Archaeologists believe they have found the remains of a Bronze Age boat building community in Monmouth.

Excavations show 100ft-long (30m) channels in the clay along which experts think vessels were dragged into a long-gone prehistoric lake.

Monmouth Archaeological Society started to unearth new findings when work started on Parc Glyndwr housing estate two years ago.

The research is being published in a book called The Lost Lake.

Author and archaeologist Stephen Clarke, 71, said: “I started digging here with the society 50 years ago – I wish I had another 50 years.”

He said finds had helped the group to better understand the ancient history of Monmouth long before Roman times.

The town is served by three rivers but the group said it had evidence to suggest it was actually built on what was a huge prehistoric lake which became a home to hunter gatherers.

Over millennia it drained away and finds including charcoal from fires, flint shards and pottery from the Stone Age, Iron Age and Roman times have been found by the town’s professional and amateur archaeologists.

They have been excavated in sites around the town and in different layers of clay, sand, gravel and peat as the earth-bed composition changed from lake, lagoon, marsh and dry land, according to Mr Clarke.

Among the discoveries are a pair of “dead-straight” metre-wide channels in the clay shaped like the bottom of wooden canoes – along with a third smaller groove.

Mr Clarke said it supported the theory of a vessel having a support arm, adding he was seeking the opinion of marine archaeologists.

These channels were found over a mound of burned earth which has been carbon dated to the Bronze Age although other finds around the area date back to the Stone Age.

“I have seen 14-tonne machinery sliding in the clay so it would have been easy to push a boat,” said Mr Clarke.

He believes the finds suggest a settlement and boat building industry although no boat timbers have been found.

“There is a lot to explain,” said Mr Clarke, adding that the area “must have been alive with activity for thousands of years”.

“It is so new [the findings] that most people in the country do not know about it,” he said.

Flags were at half-staff at the state Capitol today in honor of a Coronado-based helicopter pilot killed in a crash in the Red Sea.

Navy Lt. Cmdr. Landon Jones, 35, of Lompoc, was killed Sept. 22 as he tried to land a MH-60S Knighthawk helicopter on the deck of the San Diego-based guided-missile destroyer USS William P. Lawrence.

Chief Warrant Officer Jonathon Gibson, 32, of Aurora, Ore., was also killed in the crash. Three other crew members survived, according to the Navy.

In a statement, Gov. Jerry Brown and his wife, Anne Gust Brown, expressed their deepest condolences on behalf of all Californians to the family and friends of Jones.

Scots fought ‘in bright yellow shirts not Braveheart kilts’

Medieval Scottish soldiers fought wearing bright yellow war shirts dyed in horse urine rather than the tartan plaid depicted in the film Braveheart, according to new research.

WAR VETS HEAL WITH THE HELP OF DOGS

Summary

1 in 4 war veterans will come home with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Over four million healthy, adoptable animals will be euthanized in shelters this year. Dogs provide healing and comfort to vets.

What is the issue, problem, or challenge?

A Pentagon study found that one in four veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan suffer from PTSD, depression or anxiety. Veterans are coming home with feelings of abandonment and having a difficult time adjusting to civilian life. This includes depression, substance abuse and in the worst cases, violence and suicide. Working with the dogs and training them to help others has proven to be very beneficial to veterans and shelter dogs. The dogs eventually are paired with people in need.

How will this project solve this problem?

Canines With a Cause brings shelter dogs and returned veterans together. Spending time with a dog can lessen stress. Vets benefit from the healing companionship of the dog and shelter dogs’ lives are saved by finding loving homes.

Potential Long Term Impact

Awareness will be brought to the plight of our vets suffering from PTSD as well as showing the benefits of training a shelter dog. Both the lives of vets and dogs will be saved in the long run as well as others who will utilize the service dog.

 Amazonian Butterflies Drink Turtle Tears

The sight of butterflies flocking onto the heads of yellow-spotted river turtles in the western Amazon rain forest is not uncommon, at least if one is able to sneak up on the skittish reptiles. But the reason why butterflies congregate onto the turtles may be stranger than you think: to drink their tears.

The butterflies are likely attracted to the turtles’ tears because the liquid drops contain salt, specifically sodium, an important mineral that is scant in the western Amazon, said Phil Torres, a scientist who does much of his research at the Tambopata Research Center in Peru and is associated with Rice University.

Unlike butterflies, turtles get plenty of sodium through their largely carnivorous diet. Meat contains significant levels of the salt, Torres told LiveScience. But herbivores sometimes struggle to get enough sodiumand other minerals, he added. “They end up needing this extra mineral source,” he said. 

Drinking tears

Turtle tears are not the only source of such salts for butterflies; the insects also readily get the salt from animal urine, muddy river banks, puddles, sweaty clothes and sweating people, said Geoff Gallice, a graduate student of entomology at the Florida Museum of Natural History, who has witnessed butterflies flocking to turtle tears in the western Amazon rain forest.

This region is lower in sodium than many places on Earth, because it is more than 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) from the Atlantic Ocean, a prime source of salt, and is cut off from windblown mineral particles to the west by the Andes Mountains. Dust and minerals make their way into the Amazon from the east, sometimes all the way from north Africa. But much of this material is removed from the air by rain before it reaches the western Amazon, Torres said.

 A newborn calf reportedly cried for five hours, inconsolably, after being separated for a second time from his mother, who tried to kill him, twice.

Keepers at a wildlife park in eastern China, the Shendiaoshan Wild Animal Nature Reserve, in Rongcheng, Shandong province, removed the calf from his mother after she rejected him, stomping on him. Hopeful that the injury had been accidental, they treated the calf and returned him to his mother’s side. She turned on him again, so they again removed him. The calf wept under a blanket for five straight hours before keepers were able to console him.

“He couldn’t bear to be parted from his mother and it was his mother who was trying to kill him,” a keeper said, according to reports. All was not lost for the little calf, however. Named Zhuangzhuang, he has been adopted by the keeper who rescued him and they have formed a strong bond.

“It’s bad luck to open an umbrella indoors.”

Though some historians tentatively trace this belief back to ancient Egyptian times, the superstitions that surrounded pharaohs’ sunshades were actually quite different and probably unrelated to the modern-day one about raingear. Most historians think the warning against unfurling umbrellas inside originated much more recently, in Victorian England.

In “Extraordinary Origins of Everyday Things” (Harper, 1989), the scientist and author Charles Panati wrote: “In eighteenth-century London, when metal-spoked waterproof umbrellas began to become acommon rainy-day sight, their stiff, clumsy spring mechanism made them veritable hazards to open indoors. A rigidly spoked umbrella, opening suddenly in a small room, could seriously injure an adult or a child, or shatter a frangible object. Even a minor accident could provoke unpleasant words or a minor quarrel, themselves strokes of bad luck in a family or among friends. Thus, the superstition arose as a deterrent to opening an umbrella indoors.”

The horseshoe is considered to be a good luck charm in a wide range of cultures. Belief in its magical powers traces back to the Greeks, who thought the element iron had the ability ward off evil. Not only were horseshoes wrought of iron, they also took the shape of the crescent moon in fourth century Greecefor the Greeks, a symbol of fertility and good fortune.

The belief in the talismanic powers of horseshoes passed from the Greeks to the Romans, and from them to the Christians. In the British Isles in the Middle Ages, when fear of witchcraft was rampant, people attached horseshoes open-end-up to the sides of their houses and doors. People thought witches feared horses, and would shy away from any reminders of them.

Fear of the number 13, known as “triskaidekaphobia,” has its origins in Norse mythology. In a well-known tale, 12 gods were invited to dine at Valhalla, a magnificent banquet hall in Asgard, the city of the gods. Loki, the god of strife and evil, crashed the party, raising the number of attendees to 13. The other gods tried to kick Loki out, and in the struggle that ensued, Balder, the favorite among them, was killed.

Scandinavian avoidance of 13-member dinner parties, and dislike of the number 13 itself, spread south to the rest of Europe. It was reinforced in the Christian era by the story of the Last Supper, at which Judas, the disciple who betrayed Jesus, was the thirteenth guest at the table.

Many people still shy away from the number.

Did you know electric cars were made in Denver in 1904? Oliver Fritchle made them. He was born and raised in Ohio…moved to Denver then made his cars. At the time the majority of cars in the USA were electric…followed by steam engine cars. Gasoline engine cars were a distant third.

Oliver was a chemist and battery maker. He created the Fritchle Automobile & Battery Company in Denver and developed many incredible things besides the batteries that drove the cars 110 miles between charges. 

The bottom line is Fritchle’s electric vehicles were every bit as good as the new modern vehicles (without GPS, sound systems and AC of course) in terms of distance they went on a single charge. The reason is the new modern electric vehicles all use his inventions. The truth is they use the innovations Fritchle created and used in his electric and hybrid cars more than a century ago with some upgrades of course. Cars today are much larger and have lots of electric gadgets.

The problem for Fritchle was a guy named Ford. Fritchle’s cars cost $2000. Ford started creating gasoline engine cars on a grand scale and sold them for $700. Plus they could go farther than electric cars…but not farther than Fritchle’s hybrid cars. Ford was mass producing cars and so the price was lower. And price always wins.

The new electric and hybrid cars are impressive but really not that much more compared to Fritchle’s cars. A  brand new 100% electric Toyota SUV cost  $53,000 and goes 112 miles between charges…that’s it. It’s great to drive around locally, but you can’t take a trip out of town. And Frichle’s cars went between 100 and 110 miles between charges. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Stevia is perhaps unique among food ingredients because it’s most valued for what it doesn’t do. It doesn’t add calories. Unlike other sugar substitutes, stevia is derived from a plant.

The stevia plant is part of the Asteraceae family, related to the daisy and ragweed. Several stevia species called “candyleaf” are native to New Mexico, Arizona and Texas.

But the prized species, Stevia rebaudiana (Bertoni), grows in Paraguay and Brazil, where people have used leaves from the stevia bush to sweeten food for hundreds of years. In traditional medicine in these regions, stevia also served as a treatment for burns, colic, stomach problems and sometimes as a contraceptive.

Today, stevia is part of the sugar substitute market.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates Americans  added more sugar  to their diet every year since the 1970s until 2000. When Americans dropped the added sugar, they turned to sugarlike extracts. The sugar substitute market was estimated to be worth $10.5 billion in 2012. And the market may be growing. Just 18 percent of U.S. adults used low- or no-calorie sweeteners in 2000. Now, 24 percent of adults and 12 percent of children use the sugar substitutes, according to a 2012 review in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

 The Principality of Sealand has its own flag, a white diagonal stripe dividing fields of red and black. It has currency, postage stamps, a national anthem (“E Mare Libertas,” which is also its national motto, meaning “from the sea, freedom”), and even a soccer team. Never heard of Sealand? That’s not a surprise. It’s a concrete dot in the North Sea roughly the size of two tennis courts, and it’s never been recognized by any other nation on Earth. But that never bothered its eccentric founder, Paddy Roy Bates.

In 1967, Bates was a pirate radio broadcaster looking to operate a radio station untroubled by the then-strict regulation of the British airwaves. To that end, he occupied HM Fort Roughs, a Royal Navy fortification that had been built seven miles off the coast of Suffolk during World War II as a platform for anti-aircraft artillery. When maintenance workers approached the fort in 1968, the Bates family opened fire with a shotgun, beginning a fine tradition of Sealanders taking pot-shots at passersby.

A court found that because the fort lay outside Britain’s three-mile limit of territorial waters, Her Majesty’s government had no jurisdiction over the incident. This decision inspired Bates to declare his “nation” ‘s independence, rechristening Fort Roughs as the Principality of Sealand and crowning himself its first head of state, Prince Roy I.

The new nation faced its toughest international challenge in 1978, when a German lawyer named Alexander Achenbach stormed the marine platform, took Bates’s son Michael hostage, and declared himself Prime Minster of Sealand. The coup failed when Prince Roy led a daring helicopter raid to retake his country, but Achenbach’s group still considers itself the rightful leaders of Sealand, and runs a “government-in-exile” from Germany.

Sealand’s original government is also an absentee one nowadays. Prince Roy died last October, leaving the throne to his son Michael. But Prince Michael lives on the mainland, in Essex, so the Principality of Sealand currently has a population of one: a caretaker who lives on the platform. The nation’s main source of income continues to be the online sales of mugs, t-shirts, and even peerages — you and that special someone can become Count and Countess of Sealand for just $320! But in 2012, Sealand announced it was beginning a new tourism industry, for visitors dying to see one of the world’s weirdest micronations. Be warned, however: To come ashore at Sealand, you’ll have to be lifted out of your boat on a winch. After a long history of invasions, the fortress has no ladders.

Charlie Chaplin in 1916 at the age of 27

A town dating back more than 2,000 years has been discovered on the northwest coast of the Sea of Galilee, in Israel’s Ginosar valley.

The ancient town may be Dalmanutha (also spelled Dalmanoutha), described in the Gospel of Mark as the place Jesus sailed to after miraculously feeding 4,000 people by multiplying a few fish and loaves of bread, said Ken Dark, of the University of Reading in the U.K., whose team discovered the town during a field survey.

The archaeologists also determined that a famous boat, dating to around 2,000 years ago, and uncovered in 1986, was found on the shoreline of the newly discovered town. The boat was reported on two decades ago but the discovery of the town provides new information on what lay close to it.

The evidence the team found suggests the town was prosperous in ancient times. “Vessel glass and amphora hint at wealth,” Dark wrote in an article published in the most recent edition of the journal Palestine Exploration Quarterly, while “weights and stone anchors, along with the access to beaches suitable for landing boats — and, of course, the first-century boat … all imply an involvement with fishing.” [Photos: 4,000-Year-Old Structure Hidden Under Sea of Galilee]

The architectural remains and pottery suggest that Jews and those following a polytheistic religion lived side by side in the community. In addition, the researchers found that the southern side of the newly discovered town lies only about 500 feet (150 meters) away from another ancient town known as Magdala.

By Alan Graham.

It is only in recent years that the major drug companies have been forced to list the harmful side effects from using medications. Almost everything that we consume has some sort of side effect, but when you read the warning label on cure all products I wonder why people still use them at all because the cost seems to outweigh any benefits.

Take for example the the Flu Remedy Tamiflu with it’s dozens of awful side effects, seems likely to cause serious damage than cure the ailment. 

Take a look of what you may be in for as your search for relief, and perhaps you will think twice before you take any quick cure medications or even over the counter flu aids.

• • bloody nose or unexplained nosebleeds (occurs mainly in children)
  • burning, dry, or itching eyes (mainly in children)
  • cough
  • dizziness
  • ear disorder (occurs mainly in children)
  • excessive tearing of the eyes (mainly in children)
  • headache
  • redness, pain, or swelling of the eye or eyelid (mainly in children)
  • trouble with sleeping
  • Abdominal or stomach pain 
  • wheezing
  • Pale skin
  • sneezing
  • troubled breathing
  • troubled breathing with exertion
  • unusual bleeding or bruising

  
  

  • Blistering, crusting, irritation, itching, or reddening of the skin
  • blurred vision 
    
  • cracked, dry, or scaly skin
  • dry mouth
  • flushed, dry skin
  • fruit-like breath odor
  • increased hunger
  • increased urination
  • mood or mental changes
  • skin rash that is encrusted, scaly, and oozing
  • stomachache
  • unexplained weight loss

  Phlegm-producing cough

• Abdominal or stomach cramps or tenderness
• arm, back, or jaw pain

• bloating
• chest pain or discomfort
• chest tightness or heaviness
• diarrhea, watery and severe, which may also be bloody
• drooling
• facial swelling
• fast or irregular heartbeat
• fever
• hoarseness
• humerus fracture (broken forearm)
• increased thirst
• pain
• shortness of breath
• tender glands of the jaw and throat
• unusual tiredness or weakness
• unusual weight loss

• Blistering, peeling, or loosening of the skin
• chills
• convulsions (seizures)
• dark urine
• difficulty with swallowing
• fainting
• fast, slow, or irregular heartbeat
• general tiredness and weakness
• hives or welts
• itching
• itching, puffiness, or swelling of the eyelids or around the eyes, face, lips, or tongue
• joint or muscle pain
• light-colored stools
• loss of bladder control
• loss of consciousness
• muscle spasm or jerking of all extremities
• red skin
• red skin lesions, often with a purple center
• red, irritated eyes
• shortness of breath
• skin rash
• skin rash or itching over the entire body
• sore throat
• sores, ulcers, or white spots in the mouth or on the lips
• sudden loss of consciousness
• sweating
• swelling of the face or tongue
• upper right abdominal or stomach pain
• weakness
• yellow eyes and skin
• Phlegm-producing coughing

When Kids Are Quiet, It Can Only Mean One Thing

The Coronado City Council voted, 3-2, Tuesday to ban smoking in all public spaces in the city. Councilmen Al Ovrom Jr and Richard Bailey were the only no votes.

“The council has really moved to protect the health of residents and visitors in Coronado,” Lorenzo Hitley from the Community Against Substance Abuse said. “It’s a major public health achievement the council demonstrated real leadership.”

With the ban, Coronado joins three other cities, Solana Beach, Del Mar and El Cajon, in the county in banning smoking in public places.

“We’re very excited that Coronado has adopted a really smoke-free outdoor ordinance,” Debra Kelly from the American Lung Association said. “Right now they have a D-grade, by passing this they will leap to a B-grade or maybe an A-grade.”

Hitley had also asked that the council to include electronic cigarettes in the ban.

“Electronic cigarettes are burgeoning at an alarming pace in most of the liquor stores and many large supermarkets,” he said. “The use of those electronic cigarettes, unless it’s regulated, adds to the confusion whether or not the nonsmoking [ban] is in place.”

About 100 people were at the meeting and all the people who spoke were in favor of the ban. The adopted ordinance does allow an exception for some outdoors dining area where the majority area is on private property.

Linda Barbour from the American Cancer Association urged the council to rethink the policy and make all public areas non-smoking.

“We’re concerned with the exception provision for the outdoor dining section where the public and private exemption may create confusion among the member of the public and may make this provision hard to enforce,” she said.

Councilman Bailey disagreed.

“I generally in support of the ordinance with the big exception that I do not think we should be legislating a smoking ban on private properties,” he said. “I can’t imagine the situation where it would become an issue.”

Mayor Casey Tanaka also agreed with that assessment. He also is against adding electronic cigarettes to the ban.

“The whole public policy point of view is about second-hand smoke and electronic cigarettes don’t put out second-hand smoke,” he said. “We’re just bending it to bend it.”

Councilman Ovram, who voted no, said that the ordinance is an over reach by the city.

“I think it’s overkill,” he said. “The problem is around the business district and it seems to me that it’s should be restricted to the business district.

The ordinance also bans smoking on all outdoors public events, regardless of whether they’re on public or private properties. The law will come in to effect Jan. 1. Anyone caught violating the law will be subjected to a $100 fine.

As a child, Norma Jeane Baker (Marilyn Monroe) lived in an orphanage and had 11 sets of foster parents, after her mother Gladys was institutionalized.

She almost chose the screen name of Jean Adair before settling on Marilyn Monroe. Her agent Johnny Hyde reportedly convinced her to have two plastic surgeries: reshaping the cartilage at the tip of her nose and a chin implant.

Although she was typecast as a dumb blonde (a persona she hated), she was actually extremely intelligent. She had an IQ of 168. 

Although she famously sang “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend,” in reality Monroe wasn’t into expensive jewelry. All the jewelry she owned was costume, expect for a diamond ring and a strand of pearls given to her by her second husband, Joe DiMaggio.

She was one of the first women to own her own production company, Marilyn Monroe Productions. The company released only one movie though, The Prince and the Showgirl (1957). She was an excellent cook!

Monroe helped change the course of Ella Fitzgerald’s career by personally calling the owner of the popular Hollywood nightclub, Mocambo, and helping her get booked. Initially the club would not book Ella because she was black.

According to Ella:

“I owe Marilyn Monroe a real debt…it was because of her that I played the Mocambo, a very popular nightclub in the ’50s. She personally called the owner of the Mocambo, and told him she wanted me booked immediately, and if he would do it, she would take a front table every night. She told him — and it was true, due to Marilyn’s superstar status — that the press would go wild. The owner said yes, and Marilyn was there, front table, every night. The press went overboard. After that, I never had to play a small jazz club again. She was an unusual woman — a little ahead of her times. And she didn’t know it.”

Monroe converted to Judaism after marrying playwright Arthur Miller.

During her marriage to Miller, Monroe tried to have a child (she desperately wanted to become a mother); unfortunately she suffered both an ectopic pregnancy and a miscarriage.

Miller wrote Monroe’s role in The Misfits as a Valentine’s Day gift to her. Although she hated the role, many critics consider it the best performance of her career.

After her breakup with Miller, Frank Sinatra gave Monroe a Maltese terrier to help her feel better. She named it Maf (short for Mafia Honey).

Miller’s 1964 play After the Fall is a thinly veiled portrayal of his marriage to Monroe.

The racy flesh-colored dress Monroe wore while singing the infamous “Happy Birthday Mr. President,” was covered with 2,500 rhinestones and was so tight that she had to be sewn into it.

Despite wide acclaim for her acting abilities, she was never nominated for an Academy Award. However, she did win a Golden Globe for her role as Sugar Kane in Some Like It Hot.

Monroe made Joe DiMaggio promise to leave flowers on her grave every week if she died before him. He kept his promise and had half-dozen red roses delivered three times a week to her crypt for 20 years.

She was buried in a pale apple green Pucci sheath dress.

At the height of her fame, Monroe wrote her autobiography My Story (with help from her friend screenwriter Ben Hecht). The book was not published until a decade after her death.

Even if dogs have been domesticated since approximately 33,000 years ago, their primal instincts remain active to this day. Some of these instincts include howling at the moon, pack dependency and even territory marking.

Research shows that Dogs are the only animals in the animal kingdom that can read the emotions on your face much like humans. In other words dogs can tell at a glance if we are happy, angry or sad just by looking at our faces.

It’s a common misconception that dogs are completely color blind and can only see in black and white. The truth however is that a dog can see colors, just not as vivid or rich as we can.

A recent study conducted at the Schillerhöhe Hospital in Germany concluded that dogs have the incredible ability to recognize the scent of certain organic compounds in the human body, which are linked to the presence of lung cancer. This scientific breakthrough proves that canine companions may be instrumental in early detection of an otherwise traditionally hard to detect disease.

A number of studies have indicated that dogs face health risks when exposed to the toxins in secondhand smoke which include respiratory problems, allergies and even nasal and lung cancer.

Limping from a dog can be due to a host of things from a thorn stuck in their paw to arthritis. However, in some occasions, limping can also be a sign of bone cancer. So take any sign of limping seriously and visit your vet as soon as possible. It turns out that a chemical in chocolate called theobromine is toxic and can seriously, even fatally affect your dog if it ingests between 100 and 150 milligrams per kilogram of body weight.

One study suggests that the longer and more pronounced a dog’s features are the longer he’ll be around. Conversely, dogs with flatter faces like bulldogs will have shorter lives.

Thunderstorms have particular sound frequencies that can hurt dogs’ ears. The fear that your dog shows at the start of a thunderstorm may actually be a reaction to pain. Unlike humans who sweat through theirs skin, dogs sweat through their paws. Check it out next time your dog seems to be hot. 

Just as humans can be identified by their fingerprints, dogs can be identified by their nose prints because like human fingerprints a dogs nose print is unique to that dog.

Dogs have a powerful sense of smell. So powerful that it has been estimated to be one thousand times more sensitive than that of a human. Dogs are pack animals and view their human/owner as the leader. In the United States, around 1 million dogs are primary beneficiaries of their owner’s will. A frightened dog will put its tail between his legs because it cuts off the scent glands in its anal region which carry personal scents that identify the individual dogs. It’s almost as if the dog is hiding his Id card. Studies show that indeed dogs can express jealousy. Dogs have the same hormone, oxytocin, which has been shown to be involved in both expressions of love and jealousy in experiments involving humans.

50-250 words seem a lot for dogs to remember and respond to but studies show that their cognitive skills can be that sharp, in fact, as sharp as a 2 year old child. The smarter breeds can absorb as many as 250 words while the average mutts can understand around 150 words. Having the ability to reach speeds of up to 45 mph, the greyhound is the fastest dog in the world.

Ever wonder why your pup chases his tail? There’s actually a good reason to that seemingly pointless habit. The circular motion flattens tall grass in the wild and turns it into a cozy bed for them.  

The Greyhound is the only dog named by name in the Bible. The reference is found in Proverbs 30:31.  A greyhound; an he goat also; and a king, against whom there is no rising up.

Dogs, like humans, can get hiccups from eating or drinking too fast as they may swallow extra air. Sometimes feelings of anxiety, fear, stress and even excitement can also trigger hiccups for dogs.

Regardless of how it appears, your dog does not feel guilt. According to Barnard College researcher Alexandra Horowitz, the “guilty look” your dog gives you has more to do with your perception than his intention. Research shows that by petting a dog you help lower your blood pressure.

 When I was producing the rock opera in 1980, Hollywood nightclub owner, Bill Gazzarri, ran a month’s long radio advertising campaign announcing the search for singers to fill the role of Jim Morrison.  In actual fact, we were looking for seven of them who would be cast as The Jim-Tations.

 The campaign produced a god-awful and grotesque procession of wannabe amateur singers.  Half of them could not even hold a note.  One guy, in particular, thought that his audition would consist solely of his monosyllabic and agonizingly repetitious utterance of, “Indian, Indian, Indian…”  He said that for over an hour.  Then I had him yanked.

One of my favorite of the worst/best impersonators was Cro-Magnon. Everybody hated Cro-Magnon.  It wasn’t that he was so bad.  It was because he was so obsessed with Jim.  He believed that he, and he alone, was the only one who should portray the dead rock star.

Cro, as he was nicknamed by the cast, for his uncanny resemblance to the caveman, was someone who had showed up for an audition like hundreds of other Jim Morrison lookalikes.  He had the manners of a mule, smelled twice as bad, and try as he might, could only produce a sound equal to that of Quasimodo as he murdered his rendition of “Light My Fire”.  He was not called back.  This did not deter him from showing up at every single audition with all the resilience of a bounce-back toy.  No matter how hard you smack it down, it pops right back up and straight into your face.

The producer had taken pity on Cro because as bad as he sounded and as much turmoil as he caused, he was so passionate and deadly serious on making sure Jim was portrayed correctly.  In the end, he became like Shakespeare’s pesky and troublesome spirit, Ariel.  He booed, jeered, and taunted the entire cast unless they gave it their all in every rehearsal.  Cro’s presence actually kept The Jim-Tations on their toes, and ultimately, each one gave a great performance.

The cast was selected, seven Jim Morrison look-a-likes, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, John Lennon, Jerry Lee lewis, a Marilyn Monroe and a host of ghosty characters.

Jimmie Hendrix, whose real name is Jimi Graham, (believe it or not) looked and sounded so much the the real Jimi that it was difficult to see or hear the difference, with one exception, the real Jimmy was left handed Jimi Graham is right handed. To this day more that thirty years later no one ever said a word.

Even after the cast was assembled and the rehearsals began in earnest, Cro would be there before anybody else.  When people scowled at him or shooed him away, he was not insulted or deterred.  Sometimes, he would become so troublesome that it was not uncommon to find him and three or four other Jim-Tations arguing or even wrestling in Gazzarri’s parking lot.

On opening night, Cro showed up in full regalia as a sort of homeless Lizard King.  He spent the entire evening stalking the cast and badgering patrons by complaining that he was the real Jim Morrison.  

When the musical had completed its run, he continued to show up at the nightclub trying to convince them to let him do a one-man show.  Bill Gazzarri ejected him forcefully after telling him in no uncertain terms that he was sure that people would not come to the club to see a Stone-Age Jim Morrison.  Cro was deeply offended, but finally got the message and wandered off into the wilderness like a comic/tragic clown.

In addition to the amateurs, a cast of famous and soon-to-be-famous professional actors were also vying for the role of a rock ‘n’ roll idol.

Among these were Sylvester Stallone, Gary Busey, Timothy Hutton, Tim McIntire, Wings Hauser, and John Travolta.  All of whom were ill-suited for the role, but that did not stop them from submitting dreadful audition tapes that made my eyes water.

The Morrison’s even got caught up in the fever.  Over dinner and cocktails, they were recruited by a fellow retired Navy officer, who was none other than the parents of a daughter married to the wild man rocker by the name of Frank Zappa.  The group of parents were all in a state of bewilderment as to how their sons and daughters had become famous radicals after being raised so well.

 As the evening ended, the “Zapped” family gave Clara some photographs of a young actor, who had just finished shooting his first movie, “Double Down”.  It was a dismal gambler/gangster feature shot in Reno, Nevada on a below-the-poverty-level budget.  They wanted to see if Anne and I would consider him for the role of Jim.

We met with the actor’s representative, a writer named Michael Blake.  It was he who wrote and directed “Double Down”.  He was unashamedly proud of his film. He was equally unashamed about promoting one of the actors from his film, who was killed off in the first scene.  Blake would say, “This guy is going to be the number one box office attraction in the very near future.  You just wait and see.”

I did wait and I did see.  A few short years later, Michael Blake wrote a little movie called, “Dances with Wolves”.  His prediction had become as real as Mount Rushmore and Kevin Costner became an overnight box office sensation.

Today Jimi Graham is still Rockin his heart out, and every day he plays, he rekindles those wonderful remembrances of  “The Roar Of Crowd And The Smell Of Grease Paint”

Thanks a million Jimi

ALAN GRAHAM

In an exclusive interview with Vanity Fair for the magazine’s November issue, Mia Farrow suggests for the first time that there’s a possibility her son Ronan, 25, is Frank Sinatra’s boy, and not Woody Allen’s.

Ronan was thought to be Farrow and Allen’s only biological child, explains The Guardian.

In a preview for the issue, Vanity Fair teases:

Farrow discusses her relationship with Frank Sinatra, telling Orth that Sinatra was the great love of her life, and says, “We never really split up.” When asked point-blank if her biological son with Woody Allen, Ronan Farrow, may actually be the son of Frank Sinatra, Farrow answers, “Possibly.” No DNA tests have been done. When Orth asks Nancy Sinatra Jr. about Ronan’s being treated as if he were a member of her family, Sinatra answers in an e-mail, “He is a big part of us, and we are blessed to have him in our lives.” [Vanity Fair]

Though it’s been rumored to be the case for years, reports New York Post’s Page Six, this interview is the first time that Mia publicly admits the possibility. Farrow and Sinatra were married for all of two years, from 1966 to 1968, but continued to be involved afterwards, even as Farrow got together with Allen. Sinatra, who died in 1998, would have been 78 at the time of Ronan’s conception, adds The Guardian.

The Washington Post also finds a resemblance between Ol’ Blue Eyes and Ronan, a human rights lawyer who frequently accompanies his activist mother around the world in her endeavors as a UNICEF ambassador.

In a superb act of defiance a man stands up to the withering forces of bureaucracy 

c. 1903-09, courtesy Coons collection

Save Our Heritage Organization filed a Petition for Writ of Mandamus in San Diego Superior Court to challenge the unlawful actions of the Port of San Diego and its Commissioners in approving the Coronado Rail Line Lease project without first preparing an Environmental Impact Report (EIR). The Port approved the Lease as potential lessee of a portion of the Coronado Rail Line, a cultural, recreational, and regional transportation resource.

The proposed lease project allows paving up to and between the rails of the Rail Line, and has potentially significant adverse impacts on the use of the Rail Line for current and future recreational, cultural, and transportation uses. The Port improperly segmented its approval of the lease from the pending related Bayfront Redevelopment Project and other projects that are inconsistent with continuing use of the important Rail Line. 

The case asks for a peremptory writ to issue in the first instance to require the Port to set aside its approval of the lease, and to reconsider approval only after completion and certification of an EIR that studies and mitigates pending related plans and considers feasible project alternatives that may preserve the Coronado Rail Line for beneficial uses. 

Bruce Coons explained why the lawsuit is important: “This lease will deny the use of the entire Rail Line, both for the current historic tourism and potential future rail uses, and deserves full environmental review.”

Congratulations to Us, Mr. and Mrs. Albert & Kimberley Graham celebrating our 25th Anniversary on September 24, 2013!!!!

Yeah, we made it! Love, Me to You

When Mary A. “Pink” Mullaney passed away on September 1st, she left behind 6 children and 17 grandchildren. “Pink” was so adored by her family that they wrote the most amazing obituary for her. Read it, it’ll put a smile on your face:

If you’re about to throw away an old pair of pantyhose, stop. Consider: Mary Agnes Mullaney (you probably knew her as “Pink”) who entered eternal life on Sunday, September 1, 2013. Her spirit is carried on by her six children, 17 grandchildren, three surviving siblings in New “Joisey”, and an extended family of relations and friends from every walk of life. We were blessed to learn many valuable lessons from Pink during her 85 years, among them: Never throw away old pantyhose. Use the old ones to tie gutters, child-proof cabinets, tie toilet flappers, or hang Christmas ornaments.

Also: If a possum takes up residence in your shed, grab a barbecue brush to coax him out. If he doesn’t leave, brush him for twenty minutes and let him stay.

Let a dog (or two or three) share your bed. Say the rosary while you walk them.

Go to church with a chicken sandwich in your purse. Cry at the consecration, every time. Give the chicken sandwich to your homeless friend after mass.

Go to a nursing home and kiss everyone. When you learn someone’s name, share their patron saint’s story, and their feast day, so they can celebrate. Invite new friends to Thanksgiving dinner. If they are from another country and you have trouble understanding them, learn to “listen with an accent.”

Never say mean things about anybody; they are “poor souls to pray for.”

Put picky-eating children in the box at the bottom of the laundry chute, tell them they are hungry lions in a cage, and feed them veggies through the slats.

Correspond with the imprisoned and have lunch with the cognitively challenged.

Do the Jumble every morning.

Keep the car keys under the front seat so they don’t get lost.

Make the car dance by lightly tapping the brakes to the beat of songs on the radio.

Offer rides to people carrying a big load or caught in the rain or summer heat. Believe the hitchhiker you pick up who says he is a landscaper and his name is “Peat Moss.”

Help anyone struggling to get their kids into a car or shopping cart or across a parking lot.

Give to every charity that asks. Choose to believe the best about what they do with your money, no matter what your children say they discovered online.

Allow the homeless to keep warm in your car while you are at Mass.

Take magazines you’ve already read to your doctors’ office for others to enjoy. Do not tear off the mailing label, “Because if someone wants to contact me, that would be nice.”

In her lifetime, Pink made contact time after time. Those who’ve taken her lessons to heart will continue to ensure that a cold drink will be left for the overheated garbage collector and mail carrier, every baby will be kissed, every nursing home resident will be visited, the hungry will have a sandwich, the guest will have a warm bed and soft nightlight, and the encroaching possum will know the soothing sensation of a barbecue brush upon its back.

Above all, Pink wrote — to everyone, about everything. You may read this and recall a letter from her that touched your heart, tickled your funny bone, or maybe made you say “huh?”

On Sept. 11, 1967, The Beatles started filming The ‘Magical Mystery Tour’. They set out on a bus with a group of people. That was the idea. There was no script, nor a very clear idea of exactly what was to be accomplished, not even a clear direction about where the bus was supposed to go. The ‘Magical Mystery Tour’ bus took off for the West Country in England stopping for the night in Teignmouth, Devon were hundreds of fans greeted The Beatles at their hotel.
For the people on the bus it was indeed a “mystery tour”.

The Coronado guitar is back, with greater sound, build and beauty than ever for the guitarist who appreciates a different Fender guitar with a special history. In the mid-to-late 1960s, the Coronado family was Fender’s first foray into the hollow-body electric guitar world. Now the Coronado name and style returns to Fender as an utterly cool new guitar in the Modern Player family, with stunning looks, tone and features.

The Fender Coronado guitar’s thin semi-hollow maple body has an alder center-block and bound top and back, with stylish bound f holes. Its “C”-shaped maple neck has a 9.5”-radius white-bound rosewood fingerboard with 21 medium jumbo frets and elegant white pearloid block inlays. Other distinctive features include dual Fideli’Tron™ humbucking pickups with three-way toggle switching, three-ply black pickguard, four skirted “amp”-style control knobs (volume and tone for each pickup) and an Adjusto-Matic™ bridge with floating “F” trapeze tailpiece. Available in gorgeous 3-Color Sunburst, Black, Candy Apple Red and Black Cherry Burst gloss finishes.

IT BEGAN WITH THE CORONADO IN 1966.

It continued with offset semi-hollow Starcaster 10 years later. When Fender dared to venture into the hollow-body market, the result was some of the company’s most rare and unusual instruments to date.

Elegant appointments, oversized headstocks and stylized f holes that challenged the Fender’s stronghold on the early ’70s solid-body market. Unique “wide-range” pickups that deviated from that recognizable Telecaster and Stratocaster tone. Throughout their short-lived existence, Coronado and Starcaster instruments became underground sensations and ironic musical weapons to players opting for a more unconventional Fender look, feel and tone.

2013 marks the pivotal comeback of Coronado and Starcaster guitars and basses, which Fender has revitalized for its versatile and affordable Modern Player series. With top-quality contemporary features, updated pickups and a vintage vibe that’s all their own, the Coronado and the Starcaster have been embraced by an entirely new contingent of players, from the stages of Lollapalooza to the grounds of Outside Lands.

By: Alan Graham.

By Alan Graham.

Historical research compiled by Judy Sacco. 

During my marriage to Jim Morrison,s sister Anne, nobody in the family ever spoke about the genealogy of the Morrison family. The only two things I do remember is a half joking reference to being direct descendants of Robert The Bruce, and the other was once when Andy Morrison and I were discussing the family tree, he said. ” I think my ancestors were from the Outer Hebrides in the north of Scotland or somewhere like that”. That was the extent of his knowledge or interest in the subject.

Indeed he was right, the Morrison clan  was established by Alexander Morrison of Lewis, North Scotland. He was born in 1750.  He arrived in America on April 1, 1781 and settled in Hagerstown, Maryland.

Gargoyle at Lews Castle Scotland

 Stephen Morrison, Civil War Soldier (Photo compliments of Sid Heidt)

Stephen Morrison was the maternal uncle of Arthur Kelty and William Morrison Cleeland, and the paternal uncle of Hosea, William J, and Thomas C. Morrison. He was the youngest son of William Morrison and Sarah Slemmons, whose father Robert Slemmons was a Revolutionary War soldier.  Stephen was born 3 Apr 1826. He was most likely born in Connoquenessing Township, Butler County, PA, since his father William was listed in the township tax records during that time. Sometime before 1850, Stephen married Lydia Emerson. Stephen Morrison was an educator, and was elected School Superintendent by the school directors of Lawrence County, PA.  He served that post from 1860-1866. His Civil War experience [1] was that of a Pvt. in Company E, 55th Regiment Militia. The 55th Regiment mustered in June 27 – July 11, 1863, and was discharged July 18 and August 26, 1863. The 55th had service in Pennsylvania during Lee’s Invasion.

Lawrence Journal, Newcastle , Pennsylvania , Saturday, March 9, 1867:

Died Suddenly 
We regret to state that Mr. Stephen Morrison of Neshannock Township, late county Superintendent of Common Schools of this county died suddenly on Wednesday morning last. His father has been very poorly for some time, and on that morning Mr. Morrison received a message to go and see his father. He started, and while on the way, which was but a short distance, he ruptured a blood vessel—he was found before life was extinct, laying on the road, but he died in a few minutes after being taken up from the ground.

One of Stephen Morrison’s nephews, S. S. Boston (the son of his sister Maria and John Boston), was one of Stephen’s teachers at the Common School in Neshannock Township in Lawrence County, PA.

William Morrison Cleeland
The “Morrision Cleeland” in the photo is the William Cleeland / W. M. Cleeland who is listed on the National Parks Service Civil War Soldiers and Sailors System as being with Company G of the 155th Regiment, Pennsylvania Infantry, and who is also listed as William M. Cleeland with the 2nd Battalion, Veteran Reserve Corps. According to page 822 of the book “History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5”, William Cleeland was mustered into service with the 155th regiment on August 22, 1862, served in Company G, transferred to the 2nd Battalion, Veteran Reserve Corps on July 1, 1863 and was discharged on June 24, 1865. The Veteran Reserve Corps was originally called the Invalid Corps.

Birth:	1886
Death:	1971 Clearwater Pinellas County Florida, USA
Mr Morrison was the son of Robert Bruce Morrison and Susannah Reep. Husband of Caroline Hoover.  Father of George Stephen Morrison.  Paternal grandfather of James Douglas Morrison, poet and singer of the iconic rock band The Doors.  Birth:  Apr. 23, 1891 Ohio, USA Death:  Aug. 31, 1984 Spring Harris County Texas, USA Paternal Grandmother of James Douglas Morrison, poet and singer in the rock band The Doors.

Robert Bruce Morrison

Birth:	Jul. 6, 1852
Death:	Jun. 2, 1899
Family links:   Spouse: Susannah Reep Morrison (1855 – 1947) Born 09/03/1855 (Niles, Trumbull County, Ohio)   Died 02/20/1947 (Largo, Pinellas County, Florida)   Married – Robert Bruce Morrison – 10/27/1874 (Mahoning County, Ohio)   Jim aside his Great Great grandfather Stephen Morrison 1826 – 1865

Arthur Kelty Cleeland Nephew of  Stephen Morrison

birth:  Apr. 25, 1844 Pennsylvania, USA Death:  Aug. 5, 1862
Burial: Glendale National Cemetery  Richmond Henrico County Virginia, USA

Birth:	May 15, 1781 Hagerstown Washington County Maryland, USA
Death:	May 2, 1867 New Castle Lawrence County Pennsylvania, USA
William MORRISON was born May 15, 1781 at Hagerstown, Maryland, just six weeks after his parents came from Lewis (the Isle of Lewis), Scotland to the U.S. Resided in Butler County, Pennsylvania until 1853, then moved to Lawrence County Pennsylvania to the home where they resided for the rest of their lives.  3. WILLIAM2 MORRISON (ALEXANDER1) was born 15 May 1781 in Hagerstown, Maryland, and died 02 May 1867 in Lawrence County Pennsylvania.  He married SARAH (also known as Sally) SLEMMONS 23 Jan 1803, daughter of ROBERT SLEMMONS and HANNAH DONNELLY. She was born 09 Aug 1783 in Ireland, and died 03 Feb 1868 in Neshannock Township, Lawrence County, Pennsylvania. “Pedigree Resource File”, database, FamilySearch (http://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.2.1/S1BC-3XC : accessed 2013-04-04), entry for william /morrison/.    Family links:   Children:   Betsy Morrison Cleeland (1819 – 1883)*   *Calculated relationship   Inscription: PVT. PA. VOL. War of 1812
Burial: Kings Chapel United Methodist  New Castle Lawrence County Pennsylvania, USA

A Beatles tour guide took matters into his own hands after the city’s famous Strawberry Field gates were painted yellow.

Joey Lyons, who runs the popular Hard Day’s Night taxi tours, seized the initiative by buying three pots of red paint – and restoring the replica gates to their former colour himself.

But the Salvation Army, which owns the site, was less than impressed with Joey’s solo effort, calling it “vandalism.”

Joey said he felt he had to do something after seeing how upset visitors were when they saw the iconic gates – made famous by the John Lennon-penned Beatles classic Strawberry Fields Forever – painted partially yellow, along with an adjacent wall.

Lennon was inspired to write the song by his childhood memories of the former Strawberry Field childrens’ home in Woolton.

oey said: “I acted on impulse after I was in a shop and saw three tins of pillar-box red paint for sale for just a quid each. I bought them and went straight up there and painted the gates the right colour.

“It took me over an hour and I was expecting to see the blue police lights flashing at any minute.

“Neighbours who were out walking their dogs were saying ‘good on you.’”

Joey, who has been running his taxi tours for the past five years, taking visitors from all over the world on a three-hour trip around the city’s Beatles landmarks.

He said “With the money that’s generated in the city by the Beatles, I didn’t think it was fair that nothing had been done to re-paint the gates for a week.

“I see the gates every day and customers were upset they had been defaced.”

He added: “I give taxi tours to Beatles fans who have travelled from all round the world, and one of the first things they ask me is whether we are going to Strawberry Fields.

“I felt it was unfair on those who came half-way around the world to see the entrance in that state.”

A spokesman for the Salvation Army said: “While we understand the motivation of the individual who painted the replica gates to Strawberry Field, we are very disappointed that they have been vandalised again. We will be restoring the replica gates, which were installed in 2011 to protect the original gates from damage, to their original condition as soon as possible. We will assist the police in any investigations they wish to conduct into these incidents.”

http://www.livescience.com/39336-tongue-painting-chimp-wins-art-contest.html?cmpid=51462711386084

http://www.care2.com/greenliving/30-amazing-animal-traits.html?page=2

Robby Krieger has been quoted as saying “Nietzsche killed Jim (Morrison).” Jim Morrison was interested in the life and philosophy of German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, for his high school graduation present he asked his parents for the complete works of Nietzsche, at UCLA film school one of his ideas for a student film was an incident from Nietzsche’s life when Nietzsche stopped a man from whipping his horse to death, (Nietzsche was soon institutionalized after that as being mad). Nietzsche’s The Birth of Tragedy reads like a blueprint for The Doors, and Morrison did occasionally reference Nietzsche in a warm up room before a concert in Saratoga Springs, New York. Morrison improvised an ode to Nietzsche, and in the song The Soft Parade included the line “we’ll whip the horse’s eyes and make them cry.”

Friederich Nietzsche was born October 15, 1844, he showed an early interest in music a and languages and was accepted at the prestigious Schulpforta school. Nietzsche soon learned Latin, Greek, Hebrew and French while also composing his own poems and musical compositions. It’s while at school that Nietzsche first discovered poetry and ideas that others thought eccentric, blasphemous and considered at the time to be “unbecoming.” It’s at this time Nietzsche may have discovered the music and writings of Richard Wagner. Nietzsche went to the University of Bonn as a theology student but soon suffered a crisis of faith and soon started studying philology (the study of Greek and Roman textual criticism). Nietzsche in later writings would proclaim “God is dead,” started writing and publishing essays arguing that historical research had discredited the central teachings of Christianity, as well as essays praising the philosopher Arthur Schopenhaer. Still somewhat the prodigy Nietzsche was named, at age 24, as a professor of classical philology at the University of Basel in Switzerland. Nietzsche still holds the distinction of being among the youngest tenured professors of Classical studies. Nietzsche also met and befriended Richard Wagner and his wife. Nietzsche also started publishing some of the works he would be remembered for including The Birth of Tragedy, which attempted to define the tragic roots of music in the ideas of the Apollonian versus the Dionysian. Human, All Too Human, a book of aphorisms tackling such diverse subjects as metaphysics, morality, religion and even gender studies. It was around this time Nietzsche’s health failed, it has usually thought syphilis was the culprit but Nietzsche had suffered ill health since childhood. Some theories also hypothesize that Nietzsche’s turning to philosophy incurred the disordering of his mental health, bi-polar disease has also been mentioned as a factor. Due to these disruptions of his physical and psychological health Nietzsche started traveling to other European cities seeking remedies and treatments for his various conditions. Despite his ill health Nietzsche continued to publish, The Gay Science, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, andBeyond Good and Evil date from this period. It was in Turin, Italy that incident of Nietzsche saving a horse pulling a cart from the wrath of his owner, after which he was arrested and he seemed to suffer a break with reality signing letters to friends ‘Dionysos.’ A friend, Franz Overbeck brought Nietzsche back to Switzerland where Nietzsche continued to write. As his health failed he came under the influence of those around him including an unscrupulous doctor, his mother, and finally his sister Elisabeth, who didn’t understand her brothers writings and after his death on August 25, 1900 used them to her own ends.

Nietzsche’s writings have been pointed to as being anti-Semitic and advocating German nationalism. But the facts of Friedrich Nietzsche’s life dispute this, he severed ties with a publisher because the publisher was anti-Semitic. The anti-Semitism is the work of his sister Elisabeth, who held those beliefs and after the death of Friedrich took it upon herself to compiled The Will to Power from her brothers unpublished notebooks and her misunderstanding of earlier outlines and the imposition of her own beliefs have lead to at least one Nietzsche scholar to classify The Will to Power as a forgery.

Nietzsche’s writing were neither big sellers or well received during his lifetime, it was later generations that discovered him. H.L. Mencken published English translations of his work Jack London discovered a philosophy in Nietzsche, as did Eugene O’Neill, the Nazi’s perverted Nietzsche for their own purposes (as they perverted just about everything else they needed to advance their ideology), and via the beats of the 1950’s, influenced Jim Morrison.

UDATE.

My dear friend Loren died last night peacefully in his bed surrounded by his loving family.

He battled bravely for ten years without a word of complaint and always with a sense of humor.

The angriest word I ever heard him ever utter was, MERCY!

Al Graham

Now cracks a noble heart. Good-night, sweet prince;

And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.

-Hamlet, Act V

My friend, Loren, is ailing right now and has few pleasures these days.  His wife, Mary, is at his side 24/7 caring for his every need.  Always on the hunt to find something to cheer him up, she came up with an idea she thought might do the trick.  She had her son, Michael, build a large plywood platform beneath the window where Loren sits to watch the day go by.  They placed colorful wind chimes, a bird feeder, and a water bottle on the platform.

Soon there were birds descending on it as if it was a new airport runway.  One day, a couple of doves came to visit.  They ate and drank along with the robins, sparrows, cardinals, and even little humming birds all chattering happily like it was a bird social.  The doves must have called, e-mailed, or written to every single dove in San Diego County because in a matter of days, doves began moving in for good.  Today they have even established a queue or a waiting line on some power lines above the house.  They sit waiting patiently for their turn.  There are far too many of them to land all at once.  So they are orderly and organized.

One day, I got a frantic call from Mary asking me to come there immediately.  I ran outside carrying my trusty Flip camera.  When I got to the door, Mary blurted out, “Look behind you!”   I whirled around to see a very young Golden Eagle perched menacingly in a tall palm tree.  His eyes were wild and he looked poised to strike, possibly at me.  I turned on my camera and slowly raised it until his beautiful wild eyes came into view.  He stood quite still.  He seemed to settle down and was more curious than threatening.

He watched the doves, sparrows, and even young blackbirds as they engaged in a feast of seeds and fresh water.  I felt sure that soon he would swoop down and snatch up one of the birds but he just kept watching the joyful activity.

The birds played on as if there was no threat at all and soon the eagle flew away. We all marveled at the outcome and thought that our presence may have saved the lives of a bird or two.  Yesterday I received another frantic call from Mary. The eagle was there again in the very same tree.  He was there simply to observe that blissful pageant.

I never got there in time to see the eagle again, but Mary told me that he was much bigger now and more beautiful than ever.

So the bird platform sits there.  It is an unenclosed aviary inhabited by an army of feathered vertebrates. Loren watches and smiles with glee as the magnificent procession prolongs.

A  few years back when Loren was suffering many seizures, his shunt would malfunction causing him all kinds of problems. He would have hideous hallucinations that shook him up.  One night, his wife asked me to come up because he was in a panic. He imagined that a giant eagle had flown in through his window, which was closed, and that it was hiding behind a chest of drawers.  I convinced him that it had gone but he now saw it at the window again.  I said I would go outside and chase it away.  I did and then yelled to him that it was now gone.  He thanked me and I went home.

The next morning, Loren realized that the intruding eagle was not real and that I had just played along with him at the time in an effort to calm him.  He told Mary that I was a really good friend and then he belly laughed all day about it.