Iwo Jima February 19, 1945- Thanks Dad.

Sixty-nine years ago, my late father was just twenty.  He was a PFC in the Third Marine Division and  a veteran of the Bougainville (1943) and Guam ( 1944) Campaigns. He and his pal Bob Guth were aboard an LST off Iwo Jima on this day in 1945.  Thanks Dad, Bob and all of the other heroes who made very little of their great sacrifices.

Podcast Comes to Beachwood Reporter! Kingsford and Rhodes Rock the Airwaves!

Listen up, Bitches!

"The world's wittiest Chicago-centric news and culture review kicks off its new weekly current events podcast with hosts Andrew Kingsford and Steve Rhodes. It's real, man." 

Steve Rhodes is a true Chicago newsman, even though he hails from The Land of Ice and Snow where people actually like Garrison Keillor and Swedes vote for Al Franken and On we sweep with threshing oar, Our only goal will be the western shore. . . . where was I ? 

Yep, Steve Rhodes can sling ink.  Steve is paired with Andy Kingsford from Oz, who owns and operates The Flying Saucer - a great place for generous portions of great food at modest prices,  Rhodes sling ink and Andy slings hash.  Together, they present the a solid podcast of news and insight only rivaled by the Skinny and Houli Show. 

Voila, Steve et Andy les durs sauvages et originales de Beachwood Inn et des journalistes qui connaissent leurs pommes de terre de leur Preckwinkles!

Leo HS Morning 2/11/2014 -I Ride With Pride and Clyde By My Side!

 I am blessed with a great life and the opportunity to work for Leo High School.  I get to Leo at about 4:45 most days and start the boilers, do some paper work and get one of the vans ready to pick up between seven and nine guys participating in early morning activities. My crew is usually Cyde, Chris, TJ, Mick, Joe, Latrell, Caleb, Gaylon, and Sydney.  I begin in Englewood at 74th & Normal, go to Grand Crossing at 66th & King Drive, take that beautiful, historic and inspiring Boulevard north to 35th and Dunkin Donuts!

At 5:45 AM I defrost and chip ice from Old # 7 and get the heat up -somewhat and at 6:10 head to pick up my co-pilot and fifteen year old mentor Clyde at 74th & Normal 

 The man emerges and runs to the van.  Hoists himself and a twenty pound book bag in to the van and greets me with a genuine "Good morning Mr. Hickey! My Mom says hi!  Let's Roll!"Route #66   Nelson Riddle   Nelson Riddle Collection

Download Route #66   Nelson Riddle   Nelson Riddle Collection MP3 for free on Dilandau

 Roll we do north toward Hamilton Park . . .

and then east to Wentworth, north again to 67th and then east to grab Chris - on the way Chris's Mom calls to say that he has the flu. Like Clyde, Chris never misses a day and commands a 3.8 GPA.

We pass Chris's home in the Park Homes and head north

 Under the 63rd Street L Platform

 and past Wahsington Park at 59th Street.  Past the 55th Street Garfield Boulevard the real charms of Chicago Architecture from the days of Burnham become evident.

 East and west we see scores of the very best examples of Chicago Architecture.

 We come to heart of Bronveville the birthplace of Chicago Blues and Jazz and the Harold Washington Library on the east side King Drive.

 At 45th we pass a beautiful old building boarded up and aching for a rehab.

 The Sax Man agrees!

 On the east side of 43rd and MLK drive stands my very favorite Chicago building.

 Just before 35th Street we come to the wonderful WWI Memorial to the Men of Bronze - the all African American Illinois Guard Regiment from Chicago that twisted the Kaiser's mustache until he gave up.   We make a right at 35th Street and a left at the strip mall that is home to our Dunkin Donuts

I explain that we are 'showing the flag,' like a 1920's Yankee gun-boat on the Yangtzee River - representing Leo High School in words and deeds and the lads have stepped up magnificently. For two years now, we are warmly greeted by the Dunkin Donuts regulars, headed by the Mall Manager Roy and the working the men who begin their day here.

Not a day goes by without a full report from Clyde

and fleshed out by Joe, Mick, Caleb, TJ, Latrell & etc.

The Dunkin Donuts He-Bull . . .

and the Dream Team serve us with coffee, OJ and a box of Munchkins ( chocolate glazed only).

These are my pals!  Missing is eighty year old Miss Marie and the famous BB Ref.

Back to the van and west on 35th Street, we pass Catholic League rival D.

 and approach the Dan Ryan.

 We pass Sox Park and merge with a near miss which upsets sissy-britches Mick

 Now, I pay great attention to rush hour south!

 We exit at 79th Street head west and arrive at Leo High School at 7:15 AM.

The guys polish off the Munchkins and get a hot breakfast at Leo.  The guys head to their activities, or tutoring sessions.  They put in a very long day of academics and sports and most do not get home until well after 7PM.

I am a very blessed man - Facta Non Verba.

Progressive Hack and Armchair Theologian Pat Quinn Firmly Believes in Jane Addams Mother Almighty Maker of Heaven and Earth

 

“That Christianity has to be revealed and embodied in the line of social progress is a corollary to the simple proposition, that man’s action is found in his social relationships in the way in which he connects with his fellows; that his motives for action are the zeal and affection with which he regards his fellows” Jane Addams

“I believe in taxes being based on ability to pay,” Quinn said. “I think that’s a principle as old as the bible. I think what we have to do in Illinois is have a fair system that also promotes economic growth.” Gov. Pat Quinn

 Governor Quinn firmly believes that decision about a woman's body should be made by her and her doctor. He supports a woman's right to privacy and choice without restriction as embodied in Roe v. Wade.
In accordance with his beliefs that healthcare should not be predicated on income, Governor Quinn supports legislation restoring abortion coverage under the state Medicaid plan. In addition, he supports legislation to repeal Illinois' 1995 Parental Notice of Abortion Law.
Source: 2010 Gubernatorial website quinnforillinois.com, "Issues" , Nov 2, 2010

Pat Quinn goes to church and it happens to be a Catholic Church.  However, it his thoughts words and deeds are pure 19th Century First Church of the Darwinian House of Jane Addams - Secular Progressive Reformed. There are many of my coreligionists who chew swallow the bloody wafers, Girl Scout cookies and walking-around money from Planned Parenthood and the abortion industry without even a chaser, because they feel for women.  Feelings and intentions trump everything else; after all, the zeal and affection with which he regards his fellows” is all that is important.

Jane Addams really carried the ball over the goal-line for people who believe that Catholics are not zealous, nor affectionate toward their fellow man in the abstract and the particular. In fact, Jane Addams  is held in greater esteem by secularists, politicians of both parties who want to be considered Progressive, most academics and journalists and people who brand themselves independent thinkers, than canonized saints, Catholic bishops and theologians and people of simple faith.

Governor Pat Quinn cut and pasted Paul's letter to the Corinthians in order to fluff up the bunting over the redefinition of marriage in Illinois, rather than support St. Paul's doctrines.  St. Paul is the enemy of Jane Addams and her adopted spiritual children. Jane was a follower of Auguste Comte - the father of sociology and the religion of humanity.  The Social Gospel preached by Miss Settlement House and The Reverend Mr Quinn is all about science as the grease of government and government the salvific Eucharist itself.   As Brandon Harnish wrote in his brilliant essay Jane Addams's Social Gospel Synthesis and the Catholic Response, "in Addams's view Christianity is like putty, its greatest attribute being its ability to change shape." - to evolve.

The Progressive Movement grabbed Darwin by the forelocks and swung him in every direction -war & peace, sickness and in health, birth and death, sex and marriage have been formed and re-formed more than Late Night television. Jane Addams's Social Gospel was the religious component of the Progressive Movement, but it was her dabbling in politics that really paid off and proved the whetstone for the progressive dagger.  Jane Addams bullied her way into an appointment as 19th Ward sanitary officer and the rest was history.  Hull House was as much political headquarters as Alderman Johnny De Pow's grocery and saloon.  From Hull House, Addams preached her Social Gospel and waged holy war on the Democratic Party that not only bowed to, but canonized this Dowager a century later.

The Social Gospel has no room for a pew full of Catholics, so long as they remain Catholic.

As Jane Addams's Social Gospel was putty, the Catholic view of Christianity is stone ( remember the Rock of Peter?) 'used for foundation and construction alike.  The Catholic Church in Chicago was decades ahead of the Progressive in care for the poor, the elderly, the indigent, the unwanted and the ignorant.  The Social Gospel preachers evangelized politicians, journalists, professors and the comfortable.  Government replaced good works with policy.

Policy is Pat Quinn.  How's things going? One way.

Where's The Kerryman?

Chicago 1912 - Amid a sea of Stetsons, straw boaters and bowler hats stands Dermot Bresnahan of Scartaglen, County Kerry, asking .  Which one might he be?  Mighty Bee!

Tate Buckthorn - King of the Knitting Cowboys: Cadets Ain't G-Men

Tate Buckthorn Knits '. . .you have a problem with that? Let's hear it on your hind legs, barkside out, Pard.'

Some cowboys sing, some play the Guit-box, some others toss the lasso, but Tate Buckthorn's knits.  He knits sweaters, throw rugs, baby socks and when perturbed his bushy eyebrows.  Many a dry-gulching, back shooter learned that the purl'n and stich'n irons in the thick calloused hands of Tate Buckthorn can be as deadly as the shoot'n irons on his hips and  tied to his thighs.

Back in '38, when the Amerikadeutscher Volksbund was grabbing all of the best tables in Chicago's beer-gardens, Tate Buckthorn drovered a herd from the louvered rail-cars on the tracks above Canaryville's Root Street and into the Union Stockyards of Chicago.  He was tall on the saddle and knitting away like a widow woman with an eye for the Sears Catalog boys in swimming trunks, but her mind on the gospel messages. Yep, he was busy on the saddle, but with an eye on the 94% of beeves that survived the rail passage to the slaughter pens.

A group of boys from Morgan Park Military Academy were on field trip to the stockyards that day and noted the tall, bronzed figure standing on the ornate Charro saddle hugging the back and belly of  his14.2 hand bucksin stallion, Purl. Tate was doing what the Mex charros call a suerte - showing off.

The teenage boys were wowed by the cowboy's balance and command.

One big, red-headed lunk with jug-ears and buck teeth under his garrison cap halloed, " Hey Lady! Better take a chair and tend to your knitting!"

Tate slowed the pace of Purl some and went as bright-eyed as that school marm back in Fort Smith went,when Tate presented her with a hand knitted sampler containing a pornographic two-dimensional  suggestion for a mutual  day off and answered, " Pard, let me tend to your knitting."  With that, he sprung from the back of Purl and landed square in front of the cadet.





" Well, Red, ain't you the curly wolf, just!   I knit to keep focused and focus is the difference between keepin' a whole skin and taking a steer's antlers in the ribs, Pard.  Some Pokes sing, some twirl the lasso and I knit."

Tate leaped back into the saddle, " Follow me, Red and drag along all them army loafer Pards of your'n and we'll all get familiar with some Sasparilla."  They repaired to a corner store at Wentoworth and Root streets with a blue and white painted  coffin- like ice cooler packed with bottles of root beer next to the store's front steps and entrance to the shop.

Tate Buckthorn treated each of the score of boys ( that's twenty Bufflao Head, brethren) in caps and green uniforms to a bottle of Old Dutch a piece while he squatted on his haunches and knit. The boys petted and cooed over the great horse caparisoned in silver latigos and saddle strings. The door swung open with great noise and violence.  A man emerged wearing  very tight fitting black top-coat.  Under his black bowler hat set the pair meanest grey eyes this side of the Old Man.  He had a muscular thick neck that challenged the collar of his tan shirt and bulged the knot of bow tie out into the public.

" Move on away from my door so people can traffic into my shop  You have ( he said Half) your Pop now go!.  This is private, now!"

" No reason to put the bulge on, Pard. Me and these h'yar saddled-chaps and my old Cayuse, Purl, don't mean to obstruct the trail none."

" Well, take your knitting elsewhere."

It got quiet. . ..two quiet.

Tate stood full to the flush, but let the insult pass.

" Hombres, lets move across the street to that other corner." Indicating the sign above the grocery and notions shop hung sign bearing the name of the owner.

" I take it you are Mr. Hintern-Schnüffeln."

" I have that honor. Why?"

"Some handle.  I see you do not sell beer to Indians.  Get a crowd of Comanch are these parts?"



The Bowler'd square head went blood red,  " There are many tribes of Indian."

Tate Buckthorn sized up the warning sign as well as the owner proprieter.

" I'appears to me, that you lay claim to a wide field."

"  Soon, we will not need such signs, nor require an explanation to the likes of you and all Untermenschen."

" Well, Juniper, I'd wager my next six packets of hard money that you arfe one of them Papier-Aufhänger Liebhaber Wer hasst Juden, Schwarze, Katholiken, Zigeuner und Fuller Brush Männer.

" I do not hate Fuller Brush Men!  You . . . Sie sprechen sehr gut Deutsch für eine Satteltramp.

" Do you sabe un culo kansas antaño patadas?"

The store owner pulled a Ruger MK III .22 automatic from his coat pocket and threatened Tate, but more so the twenty cadets.

" Alle von euch Ratten, weg von meiner Tür bzw. diesen Cowboy, der der Jude Krankenhaus auf 29th Street senden!"

The threat of violence and race-baiting rhetorical flourishes by the bowler wearing Bunds had taken the rag of the bush and Tate's wrists rolled yarn by the yard from the twin needles yet clutched in his gnarled hands.  The Bowler'd bully boy's Nazi heater clattered to the cement and the big buck-toothed red-headed cadet from Morgan Park Military Academy kicked the gat far way from the two combatants and into the Canaryville gutter,

With the Teutonic trouble-making desparado ensnarled in butternut wool, Tate tightened the yarn on the Heinie Hyena until the coppers arrived.

The man was charged with threatening boys with and unlicensed hand gun and taken to hoosegowl on 35th Street.  He was booked.

Tate was surrounded by the boys who had had an adventure in the stockyards.  The big redhead thumbed back the brim of his garrison cap and offered, " Mr. Buckthorn I learned a great lesson today."

Tate smiled high wide and handsome, " Tend to your knitting Red! Tend to your knitting and visit the gospel mill every Sunday!  . . .and drink Old Dutch Root Beer!."

Why I Tend to Admire Sarah Palin and Not So Much Our President

I like Sarah Palin - she is a very centered and happy person.  President Obama?  Not so much.

Tales of the South Side -The Victim

Aunt Olympia thought him "Sharp! Real Cool Man!"; his contemporaries . . . not so much.

Listen to your relatives . . .with a handful of salt.  Uncle Jim might suggest a tatoo.  Cousin Buck might offer a suggestion on head-gear akin to Elmer Fudd's haberdashing noggin.  Aunt Stell might think you'd look cute in a slutty-biker chick's leathers and Dad might even suggest WWI leggings for cold winter days.  Listen, nod, but be wary.

Quinn Swallowski  listened to Aunt Oly and selected only really stylish low-priced menswear from Zembski's Family Store on 41rd by Archer and dressed accordingly.  Quinn wrapped himself in smart low-priced fashion and does so to this very day.  Others might find a Brooks Brothers look at a modest tariff but Quinn went full Zembski's at retail . . .and looked it.

"Forget them Baskins, Sears, Munky Wards, Joe-College Red Hanger wallet lifters, Quinn; go by Zembski over by Archer there. Save you money and look nice." the large and meaty mouthed Aunt Olympia commanded.

God generously featured Quinn corporeally -" He looked nice.  Nice hair, nice eyes, nice teeth - nice.

Quinn never ripped his trousers or dirtied his shirts.  Aunt Oly told him of those dangers though she dressed like an auto -mechanic at lunch.  Oly told and Quinn bought it.

This confidence shared between aunt and nephew proved daunting, when young Quinn attended Hubbard High School in 1991.  It seems that some of his school mates found the pretence and self-attention challenging themselves.  That was in a time when bullying was not a one way street,  not  like Hamlin, or today.


Quinn's parents were old country DPs with barely enough English to cash a check at the currency exchange across the street from the Giant Indian at 63rd & Pulaski.

Quinn learned fashion from Aunt Olympia, who was divorced from Uncle Bogdan three days after their wedding and lived with Frieda above the pet store at 63rd Kolin. Aunt Margie was a hoot - she could open non-twist off beer caps and had been a softball All Star for ten years running.   Uncle Bogdan beat it to Tinley Park, or Oak Forest somewhere.  He dressed like a machinist and refused "to wear nice powder blue leisure suit to wedding."

Quinn was named Quinn after his father's foreman at Tootsie Roll by Cicero Ave. and thought the given name might counter pollack jokes from the ever diminishing Irish around 63rd Street. Not so much.  Better Arabs, Mexes and Blacks than crook Micks - kiepska banda drani.  Quinn's parents respected American born little sister Oly's judgments, "She first went by Zembski's; is nice."

Quinn Swallowski dressed nice and he was nice boy like Osmond Brother.


Such things mattered not to the Insane Popes around Hubbard High.  Quinn found things unsettling as the only snappy dresser among a herd of RPN ( Royal Popes Nation) bedecked in White Sox gear only.

Name calling directed at Quinn was identity specific and colorful.  Quinn ignored taunts and managed his time according to curriculum schedule, detention and shift changes at 8th Police District over by St. Louis Street.

Aunt Oly even picked Quinn up from school when her shift at Tootsie Roll allowed -some weeks day; some weeks nights.  Afternoons?  Run, Quinn!

Run Quinn did, like a hobbled Llama.  His running gait only added to the reactive scorn from his contemporaries.  His friends all went to Maria High School, or St. Rita.  Hubbard was tough . . .is tough.

Quinn became a model for Zembski's catalog and eventually landed a great gig with Sears.  He was making money hand over fist over hand.  Quinn's gang banger antagonist had matriculated to  getting tequila and 40 oz. empties collaged around their graves over by St. Mary's Cemetery on Pulaski.

Three years after graduation, Quinn was asked to model for Chicago Public Schools literature and made even more money.

Quinn still deferred to Aunt Oly's fashion judgment.  Soon, Quinn's services were no longer desired at CPS.

Quinn Swallowski was the wrong face in the wrong duds.

Aunt Oly moved to Florida with Frieda, when the damn Mexicans bought the building and kicked out pet store and cancelled the rent of two old bags. Quinn is unemployed, but still looks great within the fashion context set by Aunt Olympia.

Quinn remains a victim.

Hey, I'm just sayin'!

.

These Are the U.N. Beauties Demanding that the Vatican ( Catholic Church) Behaves.

 Thirteen of the eighteen members of U.N. Committee of the Rights of the Child are from what NPR and the BBC World Service like to term 'emergings nations' - nations prone to hacking off limbs, human trafficking, beheading for Allah, vanishing neighbors, nepotism, junta of the week bloodbaths, maritime piracy and Ivy League Alumni.  Hey, they're emerging.

Now, to be fair, I do not know if getting cleaned out at a casino ranks as a human rights violation or not, but Monaco might be somewhat less strident about pedophiles than the House of Saud, who tend to tuck the Koran under the mattress in the late Grace Kelly's principality.

I read that the U.N. Committee of the Rights of the Child are really, really put-out with the Vatican for ignoring the homosexual rape of teenage boys and making girls dor th laundry - all charges made clear by Hollywood, SNAP, Jefferey Anderson, Bill Maher, HBO, OXFAM, and Al Qaeda.  More so, there is a demand of compliance that the Vatican catch up to these emerging nations with regard to gay rights, gay marriage, abortion on demand and free rubbers.

They are dead serious, which makes the hypocrisy all the more laughable.  Here's UN Kid's Watchdog Roster

Ms. Agnes Akosua AIDOO	Ghana*	28 February 2015
Ms. Amal ALDOSERI (Vice-Chairperson a.i.)	Bahrain*	28 February 2017
Ms. Aseil AL-SHEHAIL (Vice-Chairperson)	Saudi Arabia*	28 February 2015
Mr. Jorge CARDONA LLORENS	Spain	28 February 2015
Ms Sara DE JESÚS OVIEDO FIERRO (Vice-Chairperson)	Ecuador*	28 February 2017
Mr. Bernard GASTAUD	Monaco	28 February 2015
Mr. Peter GURÁN	Slovakia*	28 February 2017
Ms. Maria HERCZOG (Rapporteur)	Hungary*	28 February 2015
Ms. Olga a. KHAZOVA	Russian Federation	28 February 2017
Mr. Hatem KOTRANE	Tunisia*	28 February 2015
Mr. Gehad MADI	Egypt *	28 February 2015
Mr. Benyam Dawit MEZMUR (Vice-Chairperson)	Ethiopia *	28 February 2017
Ms. Yasmeen MUHAMAD SHARIFF	Malaysia*	28 February 2017
Mr. Wanderlino NOGUEIRA NETO	Brazil*	28 February 2017
Ms. Maria Rita PARSI	Italy	28 February 2017
Ms. Kirsten SANDBERG (Chairperson)	Norway	28 February 2015
Ms. Hiranthi WIJEMANNE (Vice-Chairperson)	Sri Lanka*	28 February 2015
Ms. Renate WINTER	Austria	28 February 2017

* A few Rights of Child moments from some eemrging nations -

 Ghana -

Le Maison Saud -

Bahrain -

Ethiopia - 

Sri Lanka-

The United Nations is important for one thing alone - slob diplomats who scoff-law NYC, bolt on checks, rape maids and speak English like a crack-heads on NPR.  Thanks for your insights.  This should get Matt Damon's fullest attention.

Let The Velvet Fog Blow The Snow Away!

Snow! Really?  I tried writing something -saved it and went to Leo HS, because it looked to bad out there. It was.  When I got to Leo, I cahnged what I had begun to write.

It took me forty five minutes to get to Leo HS today.  Left the Hickey Family Compound on Rockwell at 4AM;  got to Kareem's Dunkin' Donuts at 4:25 ( six blocks), but Western Ave and 79th Street were well plowed.  I pulled into the lot at Leo at 4:45.

I listened to Mel Torme Live at Marty's and managed nicely without any superfluous obscenities, blasphemies, vain threats to whomever, or spin-outs.

Let the Velvet Fog be your snow-plow!



You gotta love Steve Allen!



How about it?


Here is my favorite When Sunny Gets Blue and one by the great June Christy!


 Drive with Care everywhere!

Snow-Blowing and the Sad Deaths of Talented People and of Course The Superbowl

The Irish Funnies are not.  No matter the day, we are reminded of life's gossamer hold on our blood and bones.  Yesterday, I spent my morning shoveling and snow blowing, after listening to the gospel from Luke in which two very elderly people witness the fulfilment of God's promise when Mary and Joseph brought Jesus to the Temple for the Purification Rites.  I shovel and snow blow in league with Mike the Vietnam vet and retired Chicago Streets and Sanitation worker and a retired CPD detective and attorney who owns the same make and model as my own.  We are a troika of sixty years and change male making the path the little easier for our neighbors, especially the aging widows.  We ain't kids.

This winter is like other winters, despite the Polar Vortex and our dangerously over-heating planet.  Mike, Copper and I have been 'doing the sidewalks and diveways' since 1999, when I moved on the block form Griffith Indiana.  It is not fun, but it needs to get done.  We learned by being ordered by our elders and betters to 'get your ass out there and shovel the sidewalks, because you should not need to be told to.'  I have watch home-owners in possession of snow-removal gear take care of their property and return to warmth of the hearth and the flat-screen TV.

I can't do that and neither can my two neighbors. We are too timid to face the echoes of commands past -'get your ass out there and shovel the sidewalks, because you should not need to be told to.'  I don't know what my counterparts thought about while snow-blowing, but was stuck on the gospel by Luke and thought about old people (sans me of course) and how they perceive infants as possibly a justification of their lives. -

Now there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout, looking for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him.
And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he should not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ.
And inspired by the Spirit he came into the temple; and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him according to the custom of the law,he took him up in his arms and blessed God and said,"Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word;
or mine eyes have seen thy salvation which thou hast prepared in the presence of all peoples,
a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to thy people Israel." . . .
And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phan'u-el, of the tribe of Asher; she was of a great age, having lived with her husband seven years from her virginity, and as a widow till she was eighty-four. She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day.And coming up at that very hour she gave thanks to God, and spoke of him to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem.

Now, bear in mind that it is cold and that I am a God Damn crybaby; therefore my thoughts were constantly derailed according to cracks in the sidewalks and dents to the blades, the odd refuelings and unclogging the chute - yes, with the engine off.  I'm not a complete moron.  I thought about the recent death of a colleague, the result of folly.  How all the good that one can do, might be erased by one case of bad judgement.  I thought about my own catalog of sins of commission and the warehouse full of omissions.  What if I had grabber -right here in the alley between Rockwell and Maplewood and had not the opportunity set things somewhat right.

Old Simeon and Anna were delighted to witness the redemption of Jerusalem.

Finally, the sun came out and no more snow packed on to piles.  I spent the Sunday doping off, reading and watching old Maverick re-runs, until SuperBowl XLVIII!  Bad snap! Safety! It only got uglier.  The commercials? All I cared about was the Doritos selection, which included south sider Mike Cullen's talents.  Red Hot Chili Peppers? Not so much.  I watched the game until Denver scored, which seemed like a PC every-one-gets- a-trophy mercy kiss.  I had to be up at 3:30AM to pen my prose, go to Dunkin Donuts, say Hi to Cousin Sy, drive to Leo High School light the boilers, read the stuff I wrote and fix my more glaring errors, start the grey van and pick up the guys.No Jerusalem in New Jersey for the Mile High Guys.  What a stinker.

When I woke I learned of the death of Phillip Seymour Hoffman found with a needle in his arm in the bathroom of his NY apartment.  My God, the kid was only 46 and had proved himself to a most talented actor. Those demons we deny, or try to self medicate and meditate did in another supremely talented human being.

But Simeon and Anna kept their attentions on redemption and the new Jerusalem.  They saw it in the baby Mary and Joseph brought to the Temple according to the faith. No hoopla, or glitz, but genuine.

Walp, four to six inches of the white stuff is on the way.  I know what I'll be doing with my Me Time.

In Praise of Great Women!

There is no more evident sign that anyone is a saint and of the number of the elect, than to see him leading a good life and at the same time a prey to desolation, suffering, and trials. -- St Aloysius Gonzaga



Thanks to my pal Jack Daley for this daily reminder of the power of good women and God bless the young gents on the skateboards who preserved this video epiphany!