making the wash, at least the way Pop did it, was pretty bullet proof.  Really, you just wanted to use the yeast to make as much alcohol as possible.  Now, cause Pop believed that all moonshine was made from corn, you were also trying to get some of the unique fusels that can bring in the mix, but that happens naturally.  Before you can get to fermenting though, you have to prep things.  You needed your ingredients; corn, sugar, yeast, and water.

    As I said, only corn will do, and Pop was a little cavalier about what kind of corn, as he got it from the feed store.  He often went for a medium corn meal.  I imagine had it been available he’d have used something like https://www.bobsredmill.com/shop/gluten-free/gluten-free-medium-cornmeal.html instead. I don’t know if this is optimal, I just know that’s what he did, and it worked for him.  Anyway, once he had the cornmeal he’d pour in some hot water with the cornmeal and sugar and let that soak for a good day or two.  It didn’t have to stay hot, simply needed to be hot to dissolve the sugar.  Then let it soak.

    Next you’d put the yeast in some warm water. He told me he liked to keep it in that below 90 degree range as that was the right temperature for the type yeast he liked to wake up.  Yeast varies, of course, and some like higher or lower temperatures so I reckon that is going to depend.  Either way, he’d mix things in and add the yeast-water to the corn/sugar mix.  Then add even more warm water that had been heated over an open fire, then wrap things in old horse blankets and let it sit.  And since this is here the fermentation was happening, it would bubble and fart up a storm.  Like an old lady with a delicate stomach that had a spicy Mexican dish three meals running.

    I imagine, had the home brewing craze been on grandpas radar he’d have loved those,  fancy buckets with spigots on the bottom and airlocks on the top.  But he’d jury-rigged some old trash can with a hole in the lid, a tube through the hole, and the other end of the hose beneath some water in a different, smaller bucket.  And he’d let that go on for four or five days until it had stopped bubbling the water.

     

    Cookin’

    So that lesson done, it was the next week after dinner that we went out to learn to actually cook a batch of shine.  Now, a modern moonshiner would probably enjoy one of those fancy bags to put the corn in at the beginning, the ones with the fine mesh that lets water through just fine.  I suppose one would be able to simply lift the spent grains up and out and only really have to filter the dead yeast.  But Pop and his friends were dealing with a different eras techniques.  He had  multiple filters set up and would use gravity to drain it through.  We spent quite a bit of time pouring wash through cheesecloth of different grades until Pop was satisfied it was filtered well enough.

    Once that was done, we poured it into the copper pot still he had that sat on top of an out door propane burner.  He claimed they use to use wood-fueled fires, but I can’t imagine that shit.  Anyway, here’s a picture of a copper pot still for making distilled water that’s similar in design if not size to the one my Pop used.

    It’s actual distillation stage where the patience and artistry comes in. That liquid sitting in that pot is a mix of water, various alcohols and fusels.  Now, all those things have different boiling points.  Methanol burns off first.  You do not want to drink methanol. It’ll give you headaches and tastes like shit in low doses.  In higher doses it can cause blindness or even death.  Bad stuff that Methanol.  Interesting thing is though, the treatment for methanol poisoning?  Ethyl alcohol.  Apparently the receptors that grab methanol prefer our good friend ethyl and will let those molecules go in exchange.  Anyway, methanol starts evaporating around 150 degrees. So now is the time where you get busier than a one legged man in an ass-kicking contest.

    Once the pot was up to that temp, based on the gauge we had, Pop would start diverting water from the crick into the tun.  This cools the copper down and encourages the evaporated liquid to condense and run down the coils and out of the tun.  Pop would turn the heat back what he reckoned was a good piece; wanting it hot enough to continue heating the wash, but at a slower rate.  As about the time the pot hits 165 degrees, the methanol would have condensed and starts flowing out.  Some math comes in and there’s a formula for calculating exactly how much methanol will be produced per gallon of wash.  And it’s somewhere between .6 and .8 ounces per gallon.  Anyway, Pop was the type who tended to free-hand things and didn’t want to poison no one.  So he just figured for every gallon in the pot, he’d take 2x as many ounces from the beginning and dispose of it.   Usually it got just tossed in the ground.

    So once he was done with the Methanol, there’d be a tapering off and the temp would climb to the 175-180 degree mark.  That’s where the Ethanol is being produced and begins to flow. The heat would be turned down to the minimum at this point and the water should be flowing strong and cold over the condenser coils.   Again, if Pop were running a formal operation here, he might have gotten this down to a more detailed amount, but he’d collect a quarter of the expected run or so and set that aside, usually based on testing with his finger in the drip and getting a taste.  Those were the heads and they were higher proof, and didn’t taste as good.

    But now..now we’re into the Heart of the run and it should be the good stuff.  Sweet and cool right out of the tap and small little taste of heaven.  The pot would be sitting in that 176-178 degree range and the ethyl produced is about 10% of the total amount of the wash. (So a 5 gallon wash would make about a gallon run, with a quart of heads, two quarts of heart, and a quart of tails.)  This is what you want to keep.  And while a half a gallon doesn’t sound like much, that’s 130 proof sweet corn liquor and will go a ways.  Especially as grandpa ran much larger batches and he’d do several runs from spring into the summer.  More on what can be done with this later.

    As the temp hit 180 or so, the proof fell off, and again more fusels are included and he was into the tails of the run.  Usually this’d be about the same amount as the heads and would be combined with it.  If you ever had turpentine tasting moonshine, it’s usually some cheap asshole mixing his heads and tails into his heart run, or simply selling that outright. As you might imagine, Pop, being a man who took pride in his law breaking, had no truck with such foolishness.

     

    Afterwards

    The heads and tails would be poured into the next batch of wash to up the alcohol content and extend out the hearts.  Of course, with his experience at it, he could tell by dabbing his finger where things needed to change, as I mentioned.  And he showed me how that would work.  Again, it’s part of the art of it doing it this way. He’d also take the heart run and divide it up.  Some of it he’d mix with apple cider and put cinnamon sticks in.  Others spring or summer fruit and a bit of juice or water and put up to let it age.

    Once the pot had cooled, often he’d simply dump the leftover wash in there.  The heads and tails would get mixed into the next batch as I mentioned.  And the spent grains would be used by Granny to make some outstanding cornbread.  Fresh blackberry preserves on some moonshine spent grain cornbread that had just come out of the oven in a iron skillet was a consistent treat growing up.  And while both of them are gone now and have been for sometime, any time I find some moonshine and some cornbread, it is a chance to connect with them, and that wonderful spring twenty odd years ago.

  • A Letter to Penthouse

    Dear Penthouse,

    I never thought this would ever happen to me. I’m kind of an average guy, quiet, introverted. For starters, I’ll have to give you a little background on how all this went down.

    Remember those times in the military or your job during the summer? You’d be sitting around with your buddies and one of them would start out with “This ain’t no shit” and you knew the rest of the story was gonna be BS. Well, I’ll skip that ’cause this really did happen to me.

    First the history. I was in the Army at the time and divorced, stationed at a large installation in Texas and had custody of two young kids. I was dating a cute Vietnamese girl that I had met a few years earlier. In March of 1974 we decided to get married and be a family. By the Spring of 1975 I figured I was not going overseas again, since I would be retiring in 1976. We decided to buy a house, I’d never owned one before, even though I was in my late 30s. We found a new 4 bedroom and got moved in in February 1975.

    Then things started happening, quickly. The war in Viet Nam was really heating up, the communists were headed south, towards Saigon, where my wife’s relatives lived. We were glued to the TV, no cable news back in the old days so every night we watched with anticipation as the war drew nearer and nearer. Then panic mode! The North Vietnamese army was on the outskirts of Saigon! We had no idea of what could or should be done but knew that we had to try something. The end was inevitable and closing quickly, tanks were everywhere, panic in Saigon.

    About the 24-25th of April we send telegrams to the US Embassy in Saigon, listing the names and ages of all the relatives and told them we wanted to sponsor them in the US. By that time there was chaos in VN, there was no functioning government and the embassy was a mad house, scrambling to get the Americans out. You’ve seen the end play out on TV hundreds of times, of the helicopters lifting off the roof of the embassy.

    We were heart broken, my wife in constant tears, not knowing what had become of her family. A few weeks later, like two or three, a phone call from someone at Camp Pendleton, CA telling us that someone wanted to talk to my wife. It was her brother! And her mother! And her sister! And her sister! And lots of nephews and nieces, some that she had never seen.

    Now the plot thickens. My wife’s uncle was Port Commander of Newport, Saigon, and a navy captain. As the war closed in and panic abounded he sent word to his own family and my wife’s to get the hell out of Dodge. Her brother rounded up the whole family, got them to Newport and the uncle got them on one of the last ships leaving Saigon. Her uncle stayed, even though his own family had left, to try to help others . He finally got on the last ship leaving the port.

    OK, now all of my wife’s family are at Camp Pendleton, processing the necessary refugee paper work, getting medical exams, etc. I was talking to Pendleton explaining that we would sponsor my wife’s family. They explained that there were quite a few and we said we would take them all. We learned there was 14 in all but we wanted all of them and they agreed. Now what?

    First thing is to figure out what we needed. I started building beds, including a couple double bunks, a double bed for my new brother-in-law and his wife and moving them into place. As it turned out there were 2 boys about my son’s age and 2 girls about my daughter’s age. Step cousins, so it was time to share bedrooms. The married couple and their 2 little boys would get a bedroom, the other 6 people would move into the double garage, I had wired it and finished out the front with windows, curtains and a door, rugs on the floor, TV and AC. Not great but not Pendleton tents either.

    Finally the big night, a Friday, when the new people would be arriving. We had two cars and a neighbor came with her station wagon to the local airport. As we waited the newspaper people and TV cameras showed up. What the hell is that? My 12 year old had alerted the media, unbeknownst to me. The plane arrived and the relatives started getting off, my wife hadn’t seen her family for close to 10 years. They kept coming and coming until 14 had finally got on the tarmac, there was joy in Mudville!

    We got them loaded in the cars and back to my house so we could take inventory. The kids were scared, they had no idea what was going on, they’d been on the ship for many days and a few weeks at Camp Pendleton. Somehow, the first beds had been assigned. I don’t remember but I’m sure there was food to eat. They were the first refugees to get to Temple, TX.

    It was June and kids were not in school. The next morning’s front page ran pictures of shy little bewildered Vietnamese kids. We were getting the 15 minutes of fame, on TV, the papers wanted more interviews with the people, my B-I-L spoke some English plus my wife interpreted so we sat and did the interviews.

    A phone call the next morning from someone asking if anyone of the newbies was looking for a job and
    could he donate some outgrown clothes? He suggested the company he was at and a couple days later I took the oldest nephew down to apply and he started working, less than a week after arrival. The following day, on Sunday, the school superintendent came by, all upset, because the youngsters would be in his school district and they didn’t speak English. I told him not to worry. Wife’s sister was soon working in a couple weeks as well.

    OK, here’s kind of a thumb nail sketch of the new folks. All references relate to my wife.

    Mother, early 60s, widow, no real work experience

    Brother, about 36-37, medical doctor, 2 kids
    Sister in law, brother’s wife, 36-37, also a medical doctor
    Nephew, brother’s son, 5 years old
    Nephew, brother’s son, 4 years old

    Sister, about 37-38, air traffic controller at Tan Son Nhut, 6 kids
    Nephew, 19, VN Air Force
    Niece, 17, student
    Nephew, 14, student
    Niece, 13, student
    Niece, 11, student
    Niece, 10 student

    Sister, 15, student

    Elderly lady, about 60-65, mother of brother’s wife

    After 1 month brother and family (including wife’s mother) drove to CA in a VW beetle that we had bought for them. I explained that they had to drive at night in the desert because of the summer heat.
    Now we are down to just 9 new relatives. The summer passed, kids watched TV, were learning a little English but not too much.

    School started, 7 new kids plus my 2 all got on the bus. My son and daughter got them into their classrooms OK, small country school. After a few days niece 11 came home crying ’cause she couldn’t understand the teacher but she was kicking butt in math. Another month or so teacher asked niece 13 where she lived, niece said Texaco and all the kids laughed, she came home and told her brothers and sisters and they laughed as now all were learning English pretty fast. Birthdays were a frequent and new event, a cake, a couple presents, and the kids were well on their way. Boys were throwing the football around in the front yard, girls were shooting hoops in the driveway. Mother was watching wrestling on TV and doing what she could around the house. Meals were non stop, it seemed. The wash machine and dryer never shut off.

    At Christmas time the niece 10 and 11 wanted a talking doll, as did my 9 year old, they were happy little girls. Everyone enjoyed their first American Christmas, all kids were doing well in school. On Jan 1st Sister and 6 kids moved into a low rent apartment only a couple miles from us but they were on their own. Mother and sister 15 stayed with us another 2 years.

    Now let’s take another look after nearly 44 years and see what has happened.

    Mother passed away about 20 years ago, having lived in a nursing home for many years after a stroke.

    Brother and wife passed their CA exams, worked as doctors in the Indiana prison system, until retiring and moving back to Orange County, CA. Brother developed Parkinson’s and passed away about 10 years ago. His wife retired, teaches piano pro bono. Nephews 4 and 5 graduated from Tufts U as dentists, practice in Orange County.

    Sister worked at Texas Instruments in assembly, then retail until retirement, moved to FL. Her kids, nephew 19 had a variety of jobs, got cancer and died at about 50. Niece 17 graduated med school, practiced as a pathologist, retired a couple years ago at about 58. Nephew 14 dropped out of high school, got a GED, graduated Iowa State with a BS in Chemistry, got a Master’s in Public Admin, works for the VA in FL. Niece 13 joined the AF, became an Air Traffic Controller, went to Civil Service as a n ATC at Sea-Tac, retired with 30 years. Niece 11 got a BS in Computer Science from UTexas and ran later into serious mental health issues. Lives on the street in Dallas, did a little time in the pokey for fraud and spent a stint in a mental hospital. Niece 10 dropped out of school, banged around for awhile, got her life in order, went to Dental Hygienist’s School and now is Top Gun at a big clinic in Mpls.

    Sister 15 got a math degree, maybe UTexas, not sure, teaches at a private school. Her husband was a cop, drowned while his wife watched. They had been married only a couple years and she has never remarried.

    S-I-L’s mother died in CA a number of years ago, maybe 10-15. So, let’s see, we have 9 youngsters that arrived in 1975. All married, mostly to Americans. 9 divorces (a couple were divorced twice), 1 widowed, 1 street person, 1 died, 2 single (divorced), 4 presently married. (Only 1 is on his only marriage). At this time in their lives most are doing well, minus the bag lady. Her family has tried to help her but the schizophrenia can’t be beat. One day she’ll be a Dallas statistic.

    Oh, the uncle that helped them make their getaway. His own family didn’t know he had escaped for several months as he had ended up in Guam. He and his family settled in Virginia and he worked in DC for a contractor until his retirement and ultimate death. My wife got to see him and his family before he died.

    If there is something good from the VN War, at least for me, was that my wife got her family back. We had an exciting time watching those kids mostly succeed, not without a lot of effort on their part. The Catholic Charity, Caritas, had allocated $400 per person for resettlement. I kept meticulous records of expenses, sending in the receipts every couple weeks. I would buy the groceries, divide by 18, take off 4 shares for us and Caritas would send a check for the other 14. As people left I would update the figures. I can’t remember how it all worked out but we wanted the new folks to have the leftover Caritas money. I think there may have been some residual for them to use later.

    Well, Penthouse, that’s about the end, not the usual ending to a Penthouse letter but a Happy Ending anyway.

  • A Close Shave

    A lot of chatter happening this week, which made me postpone what I planned to write about for another week.  As many are undoubtedly aware Gillette, a company that markets razors to both men and women, aired a controversial commercial linked here.

    This is my review of Full Sail Malted Milkshake IPA:

    Many took the message as a negative, saying the commercial insults their customer base.  Making a statement like this their critics say, will drive their customers away, that disagree with the social statement being made.  Strange, given the company itself profits from one of the defining physical characteristics of men—having a beard.

    Gillette itself is not a stand alone company that will suffer as a result of this, rather they are a subsidiary of Proctor & Gamble.  As of this writing P&G was not immediately shorted by a large number of investors, like what happened with Nike. Their stock price was rather flat for the week. Unlike Nike, their product lines are diverse and are necessities that nearly everyone uses.  People will continue buying their soap, their toothpaste and Double Quilted Charmin Toilet Paper.  While it can be argued this is not the first time P&G made such a social statement with one of its brands (remember the ‘like a girl’ campaign?) this is different because they did not criticize previously.  Rather they took what was a pejorative often used by men toward other men (i.e. you play ball like a girl!) and turned it into something positive. Here it appeared to be open criticism, constructive or not.

    Interestingly enough, another P&G brand is Old Spice, whose marketing campaign a few years ago appealed to the lighter side of masculinity, to great success.  

    H/T: You know who you are, you MAGNIFICENT….

    The merits of the message itself, and whether it was intended to insult is not a question to be answered here. As usual such interpretation is best left to the individual.  Will I buy Gillette’s products?  No.  Recently, a fellow Glib challeneged me with an incredibly thoughtful gift.  Should I do what I always do and pick up yet another skill, I may never need to buy a razor again.

    A better question is, are the attributes commonly associated with men something we evolved beyond?  Men typically are more predictable than women at any given time, more assertive, are motivated by physical things, are driven to compete and succeed at different interests than women.  The downside to this, is men more often than women will behave recklessly, and aggressively. These characteristics though are even now being portrayed as positive attributes—in women, as this recruiting commercial for the United States Marines Corps suggests.

    Have we moved past the point where the potential for the negative is too much of a liability for any benefit it can provide?  Competition often breeds adversity, which does not have to be a bad thing. Teaching others in that sense, to overcome adversity and handle it when it defeats them while they are young may be in their best interests later on. Others might be less assertive, and might have a more difficult time adjusting so the argument to show respect for the brainy kid also has merit, because one might not grow up and cure cancer if he or she is always being put down.  Is developing confidence through physical strength best frowned upon, to allow for the more cerebral, even one that might go so far as to act (ahem) like a girl?

    Why does it have to be one or the other?  As I write this, I am at my son’s Tae Kwon Do class.  I am reminded of last week while he was sparring a older boy, with a higher belt.  My son comes across as the brainy kid; in fact he takes an advanced math course because it comes easy to him.  That day, his opponent moved to strike with a round kick.  In response, he stepped in closer to avoid the kick’s impact and landed a front kick to his opponent.  His opponent, a larger and more experienced martial artist, lost his balance and found himself on the floor.  At that moment, my son beat his opponent by outsmarting him.  He learned more about himself than I could ever teach, but he’s still a math geek.

    In the end they shook hands and moved to their next opponent.  No hard feelings.

    If men acting like men are frowned upon, perhaps a way to fight this perception is to understand why those attributes are positive and where to apply them.  The fact these attributes are being encouraged in women is proof enough then are a benefit to society.  The attributes cannot be negated, unlearned, or taken away, they are hard wired psychologically and genetically.  The trick then becomes learning how and when to strike, and use the inherent strengths tactically.  Perhaps then, critics will see the problem is not masculinity, but in their own shortcomings.

    As for the beer, it appears Full Sail went and rebranded unfiltered Sculpin.  Which for the IPA…people is not a bad thing.  Not the hoppiest of IPA out there, but if you dig grapefruit and texture this will not dissapoint. Full Sail Malted Milkshake IPA:  2.7/5