Tag: Me Myself I

Personal stuff

Law Abiding, More Or Less

Politics

Despite my outwardly-conservative mien, I am in fact a rebel, and have been one pretty much all my life.

Most of my Longtime Readers are familiar with my 1972 arrest and brief imprisonment (at age 17) back in the old Racist Republic, for the heinous crime of daring to publicly express my opposition to apartheid and especially to the education policy foisted upon Black South Africans by the Afrikaner Nationalist government. Because this protest had taken place in public (even though on the university campus), I and many others were charged under the Riotous Assemblies Act (there was no First Amendment in S. Africa, you see) because we hadn’t applied for a protest permit — did I already mention that the protest took place on private property? — but I and the others were later acquitted on a technicality.

That was only the first of my encounters with the State, by the way. Another involved hiring a wonderful Black maid to clean my apartment and do my laundry, but refusing to “register” her with the proper local authorities because I thought that was a load of old bollocks. Then when this was discovered, the local gauleiter bureaucrat charged me with being in contravention of the Group Areas Act (the one that said that Blacks couldn’t be in “White” areas without a permit), and issued me a fine. Which I refused to pay. So I was dragged into court yet again.

Judge: You have to pay the fine.
Kim: I’m not going to pay the fine.
Judge: Can you not afford it?
Kim: No, I can afford it. I’m just refusing to pay it.
Judge: Why?
Kim: Because it may be the law, but it’s ridiculous.
Judge: If you don’t pay the fine, you could face a jail sentence.
Kim: I don’t care. You might as well fine me for not having a permit to work my job here in Johannesburg.
Judge: You don’t need a permit to work here; you’re White.
Kim: And that’s why I’m not going to pay the fine.
Judge: [mumble mumble]

At that point, my lawyer told me to sit down and STFU, went up and spoke to the judge, who then told me I was free to go and slammed his gavel down with what I think was relief.

Turns out that unbeknownst to me, one of my buddies had come to the courthouse in case I needed bailing out — he knew me far too well, I think — and he’d secretly paid the fine already. (His father was a member of the U.S. Embassy staff, and apparently he’d ordered his son to do what he did because while he sympathized with my actions, he also saw the realities of the situation, and me having a criminal record was not a Good Thing. Bah.) For the record, I was then 26 years old.

Since I’ve been living here as a citizen in the United States, though, I’ve lived a simon-pure life, from a legal standpoint anyway. The reason is that most U.S. law makes kinda sense, certainly when compared with the apartheid bullshit, although I regret to say that I did carry a handgun a lot when I lived in Chicago because that prohibition was not only stupid, but un-Constitutional (as the McDonald case would prove many years later). It was crappy. Every time I saw the potential for some villainy to be perpetrated on me or someone close to me, my thought was always, “Oh please please please pick on someone else because otherwise I’m going to get into such shit when I shoot you in the face.”

I’ve also started to misbehave a bit since, oh, 2009 (the start of The Obama Years) because socialism, no details necessary. But really, it’s been so far, so good.

And I told you all that so I could tell you this (and it was all triggered by this article).

What may come as a surprise to most is that the laws I obey almost obsessively are the traffic laws. Why? Because alone among the laws, they all make sense: slow down here for the sharp corner, don’t park there, stay in your lane, don’t run a red light, don’t speed through a construction zone, etc. etc. — all are very sound and logical, and I obey them almost obsessively. Since coming here over thirty years ago, I have had the grand total of one traffic ticket, and that was because I was lost, looking for landmarks and didn’t see the speed notice. Even the judge sympathized, and let me off. That’s a fine I would have paid, let me tell you, because I really shouldn’t have been speeding.

I also like the fact that when people break the law egregiously — e.g. running a red light while drunk — that the Law beats them over the head with the Book. I also think that if an illegal alien breaks a traffic law — any traffic law except maybe illegal parking — he should be deported. I remember talking to an Egyptian guy — a legal resident — boasting about how he’d amassed an astonishing number of traffic tickets for reckless driving because “We don’t have traffic lanes in Egypt, man. You drive where you want.” Having been to the Third World (in my case, India), I’ve seen how this approach to driving works and let me tell you folks, it ain’t pretty. I told him he needed to straighten out and clean up his act, because if he ever got nailed for driving that way and caused someone’s injury or death, he wouldn’t have to worry about the damn police because I’d come to his house and pull his eyes out of his sockets. (“If you’re going to drive around without looking, you don’t need your eyes, asshole,” were my exact words.) He was not happy, but then again, nor was I.

And I’m sick of people thinking that driving is in the Bill of Rights and therefore can’t be taken away from them. It isn’t, it can, and in a lot of cases, it should. Yeah, I know that if you can’t drive, you’ll lose your job because you can’t get to work blah blah blah. That’s the reason to drive carefully and not break the law, shit-for-brains.

I need to quit now before I get really angry.

Getting Older, Caring Less

Culture

There are three ironclad rules about getting older:

  1. Make no long-term investments.
    This means not making any kind of investment where you’re unlikely to live to see the outcome.
  2. Never trust a fart.
    I don’t think I have to explain this one.
  3. Never waste an erection.
    Ditto. Believe me, when you get up there in age, these physiological miracles are not as common as they were in your twenties.

Let’s go back to #1 for a moment. Perhaps it’s because the past few years have been so difficult for me, nursing an ailing wife and then having to deal with her death, one realizes that most stuff is irrelevant by comparison, on a personal basis of course.

It has worried me that things that would in the past have brought from me a seething rant full of invective, rage and possibly even threats, now occasion from me a wry smile, a scowl or a muttered curse. (This would include almost every idiocy / lunacy perpetrated by Our Beloved Government — may the fleas of a thousand camels infest their nether regions.)

Why is it that I don’t really care much about anything, most especially when it doesn’t affect me personally, or if it does, it’ll likely happen after I’m dead? (There is a tangential discussion to be had on this topic, by the way, which would argue that if  my attitude is common among senior citizens, then old farts like me should never be allowed to formulate any kind of long-term government policy or change any social institutions. But we’ll do that some other time.)

When we lived in the Chicago ‘burbs (Prospect Heights, for those who know the area), our little municipality was one of the very few which did not use “city” water, but relied on wells. (This despite Lake Michigan being but a few miles from our front door — inexplicable.) Property taxes were of course lower, but that was offset by occasional water shortages, which totally sucked. Anyway, a referendum was held on whether the Heights should go to city water — it would require a bond to finance bringing water lines to the streets, but residents could have the choice of paying for the water line from the street to the house, or just sticking with well water. The bond would require a one-time per-household fee of a few hundred dollars — payable by an addition to the property tax bill (which, as  I mentioned earlier, was very low). We were overjoyed, and couldn’t wait for the measure to pass. It failed. It failed because about 50% of the residents were elderly and didn’t care that the future residents would have a better quality of life — because they themselves wouldn’t be around to see it, and thus weren’t interested in spending even the few dollars necessary. So we were stuck with tepid, unreliable well water, which situation we resolved by moving to the City of Chicago when our lease ended, and living not a few miles, but a few yards from Lake Michigan. We never stopped hating those elderly residents of Prospect Heights, though — even though they were obeying Rule #1.

I don’t want to be one of those selfish old bastards; but at the same time, I find myself getting the same kind of perspective. My conscience will generally make me do the right thing, I hope — I would vote in favor for that water bond in a heartbeat, for example — but from what I can tell, that’s not the way to bet when it comes to other people, and most especially older politicians whom one would hope have the same social conscience as I, but who clearly don’t.

Have I gone soft? (This is not a reference to Rule #3, by the way; at least, I hope not.) I’ve noticed that events that would normally make me livid with rage now simply irritate me; and paradoxically, things I would have shrugged off in the past now make me want to reach for the 1911.

Maybe it’s because of the circumstances I find myself in now, maybe it’s an effect of age, or maybe it’s some of both. I need to think about it some more, and figure it out.

Your opinions on this topic will be welcome. This is important stuff to me.

Caution

General

Conversation between Doc and myself, this morning:

“Kim, the lawn guys are coming to mow the grass and spray the weeds in a few hours.”
“Okay.”
“So if you see some strange guys walking around the back…”
“Yeah yeah yeah, I know, don’t shoot any of them.”
“Just wanted to make sure…”

Life in a Gun Nut’s house is so complicated sometimes… shoot this guy, don’t shoot that guy, yadda yadda yadda… I think I’ll just go to the range later on today to avoid a potentially messy situation. Anyway, that new Ruger Mk.IV isn’t going to shoot itself, you know.

Lovely To See You Again, My Friend

General

Yeah, I know: it’s the title of an old Moody Blues song (and one with which they usually open their live shows). But in my case, it resonates with me, and not only because I’ve always loved the Moodies.

I have been astonished at how many of my former Readers — that is to say, Readers from my previous website offerings — have come back to see this latest version of my back porch. More than that, however, is the pleasure I feel at making their acquaintance, again. I recognize the online nicknames, remember the stuff they like to read about, and hell, even their writing styles are familiar to me, some as much as my own.

I’m not a man who requires much validation — as all know, my attitude is “Like me, and stay; dislike me, and feel free to go somewhere else” — so to have all you guys and ladies reappear out of the mists of time gives me not a feeling of validation, but of pleasure, just as one would greet an old school friend.

And yes, while the circumstances of my back porch’s reappearance are lousy, it helps a great deal that so many of you have said, in essence, “We’re truly sorry about the circumstances, but damn, it’s good to have you back.”

Ditto.

When I relaunched my blog, I spoke about needing a reason to live (and I promise, this will likely be the last time I mention this), and I believed that writing was okay, but not a complete reason to do so.

Actually, it is. I wake up each day not with a thought of “What the hell am I going to write about today?” but rather, “What do I feel like writing about today?” The difference between the two questions is profound, and I have to tell you all, the fact that there’s an audience of old friends willing to indulge me in my rants, raves and quasi-intellectual scribblings one more time makes the whole thing easy.

You see, I don’t choose to write; I have to write, have to communicate, and make known all the stuff which pleases me, enrages me and strikes me dumb with its beauty. And of course, there’s the godless Democrats to consider… and in a later post, I will explain the concept behind The Glorious Day.

In the meantime, please let me offer my deepest gratitude to all my Returning Readers for having faith in me after so long an absence, and to the New Readers, with whom I’ll no doubt become as familiar as with the older group, a.k.a the Beer ‘N Treason Set (thank you, Longtime Friend and Reader Jim D, for the name).

It’s good to be alive and writing again. And it is lovely to see you again, my friends.

My Friends, Part 2: The Brits

Grief & Loss

I have spoken before about how my American friends have saved my life in this, my time of mourning. Now I need to tell you about what my British friends have done for me; but before I do so, a little background is necessary.

We met Mr. and Mrs. Sorenson (their online nicknames) back in the late 1990s, enjoyed each others’ online company, and on our next trip to England, Connie and I met up with the “Sors” in Bath (yeah, I know: I was then and now too lazy to type out “Sorenson” in full). We spent a couple of wonderful days together and made a friendship that has lasted to this day. Every single time we flew to Britishland thereafter involved visiting with them, even if just for dinner or shopping. One trip even included a day of shooting clays at the Royal Berkshire Gun Club; and they in turn hooked up with us on a vacation at Disney World and later, a trip to Plano which involved the firing of thousands of rounds through various of my guns. (Yes, I turned a pair of hoplophobic Brits into gun nuts, and damn proud of it I am, too.) Both Sors have been regular visitors to my various websites over the years, and Mrs. Sor has been a constant, and very welcome commenter at this new incarnation of my online ramblings. Mr. Sor is also an enthusiastic not to say dedicated beer drinker, and so much of our time together on either side of the Atlantic has been spent in a blissful alcoholic haze. As is also the case with my other two Brit friends.

I met The Englishman through his blog, An Englishman’s Castle, and having several common interests (hanging liberals, shooting criminals, burning down government buildings along with their inhabitants, etc.), we struck up a very cordial online friendship. Then one year la famille du Toit went on an actual vacation (the first in years, as opposed to business trips with a few days tacked on), and for our sins we picked Portugal’s Algarve coast, about which I’d heard so much, and had seen many beautiful photos thereof in the distant past when I was involved with the advertising account for TAP, the Portuguese airline. Because neither The Mrs. nor I knew much about the place, we decided to play it safe (for once), and booked two weeks at the Club Med outside Albufeira. I won’t go into details, but it was a total disaster and we were miserable — to the point where The Mrs. and Daughter were actually prepared to leave the group and go somewhere else, like England or Scotland, all by themselves.

Of course that wasn’t an option. At a family meeting, all decided that we’d go over to Britain, but the cost of additional accommodation was quite beyond our budget (canceling our stay would entail getting no partial refund from the chiseling Club Med bastards), and we were waiting for a client check to clear before spending any more money. So in utter desperation, I called The Englishman and begged for a few days’ accommodation (which he’d once offered to us) so we could catch our breath and figure out what to do next. Please understand that we had never met in person before, yet when I told him that we were miserable and worse, surrounded by Frenchmen, his response was immediate: “Surrounded by Frenchmen? Oh dear no, no, no, we can’t have that: come on over and we’ll put you up for a couple of days.” So we left the Algarve and flew to England. We stayed at the Castle (actually, an old farmhouse), and fell in love with the place — yes, that’s where The Mrs. is going to be laid to rest — and in love with the Englishman Family. Then after a brief visit to Bath (just a few miles away) we went on with a new vacation plan — bidding a sad farewell to Mr. and Mrs. Englishman and their delightful children.

In parallel, I’d likewise met Mr. Free Market (Mr. FM) through his blog at Free Market Towers (actually, an ancient “cottage”) and discovered not only a similar affinity to those same interests as The Englishman, but a common deep and abiding love of firearms and shooting. Here’s the funny bit: although at the time he lived literally down the road from The Englishman, they’d never before met in person — which they soon remedied, and another friendship was established. Anyway, we met Mr. and Mrs. FM in person on a later trip and all got on like a house on fire — to the extent that our families have spent much time with each other on both sides of the Atlantic, the Free Markets coming over for Thanksgiving one year, several trips involving visits to sundry shooting ranges, stopovers at the Castle en route to other destinations, and what have you. And I should point out that along the way, my American friends Doc Russia and Combat Controller have become buddies with Mr. FM too, and have shared several adventures together (details to follow some other time).

So Mr. FM called me up a short while ago to see how I was doing and what my plans were. When I reminded him I was staying at Doc Russia’s house, his next words were:

“So what are you doing there? How do you spend your time?”
“Writing. Grieving. The occasional trips to the range and the pub with Doc, I suppose. But mostly just writing and grieving.”
“Ah. Well, the War Office [Mrs. FM] has just told me that your bed is made up and ready for your arrival.”
“What?”
“My dear boy, if all you’re going to be doing is moping, writing, drinking and shooting, then you may as well do some of that in England as in Texas.”
“But I can’t afford to fly over to the U.K.”
“Don’t worry about that. I have BA Miles to spare.”
“Mr. FM, seriously: I have little or no money, especially when it comes to Expensive Britain. All I could do is stand the occasional round of drinks.”
“Your money’s no good over here, old chap. Just leave everything to us.”
“But, but… I don’t want to abuse your hospitality. How long could I stay? ”
“As long as you like. A couple months or so should do it.”
“That seems like a hell of an imposition.”
“Dear heart, it isn’t at all. Frankly, I’m going to be out of the country quite a bit on business, and I’d feel better knowing that Mrs. FM won’t be all alone in the house while I’m gone. Also, we’re going on holiday for a week or two, and I’d definitely feel better if FM Towers wasn’t standing vacant during that time. So you’d actually be doing me a favor.”
“I don’t know what to say…”
“And you can go and visit The Englishman and your other friends while you’re here, of course. Just use the Range Rover. We’re also planning a hunting trip in Scotland and some high-bird grouse shooting later in the year, so you may as well join me for those.” Pause. “Oh, and as you know, Doc Russia and Combat Controller are coming over for the Scotland deer hunt too, so we can all get together and have a good time. There’s also Goodwood [Festival of Speed] and trips to Royal Berkeley and Bisley for some shooting, but we can work all that out later. I almost forgot: The Englishman wants us to do a tour of historic pubs in the West Country, so put that onto the schedule too.”
Then came the killer question which decided the whole thing.
“And Kim: exactly when were you thinking of interring Connie’s ashes in The Englishman’s Long Barrow, anyway?”

When I’d picked myself off the floor and could speak again, I looked at the calendar and made the travel arrangements with Mr. FM. Circumstances permitting and catastrophes aside, I’ll be leaving for Britain in late June. And wow, it looks like I’ll be getting to do Bucket List Entry #2 a lot sooner than I thought.

So there you have it: I now have yet another reason to live — just one in a long line of reasons to live, all made possible through the unbelievable generosity and kindness of friends.

I don’t know what I did to deserve all this, but to quote the silly Rogers & Hammerstein song: “Somewhere in my youth, or childhood… I must have done something good.”

And for the first time since I whispered good-bye to Connie on that dreadful day in February, I absolutely know I’m going to survive this thing, and it’s all thanks to my friends. Amazing.

The Moon Through A Dusty Window

Culture

After I posted Every Picture Tells A Story last Saturday and admitted ignorance as to the artist behind the wonderful cartoon, I received an emailed suggestion from Longtime Reader Michael G., who included a link which didn’t give me the answer, but it did take my breath away.

You see, I have (yet another) deep, dark and deadly secret: in my yoot, I was addicted to pulp fiction novels. At the time (early 1960s) they were deemed Way Too Racy for a young boy by my parents, so I was forbidden to read them. I don’t know why they were worried: in my nine-year-old innocence, I had absolutely no idea what the sex scenes were all about, and I just skipped them to get on with the story (I told you I was innocent). Needless to say, the parental ban simply turned the novels into catnip for a cool cat like myself, so with the assistance of a scandalous uncle (who was only seven years older than I and therefore keen to help me out), I worked out a plan: I’d give Uncle “Locky” my pocket money to buy the novels “for himself”, and then after he was done with them, I devoured them (by the dozen), reading them late at night after my parents had gone to sleep to avoid detection, using either a flashlight or, if the batteries had died, reading by moonlight if available — hence, a partial explanation of the title of this piece. Here’s the actual cover which triggered this post:

…and I got it from the treasure trove behind the link in Michael G.’s email.

To say that I was captivated by the covers of these old, long-forgotten novels would be the understatement of the year. Regrettably, none of the titles rang any bells in my memory — give me a break, it was over fifty years ago — but good grief, I spent hours looking at the covers this past weekend, still as enthralled as I was when a pre-teenager.

Of course, nowadays the blurbs could legitimately be terms “false advertising”, because seldom were the salacious hints actually depicted in the stories, mostly because of censorship whether editorial or governmental. And yet fools like myself (and there were probably hundreds of thousands of us) continued to buy the silly things week in and week out, hoping against that this time there’d be a really racy scene instead of something like:

“Come here, Big Guy,” she said, slipping the robe off her waiting body…

…followed by a chapter break. And I’m not even sure that that would have made it into print. Those were innocent times, my friends, and I’m thinking that I prefer them to our “modern” times, where “How To Suck Your Man To Orgasm In 30 Seconds” could be on the cover of Woman’s Daily — and the Cosmo cover would be even  more explicit.

And just to finish: I think that “The Moon Through A Dusty Window” is a brilliant title for a novel — it could-a been a contender, it could-a been somebody…

It could have been Hemingway’s.