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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~ In Memoriam: Ray Coniff (1916 -2002) ~~~~
~~~~~~~~ Bandleader of The Ray Coniff Singers ~~~~~
~~~~~~~~ Composer of Lara's Theme from Dr. Zhivago ~~~~~
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In the first place we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the man's becoming in very fact an American, and nothing but an American...There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag, and this excludes the red flag, which symbolizes all wars against liberty and civilization, just as much as it excludes any foreign flag of a nation to which we are hostile . . . We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language . . . and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people.
— Theodore Roosevelt , American President, 1907
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Each month we take time to thank two of our good readers of Good Mountain Press Digest, books and reviews. Here's our two worthy Honored Readers for this month. One of their names will be in the TO: address line of your email Digest notification. Our Honored Readers for December are:
Finally resolved a problem with my scanner. The HP Scan Director was aborting due to Internet Explorer 6 Script Errors. I had been working for several weeks through emails with both Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft Tech Support, but nothing seemed to work. Finally I got a phone from Rahul in India to help me from the HP side of the problem. Spent two hours on the phone with him, and we made no progress to resolving problem, but I did get a work-around from him. There is a Scanners and Cameras program in the Control Panel of XP which will always work if any of the application software for the scanner does not. That allowed me to scan photos even though Picture Publisher no longer did during this trouble-shooting phase.
Rahul also showed me how to save the REGISTRY by an Export to Desktop and to restore it by double-clicking the Icon on desktop. Then we deleted Registry edits for all HP scanner software from USB and Enum folder. Giving Permission when necessary to allow deletion. Then we reloaded scanner CD software. While this long process of reloading scanner software was going on, he asked me about my writing and I told him about doyletics.com — he was having trouble locating site, so I told him to Google “Bobby Matherne” — that went faster. Then I explained what he could use it for. Asked if he had a food dislike. He said bananas and I explained how to proceed. Said he felt intimidated in front of certain higher-ups at work and I explained that was a stopper doyle and told him how to remove it using a speed trace. He said he had been looking for how to do that for a long time and thanked me. Told him to email me when he begins to get some results. Rahul is a great young man and will be unleashed to do great things in his life as soon as he removes those stopper doyles. Told him of a young woman who removed stopper doyles and has since gotten two promotions.
Del and Noemi went to one of our basement apartments and mopped and cleaned it out. It was one we had a week earlier moved all of the things abandoned in it by tenants who were not returning. The next day was our grandson Sam’s football game for Monteleone Junior High in Mandeville across the Lake. We went to Metairie and decided to have lunch at Houston’s. The waiting line went out to the street at 11:30, but Jan the hostess told us we could eat at the bar. John, my favorite bartender, waited on us. As we ate I keep looking at a bearded guy to the right side of the bar. From his profile he resembled my cousin Phil Bascle, and I kept waiting for him to look my way to identify him, but he didn’t. Asked John and he said he knew the guy, but couldn’t recall his name. “Is it Phil?” I asked and he said yes. I went over and talked to Phil and after he finished he came over and talked tome and Del. His T-shirt business is going strong — no hurricane damage and most of his large clients are out-of-state. His home off Claiborne Avenue had water and is being remodeled. The movie we wanted to see at Clearview Mall was on too late, so we drove across Lake Pontchartrain and got to the football game a bit early for a change. Stoney was working as clock operator while his son Sam was playing on the offensive line and calling the defensive plays. After the Star Spangled Banner was played, a woman in the row in front of me turned around and complimented me on my singing. All that practice at High Mass in St. Joseph’s each Sunday is helping. Sam's team came back in the last quarter to make it 18-8. Not bad for a first year team with kids who never been in a football uniform before. For Sam it is his eighth year playing football, having started when he was only six.
The next day I got my scanner working again. The latest email from MS gave me a fix.reg file which when loaded to my Desktop and double-clicked added four items to my Registry and fixed all the IE6 Script errors. I was able OCR (Convert a scan into text), upload Shutterfly.com files, and do a Create System Restore point in case I had the problem again. It was a delight to have my PC all working again. I was able to upload a lot of photos to Shutterfly.com that had been waiting and shared them with friends who appeared in them.
My daughter Maureen called to say she had two LSU tickets for me. It was the Homecoming Game. I left about noon and headed for Baton Rouge. Drove up Highland Road to the campus, the route I always took back in 1958-62 while I was in college there. Parked behind Parker Coliseum and walked to the Student Union where I found, to my delight, they had a PJ’s Coffeeshop there. I sipped my double latte as I read Steiner’s “Threshold of the Spiritual World” while looking out on the colorful activities on the Parade Grounds through the windows of the Student Union. The Union has a special place in my heart because I paid a large fee each semester and never got to use it while I was in attendance there — it was only a memory of the future while I was paying for it, so I never miss a chance to enjoy it in the present.
I walked out to fraternity row to look at the decorations of chicken wire sculptures covered with crepe paper. Walked as far as the Kappa Alpha house where I resided one summer when the North Stadium dormitories were closed. It was the summer of the presidential conventions for the 1960 election and I remember watching them on the tv there.On the morning after the election months later in the fall, I was once more living in North Stadium dorm, and as usual, I went to the Huey P. Long Field House (our pre-Student Union fill-in) for breakfast, mail, and on this morning some news of
how the Nixon-Kennedy election turned out. There on the news stand was a Mad Magazine with a full color cartoon of John Kennedy and a banner above him proclaiming, “Congratulations Jack! We were with you all the way!” I was speechless! How could Mad Magazine have gotten this magazine out overnight?! My puzzlement turned into chucklement as soon as I turned an issue over and saw the equivalent image and banner of Richard Nixon: “Congratulations Dick! We were with you all the way!”
The Pete Maravich Assembly Center or PMAC had been newly redecorated. Its concourse has been remodeled inside with translucent murals of giant tigers lining it. Tables were decorated in Purple and Gold inside for people to sit and eat, and many of them were occupied. I had a choice of shrimp po-boy, catfish plate, or crawfish étouffée plate. Took the crawfish and it was delicious. Almost as good as the one I made the other day. Had some mushroom soup in it which helped make it very smooth. Only $7 and the cole slaw with it had red cabbage in it and was also very tasty. And the drinks were free. Plus at 5:10 the LSU Golden Band was coming to do a free pre-game show for us inside the PMAC where I could sit in AC comfort and read a bit (once the lights came on). It was a grand time. As was watching the LSU football team beat a strong Appalachian State team handily.
On the next day we went to the first event at my club since the hurricane. Lots of folks were there and it was great to see and talk to everyone. It was the most high energy event outside of our carnival balls. Lots of talk about what people did during hurricane, house repairs, and such. In the evening, hamburgers were grilled and a new group of folks showed up for the movie night. Got to see an old friend from my TANO days, Jack Aiken, who was in town to visit his parents and whose dad is a member.
Finally got the adjustor to come out to our fouplex apartment building. Explained to him how I had the trees removed which caused the roof damage and had to hire a contractor to put the blue roof tarp to protect it from further damage.
Meanwhile we received our first roofing estimate for Timberlane of 12K and 14K depending on the type of roofing we wanted to go with. And they had a crew ready to start as soon as I gave him the okay. I told him I needed to discuss it with my wife. I also didn’t know how much State Farm was going to pay for all my damage. I went to Metairie and had lunch with my daughter Maureen who had been working so hard in her new job as Assistant Principal of East Jefferson High School that I hadn’t seen much of her. When I returned home, we found a check from State Farm which would cover the roof damage, and Del and I decided to go with the Architectural Shingles for $14K. Things were beginning to move at last.
One day Del’s garage door opener broke. We had heard something fall in the garage the night before. When we tried to open door, I noticed one of the two door support springs was hanging down. The spring had broken where it had been bent into a U-shaped connector. Apparently they heated it to do that and made it brittle, causing a weak spot.
Del was gone, and without Brian around to help me (still evacuated to Colorado while his house gets fixed), I could not raise the garage door, so I got my handy come-along and pulled the spring taut with it and raised the door. First time I did it by hand thought it would remain up by itself. It did. For about a minute, then it came tumbling down and I had to jack it up again. This time I connected the door to the hoist chain of the opener and after I had made the spring taut, it came right up.
But before I could do ANY of the above, I had to rig up a another U-shaped connector in the heavy duty spring steel. I had to jimmy open the spring with a couple of screwdrivers enough to grip it in the vise. Then hammer it into a right angle as best I could. Took a lot of maneuvering to get it just right. Dealing with heavy-duty spring steel is no easy chore.
Next problem was getting the spring connector into the anchor spot at the back of the pulley track bracket with spring’s pulley still connected. I finally relented and untied the pulley’s cable to get the spring hooked into place. Works fine now. May last longer than the other three springs in place on the two doors. This was not the end of the problems with the garage doors. The other began acting up. Finally discovered the problem was caused by a temporary overload and found out how to reset the circuit. When I called Overhead Door Co. they told me they had such a backlog of work and loss of experienced workers, they weren’t taking any new service orders. Thank God we have an in-house maintenance man who can keep things going while the rest of the world gets back up to speed.
Our neighbor was having her entire fence replaced and we needed to find a place for our Schnauzers, Steiner and Ita, to live in the meantime. Del and I placed two folding tables across the South Portico area from hot tub to fence and the dogs were content there while the fence got removed and rebuilt. Of course, once rebuilt there were large gaping holes from the bottom of the fence to be shored up to keep the dogs in the yard. They escaped about seven times before we were able to identify and close up all the holes they used or dug.
One Tuesday night we had some stormy weather that was coming our way in front of a cold wave, but we had to go to Sam’s thirteenth birthday celebration as he played football for the Monteleone Marlins. Asked Sam if he knew what team the New Orleans Saints were playing at the moment he was born. He didn’t know, so I told him, the San Francisco Forty-Niners. Sam was one of three grandchildren we had who were born on Sunday during a Saints game: Weslee during the Chicago game and Molly during the Dallas game. Sam’s team, the Marlins, won their second game of the year, 14-8. Sam’s other grandparents, Bill and Carol, were there as were Sam’s mom and dad, Stoney and Sue. I took video camera footage of most of the game.
We had left for Sam’s game in plenty time but I went thru Commerce Street to catch the light, and I commented to Del, “Look, somebody has dogs like ours.” Well, they were ours. They had dug their way under the back fence in the corner by the new fence was connected to ours. We took them home, filled in one hole we found under the fence, kept our fingers crossed, and left for the game. One time the dogs got out and Del went in the front looking for them. They had already returned while she was looking for them. As she called them, the dogs came up to the gate from inside the yard. Another time they had been gone for several hours before we were able to get out to search for them. We walked out to the car and there came Steiner followed by Ita. This type of thing went on for a week before we closed all the holes created by the new fence of our neighbor.
Went to our apartment fourplex to get natural gas turned on and Del called me to say, “Our roof is crawling with Mexicans.” I drove home to find our new roof for Timberlane being installed. I had to act as the foreman to ensure that they did what I was paying for. Got the fireplace securely caulked and flashed and the rotten piece of roof decking replaced. We ordered an upgrade for the roofing material, replacing the 20 year roof with a 30 year roof. It cost us three times what the new roof 12 years ago cost, so I’m planning to stay around to enjoy every year of it.
In preparation for Thanksgiving, I cooked about 12 shrimp-stuffed merlitons about five days early and Del and I enjoyed them with some sweet potatoes on those cold days right before the holiday. My friend Brian returned from Colorado after his long evacuation vacation there. Good to have him back.
On the offspring front, Stoney, Sue and Sam came over to pick up the desk that Del gave Stoney. We all went over to DiMartino’s for sloppy roast beef po-boys and shrimp potato salad.
Our oldest daughter, Maureen, had a medical procedure during her Thanksgiving break. When I saw her resting in bed a couple of days after the operation at home, I told her it was strange to see her fragile and resting, she is always so strong and busy. Her mom, Judy, was there and she agreed. Maureen was working a jigsaw puzzle on her bed as she rested. I brought a double latte from PJ’s for the two ladies. We talked for a long time. Judy talked about her taking care of Henry, her father, in his last years. How he always railed against the Catholic Church and refused to go to church. Then about six weeks before he died, he got so sick that Judy called a priest for Extreme Unction or Last Rites. She said, “They use another term now, but I don’t remember what it is. The priest kept correcting me.” (It’s now called officially the Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick, I found out later when I Googled it.)
When the priest began the Sacrament, she said that Henry’s body went into convulsions. He began tossing around and he had to be held down for its duration. She said it was an exorcism, and I agree that it was demons which were being exorcized from Henry’s body. He had been a bear to deal with for a year or so before that time, and after the Anointing of the Sick, he was the most pleasant person. Judy said that after the anointing she noticed a red spot, almost a blister, under his right foot on the heel, where the demons came out. Very astute.
Well, it was truly a blessing for Judy his daughter, Barbara his sister, and Anthony his son who thoroughly enjoyed talking and visiting with Henry for the six weeks after the anointing by the priest. Judy said that the priest stopped the anointing at one point when Henry started to act up, but Judy insisted that he go on. An exorcism and extreme unction all in one rite. What a wonderful story.
For Thanksgiving we watched a bit of the parades and then headed for the Palace in Elmwood to see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, the best one so far. Afterwards we came home to eat our merlitons, Chicken Gloria (recipe for this month), and decided to drive to my brother Paul’s house to visit with Greg and Monique who were in town for the day. Got photos of Greg's daughter, Andie, Paige, and Grace and one of Monique asleep with her daughter Taylor in a chair. On the way we saw billboards with new signs on them by Lamar, the billboard company. Simple messages to fill the boards which had their advertising displays torn away by Katrina. Twice we saw this one: “Call Your Parents” and I told Del, you call your mom and I’ll call my dad. That’s a sign!”
On Friday Del worked preparing her mom’s new apartment at Woldenberg Village and I had lunch with Brian. Hard to find a restaurant open on the day after Thanksgiving, but we did. Then I drove home to watch Texas lose to A&M and LSU beat Arkansas. Well, one out of two ain’t bad.
We spent another day at the fourplex, this time removing all the stuff from 1211 and getting an estimate to repair the ceilings, walls, and windows damaged by Katrina. The roof has been replaced, and the yard has now been cleaned out. An exhausting day of work for me and Del who were on our feet all day. She filling bags, I replacing door locks, taking apart beds, and both of us generally directing the cleanup effort.
On Sunday we spent a restful day and Monday we were back in the trenches, this time the final preparations for Del’s mom, Doris, to arrive back in New Orleans. Interestingly, even though she will be same distance of two miles from Timberlane in her new apartment in Woldenberg Village on Behrman Highway near Gen DeGaulle, she will no longer live in Gretna, but in New Orleans.
Monday afternoon Del called me to say the new TV, a 42" Panasonic Plasma Screen, had just come in. I went there and they had left no F-cable to connect up to cable outlet. She couldn’t get Cox on the phone to do anything, so I drove home, picked up several F-cables and went back. I got the TV setup to work with the DVD and VCR at the hardest. It’s one of the best designs of a remote and TV combination I’ve ever seen, but so different, it takes a lot of learning. Just put in a code for the DVD and VCR and the remote works on them just fine. Took a long time to figure out the setup arrangement of the TV and the remote, but after that it was simple and easy-to-use. Biggest problem was to figure out how to actually make the DVD take over the screen. All hidden in a TV/Video button. With the F-cables I was able to get all the COX channels working. Even some high numbered sound channels like 115-1 to -50. 115-46 was nice music so I set it up as a Favorite. That was the hardest part: figuring out how to set up Favorites with little help from the sketchy instruction manual.
We left about 6 PM to drive to Signature Flight Services on Aberdeen (an extension of Loyola Drive in Kenner which ends at the northern edge of Moisant field). We waited in a nicely appointed lobby for the plane which arrived as scheduled after a six-hour delay to allow the bad weather to abate over Charlotte, NC. Loaded up Doris, potty chair, walker chair, and two suitcases in Caddy and we drove to Woldenberg Village and got her ready for bed, then came home to a well-deserved good night’s sleep.
The next morning Granma Claus, as I call Del at this time of year, was up at 2 AM wrapping presents until she ran out of wrapping paper. She came to bed about 5 AM when I got up and began working assiduously to complete my second Steiner review for this month, “Secrets of the Threshold.” It is November 29, 2005 about 3 PM and some Eggplant Supreme is baking in the oven for Del and my supper as I type these words to complete the Personal Notes for this month.
Tonight my LSU Tigers are playing basketball and I hope they rise to another win and keep their new spot in the Top 25 or move higher. I’ll watch them on TV at 7 and tune into the New Orleans Hornets game about an hour and a half later. And people ask my why I have so many TVs in our screening room. How else would I ever watch a good movie while keeping track of two basketball games at the same time?
One brief note about Doris's new accommodations at Woldenberg Village. She tried to warm up her coffee in the microwave oven in her kitchen and it didn't seem to work. Del came over and tried to do it, and it didn't heat up the coffee for her either. She called Maintenance and reported it. "We'll be right there," the maintenance man said over the phone. Four minutes later, a knock on the door. He tried to heat the coffee and it wouldn't heat for him either. "I'll be right back," he said and left. Four minutes later, he was back with a new microwave, switched it in place of the old one, and the coffee heated just fine! How long does it take to fix a broken microwave where you live? Next Digest I'll have some photos of Doris in her new place.
Till next month, keep the home fires burning and have a wonderful Christmas and New Years’ celebration.
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Hits (Watch as soon as you can. A Don't Miss Hit is one you might otherwise ignore.):
“Dreamer” (2005) with Kirk Russell and Dakota Fanning as a father who lost his dreams and a daughter who found hers in a horse named Soñador or Dreamer. The crippled horse saved from destruction after a broken bone who rises to become a champion — a story which never grows jaded shines in a new light in this feel-good movie. [Note: this was our first-first run movie in a movie theater since Katrina.] “Fever Pitch” (2005) A marvelous portrayal of Red Sox fever and how the bug affects its victims (or lucky carriers). Drew Barrymore begins dating such a fan in the late fall and by the time Spring Training arrives, the relationship must be renegotiated. Can love survive the Bambino’s curse? A Don’t Miss Hit!
“50 First Dates” (2004) Watched this again, and just like Lucy in the movie, everything seemed as fresh and new as if we’d never seen it. Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore are at their career best. Ula the Hawaiian Kahuna is a hoot! Story is a mixture of Groundhog Day, Clean Slate, Goodbye, Lenin, and Memento but surpasses all of them in sheer exuberance and joy. A Don’t Miss Hit! “Shattered Glass” (2003) was worth a second look to see if we could put all the pieces together now that we had seen the entire movie of Steven Glass’s fairy tale life as writer for The New Republic. What we saw was a good writer making up stories and masquerading them as facts. At one point, another editor told her boss, “This couldn’t have happened if we had photos. You can’t fake a photo.” The New Republic magazine has a long history of never using photos inside its covers. A Don't Miss Hit! “In America” (2002) A young Irish couple with two little girls move to New York to further his acting career. She is pregnant and the memory of their dead son hangs like a millstone around them. They move into a drug culture tenement and the girls first Halloween Trick or Treat is amazing. (See First Viewing.) A Don’t Miss Hit!
Misses (Avoid At All Costs): We attempted to watch these this month, but didn't make it all the way through on most of them. Awhile back when three AAAC horrors hit us in one night, I decided to add a sub-category to "Avoid at All Costs", namely, A DVD STOMPER. These are movies so bad, you don't want anyone else to get stuck watching them, so you want to stomp on the disks. That way, if everyone else who gets burnt by the movie does the same, soon no copies of the awful movie will be extant and the world will be better off.
“Hide and Seek” (2005) Hide this one and forget to Seek it. If you do seek it, you’ll find De Niro and Charlie waiting for you while Dakota Fanning watches. A DVD Stomper. “Distant” (2002) is how far you should stay from this film. Starts nowhere, goes nowhere, ends nowhere. How does one say DVD Stomper in Turkish? “Me and You and Everyone We Know” (2005) should skip this one. A shoe salesman is stalked by a performance artist. A six-year-old boy by a 50-something female. If the phone rings and someone says, “Macaroni” — hang up immediately.
Your call on these — your taste in movies may differ, but I liked them:
“Satin Rouge” (2002) A lonely widow’s life is drab and dragging until she takes up belly dancing.
“Schultze Gets the Blues” (2005) A miner in East Germany, Schultze is given early retirement and gets the blues. He finds his accordion will not play his usual polkas after listening to a Louisiana station on his short wave radio, but instead seques into zydeco. He ends his life boating across the Louisiana bayous and living in the music he had heard over the radio back home. “Melinda and Melinda” (2004) Woody Allen at his best. A woman names Melinda interrupts a dinner party and comes to live with the hosts. Comedy or tragedy? Unsatisfied with either approach, Woody gives us both stories. “3-Iron” (2004) — the two main characters scarcely talk at all. The young man drives a fancy BMW motorcycle but instead of working, he lives in vacationing people’s apartments without their knowledge or consent. He washes their dirty clothes, waters their plants, and cleans up after himself. In one apartment a cowering, battered woman watches him unseen and when the husband comes home, our hero is blasted with golf balls from a 3-iron. The eponymous 3-iron makes its appearance throughout the rest of the movie which seems to go nowhere, but magnetically draws us along with it to the end.
Preparation
Prepare chicken by sprinkling it with Season-All and then boiling till the meat falls off bones (about 1 hour) in water with a peeled whole yellow onion and, then cooling for an hour, removing chicken from the bones, discard bones, and cut chicken meat into inch-size pieces and put aside.
Mix chicken stock, soup and sour cream into a frying pan and stir and heat until it bubbles, then mix in the chicken pieces. Add additional stock if mixture needs it.
Pour the contents of the pan into the Pyrex dish covering the crackers.
In olden days, the floors of homes were dirt and to keep the floor clean and warm, the material remaining after various grains were threshed were placed on the floor of the home. This worked well, but soon it was noticed that the threshing material kept falling out into the street whenever the door was opened, so homeowners placed a strip of wood to keep the threshing material from spilling out of the home. This strip marked the boundary between the inside and the outside of the home and it came to be called in English simply the “threshold” since its job was to hold the threshing material inside the home.
In this book by Rudolf Steiner as our guide we walk back and forth with him over the threshold between our home in the physical world and the various supersensible worlds of the elemental, spiritual, and super-spiritual worlds. He introduces us to our Soul Captain, the Guardian of the Threshold, which each of us greets each night as we drop into unconsciousness as we sleep. He explains what are the conditions we will find in the elemental world of transformations, in the spiritual world with independent beings on an island with us, and in the super-spiritual worlds with living thought-beings. He introduces us to two worthy companions in our Earth sphere of physicality known as Lucifer and Ahriman and warns us of the consequences of paying too much attention to either one of them, but rather how we should maintain a balance of their forces in our lives.
What next? Read the Review? Read the Book? The choice is up to you.
Through Steiner even we who are not clairvoyant can come to understand that it is only through observation of the spiritual world that the obscure meanings in the clear truths of our philosophy and science can be understood rightly, that the “being of man, the real, true nature of man, lies in hidden worlds.” Worlds hidden to the sensory data we receive from the physical world. One cannot even enter the first level of spiritual worlds, the elementary world, unless one has prepared oneself for what to expect there. If one is not clairvoyant, one can prepare onself for that by studying spiritual science. How is the elementary world different from the sensory world in which I live as I type these words and you, dear Reader, live as you read them? You know that in the sensory world that you can observe other beings as distinct from yourself. You may change a little when you talk to your mother from when you talk to a colleague in a bar, but you are still yourself, no matter whom you are conversing or otherwise interacting with. This changes dramatically in the elementary world where you become the other person. We learn in this sensory world by observing others; we learn in the elementary world by transforming into others.
In the elementary world, we are constantly transforming ourselves into other beings we meet — it is our natural way of interacting with them. But we lose in the elementary world the natural ability which our physical body that allows us to feel our self as an Ego or “I”. But in the elementary world we get no assist from our physical body and we must exert our own will to have a feeling of self.
These two excerpts from the review will give you a flavor of its subject. This is a companion book to The Threshold of the Spiritual World reviewed above. These lectures were apparently given about the same time as the above book was being written. Thus, it is best to read these two books in quick succession, either one first.
I hear often from my Good Readers that they have bought books after reading my book reviews.
Keep reading, folks! As I like to remind you, to obtain more information on what's in these
books, buy and read the books — for less information, read the reviews.
In this section I like to comment on events in the world, in my life, and in my readings which have come up during the month. These are things I might have shared with you in person, if we had had the opportunity to coverse during the month. If we did, then you may recognize my words. If I say some things here which upset you, rest assured that you may skip over these for the very reason that I would likely have not brought up the subject to spoil our time together in person.
1. MAN-MADE DISASTER: Padre Filius Reads the New Orleans Times-Picayune this Month
Padre Filius, the cartoon character created by your intrepid editor and would-be cartoonist, will appear from time to time in this Section of the Digest to share us on some amusing or enlightening aspect of the world he observes during his peregrinations.
This month the good Padre reads a Headline about the Man-made Disaster created by inept and uncoordinated Levee Boards who never inspected levees and ignored reports of signs of water seeping under the levee a full year before the levee breached during Hurricane Katrina destroying thousands of homes.
2. Sex is the Word
After listening to a BeeGees CD last night it occurred to me that the song “Grease” could have all instances of the word “grease” replaced by “sex” and it would mean exactly the same thing, a little more explicitly. It is the word, the thought, the feeling that is on every teenager's mind.
We take the pressure and we throw away
Conventionality belongs to yesterday
There is a chance that we can make it so far
We start believing now that we can be who we are
Sex is the word
Sex is the word
It's got groove, it's got meaning
Sex is the time, is the place, is the motion
Sex is the way we are feeling
3. Complainers Abound
I met this guy who was complaining that his insurance check was too low — under a hundred dollars. Then I met another guy who thought he wouldn't have enough damage to meet his deductible and ending up exceeding the limit on his policy! The first guy should talk to the second guy who'll be spending years getting his place back into liveable condition. If there's anybody in the New Orleans area with nothing to complain about, which I doubt, all I can say is: "Don't complain to me."
4. Carnival as a Soul-Need
A letter writer to the Times-Picayune recently decried the plans underway for a scaled-down Carnival season in New Orleans, calling it "childish and irresponsible," pleading that we show compassion for those who have lost so much and use "our available resources to address those needs," and indicating that this would "signal that we care enough to forgo traditional festivities until we have attended to the fundamental needs of our city."
I think it is commendable to show compassion for those who have lost so much and I am glad to hear of concern, but the letter betrays a presupposition which I feel must be exposed. It is that Carnival time is merely a festivity which does not address a fundamental need of the citizens of the metropolitan New Orleans area.
Are food, shelter, and clothing the only fundamental needs? It would be a dull place to live if that were so. There are also soul needs which are fundamental, and Carnival itself is such a soul need. It is a time that activates, enlivens, and freshens the fantasy life of the soul. Average New Orleanians don't think about that aspect of Carnival much, but their very support of the Carnival season, even in times of disaster recovery, shows the intense, deeply-felt need it fills in their soul life.
It grieves me to think that the letter writer lives in the City that Care Forgot and imagines that it is the City Which Forgot to Care just because it devotes a portion of its time, money, and energy to fructifying the fundamental soul-life of the city.
How does one know if a city is not attending to its truly fundamental needs? It becomes a place that people do not want to live in or visit. No one can claim that to be the case for the New Orleans area.
5.Comments from Readers:
[RJM: Eddie Coryell's email address is no longer working and when removing him from the Digest List, I found this email. This email was sent to Edward Reaugh Smith and copied to me a couple of years ago. If anyone knows Eddie's new email address, please forward to me and I will re-add him to the List.]
Dear Edward,
How are you? Good I hope, and as amazing a man as ever.
I wanted to share this with you. I have felt recently that I was getting too
involved with outer life and its demanding routines (and not feeling very
"spiritual"). Then the thought came to me that Steiner's birthday was only a
day away — easy to remember 'cause I'm also a "27" (of June). At that, I
logged on to your website site and discovered that wonderful list by year of
all that Steiner had contributed through his many books and lectures, and
re-read some of your writings. Then, on Rudolf's birthday, I discovered
Bobby Matherne's website. It was like finding you a second time, and he's
even reviewed your books! I am absorbing as fast as I can. I feel like I've
found another brother of anthroposophy at a time when I was feeling a bit
separated. I feel blessed and rejuvenated. I like your bold statement that a
thousand years from now Steiner will be viewed by people as we now view
Abraham. Just as you, because of prior life experience and knowledge gained,
Bobby has a unique "feeling" and interpretation for anthroposophical
concepts.
I thank God for both of you and our bond — that we have been blessed to
have discovered anthroposophy.
Sincerely,
Eddie Coryell, Glendale
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Received this entery in my Guestbook: I am seeking a Bradford Riley who was an actor in new York in the 1970s. I am a playwright/actor who appeared in plays with him. For my memoirs, I am seeking information from people I worked with. You mention a "Bradford Riley" on your page, and print a photo which looks very much like the person I am seeking. If it is indeed he, can you tell him Robert Patrick would like to speak/e-mail with him?
I called Bradford Riley, at Romeo's Italian Restaurant. “Your voice is better than spaghetti,” Bradford said when I told him that Robert Patrick was looking for him. The two old colleagues soon got together over the phone.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From Jeff March of EditPros News
Hi, Bobby...
Yes, avoidance of gender-specific references or clumsy "he or she"
constructions sometimes results in a bit of grammatical rule-breaking.
Whenever possible, I try to use plural subjects to enable proper use of
the adjective "their." Your sentence "Scientists should mind their P's
and Q's" is a good example of that approach. (By the way, I do agree
with your use of the apostrophes in that sentence for clarification.)
In your example in which "person" is the subject, a plural subject
would work there, too--not necessarily "people," because that can refer
to a culture or civilization rather than simply to more than one
person. I think "person" is perfectly acceptable as a combining word
with "spokes-" and "chair-," but I likely would try to find a
substitute subject by defining the type of person in question--for
example, "taxpayers should mind their P's and Q's" or "union
members..." or "single parents...".
While we have touched on gender neutrality in prior editions of
our newsletter, revising that topic more comprehensively would be
worthwhile. I'll make a note of that. Thanks for the suggestion, Bobby.
Take care...
— Jeff
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From Betty Chowning, Louisville, KY:
Bobby
What a delight and refreshing communication. The combination of your news is terrific and I enjoy it so much. Hope you
and Del are doing great and enjoy being back home, Betty
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From Debbie Barford, Chicago, IL:
Hi, Bobby,
Hurricane time must be very, very frustrating - I think you all will be in hurricane time
for a long time to come! Don't even worry about that book - just finish it if you really
want to. I only mentioned it because I thought you might be interested in the
description of his internal experience. Very sweet of you to contact me.
I have been reading your updates, and must say, you have had SOME adventure this
year! May you have a real slow year in 2006!
Blessings,
Debbie Barford
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My reviews are not intended to replace the purchasing and reading of the reviewed books, but rather to supplant a previous reading or to spur a new reading of your own copy. What I endeavor to do in most of my reviews is to impart a sufficient amount of information to get the reader comfortable
with the book so that they will want to read it for themselves. My Rudolf Steiner reviews are more detailed and my intention is bring his work to a new century of readers by converting his amazing insights into modern language and concepts.
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Finally resolved a problem with my scanner. The HP Scan Director was aborting due to Internet Explorer 6 Script Errors. I had been working for several weeks through emails with both Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft Tech Support, but nothing seemed to work. Finally I got a phone from Rahul in India to help me from the HP side of the problem. Spent two hours on the phone with him, and we made no progress to resolving problem, but I did get a work-around from him. There is a Scanners and Cameras program in the Control Panel of XP which will always work if any of the application software for the scanner does not. That allowed me to scan photos even though Picture Publisher no longer did during this trouble-shooting phase.
He said bananas and I explained how to proceed. Said he felt intimidated in front of certain higher-ups at work and I explained that was a stopper doyle and told him how to remove it using a speed trace. He said he had been looking for how to do that for a long time and thanked me. Told him to email me when he begins to get some results. Rahul is a great young man and will be unleashed to do great things in his life as soon as he removes those stopper doyles. Told him of a young woman who removed stopper doyles and has since gotten two promotions.
The movie we wanted to see at Clearview Mall was on too late, so we drove across Lake Pontchartrain and got to the football game a bit early for a change. Stoney was working as clock operator while his son Sam was playing on the offensive line and calling the defensive plays. After the Star Spangled Banner was played, a woman in the row in front of me turned around and complimented me on my singing. All that practice at High Mass in St. Joseph’s each Sunday is helping. Sam's team came back in the last quarter to make it 18-8. Not bad for a first year team with kids who never been in a football uniform before. For Sam it is his eighth year playing football, having started when he was only six.
My daughter Maureen called to say she had two LSU tickets for me. It was the Homecoming Game. I left about noon and headed for Baton Rouge. Drove up Highland Road to the campus, the route I always took back in 1958-62 while I was in college there. Parked behind Parker Coliseum and walked to the Student Union where I found, to my delight, they had a PJ’s Coffeeshop there. I sipped my double latte as I read Steiner’s “Threshold of the Spiritual World” while looking out on the colorful activities on the Parade Grounds through the windows of the Student Union. The Union has a special place in my heart because I paid a large fee each semester and never got to use it while I was in attendance there — it was only a memory of the future while I was paying for it, so I never miss a chance to enjoy it in the present.
Del was gone, and without Brian around to help me (still evacuated to Colorado while his house gets fixed), I could not raise the garage door, so I got my handy come-along and pulled the spring taut with it and raised the door. First time I did it by hand thought it would remain up by itself. It did. For about a minute, then it came tumbling down and I had to jack it up again. This time I connected the door to the hoist chain of the opener and after I had made the spring taut, it came right up.
Our neighbor was having her entire fence replaced and we needed to find a place for our Schnauzers, Steiner and Ita, to live in the meantime. Del and I placed two folding tables across the South Portico area from hot tub to fence and the dogs were content there while the fence got removed and rebuilt. Of course, once rebuilt there were large gaping holes from the bottom of the fence to be shored up to keep the dogs in the yard. They escaped about seven times before we were able to identify and close up all the holes they used or dug.
We had left for Sam’s game in plenty time but I went thru Commerce Street to catch the light, and I commented to Del, “Look, somebody has dogs like ours.” Well, they were ours. They had dug their way under the back fence in the corner by the new fence was connected to ours. We took them home, filled in one hole we found under the fence, kept our fingers crossed, and left for the game. One time the dogs got out and Del went in the front looking for them. They had already returned while she was looking for them. As she called them, the dogs came up to the gate from inside the yard. Another time they had been gone for several hours before we were able to get out to search for them. We walked out to the car and there came Steiner followed by Ita. This type of thing went on for a week before we closed all the holes created by the new fence of our neighbor.
Our oldest daughter, Maureen, had a medical procedure during her Thanksgiving break. When I saw her resting in bed a couple of days after the operation at home, I told her it was strange to see her fragile and resting, she is always so strong and busy. Her mom, Judy, was there and she agreed. Maureen was working a jigsaw puzzle on her bed as she rested. I brought a double latte from PJ’s for the two ladies. We talked for a long time. Judy talked about her taking care of Henry, her father, in his last years. How he always railed against the Catholic Church and refused to go to church. Then about six weeks before he died, he got so sick that Judy called a priest for Extreme Unction or Last Rites. She said, “They use another term now, but I don’t remember what it is. The priest kept correcting me.” (It’s now called officially the Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick, I found out later when I Googled it.)
Well, it was truly a blessing for Judy his daughter, Barbara his sister, and Anthony his son who thoroughly enjoyed talking and visiting with Henry for the six weeks after the anointing by the priest. Judy said that the priest stopped the anointing at one point when Henry started to act up, but Judy insisted that he go on. An exorcism and extreme unction all in one rite. What a wonderful story.
We spent another day at the fourplex, this time removing all the stuff from 1211 and getting an estimate to repair the ceilings, walls, and windows damaged by Katrina. The roof has been replaced, and the yard has now been cleaned out. An exhausting day of work for me and Del who were on our feet all day. She filling bags, I replacing door locks, taking apart beds, and both of us generally directing the cleanup effort.
We left about 6 PM to drive to Signature Flight Services on Aberdeen (an extension of Loyola Drive in Kenner which ends at the northern edge of Moisant field). We waited in a nicely appointed lobby for the plane which arrived as scheduled after a six-hour delay to allow the bad weather to abate over Charlotte, NC. Loaded up Doris, potty chair, walker chair, and two suitcases in Caddy and we drove to Woldenberg Village and got her ready for bed, then came home to a well-deserved good night’s sleep.
“Dreamer” (2005) with Kirk Russell and Dakota Fanning as a father who lost his dreams and a daughter who found hers in a horse named Soñador or Dreamer. The crippled horse saved from destruction after a broken bone who rises to become a champion — a story which never grows jaded shines in a new light in this feel-good movie. [Note: this was our first-first run movie in a movie theater since Katrina.]
What we saw was a good writer making up stories and masquerading them as facts. At one point, another editor told her boss, “This couldn’t have happened if we had photos. You can’t fake a photo.” The New Republic magazine has a long history of never using photos inside its covers. A Don't Miss Hit! 
“Melinda and Melinda” (2004) Woody Allen at his best. A woman names Melinda interrupts a dinner party and comes to live with the hosts. Comedy or tragedy? Unsatisfied with either approach, Woody gives us both stories.
2.) ARJ2: 
I met this guy who was complaining that his insurance check was too low — under a hundred dollars. Then I met another guy who thought he wouldn't have enough damage to meet his deductible and ending up exceeding the limit on his policy! The first guy should talk to the second guy who'll be spending years getting his place back into liveable condition. If there's anybody in the New Orleans area with nothing to complain about, which I doubt, all I can say is: "Don't complain to me."
our newsletter, revising that topic more comprehensively would be
worthwhile. I'll make a note of that. Thanks for the suggestion, Bobby.
