Timepieces: postscript

Inevitable, isn't it, that as soon as you hit the publish button and retire for the night you remember several excellent examples and ideas that should have been included? All right in your own house? Not that I could have changed a thing -- the power went down at about 10:30 p.m. in a windy snow storm last night and wasn't switched back on until several hours later in the dark of early morning.

However, today I opened a little used drawer and found two watches which should have been included in last night's post. You will note that Chairman Mao (above) presided over a clock face 1) with nary a number and 2) with a red star atop the second hand. One of these was given to every member of my tour group to China back in 19aught80. We arrived in China at a time when little blue uniforms were still worn by all citizens (silk or fine wool for the masters, wash cotton for the masses), all the shoes were black cotton Mary Janes and the country was just opening to tourists from the capitalist west.

Quite in contrast, the Lady Elgin was given me by my Phoenix grandmother when I graduated from Phoenix College back in the 40s. In those days, a good watch was a valued treasure and there was little competition from the dime stores. (To judge from my spam mail, I gather that there is still a market for snob watches.)

And then, on the mantelpiece there sits the xerox clock, a project of passing interest to my late husband. The works (below) are for real, the temporary face was a paper copy that was never replaced by the real thing. The eagle is removable, but lends an air of grandeur to the enterprise.

Bavarian Squirrels: Steve, who is a regular commenter here at Walking Prescott, has been providing nuts for and photographing the squirrels who abound in his village. They all are beautiful animals, with great tufted ears, but he has one (to me) rather remarkably colored critter he calls Coal. Coal is a black squirrel, what one might call a "tuxedo squirrel", which is totally new to me. Today's post gives a good series of pictures of all three of his current visitors.
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Walt Disney flies again

So over at Albertson's there was this new batch of balloons, which included some quite Disney-ish looking items, such as that castle and, on closer examination, Snow White herself. Being of a suspicious nature, I figured that there was a reason -- a commercial one -- for Snow White to be popping up in public around Christmas time. I promptly hied myself over to Amazon to check on the DVDs and discovered, to no surprise, that the Disney folk have just released a new edition of their pioneering feature-length cartoon. (The last time it was released was in 20-aught-2. That's a pretty good life span.)

I suppose that it's a good thing to keep DVDs of films such as Snow White and the Wizard of Oz and Shirley Temple's Little Princess in print. That way, today's kids, inundated with modern children's books and cartoons coming out the kazoo, will be familiar with a handful of the classics. It's too bad that so much new (and so much of it so bad) muscles out the old stories that provided a bridge between generations. I recall what fun I had putting together a wonderful library of children's classics for my dotter, assembled from visits to resale shops and rummage sales and 2nd hand bookstores. The only old books that I never found in these venues were the Oz books, but then I had my own collection to pass along. Of course, none of these old books would pass muster under that recent law passed by our thoughtful folk in Congress -- there might just possibly be something toxic in the ink that would poison a toddler who consumed, say, the entirety of that library I collected. Sigh.

Comic relief

Here's what I saw when I entered the MD's office this morning for a check-up. Right in front of the window where the receptionist sits. Unless something really new and terrific comes along to outclass such excellent and fitting Halloween decor, consider this is my contribution to the holiday celebration.

Of course, I had more in mind when I planned this post. Three comic strips I've clipped which were particularly poignant. Number one, above, takes me all the way back to my childhood and then to my own motherhood. Long, long ago in the far beyond, my mom made a point of declaring that all store bought witch or princess costumes only proved that the wearers (or certainly their mothers) lacked imagination. She managed to convince me, though I had a hard time convincing the dotter that a fine Cat in the Hat outfit that I made from cast off grey sweaters plus a big stovepipe hat fashioned from a kraft paper grocery bag, painted in those famous red & white stripes, beat all hell out of outfits from the store. Of course, back in those days, All Hallow's Eve had not become a big national holiday worthy of huge temporary shops dedicated to ghosts, goblins and even costumes for Rover. I wonder if anybody bothers to dream up a one-off costume these days; so many themes have already been coopted by the Halloween industry.

You've probably noted that I have a habit of treating The Google in the style of a modern oracle. I felt absolutely vindicated when I caught this bit in the Arizona Republic a couple of days ago. Repeat after me, ALL PRAISE TO THE GOOGLE.

Finally a memorial to my dear, late cat, Max, who, like Fuzzy, was likely to suddenly march up and bite, without warning or reason. I still miss Max very much; he never returned home.

Note: I realize that I have jumped copyright on these cartoons and hope that the owners will be kind enough to consider this post the equivalent of inviting my friends to see the clippings that I post on my refrigerator.

Why I disappeared

GrannyJ, it turns out, is NOT made of steel after all. I was just sprung from the local hospital, after a panic and/or emergency over the past couple of days. Now that it is all over and I am back in my own bed, I'm kicking myself for all the pictures that I did not get. The ER, for instance, is chockablock full of photogenic apparatus -- as the Hollywood guys are well aware.

Friend Patty, who tended to critical details like notifying the relatives and delivering me home, brought the camera after I was ensconced in a less highly equipped double room, where I took this handful of pix for the memory blog.

Here are the privacy curtains and twin TVs. Not being a TV person, I think I might have made good headway on War and Peace in the past couple of days. Below, the controls on the hospital bed.

However, the most remarkable event of all was having a transportation person, who showed up to move me down to to a lab, look at me and say, "Why, you're GrannyJ, aren't you!" Made me feel like a celebrity, it did. But then, I've never had a bad experience at our local hospital -- all part of living in a very cool smallish mountain town.

Is Jimena another Octave?

Synchronicity strikes again! Honestly, I wasn't thinking of Hurricane Jimena, currently hurling itself at the Baja peninsula, when I posted a link about Arizona catching the leavings from Pacific hurricanes every few years. After reading Azlaydey's comment about the Skull Valley Store this morning, I thought about 1) how maybe it would be interesting to check out the the current situation and 2) how weird it all was when Octave's tailings landed here in back in 19aught83.

So there you have (above) the projected path of Jimena, as of 11:30 p.m. EDT Monday, courtesy of Wunderground. Pointing smack dab in our direction. However, Ken Clark, the Accuweather blogger, has this to say, what happens to Jimena past Wednesday [when it hits Baja]? The interaction between the land and cooler waters should quickly diminish the strength. But moisture will continue to spread north. What is not easily answered right now is how far north will that moisture get. Computer models are not that impressive with moisture over southeast California or Arizona on Thursday or Friday. They very well could be wrong. But one thing we have to consider is that there will still want to be a ridge in place between a storm moving through the Northwest and the remains of Jimena and that ridge may be over portions of southern California and Arizona blocking a lot of the northward advance of moisture.

There was nothing like such a protective ridge when Octave came our way. LH and I were living in Wilhoit the other side of the Prietas at the time. We slept soundly the night it arrived, unaware that there had been a major storm. Little did we realize as we drove up the winding road from Kirkland to Skull Valley the next morning that the road might not be there the next time we tried it -- or that the flash flood had undercut the railroad tracks on the other side of the big wash. Imagine our amazement when we arrived at the Skull Valley Cafe to be told that they weren't open, that there had been 14 inches of rain on the west side of Granite Mountain, and that there were a two or three of feet of mud in the Skull Valley Store , which had recently been bought by a young couple. They were wiped out, we were told.

And so we headed to Prescott, still hoping for breakfast. As we left Skull Valley and headed up into the hills, we hit a patch on the highway where it looked as though water had washed across at some point. Reality was that water, several inches deep, was still crossing the highway. Everywhere. The hillside was still draining. Once we arrived in Prescott, it was almost impossible to find an open restaurant because the gas mains had been shut for fear of a break. Also, we were told that Iron Springs Road had nearly been taken out by flooding on Willow Creek. The final blow from Octave was that a railroad bridge north of town was washed out; as a result, the Santa Fe decided it didn't have enough business to bother repairing the damage and Prescott was without rail service from that time forward. However, the track along Skull Valley Wash was quickly repaired; a good thing, too -- roads in the area were in such bad condition that the rancher at the Bar-U-Bar could only get out by hitching a ride into Skull Valley on the Santa Fe.

So we wait and see. In the meantime, we are finally getting some rain.

Innards

As you probably know by now, the decor of medical offices fascinates me. Since this is the time of year following my annual check up, I've been sent to a couple of specialists just on the off chance. Today's pictures remind me of why I became a journalist.

Back when I entered college, the standard career options for one of a female persuasion were 1) teaching, 2) nursing and 3) maybe social work (if you'd ever heard of it). To all of which I said, "no way!" As you guessed, the pictures remind me of the nursing choice; no stomach for all that icky stuff!

Of course, they also remind me that I was never going to be a real blood and guts newspaper reporter, either. I wound up working the trade press where the pinnacle of my career was one of the few in-depth interview allowed by Ray Croc, the man who invented McDonald's. (Also Col. Sanders, the real article.)

What's up overhead at the library

Once again, it's quilts, courtesy of the Thumb Butte Quilters' Guild. The library calls the venue its "Look Up" Gallery. I call it the impossible-to-photograph location. Too bad -- as ever, the quilts represent topnotch craftsmanship and are great to look at.

If you wonder about the weird angle, credit the lights that are quite in the way for straight forward pix of most of the quilts.

In case the dotter doesn't recognize it, this quilt celebrates a trip to Alaska. Now that I look closely, I see many orcas as well as tall trees and a glacier. All that's missing is the volcano.

I think the zinnia quilt was my favorite. That or the chickens.

Serious Links: Normally, my linkage deals with the interesting, the beautiful, the amusing. For a change, some heavy-weight stuff. Let's start with our local foreclosure blog, which reports a fact that hasn't made the front page of our daily paper -- the Prescott metro area (i.e., Yavapai County) ranked #25 on the nationwide list of metro areas hardest hit by foreclosures in the 1st quarter of the year. You may have seen comments by Boonie; he has changed the focus of his blog from travel to brief essays, such as a commentary comparing the green movement to a religion. For a dose of the current economic bad news in interactive graphics, visit Slate's Disappearing Jobs map. Then there's Fred, who bemoans the evolution of the newspaper city room from a smoke-filled home of hard-bitten, hard-news cynics into a sanitized, polite, non-smoking and tedious environment. Amen! I started my own journalism life as a copy boy on the old Chicago Sun. Dropping into Kappy's Bar & Grill to get whisky in a paper cup for one reporter or running the latest handicaps over to the Daily Racing Form for the slotman on the copy desk as well as sharpening handfuls of soft lead pencils and interleaving cheap yellow copy paper with carbon paper to make "books". Back then, type was set by wandering linotype operators who 1) could spell and 2) were sharp in a way that only the self-educated can be . Too bad that world has vanished.

Brother/sister act

Short shrift tonight. I'm spending the evening cuddling up with our IRS folk & many pages of paper work. It's not difficult. Just tedious, with no reward once completed. So I settled on a post of quick pix. #1, my favorite Aussie brother, obviously in Memphis, with an iconic local product. (I think that's popcorn in the Elvis "guitar".)

And, if you look carefully, you'll see me, clicking away in a in a local collectibles shop. I like the lorgnette effect. By tomorrow night, I might be back to normal, possibly with pictures of the local April 15 Tea Party if our weather permits.

A miscellany of great cats

By great, I mean truly Great, as in very large, man-eating cats.

How I arrived at tonight's subject, however, is a bit of a tale, having to do with a soul-eroding printer/scanner problem. You see, one day a couple of months ago, my trusty Epson suddenly sat there, saying "Won't. Won't." Since ours is a throw-away society in which it costs more to repair an item than to replace it, twas time for a different printer. I thought that my b&w laser printer would do my scanning, so I bought a Cracker Jack box sort of printer-only for color. However, b&w laser printer couldn't be coaxed into doing my color scans.

Time for a new approach. Friend had inherited an HP 3-in-1, which she passed along to me. Oops, it needed printer driver, scan twain, etc. Went to HP's web site, where I located said drivers for the Mac, but couldn't connect to the site for a download. Had to order a set of driver software on CD. Popped CD into my computer, clicked on install -- and landed in an infinite loop. All consultations with HP, both in Mumbai and in the States, were totally, completely fruitless -- essentially, their experts told me to do what I had already tried. Finally, I did the intelligent thing: I went to Amazon and had them overnight me a 3-in-1. Not an Epson. Certainly not an HP. I finished putting it together and installing the software an hour ago.

In the meantime, while waiting for the printer to arrive, I cleaned the Stygian counter in my office. Lo and behold, I found a batch of pictures that I thought had gone completely missing. Which brings me back to the Great Cats.

We'll start here in town, where I would l guess that the lion craze is winding down. And rightly so. When the King of Beasts is relegated to adorning a catch-all box for magazines, knitting, etc., it is time for a change. And I don't mean parking him to guard the WalMart ice take-away, either (below). These lions are getting no respect! None. No wonder they look grumpy.

Tigers linked together as a belt? Better than decorating a doo-dad box. Actually, kind of pretty. I found it at a rummage sale last winter and couldn't resist. Reminds me of the tigers in Little Black Sambo who circled the tree so fast that they melted down into ghi (butter).

Here is a much more serious treatment of a Great Cat -- a large puma mask that was sold for a pretty penny at a Prescott College art auction two winters ago.

And now, the entire reason for this post in the first place -- the no-longer-missing picture of me and the gold (or gilded) lion in the Forbidden City in Beijing, back in the days when I had a career. That is not a cat to be trifled with.

The Lone Ranger Suite

To answer the question you didn't ask, I did not see the Lone Ranger and his trusty steed, Silver, while walking to the Square today. Or any day, for that matter. No, I needed a place holder while I await the return of my trusty Apple MacLemon so I can download from my camera the pictures of the Curious Incident of the Chipmunk in the Shower. While I was pondering what to do instead, KNAU fired up Wagner's overture to Die Freischutz (The Flying Dutchman) and there was my answer -- theme #6 for what I choose to call the Lone Ranger Suite.

Backtracking for a moment: in my very early teens, I was quite smitten by the Lone Ranger (on the radio, of course; TV was several years in the future.) Oh, his voice was so strong and masculine (rivalled at that time and in my adolscent opinion only by Orson Welles and Burgess Meredith.)

But the Lone Ranger serial also served my development as an incipient egghead. Huh? You must understand that down in Jacksonville, Florida, in the late 30s and early 40s, NPR radio with its continuous day and night stream of music wasn't even dreamed of. No, classical music happened one night per week at 10 p.m. for all of an hour -- except on the Lone Ranger show, which relied on romantic era warhorses for dramatic mood setting. Just one example: the Polovetsian Dances from Borodin's Prince Igor usually meant that an Indian war party was gathering.

At the moment, some other compositions I recall being introduced to include Mendelssohn's Fingals' Cave, Les Preludes by Liszt, Wagner's Rienzi overture, A Night on Bald Mountain by Moussorgsky, the sea music from Scheherazade and, I believe, at least one selection from Tchaikovsky. All what the dotter would characterize as Big Music. Very Big Music. (Big and bombastic to my jaded elderly ears!) I've always wanted to hear a mashup of these themes woven together into the Lone Ranger Suite.

Beginning and ending, of course, with the gallop of the William Tell Overture. Only one sad note -- we are living in an age in which there are probably no youngsters left who would automatically let loose with a "Hi Yo Silver, Away!" as soon as they heard the Rossini. Tho there might be a shout from a septuagenarian in the back row.

... or shine; the curves don't go away!

I've mentioned before that one of my uncles worked for ADOT (the highway department) back in the mid-20s when the White Spar was under construction. He later joined the US Forest Service, working all of the forests in Arizona -- except for the Prescott. When he was with the Kaibab and the Coconino, he drove many trips from the north to visit his parents in Phoenix -- all via the White Spar. ("A fine highway," he said, "but look out for scared little old men hugging the mountainside. Extra dangerous when they're heading north -- on the wrong side of the road.") According to his oldest son, they were often delayed for hours in winter by jack-knifed semis completely blocking the roadway. I don't know just when the Skull Valley Road was paved; however, when we moved to Wilhoit in aught-81, almost all semis split off from SR89 at Kirkland Junction over to Kirkland and thence up through Skull Valley, arriving in Prescott via the Iron Springs Road. Not very many curves -- but some long stretches in grade that resulted in trucks gently sliding off the highway.

Now that you've clenched your jaws for your first two rides up the White Spar, you should be used to the curves and we can plan another trip Real Soon Now -- this time to focus on the mountain scenery. (Two other facts worth mentioning: 1) most people are not aware of it, but this highway follows the course of the Hassayampa River for most of its length and 2) my family has the distinction of two speeding tickets on the White Spar, one each for the dotter and my LH. Neither, by the way, on the stretch of road between Prescott and Ponderosa Park, which had a bad rep for tickets.)