Recreating the Past

Abe Lincoln with Lady Admirers

If you have never been to a Civil War Muster, by all means try to see one. My town has one every year and they do a different Battle each time. The Uniforms are very authentic looking and they use real cannons and muskats. The campsite looks amazing also with tents pitched up and soldiers playing cards and chess. Sometimes there is a military band playing on old brass horns. These soldiers even sleep in the tents overnight. There is also now a town like section with a jail,post office and other buildings with women and men doing things they did back in Civil War times while wearing perfect period time clothing. Sometimes entire families will participate in these events. I wonder if they do Revolutionary War Re-enactments? Even WW1, WW2, Korea or Vietnam re-enactments would be interesting, tho the Tropical setting of Vietnam would be difficult in some areas of the USA. At our Civil War Muster they will setup tables to sell old artifacts like pistols, muskats, knives, uniforms, old coins and homemade candles and baked goods they make on site. Bring a camera and record a recreation of history. I did and will never forget it.

I do Declare: It is a Hot One!

Sister Missy and Cousin Kim keeping cool



Neighbor Cathy, Sister Mindy and Cathy's Mom Janet




Mindy, Jimio, Cathy and Momio

 We may be having a heat wave these past few days but I remember heat waves past and without Gilletts Lake to cool us off, I don't know what we would have done. We had no air conditioning back then, not even in our cars. "Michigan is too far north for A/C", people would say. You know it had to be hot when Momio and her friend Janet went swimming. In fact this was such a rare event that photos had to be taken to verify this momentous occasion and they did it in style. I remember one time I was riding my 1966 black Schwinn Racer over in the motorcycle trails by Warriors Hill and it was so hot by the time I got back I had a heat rash and I jumped straight off my bike into the lake. That was so refrshing.

Nothing Like a Down Home Local AutoRace

Driver we Sponsored winning a Race

This picture is of a Driver Dadio and I sponsored. He won Rookie of the Year in the Detroit Iron Class. Going to the race was a fun experience. This was a small local racetrack not like Nascar. Half the fans knew each other. This race was 19 years ago and things have changed a lot since then. Back then you could bring bottles and alcoholic beverages in the stands. People brought Coolers with their BBQ rib left-overs and put their plates, knives and forks on the wooden benches. They were not going to be denied a picnic while watching the auto-race :-]  Kids would run all over the place and stand right down near the track behind an old wire fence. Over the loudspeaker a person would yell out the raffle numbers that were on your ticket to recieve prizes. In between races the loudspeaker would belch out old country tunes. One thing I saw that was groovy was when I looked up in the sky, it had this purple color to it. I suppose all that auto exhaust had something to do with it. Some weird chemical reaction I guess. This Racetrack was so local, I had to drive down 2 miles of dirt road to get to it and park on grass. It gave a kind of down home feeling but that was dissapated quickly by my fear of getting a flat tire. These local races are very entertaining to watch because they would have a crash every 2 laps. This guy would come on the track with a pickup truck and sweep the broken auto parts into a big shovel and toss them in the bed of the pickup. Another guy would spray any other oil and debris with a hose. If a racecar could not move off the track, 3 or 4 guys would come out of the Pits to push the car into the infield. Sometimes 2 drivers would get into a fight over a wreck. What was really cool was the little homemade stand with steps they built for the guy to wave the caution yellow flag, the warning red flad, the green go flag and the checkered winning flag from. It was fun watching 3 or 4 different races. One race had little tiny cars and some races had pickup trucks racing. They even have bus races but never saw them. Here's the Website of the Racetrack I went to.  http://www.springportmotorspeedway.com/ and the wiki page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Springport_Motor_Speedway

Are Books Going Extinct?

The Book Exchange

We have a used bookstore downtown that has been there 12 years but Im afraid business will really slow down due to digital ebooks on Kinder devices and such. Hopefully Im wrong and that the desire to collect the physical books will bring in new business. The Book Exchange even takes money off the selling price if you bring in another book for the store. With Kindle and other e-reader devices, readers can have books in seconds anywhere they go. Still the cost of a Kindle varies from $114 to over $300 and you still have to buy the book online. Going to the library offers a free option but the selection is not always good and the hassle of going there plus the gas and time spent cuts into the free part somewhat. Garage Sales somtimes will have a few books at very cheap prices.  I need to add to my book collection desperately. What few books I have are screaming for more friends.

An Old Idea Takes Root

Jackson Victory Garden Downtown

Will the Victory Gardens of 2011 save the Economy? Probably not but we are still early in our recent catastrophy. During WW2 people grew Victory Gardens. In a 1943 Comic Book Superman and Batman grew a Victory Garden together. There were Government Poster of Victory Gardens: "Will you have a part in Victory? Every garden a munition plant" "Plant a Victory Garden - A garden will make your rations go further" "Uncle Sam says garden to cut food costs" "Dig On for Victory" Many people took photos of their Victory Gardens and photos of the whole family digging in the Victory Garden. They even had newspaper articles about the Victory Garden of '43 or the Victory Garden of '44. Books about how to plant Victory Gardens and where and when to plant them. People even made creative signs at their gardens. People with no yards planted gardens on city property. Even had Victory Gardens during WW1 and Germany also grew them. Growing Victory Gardens helped save food for the troops thus saving the military money. Saturday Evening Post and Life Magazine did stories about Victory Gardens. People bought 66,000 pressure cookers in 1942 and that grew to 315,000 pressure cookers in 1943. People grew about 20 million gardens during WW2 and harvested around 10 million tons of food, so the Victory Garden program was a success. http://www.livinghistoryfarm.org/farminginthe40s/crops_02.html But in Oak Park Michigan this year a mother of 6 tried to grow a Victory Garden after the city put in sewer lines and tore up her front lawn. She was fined and charged with a misdemeanor for noncompliance with a city ordinance that says only suitable materials may occupy lawn space within the city's boundaries. http://www.blogher.com/forget-victory-gardens-theyre-now-misdemeanor?wrap=blogher-topics/food/locavores&crumb=106887 No official definition exists of suitable materials. When they asked city officials what suitable materials meant, they said shrubs bushes and flowers. Those seem not very tasty to me. I have not seen too many Victory Gardens yet. Have seen a few Herb Gardens and some Ivy gardens so people dont have to mow their lawns!

Things are not always as they Look

What does this picture tell us?

Take a look at this picture. There is a man seemingly smoking a cigarette. This man looks amazingly similar to c'est moi. Alas it is but the true nature of this photo is deceptive. Yes, there is a cigarette in my mouth and of course you can see it is burning and the ashes are about to fall off. This is where the visual senses end and the mystery behind the photo begins. I was the subject of a dare, for you see, my friend Gario bet me I wouldn't smoke a cigarette. I retorted back that I could on one condition. I did not have to inhale this foul evil leaf rolled up inside a paper tube. Well as I was conducting my dare, the webcam accidentally went off and camptured [ha opps "captured"] this embarrasing moment. We were setting up to shoot a few camshots of us playing chess. So you see, not every picture tells a story accurately,but they do tell a story, sometimes mistakenly to a first time observer and without forhand knowledge of the actual participant at the event during the time of its occurance. Jimio's true Musing and I'm sticking to it!

Big Brother: Friend and Body Guard

Brad in Europe

Brad growing a Hemingway Beard

It's nice to have a big brother. They can take you places in their car when you are too young to drive yet. They can even teach you to drive their car but dont get too close to the mailboxes! My Big Brother Brad would even take me to the Dome to get a hamburger, fries and ice cream for dessert. The Dome made their own ice cream and had beautiful girls bring it out to your car on roller skates. We ordered the food with a intercom system they put on your door, sorta like the ones at the Drive-In Theaters. Very High-Tech in those days! I liked cruisin the ave with Brad. We saw some pretty powerful muscle cars. 496 cid Chevys and 489 Fords with these Glass-pipe exhaust, Thrushes and Cherry-Bombs, man could they scream. At a red light 2 musclecars would sit at the front side by side then the light turn green and they spin those tires. We'd be right behind them [but not trying to keep up,Brad's car a 1963 Ford Galaxie was not  built for racing though the 351 cleveland motor did 120 mph on the highway] One time this car was reving his motor up like crazy and when the light turned green he just sat there while the other car took off. That was pretty funny. I loved the Barracudas and Challengers with the huge rear tires and all jacked-up high in the back. Some even had chrome differentials [Rear wheel drive to you youngsters] Brad was a bigger than me so when anyone even thought about bothering me, one stern stare from Brad and they would sit back in their seat on the bus. Even I never would think of picking a fight with Brad or hiding something of his. Thats why we got along so well. He didn't tease me and I didn't hide his things. Big Brothers can also drive the motorboat when you want to go skiing or take out the raft to get to that spot with all the reeds growing in a horseshoe shape where all the big bass hang out. Man I can still taste them bass,perch and blurgills we caught. We'd fry them in a pan in the kitchen or grill them when Dadio was cookin burgers or steaks for a picnic. As I got older, I did my own thing and Brad did his, but if I ever needed help he was there. When Brad retired from the Navy we would see a few movies and eat at some good restaurants after he helped me out at the oil change shop. We still keep in touch by Facebook chat and swap pictures so Big Brother is always watching me!