Pig’s Going On Sabbatical

I was checking over the terms of my contract last night and I noticed that, after writing the blog for three years, I am now eligible for an all-expense paid trip to Kerguelen Island.  I think we’ll go.  Of course it does get a little cold down there but – hey – it gets a little cold up here.

Besides, Patrushka wants to go somewhere where she can wear her furs.  Don’t worry, they’re all heritage furs.  The original ermines were accidentally shot by Prince Kropotkin one morning in 1911 while he was out as usual  trying to trying to assassinate the Czar.  The Czar, riding by in his sleigh,  noticed the little guys lying in the snow and brought them home for his little daughter to play with.  My Princess Patrushka inherited them along with all the other truck – the Faberge eggs and stuff she leaves lying around the house right where I’ll stumble over them when I go out for a glass of chocolate milk.

So, where was I?  Oh yes, my sabbatical.  I want to focus more on my novel-in-progress, The Syndicate of Eternal Friendship, which had been proceeding at a snail’s pace lately.  Plus I want to organize my autobiographical pieces on the blog and see if they might hold together as a book.

So we’re heading for dear old Kerguelen.  The French Navy says they’ll have a launch waiting for us on Reunion Island, so we just have to figure out how to get there.  It’s going to be great.  No more distractions.  Just Kerguelen cabbages as far as the eye can see.  And the rabbits of course.  And the scientists dropping by every five minutes for coffee with the Princess.

Oh well, you just can’t find perfect solitude any more.  When it gets too noisy in our Quonset hut I’ll just go  for a walk and watch the albatrosses carousing up in the grey sky.

Pig Froths At Mouth Over Obama’s Cabinet, Asks “Did I Get Fooled Again?”

Look, I try to stay away from politics, government, the financial bailout or lack thereof, the various wars and Kill For Peace.  I figure the net is awash with unsought opinion on these matters and I’ll do more good by spreading a bit of the old existential gloom.  With a few laughs along the way, of course.

Howsomever, I just have to rant for one minute.  I am so disappointed with Obama’s choices so far for his cabinet.  Is this what he means by change?  To bring in or leave in place all the same hacks that got us into trouble in the first place?  In the entire land of America, in the all the universities and junior colleges and plumbing firms, is there just one small club of rich people who could possibly advise Obama on how to run America?  Is this what he considers change?

Let’s see.  Robert Gates, our new Secretary of Defense.  Well, gosh, look what I just noticed.  He already IS Secretary of Defense!  How likely is this guy to suggest we stop the war and bring home the troops and the ten billion dollars a month that we’re spending to keep them pacifying the wedding parties of Afghaistan? And, this ten billion dollars a month is coming from the canny Chinese and Japanese who keep buying our bonds.  Because even if the interest rate is getting down to zero per cent – at least they’re still safer than their own bonds.  Too bad all the poor retired suckers depending on the income from their 401k’s stocks didn’t notice in time.

How about Tim Gaither, Obama’s choice for Secretary of Treasury?  In an amazing shuffle of the cards, Tim will be shuffled over from his job as president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, where he had lunch and went to the cigar bars with all the Wall Street fat cats.  I’ll bet you much these guys like him fine.  But I don’t like them because they are out to get me and you.  And they’ll do it too.

Let’s see – US Treasury Bond rate: 0%.  Citibank Visa Card Rate: 28.9%.  Do we see a pattern here?

How many phone calls from guys with diamond-studded private jets did Obama field before he shuffled Tim?

Obama’s choice for top White House Economic Adviser?  It’s the Secret Agent of change, man of the people Larry Summers.  Hey, Larry Summers?  Isn’t he disco queen Donna Summers older brother?  No, but he’d probably have some fresh ideas.  No, this Larry Summers was Secretary of the Treasury for Bill Clinton.

What is this?  Some kind of expletive little fraternity and Barack passed the initiation rites?

Do I need to go on? What happened to Obama, the guy I voted for?   Did I get fooled again?

My capability for hopelessness, cynicism and despair is well practiced.  I grew up in this country.  I have watched every president from Harry Truman on vote for more greed, more power, more empire.

In these appointments, and I have only mentioned three – do you see one slight hint of meaningful change in this country?  Because I don’t.

This has been the shortest honeymoon in history.

Now back to our regular programming.

Sixties Survivors #7: Twiggy

I’ll bet you never expected to see Vogue Magazine featured on The Pondering Pig, let alone a Vogue Magazine with Twiggy on its cover in her thermal underwear.

The year is 1966, and it’s cold out there on the magazine stands of Paris and Montreal. She needs her thermals!

Lesley Hornby, AKA Twiggy, is turning 59 on September 19, and it’s as good a time as any to welcome her to the Pondering Pig Sixties Survivors Club.  She’ll be only 59, but she got an early start.  She was probably 16 when this cover shot was taken.

I think her birthday is a moment to ponder the predominance of all things British in the sixties. The Beatles, the Stones, and their British Invasion ilk dominated the charts for years.  British artist David Hockney was, after Warhol, the most successful fine artist of the era.  Sean Connory, as James Bond, ruled the box office world wide.  British actors in general ruled the Academy Awards.  Here are two mid-sixties years as an example, winners in upper case:

British 1964 Academy Award Acting Winners and Nominees:  REX HARRISON in “My Fair Lady”, Richard Burton and Peter O’Toole in “Becket”, Peter Sellers in Dr. Strangelove, JULIE ANDREWS in “Mary Poppins”, PETER USTINOV in “Topkapi”, John Gielgud in “Becket”, Stanley Holloway and Gladys Cooper in “My Fair Lady”, Edith Evans in “The Chalk Garden”

British 1965 Winners and Nominees: Richard Burton in “The Spy Who Came In From the Cold”, Laurence Olivier in “Othello”, JULIE CHRISTIE in “Darling”, Julie Andrews in “The Sound of Music”, Tom Courtenay in “Doctor Zhivago”, Frank Finlay, Joyce Redman and Maggie Smith in “Othello.”

Let’s see, what else?  Well, both Pop Art and Op Art invented were invented in England.  Here is the the first Pop Art collage, created by Britisher Richard Hamilton in 1956:

I already mentioned fashion.  I remember how even San Francisco hippies of the era sought out stores that featured mod styles.  For example,  a men’s clothing store on Polk Street called The Town Squire sold leather jock straps and other odd fashion items to San Francisco’s closeted gay population – now, suddenly hippies overran the place.  We all wanted to look like Mick Jagger or Brian Jones and that was the only place in town where you could find the clothes that fit the look.  There was a cheap shoe store on Market Street called Flagg Brothers.  It sold a line of Chelsea boots, known in the States as Beatle boots, for $12 to $15.  Maybe they didn’t last so long, but they looked Carnaby Street, and they sold out regularly – all walking to the Haight-Ashbury district.

Twiggy, The ‘Face of 1966′, was at sixteen the world’s most famous supermodel, and she was wearing chic clothes by Mary Quant.  We were wearing chic boots by Flagg Brothers.  I didn’t know any guys who sported a Beatles cap but our local dolly birds looked mighty cute in them.  And then, with the arrival of The Who, even the Union Jack became a fashion item.

I don’t have time tonight to think about what it all means.  I have to pack for a trip to Southern California.  I’ll be gone all weekend and back in the Pigsty Monday.  But I’m sure there is much to learn.  I, for one, never quite got over my love affair with the country that produced the Beatles, Twiggy, and other lesser beings – such as Charles Dickens and Shakespeare.  I remain an Anglophile at heart.   Could someone please think long and deeply and report in?

Meanwhile, a nice polite wink and nod to Leslie Hornby on her 59th.

What The Fashionable Man Is Wearing

Here’s my Dad and Uncle Pres hoofing it down the Midway of the San Francisco’s Golden Gate Exposition on Labor Day, 1940.  Wives and kids are presumably somewhere nearby out of camera range.  Maybe Dad and Uncle Pres dropped them off at the Aquacade while they stepped out for a quick one at Shanghai Lil’s.

It’s Labor Day.  A holiday.  Nobody’s going to work later, yet, as you’ve probably noticed, they’re both dressed to the hilt in business suits with vests and floppy pants, dress shirts, ties and, in Dad’s case, a jaunty fedora.  Their overcoats are draped over their arms in case the fog comes in.  They’re in their comfort zone, a newspaper guy and a building contractor.  It’s just how guys dress.

Okay, now here’s two normal American guys of today.  They’re roughly the same age as Dad and Uncle Pres in the first picture (early thirties). And, like Dad and Uncle Pres, they’re out for a summer holiday, if in a slightly warmer climate.

These guys would probably rather be shot than make a fashion choice, but they’ve made some nevertheless.  For one thing, they’re both branded.  Their tee shits tell us they’re Aeropostale kind of guys. The man on the right is also a Sony kind of guy.  If we could read his hat we’d learn something else about him.

I have no intention of making pig jokes about them – they look pretty much like the rest of American hetero guys in their thirties today – on a summer Saturday when they’re not going to work later.

My question is simply…is this all there is? Couldn’t we guys get together and figure out how to look a little more interesting without going all the way back to 1940?  Or having to send stuff to the cleaners? Besides, I hate floppy trousers as much as you do, but jeans and tee shirts just don’t feel that cool any more.

I Remember Love

Did you ever look at an old rock poster and wonder who the acts advertised actually were?  Like this one for instance…

Some ugly looking poster, huh?  Actually it’s a handbill, but that’s no excuse.

Love.  Rock scholars and sixties people will recognize the name right away. They were from LA, came up to San Francisco from time to time to try to break into our In Crowd,  and finally went on to rock and roll glory with their 1967 album, Forever Changes. It’s a great album. In fact, it’s the best of all the American takes on Sergeant Pepper, and possibly the only successful take ever (The Rolling Stones’ shot at it, Their Satanic Majesty’s Request was grim- their biggest mistake of the sixties).  But Forever Changes is pretty damn good.  I listened to it regularly until my turntable gave up and I gave all my LPs away – oh whadda fool!

Even their early single, My Little Red Book, deserves a three-decker rock and roll cake.  It blasted pure rock and roll fervor at a time when the music was getting just a little too flabby for my taste.   I downloaded the song from Itunes just now to check and, yes, it’s still drives like a 1966 Batmobile.   But in 1966 to my piggy ears they were just another okay band from LA.  Let them entertain us if they choose, but never shall they be invited into our superior society, he sniffed with snout held high.

At the time of this concert, Love’s first album was in the stores.  It was regularly seen in Haight-Ashbury collections because, unlike the  the Jefferson Airplane’s boring first album was and the Grateful Dead’s first outing – which, not to put too fine a point on it, stunk, Love’s first wasn’t half bad.

But who in heck was Everpresent Fullness?  Therein lies a story…

Next: The Pig’s Sad Story

Fiddling While America Burns

My plan here at The Pondering Pig is to resolutely continue to fiddle while Rome burns, even though it didn’t work out that well for old Nero.  I’m trying  to hold the hopelessness feeling at bay one more day.

You know the feeling?  It whispers at you like this: “It’s too late for democracy, too late.  The will of the people has been corrupted, they can’t see beyond the end of their nose any more.  The super-rich with pockets deep as mineshafts influence (buy) our representatives to do their corporate bidding.  Our economy is dependent on waging war,  Dwight D. Eisenhower’s nightmare about the rise of the military-industrial complex came true.  Our educated class never studied the Constitution and can’t defend the Bill of Rights because they don’t know what it says.  Our telecommunication industry slathers for profits that will come from spying on citizens for the US government.   Our well-spoken Democrat golden boy candidate – the one so many put their last hope into – voted to exonerate the telcom execs who violated the Bill of Rights by spying on citizens without a warrant.  And on and on.  I could do this for days once I get going.  I haven’t even started on our besieged planet.  It’s that hopeless feeling!

Where’s Abe Lincoln?  Could someone tell him to come up front?  He’s wanted onstage.  Or better yet, where’s Jeff Smith, the idealistic boy scout leader who took truth, justice and the American Way so seriously that he managed to bring down a state’s corrupt political machine through the force of his belief.  (If you’ve never seen Frank Capra’s Mr. Smith Goes To Washington,  or if you saw it a long time ago – it speaks to the moment, believe me.  Worth a fresh look.)

Here is one of Jeff’s key speeches , which, courtesy of IMDB, I quote in its entirety:

Jefferson Smith: [His voice very hoarse] Just get up off the ground, that’s all I ask. Get up there with that lady that’s up on top of this Capitol dome, that lady that stands for liberty. Take a look at this country through her eyes if you really want to see something. And you won’t just see scenery; you’ll see the whole parade of what Man’s carved out for himself, after centuries of fighting. Fighting for something better than just jungle law, fighting so’s he can stand on his own two feet, free and decent, like he was created, no matter what his race, color, or creed. That’s what you’d see. There’s no place out there for graft, or greed, or lies, or compromise with human liberties. And, uh, if that’s what the grownups have done with this world that was given to them, then we’d better get those boys’ camps started fast and see what the kids can do. And it’s not too late, because this country is bigger than the Taylors, or you, or me, or anything else. Great principles don’t get lost once they come to light. They’re right here; you just have to see them again!

Go look for them yourself, and let me know what you find.  Meanwhile, tomorrow we’ll be back with more on Mick and His Mates or somethng equally inane.

So Whaddaya Think? A Legal Question

Here’s a legal question for you.  Say you buy an old house once owned by a famous artist.  While remodeling you discover an original painting behind a rack in the wine cellar.  It is signed and dated by the artist and is unknown to the art world.  It’s clearly worth a lot of money and you are thrilled to be the new owner.  But then the grandchildren of the artist learn about it and sue you.  They say they inherited all the artist’s unsold paintings and even though this one was stored in your new home, by the terms of the will it belongs to them.  Does their claim hold water?  What do you think?

I’m asking because the characters in my novel-in-progress ate faced with a similar predicament and I don’t have a handy judge or lawyer around.  Your opinion could influence the entire course of fictional history!

I’m Going To California

Patrushka and I leave Wednesday for California – for a week in the home country.  I’ll try to keep a record of how my homeland looks in the summer of 2008.

I’m a little afraid of what I’ll find there.  Will there be a pall of  yellow forest fire smoke over the land?  Will gas cost $5.00 a gallon?  Will temperatures away from the coast top 110 day after day?  Will the live oaks that cover the golden hills be withered and leafless from sudden oak death blight?

We’re going to fly to Oakland, rent a car there, then make our way down the coast 350 miles to Santa Barbara for a big family wedding.  We’ll stay a day, then turn around and roll back up the coast for a couple days in the City before we fly back to the North Country.

I wonder if this will be the last trip of this frivolous kind I ever take.  In a way I’m squandering resources on a trip I don’t really need to take, just as if global warming and peak oil had never happened.  Like most everyone else, I’m having trouble adjusting my worldview.

It’s only my great-nephew’s wedding (gad, that makes me feel old).  If we don’t go, we won’t be missed.  Except possibly for my sister and my niece.  I hardly even know the groom, I haven’t seen him in years.  But I want to stay in touch with that side of the family.  Family is, well family.  You only get one.  And I’m lucky enough to like mine.

Like so many Americans of my generation, I’ve spent my life wandering from place to place.  Itchy feet, I guess.  Wherever I saw a deck of cards I laid my money down.  Now my own kids are scattered all over the forty-eight.  Patrushka and I landed in an isolated little city far off in the northwestern farm country.

My older sister, on the other hand, never left home.  In 1955, she moved across the Golden Gate Bridge to Sausalito where she’s lived in the same house ever since.  Now she is matriarch of a great tribe of children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, all of whom still live in Marin Country, and some of whom are probably hanging out together at this very moment.  They’re a tightly knit clan, and I, an outsider, a wandering ponderer, look at them with awe and respect.  Good going, guys!

So we fly to California tomorrow to celebrate another wedding in that noble family.  I’ll keep notes and file a report on our return next week.

Photo by Patrushka

A Poster For Bo Diddley

Here’s a poster Alton Kelley (and Stanley Mouse) did for Bo Diddley, the pioneer rocker who followed Kelley into the great unknown yesterday. Bo Diddley was already legendary in 1966, one of the legends of our youth. He invented the bo diddley beat. It sounded so simple when you listened to it, but it was hard or impossible for aspiring rockers to pull off — that relentless driving cross the night.

I was still in high school in 1959 when my more intelligent Palo Alto girl friend introduced me to its grinding, insinuating rhythm, although we were sitting in her parent’s living room with all the lights on. She flipped on her new LP and swung it into “Hey, Bo Diddley”, then the one I couldn’t get out of my head for weeks, “Diddley Didlley Diddley Diddley Daa-aah-die”. Bless you, girl. By 1966, when he appeared at the Avalon Ballroom in San Francisco, he’d already finished his first brush with fame, and was on the comeback trail. Actually, Bo wasn’t particularly rave among the hippies and promoter Chet Helms took a chance by booking him. But the Paul Butterfield Blues Band had blown the hippies away when they arrived in San Francisco the preceding spring. The Chicago masters soon followed in their wake – Muddy Waters and James Cotton became San Francisco regulars, and an unknown named Steve Miller (The Steve Miller Blues Band in those days) showed up a little later. So by the time of this July concert the pump had been primed to go beyond Chicago blues…and into the Chicago bo diddley beat.

Images From Alton Kelley’s Pen

It’s hard to know exactly what Alton Kelley did all those years. It’s not that he wasn’t productive. He was wonderfully so. But nearly all of his most famous work – the Grateful Dead’s skeleton and roses logo, the Zig-Zag man, were done in collaboration with his long-time partner Stanley Mouse. Together with contemporaries Wes Wilson, Victor Moscoso, and Rick Griffin (and scores of nearly forgotten others) , they visually defined a way of being.

Which notes did Mick write? Which notes did Keith contribute? What about John and Paul? It’s same with Kelley and Mouse. Maybe they remember, except Al is gone.

Here are some Kelley-Mouse images from the summer of 1966. They’re from my personal collection. I’m putting them up in their yellowed glory, keystoning and all – just as I shot them.

I don’t know who owns the copyright to the images, but these photographs of the posters were created by me.

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