A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT FOR THE DOG-TIRED AMONGST US

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Not enough sleep last night? Did a dumb thing by staying up too late watching your 'GET SMART' episodes on DVD and now you're paying the price for it . . . all-freakin'-day?

Didn't get to bed until 4 AM because you were studying for that final exam today, and now you're just dead on your feet and too tired to remember the correct answers?

Well, help is only 2 fluid ounces away. It's called ENERGY 2000 :



ENERGY 2000 comes in three flavors - Orange, Grape, Berry - and it sells for .99 cents at most Walgreens Drug Stores (at least here in Phoenix, Airheadzona, it does).

I was on a road trip vacation to Las Vegas with a friend once and we hit the road pretty early in the morning. Neither of us had gotten enough sleep the night before, so my friend had brought along a couple 2-ounce bottles of 5-Hour Energy - that product you see advertised often. (Advertising costs money, and the cost of it is passed on to the customer via higher prices - remember that, you'll need it later.) 5-Hour Energy boasts of providing "Hours of energy now - no crash later", and of being "Sugar Free" with "Only 4 calories". They say you'll "Feel it in minutes" and "It lasts for hours".

This was my first experience with 5-Hour Energy, and I'm prepared to confirm that all the company says about it is true. After that road trip, I would occasionally pick up a couple bottles of that stuffs to have on hand when I really needed it.

Then, some months later, I discovered a very similar product called ENERGY 2000 selling at Walgreens for much, much less.

In most convenience stores you'll find 5-Hour Energy selling for between $3. and $3.50. But, as I said above, ENERGY 2000  - made by Global Brands LLC of Scottsdale, AZ. but available only at Walgreens Drug Stores (as far as I know) - sells for a mere .99 cents.

But the question is: Does it work as well as 5-Hour Energy does?

Well, it certainly ought to, seeing as how the ingredients are damn near identical. Let's compare and contrast:



OK, now here's how the ENERGY 2000 label reads:

Serving Size: 2 fl. oz.
Calories: 0 [as compared to 5-Hour Energy's 4]
Total Carbohydrates: 0 g
Niacin (as Niacinamide) :  20 mg [ten mgs. less than 5-Hour Energy]
Vitamin B6 (as Pyridoxine Hydrochloride) : 40 mg.
Folic Acid: 400 mcg.
Vitamin B12 (as Cyanocobalamin) : 500 mcg.
Sodium: 10 mg [8 mgs. less than 5-Hour Energy contains]

Energy Blend 2200 [330 mg more potent than 5-Hour Energy] :
Taurine, Malic Acid, Caffeine, Glucoronolactone, N-Acetyl, L-Tyrosine, L-Phenylalanine [ENERGY 2000 does not include any Citicoline, as found in 5-Hour Energy]

There is no Enzyme Blend listed on the 5-Hour Energy bottle, but there is on ENERGY 2000. It reads as follows:

Enzyme Blend 1 mg :
Amylase, Protease, Lipase, Cellulase, Lactase

So, as you can see, the ingredients are very similar, with each formula tweaked just slightly here and there. I find that ENERGY 2000 does indeed give me energy for at least 5 hours, sometimes more like 6 or even 7 hours. It makes me feel awake and alert, but never jittery, the way too many cups o' coffee affects me. And, no, there is no "crashing" feeling as the little drink is wearing off.

Both products work great - exactly as advertised. But the difference in price is approximately $2.00 to $2.50 per bottle.

So, why am I posting an advertisement for ENERGY 2000 on my blog? Do I work for the company? Do I own stock in the product? NO! & NO! My action is solely self-serving: through this blog bit I hope merely to continue SAVING money, not make more of it. I find that ENERGY 2000 works so well and is so inexpensive that I purchase the stuffs a case at a time now (12 bottles).

I like this product (and its price) so much that I want to see it branch out and become a big seller nationally, so it will remain readily available at a price even I can afford!

If 5-Hour Energy is the kind of product you do buy or would buy on occasion, I urge you to see if ENERGY 2000 is available at a Walgreens Drug Store near you. If it's not, see if it can be requested; perhaps your Walgreens would be willing to stock it on a regular basis.

For more information, try contacting the manufacturer at:
http://www.globalbrandsllc.com/

Then study all night and ace that test. You can celebrate by swimming 2000 laps or playing tennis for a few days and nights.

Sleep?  Fuhgeddaboudit!  We'll watch 'Get Smart' all night, every night, and we'll sleep when we're dead!

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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HOT-BABES-R-US (Or, R U CUTE, PRETTY, BEAUTIFUL AND/OR SEXY?)

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Y’all know Missed Periods, right? She’s the owner/operator of the cleverly named blog ‘Missed Periods And Other Grammar Scares’, where she educates her readers about punctuation and grammar in such an entertaining fashion that they ain’t got no idea they’re bein’ taught sumpin’. (I could use a few more lessons.)

Not too long ago, Missed Periods posted a blog bit titled ‘Crazy Sexy Men’ which she closed with this sentence:

“And speaking of the dictionary, in your opinion, under the word SEXY, whose picture will you find?”

My comment started thus... uhm... ‘thusly’? [Missed Periods, where ya be when I needs ya?!] :

First thing I need to do is differentiate between the categories. (I once considered composing an entire blog bit about this subject with photographic examples of each group, but I just never got around to it.)

I have 4 categories for desirable women:

1: Beautiful
2: Pretty
3: Cute
4: Sexy

Well, guess what, 'STUFFS' fans! I just now "got around to it."

Being the sort of man who appreciates the look of an attractive woman (in other words, “bein’ an ordinary bloke”), I have given this A LOT of thought over the years decades.

Most women would probably assume that most men would be most attracted to #1: Beautiful women. [Missed Periods, was that too many “mosts” in one sentence?] Followed by #2: Pretty. Then #3: Cute. And ALL women want to be thought of as #4: Sexy, or, at minimum, NOT thought of as a “dog”. (Don’t worry, babe, there are very few dogs out there, and you prot’ly ain’t one o’ dem. Besides, dogs need and deserve love too!)

Well, if that’s generally thought to be true by most men – that “Beautiful” is best and “Cute” is least in the ‘Battle Of The Babes’ - then I just ain’t like most men. (But then if you’ve spent more than fifteen minutes reading my blog, you already knew dat.) I will state unequivocally that there are plenty of Cute women I am more attracted to than Beautiful women.

I find that there really is four different classifications for the attractiveness of women. But I also find that there is a little bit of cross-over at times. For example: there’s sometimes a fine line between Beautiful and Pretty, and I’m not always sure which class I would dump a woman into. (Uh... well... if I couldn’t decide whether she was Pretty or Beautiful, the chances are I wouldn’t “dump” her at all.)

And sometimes there is a hard-to-define line between Cute and Pretty. However, NEVER do I find myself confused about whether a woman is Beautiful or Cute. (Is this classifying and labeling of women offending any of you females out there? Gee, I sure HOPE so! You’re so cute when you’re angry.)

The most intriguing, nebulous, elusive, subjective, hard-to-quantify – HOT! – category is #4: Sexy.

Not all Beautiful, Pretty, and Cute women are Sexy. Sexy women have a certain - I dunno - “It” quality that’s almost impossible to put into words, but it just makes a dudeguy’s motor immediately overheat. It’s not necessarily a good thing. I repeat: It’s not necessarily a good thing.

I can admire and I can desire a woman who’s Cute, Pretty, or Beautiful, but a woman who’s Sexy makes me... LUST! Sexy is a kinda Va-Va-Voom(!) essence that brings out the baser, animalistic tendencies in a man. It appeals to the raw, earthy, Pirate-y “Arrrrr!” instinct in a man. "Sexy" is that indefinable something that silently screams: "Jump my bones; have your way with me, boy!" It’s the difference between “loving” and “something-else-ing”.  ...I threepeat: Sexy is not necessarily a good thang. “This world” would probably be better off without it.

Below I will provide two photographs for each 'Attractiveness Category', as seen through Stephen T. McCarthy’s eyes. I’m not trying to imply that I’ve labeled all these women correctly; I’m stating outright that I’ve labeled them ABSOLUTELY correctly.

THE BABE-O-METER ACCORDING TO McME:

1 - BEAUTIFUL :



[GENE TIERNEY]

The founder of 20th Century Fox, Darryl F. Zanuck, said that Gene Tierney was "Undeniably the most beautiful woman in movie history." 

Zanuck couldn't have been more right! Gene Tierney is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen anywhere. But the problem is, Tierney was SO beautiful that she seemed almost unearthly, goddess-like. Any woman who looked like that and allowed a man like me to paw her with his grubby little fingers would immediately lose all my respect!



[GENE TIERNEY again ...because she's just so luscious!]
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[CLAUDIA CARDINALE]

2 - PRETTY :



[MAUREEN O'HARA]



[AMY IRVING]

3 - CUTE :



[VALERIE BERTINELLI]

Oh, I had it bad, and that weren't good.
Until she went and married a guy named Eddie who was almost as "cute" as she was.



[RACHAEL RAY]

Get out in that kitchen and rattle those pots and pans!
Well, roll my breakfast 'cause I'm a hungry man

3.5 – PRETTY CUTE :

This is a kinda in-between category. I can't quite decide if these two women are Pretty or Cute, so I've decided to call them "Pretty Cute".



[SUSAN DEY]

I once wrote a haiku about the 1970s:

Loud clothes! Fords explode! 
Seventies: silly, zitful. 
STILL want Susan Dey! 



[SALLY FIELD]

When she was very young and playing 'The Flying Nun' on television, Sally Field definitely fell into the 'Cute' category. But as she got older, some of the cuteness became prettiness, until she was inhabiting that borderland between the two. -- I like her, I really like her!

4 - SEXY :



[LAUREN BACALL]



[JULIE NEWMAR]

Lauren Bacall and Julie Newmar were both Pretty women, but they also possessed that aura or quality about them that just makes a man (well this man, anyway) have impure thoughts. The other women above - I can fantasize about having a relationship with them. I mean, a nice, good boyfriend/girlfriend or husband/wife relationship. But with Bacall and Newmar, my first thought is of buttons flyin' off and zippers screechin' down! It's horrible, and delightful ...in a sinful way.

I know it sounds exciting - (hell, you should see how exciting it looks in my mind!) - but truth be told, this is not a good, wholesome thang. I REPENT! (...with Penthouse).

How many of the other women shown above do I feel exude that "Sexy"-Appeal aura?

Tierney? No. Too Beautiful to have dirty thoughts about.
Cardinale? Oh, hell yes!
O'Hara? Well, I'd say she's "semi-sexy". She has that quality but it's not quite in full bloom.
Irving? No.
Bertinelli? No. She's too Cute to be Sexy.
Ray? Ditto.
Dey? Don't get me wrong - I would have jumped at the chance, but, no, not really.
Field? No. But she definitely looked "hot" in the movie 'The End' - one of the darkest of Black Comedies.

SPECIAL CASES :

Is it possible for a woman who is NOT Beautiful, Pretty, or Cute to be Sexy? Well, one does come to mind:



[JOAN JETT]

In my opinion, Joan Jett was not Beautiful, Pretty, or Cute [that's the BEST photo I could find of her on the Internet], but she did seem to send that silent signal: "Jump my bones; have your way with me, boy!" Unfortunately, she didn't just come across as "Sexy", but "Sluttish" as well. Because of that, I never lusted for her. She wasn't the type I would bring home to Mother ...nor bring home at all - I'd have to be rather drunk (and good friends tell me that on some nights I was!)



[PAT BENATAR]

I know that a lot of dudeguys from my generation lusted after Pat Benatar. She was Pretty, and she could really sing, but, there was always something about Benatar that turned me off: I always felt she was trying to act "Sexy". But Sexy is an organic thang: you either have it or you don't, and I don't believe anyone can truly "fake it", at least not to me, anyway. I know it when I "FEEL" it, and all your tight clothing, plunging necklines and sashaying around isn't going to convince me that you possess it. I'll know you have "It" when I feel the fire down below!

But, I fourpeat: Sexy is not necessarily a good thang! It makes me think bad thoughts and feel guilty. In a heartbeat I would have married Valerie Bertinelli, but NOT Julie Newmar. (However, there will always be a dark corner in my mind where I will meet Julie for martinis and then let her tie me down like I'm Batman.)

If NONE of this is clear to you, and if ALL of it seems confusing, you need to bear in mind that a person cannot adequately ‘splain sumpin’ unless he or she truly understands it. I confess that I don’t understand this stuffs at all. I instinctively know it, but I can't 'splain it.

All I can state with certainty is that the only women pictured above that I would kick out of bed “just because” is Joan Jett and Pat Benatar. I could embrace the rest of them smoking AND eating crackers in my bed.

Ladies, if all of this yakkin' 'bout women in (almost) strictly physical terms makes you begin to suspect that Stephen T. McCarthy is a "bad" man, please understand that "I'm not bad, I was just drawn that way" ...thirty years ago:



~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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F-WORD FICTION! (Or, HOW CAN YOU HAVE ANY PUDDING IF YOU DON'T EAT YOUR MEAT?)

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In a time of universal deceit,
telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
~ George Orwell

LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov

BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley

THE SOUND AND THE FURY by William Faulkner

CATCH-22 by Joseph Heller

THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck

1984 by George Orwell

SLAUGHTERHOUSE-FIVE by Kurt Vonnegut

ANIMAL FARM by George Orwell

AS I LAY DYING by William Faulkner

THE SUN ALSO RISES by Ernest Hemingway

ON THE ROAD by Jack Kerouac

THE CATCHER IN THE RYE by J.D. Salinger

A FAREWELL TO ARMS by Ernest Hemingway

THE CALL OF THE WILD by Jack London

THE FOUNTAINHEAD by Ayn Rand

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee

ILLUSIONS by Richard Bach

Those are the titles found on Modern Library’s list of '100 Best Novels' that I have read at some point in my life. The majority of them I read in my late teens and early twenties. One exception is ‘Lolita’, which I read in 2010 or ’11. I shouldn’t say I “read” it because I didn’t finish it – I got only about two-thirds of the way through before deciding that my time would be better spent reading some nonfiction instead.

Of course, that hardly exhausts the list of fiction I read in my teens and early twenties; some of the books I enjoyed the most aren’t even found above. Titles such as: ‘Tortilla Flat’; ‘Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’; ‘Roughing It’; ‘A Tree Grows In Brooklyn’; 'White Fang'; 'Look Homeward, Angel'; ‘Crime And Punishment’; ‘Green Eggs And Ham’, et al. And make no mistake about it: I thought Kerouac’s ‘Dharma Bums’ was much better than ‘On The Road’.

A comprehensive list of fiction I’ve read in my lifetime would be many, many times longer than the list posted above!

Not too shabby for a guy who denigrates novels, eh? Strangely enough, some bloggers here in my little bathroom of the Blogosphere probably think of me as: “That guy who hates fiction.”

I don’t hate fiction, and I don’t hate the writers of fiction. (Although they do sometimes irritate me to a noteworthy degree.)

Here’s the deal: I think there is value in reading fiction and everyone should have some knowledge of the classics. I mean, there is definitely a hole in your education if you aren’t familiar with Dickens’ character Uriah Heep; and if you haven’t read ‘Huckleberry Finn’ you have missed a couple of the all-time greatest chapters in the history of social commentary and the written word – namely, chapters 16 & 31. I could easily write one of my patented neverending blog bits about the spirit, psychology, and genius found in chapters 16 & 31 of Mark Twain’s ‘Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn’.

My argument, however, is that when it is plainly observable by anyone with even just two brain cells to rub together that our American society is crumbling down, falling apart, self-destructing before our very eyes, the truly intelligent and wise individual would spend most of their time reading NONFICTION, in order to learn about the world around him or her. And if he or she had a desire to write, that person would aim toward enlightening the world via powerful nonfiction, rather than another “made-up” story from which we are already overburdened!

Look, writer-wannabes, all the great fiction stories have already been written! You ain’t gonna come up with anything genuinely new! “There is nothing new under the sun.” (D’ya know where that quote comes from? No? Then you are not nearly as knowledgeable about the greatest Book on the planet as ya oughter be!)

When it comes to fiction, there’s nothing original left to say; you ain’t doin’ nuttin’ but repackaging something that has already been written before – and most likely BETTER!

Today’s writers of fiction are merely rewrapping old stories or putting multiple older stories into a blender and presenting the “mash-up” as if it were something new. But there’s nuttin’ new in fiction. All of today’s fiction is just one person’s or several persons’ ideas tweaked, twisted, groped, photographed and . . .

. . . wait a second! I’m supposed to be writing a blog bit about writing, not about flying.

See, my problem with fiction isn’t so much a problem with fiction as it is with American priorities. The average American on the street couldn’t begin to explain the Constitution and its Bill Of Rights. The average American on the street couldn’t begin to explain the history and the workings of the Federal Reserve System and the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), and yet those are the two biggest (secular) problems that the U.S.A. faces today!

Why are Americans so oblivious to the “real world” around them? Because all they know about politics is what gets nearly force-fed to them through their newspapers and TV sets. They COULD learn the truth quite easily if they focused more of their reading time on nonfiction titles rather than works of fiction. But nonfiction, they believe, is far less entertaining than is fiction. And they’re mistaken about that, too!

And most of the Americans (at least of the female variety) who dream of writing, dream of becoming the next J. K. Rowling, as if one J. K. Rowling somehow weren’t enough.

I have no problem with anyone reading fiction; I think it’s a good way to rest the mind from the really serious matters at hand. But fiction should be the dessert you treat yourself to after you’ve consumed the main course:

"If you don't eat your meat, you can't have any pudding. How can you have any pudding if you don't eat your meat?"

Now I’m willing to acknowledge that not everyone is going to prefer nonfiction over fiction to the same degree that I do. But, if you give the slightest damn about the world you live in, about the world you’re leaving to your children and to your children’s children, then nonfiction should/would represent at least 50% of what you spend your 'reading-time' reading.

And there’s a terrible misconception out there: By and large, people mistakenly think fiction is more exciting than nonfiction. IT’S NOT! One element that makes nonfiction MORE exciting to read is the fact that nonfiction is... REAL!

Believe it or not, for just about every wild, exciting, heart-stopping
E-ticket fiction you can find, you can also find real, true-life, NON-fiction stories that match it! There is almost nothing in fiction that does not have its counterpart in a biography or history book. “This world” is a hell of a lot more exciting, mysterious, violent, and remarkable than you could possibly imagine. All of the heroes, heroines, antiheroes, tragically flawed heroes, underdogs, rebels, spies, lovers, fighters, connivers, geniuses, and villains that we love to read about in fictional stories do exist in 'true-life' nonfiction books. You can find it ALL in the real world and recorded in great, awesomely memorable works of nonfiction!

From Agee, James and Bronte, Emily to Yeats, William Butler and Zola, Émile, fiction has been covered. As a writer, you might add quantity to it, but you’re not likely to improve it. If you simply must be rich and famous – if that’s important to you - then go right on ahead and continue writing fiction and reading mostly fiction.

But keep in mind that you are fiddling writing "while Rome burns". And unless the American people turn off their televisions soon, put away the latest Fantasy, Thriller, and Sci-Fi books and turn to the information found in nonfiction that can educate us and preserve our basic liberties, before long the only professional writing that ANYONE is going to be doing will be historical revisionism written on behalf of the Ministry Of Truth.

Allow me, please, to suggest some nonfiction reading material:

If you liked this fiction . . .



I recommend this nonfiction . . .



'THE RESURRECTION OF THE SHROUD: New Scientific, Medical And Archeological Evidence' by Mark Antonacci.

If you liked this fiction . . .



I recommend this nonfiction . . .



'THE HARBINGER' by Jonathan Cahn

If you liked this fiction . . .



I recommend this nonfiction . . .



'THE CREATURE FROM JEKYLL ISLAND' by G. Edward Griffin

If you liked this fiction . . .



I recommend this nonfiction . . .



'WITNESS' by Whittaker Chambers

If you liked this fiction . . .



I recommend this nonfiction . . .



'HOSTAGE TO THE DEVIL: The Possession And Exorcism Of Five Living Americans' by Malachi Martin

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

Links:

'THE HARBINGER' by Jonathan Cahn

'THE CREATURE FROM JEKYLL ISLAND' by G. Edward Griffin

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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I’LL SEE YOUR WAYLON AND RAISE YOU ONE . . .

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"You wanna hear 'Waymore’s Blues'"?
"I never heard it."
"You never heard it? - You produced it!"

If you wanna get to heaven gotta d-i-e
You gotta put on your coat and t-i-e
If you wanna get the rabbit out of the l-o-g
You gotta make a commotion like a d-o-g
A-like a d-o-g
["D'ya understand that?"]
Like a d-o-g

When Waylon Jennings asks his sexy wife, Jessi “I’m not Lisa” Colter, “D'ya understand that?”, he seems so much like my Pa [may he rest in peace]. In fact, throughout most of the conversation with Jessi after the song ends, Waylon seems just like my Pa!

Waylon Jennings . Waymore’s Blues solo acoustic



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugm0JZhX3CI

He was - by far - the most charismatic singer I ever saw on a stage. Got to see four shows and I loved ‘em all, but my favorite was probably the first one: standing-room only in this little cowboy joint. And at one point Waylon said to the idiot standing next to me:
“You! Shut up!”
He did.

I grew up with long and lean and hungry looks
I learn’t you can't go nowhere when you go by the book!
People all around me earthbound; I learned how to fly
Upside, downside, outside, sailin’ on by!

Waylon Jennings - Trouble Man



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5_UQJWQG6Q

Waylon kicks Grace Slick’s ass.

I don't explain if you don't understand
I'm my own man - trouble man

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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SLEEP? FUHGEDDABOUDIT! "I’LL SLEEP WHEN I’M DEAD"

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At the tail of October and the snout of November, I read a couple of borrowed biographies about Rock stars Warren Zevon and Tom Petty. After finishing and returning them, I immediately went back to my literary métier: tomes about Communist subversion and espionage. (I’ll bet you didn’t think I knew words like that, huh? I’m referring to “métier”, not “subversion” and “espionage”.)

Below are some excerpts I copied from the biographies, as I found these interesting for this or that reason, or for one thing or another.



‘I’LL SLEEP WHEN I’M DEAD: The Dirty Life And Times Of Warren Zevon’ by Crystal Zevon - 2007

I attended one Warren Zevon concert in my life. As it turns out, I attended the very concert at the Wiltern Theatre in Los Angeles that was described in the following passages. I know this because my ol’ pal General Poohregard, who attended the concert with me, did an online search and discovered that Warren Zevon only played but one show at L.A.’s Wiltern Theater.

By 1987, I had seen SOoooo many music shows that I suppose I’d become a bit jaded. Although Pooh recalls it as being a pretty good, hard-rockin’ performance, I’ve always remembered it as basically “just another Rock concert”.

According to the book, however, everyone (except me, apparently) thought it was a very memorable Zevon performance:

Page 225 - CRYSTAL ZEVON:
Near the end of the Sentimental Hygiene tour, Warren played the Wiltern in Los Angeles. Everyone was there. People I hadn’t seen in years. Warren blew us all away. He was in control of the music and he commanded his audience. Ariel and I were sitting with Warren’s dad, and J.D. Souther was right behind us.

I was jumping to my feet, shouting, whistling, acting like a fan. What I also remember is that there was no alcohol backstage, so I kept making trips to the theater lobby to guzzle glasses of wine. That night marked the beginning of the end of my drinking. I didn’t get sober for another six months, but seeing him onstage, I knew sober was the way to live.

Page 226 - WARREN’S NOTEBOOK:
November 20, 1987
…The Wiltern. Nice theater. Nervous. Dad and his friend, Milt, arrived about 7:00. Then, Merle and Beth. When I came out of the shower, there were roses from Michael Ironside. Andy was nervous, too. The nervousness worked for us – the show felt great. The kids were there with their friends, Crystal & Yvonne, LeRoy, Jimmy, Stephan, J.D., Duncan & his wife – it was quite a night. It was a great night.

OK, now this next passage I found kinda humorous in a ridiculous sorta way:

Pg. 361 - WARREN’S NOTEBOOK
March 29. 1999
…Tom Waits called: Stu told him I knew vocal exercises that help hoarseness (the ones J.D. Souther taught me long distance a decade ago). “Are you sick?” I asked. “Define sick.” I said, “Mormon fever that keeps you home from school.” He said he’d gotten a cortisone shot – “Where?” “Austin.” And so on. I told him I just gave ‘em a shit show – “I get a tan and hold back.”

So, let’s see if I’ve got this right: Tom Waits was concerned that his voice was hoarse? The guy who sings ‘Tom Traubert’s Blues’ thought some of his fans might notice that his voice wasn’t as smoothly polished as it usually is?

Tom Waits - Tom Traubert's Blues (Lyrics)



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztMslNg16og

Pg. 351: WARREN’S NOTEBOOK
April 15, 1998
…Saw “The Spanish Prisoner” with Ariel & Ben. It was wonderful. I turned to Ariel at one point and said, “This is the best movie I’ve ever seen.”

Uh... y’all ever seen ‘The Spanish Prisoner’? It’s a movie that definitely had some potential, and my brother Nappy and I did get caught up in it for awhile. But by the end of the story we had found some holes in the plot that were big enough to drive a Rock star’s limousine through. If it was the best movie Warren had ever seen, then either he had not seen many movies or he wasn’t nearly as brilliant as everyone who knew him says he was. (And, incidentally, Warren was a big film fan - so it’s the latter rather than the former.)



OK, these next passages kind of blew me away . . .

Some of you may recall my blog bit titled ‘ROCK ‘N’ ROLL.A.’ In that bit I wrote the following:

I was thinking that the gypsy wasn't lyin'
All the salty margaritas in Los Angeles
I'm gonna drink 'em up
~ 'Desperados Under The Eaves' by Warren Zevon

Anytime I listen to that song, the line about drinking all the margaritas in Los Angeles immediately makes me think of El Coyote Mexican restaurant on Beverly Blvd. I’ve always thought they made L.A.’s best margarita.

Hokey-Smoke & Hoo-Wee! Gimme an “A” in Intuition! . . .

55 - CRYSTAL ZEVON:
Warren was incredibly jealous. He thought every man on the street was after me, and once we started drinking, it always became my fault. We lived walking distance from our favorite restaurant, El Coyote. The main attractions in those days were the margaritas, the green corn tamales, and the price. One night we were at El Coyote, and the subject of my past relationship with Waddy came up. The fight lasted for days. Warren was convinced that I was sleeping with Waddy, who lived about three blocks away. Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore, so I told him he should just leave.

89 - WARREN’S NOTEBOOK:
April 26, 1975
…Torrance Shopping Center huge & teeming like a skyless future city. Lots of people here & excited for Billy Jack: Waddy sang “Most Likely You Go Your Way, etc,” & “Tumbling Dice.” Place did have a pub with Heinekens on tap, so drank plenty. $600. check. Took Crystal to El Coyote.

Based on those passages above, I’d be willing to bet a Dairy Queen Blizzard that when Warren wrote that line – “all the salty margaritas in Los Angeles, I’m gonna drink ‘em up” – he had El Coyote margaritas in mind... just like I always have when hearing it sung!



[Inside the El Coyote bar, Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles.]



[All the salty margaritas at El Coyote, I'm gonna drink 'em up.]

I was sitting in the Hollywood Hawaiin Hotel
I was listening to the air conditioner hum
It went Hmmm – mmmmm- mmmmm...
~ ‘Desperados Under The Eaves’ by Warren Zevon

40 - DAVID MARKS:
One night he [Warren Zevon] ended up at the Hollywood Hawaiian motel somewhere around Gower and Yucca. He was there for a while, I mean, maybe two or three weeks, and he couldn’t check out because he didn’t have the money to pay the bill. So, one night, I got my mother’s station wagon and pulled it into the alley. He threw all his stuff out the bathroom window and we escaped without paying.

40 - CRYSTAL ZEVON:
Years later, when Warren got sober, he actually went back there to pay the bill. Of course, by then he’d written and recorded “Desperados Under The Eaves”, so they settled for a few copies of his ‘Warren Zevon’ album.

David Marks, incidentally, was an original Beach Boy when that band initially formed. And that passage above calls into question whether or not the Princess Grace Apartments at Yucca and Grace was indeed formerly known as the Hollywood Hawaiian Motel, as reported in Art Fein’s book ‘L.A. Musical History Tour’ and repeated in my blog bit ‘ROCK ‘N’ ROLL.A.’

My Nephew helped me locate the Princess Grace Apartments at ‘Google Map’ to determine if there is an alley that runs adjacent to it. The view was inconclusive, but if there was an alley, what’s left of it today is very narrow and is hardly even worthy of the name “Alley”.

The Hollywood intersections of Yucca & Grace and Yucca & Gower are separated by only six blocks, so it is possible that all those years later, Marks’ memory missed the mark by a mere six slim streets. Who can say whose account we should take a-literally?

Well, I pawned my Smith-Corona
And I went to meet my man
He hangs out down on Alvarado Street
By the Pioneer Chicken stand
~ 'Carmelita' by Warren Zevon



25 & 26 - HOWARD KAYLAN:
…I wasn’t stable at all, and neither was he [Warren Zevon]. We would drink red wine in the afternoon, we would take acid, we would smoke bongs, and then we would start walking down to Sunset Boulevard.

We wound up using as a hangout Pioneer Chicken Stand on Sunset Boulevard, which was a notorious bad fast food place that caters pretty much to twenty-four-hour biker, hooker, and dealer servicing. But either we didn’t care, or we were just too high to notice.

This too raises some questions. As I wrote in ‘ROCK ‘N’ ROLL.A.’, there was at one time a Pioneer Chicken stand on Alvarado Street, in the parking lot of where the Vons supermarket is located today. That is just a couple blocks from Echo Park. As a youngster in the early 1970s, I passed the chicken stand many times while en route to Dodger Stadium with my Grandfather.

Warren Zevon HAD to be aware of the Pioneer Chicken stand on Alvarado because it was only a block or two north of the Sunset Boulevard ‘Burrito King’ where he used to eat. However, based on Howard Kaylan’s reminiscences, it seems Warren had a more intimate knowledge of a Sunset Boulevard Pioneer Chicken stand – one I don’t specifically recall.

One wonders why Zevon didn’t sing “He hangs out down on Sunset Boulevard by the Pioneer Chicken stand”, since ‘Sunset Boulevard’ and ‘Alvarado Street’ both contain five syllables.

The only answer I can think of is this: Sunset Blvd. is a very long street that stretches from the eastern edge of downtown Los Angeles to the ocean, where it terminates at the Pacific Coast Highway. But most people unfamilar with L.A. don’t associate the name Sunset Blvd. with the grimy, graffitied downtown and Echo Park areas; rather, most people think of Sunset Blvd. as a place loaded with glitzy nightclubs and strolling celebrities. (And, yes, it’s that too.)

Did Warren mention the Pioneer Chicken stand on Alvarado Street, rather than the run-down, lowlife Pioneer stand on Sunset Blvd. (which he was more familiar with) only because the name ‘Sunset Boulevard’ would have betrayed the grungy, dangerous word-picture he was attempting to paint in the minds of non-Angeleno record buyers?

68 - CRYSTAL ZEVON:
Elmer started in on Warren. “So, Warren, ya met manual yet?” I’m so naïve, I actually thought he was referring to a person until Bop [Warren’s grandfather] stood up, looked at Warren and me, and said, “If you want to leave now, we’ll understand.” Warren got up to go, but I put my hand on his leg and we finished dinner.

Apparently I’m still as “naïve” as Crystal was then. Does anybody know what “manual” refers to here? Is that a euphemism for some sex act or something?

Mama couldn't be persuaded
When they pleaded with her,
"Daughter, don't marry that gamblin' man."

Gambler tried to be a family man
Though it didn't suit his style
He thought he had him a winning combination
So he took us where the stakes were high

Her parents warned her, tried to reason with her
Never kept their disappointment hid
They all went to pieces when the bad luck hit
Stuck in the middle, I was the kid
~ ‘Mama Couldn’t Be Persuaded’ by Warren Zevon

57 - CRYSTAL ZEVON:
…One night Don, Karen, Warren, and I went downtown [Las Vegas] to gamble. Warren didn’t gamble, but he cheered Don on when he rolled snake eyes at the craps table. He’d bet conservatively, but after a couple more good rolls, he upped his stakes. He couldn’t lose. Finally, Don scooped up his chips and we left. We were all drunk on luck and Don split his winnings with us. When we got back to our room [at the Landmark Hotel], Warren talked about his childhood and we watched the sun come up and held on to each other knowing how much we had to lose. Or gain. That night, he scrawled the beginnings of a new song called “Mama Couldn’t Be Persuaded” on the hotel stationery.

I have never been able to listen to ‘Mama Couldn’t Be Persuaded’ without thinking of my parents: Pa was always a gamblin’ man – ‘The Racing Form’, his daily newspaper – and my Ma married him in Las Vegas, where I was probably conceived. Many’s the time I went to Vegas with my Pa, watched him gamble at the tables, drank with him at the bars [The Landmark, The Fremont, The Mint], and learned from him how to play the horses.

And then to read that Warren actually began to compose that song while staying in Vegas at The Landmark, it’s too much! No wonder the eponymous ‘Warren Zevon’ album has always felt to me like it was my own personal musical statement!

325 - WARREN’S NOTEBOOK:
…When I said that Warren Oates was in my favorite movie, a riotous exchange of lines from “Bring Me The Head Of Alfredo Garcia” ensued; one of his [Dwight Yoakam’s] favorites also. Dwight’s great.

Have you ever seen Sam Peckinpah’s movie ‘Bring Me The Head Of Alfredo Garcia’?

It could have been titled ‘Show Me The Breasts Of Isela Vega'.



‘CONVERSATIONS WITH TOM PETTY’ by Paul Zollo – 2005

I found this really surprising . . .

Page 288 – Tom Petty:
“I love the ukulele. You can’t be sad and play the ukulele. It always brings a smile into the room.”

Petty used a ukulele in the song 'The Man Who Loves Women'.

Now this will seem a bit insane but I read the book about Tom Petty solely in the hope that it would reveal where his ‘Hard Promises’ album cover photograph was taken.



‘Hard Promises’ is my favorite Tom Petty album and I had been wondering from the time I purchased that Licorice Pizza in 1981 where the cover shot was taken. I had noticed that Petty appeared to be in a Mexican record store and the sign on one wooden crate says “California”, so I guessed it was probably somewhere in Los Angeles.

There were a couple of record stores geared toward Hispanic customers in the neighborhood where I grew up and so I wondered if Petty might have been photographed in one of them.

The answer came kind of late in the book and in the form of a photograph caption. There was an alternative picture of Petty taken in the same record store during the same album cover photography session and the caption said that the shots had been taken in a downtown L.A. record shop in 1981.

Ah-ha! That makes sense because I knew that there were a few Hispanic record stores in downtown L.A. that I myself had browsed through from time to time over the years. The odds are that at one time or another I stood in that same record store represented on the ‘Hard Promises’ album cover. Cool! Let’s hear it for Menudo, Freddy Fender and Los Texas Tornados!

Texas Tornados on Austin City Limits



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySNON249yes

BONUS TRACK:

FUHGEDDABOUDIT - The Official Way To Write It:

So I found myself at the Christown AMF bowling alley and waiting for my ol’ girlfriend to finish her frame – she’s in the ‘Over-70-Bowling-League’. (Well, losers can’t be choosers!) While waiting for the dog to roll her wheelchair up to the line and roll her last balls into the gutter, I decided to have a glass of Grand Marnier at the bar.

While nursing my GraMar I was watching the game show ‘Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?’ which just happened to be on one of the boob tubes in the bar/off-track betting parlor.

At one point a question was asked and answered about some official city signs that read “Leaving Brooklyn. Fuhgeddaboudit.”

This caught me by surprise because I’d never known there were actual signs proudly displaying that slang expression. So I did a little Google searching when I got home and discovered that not only do four of the signs exist, but that I had always instinctively written that slang expression letter-for-letter perfectly.



According to the Internet, the signs are found at:

Gowanus Expressway approaching the Verazzano
BQE approaching the Kosciuczko Bridge
Belt Parkway near the Queens border, and
Belt Parkway, ramp to the Verazzano

Naturally, I was reminded of the time someone said the following to me:

Do me a favor, though - stop using "fuhgeddaboudit." Without any Italian in ya, youze just don't say it right, and it make my ears hurt. In fact when ya types it, it makes my eyes hurt.

In other words, the person was implying that I didn’t butcher English properly - that I was speaking and writing bad English incorrectly. But I found out much later that - according to the Brooklynites themselves - I was butchering it just right.

I may not have “Clue One” about how to cook Steak Pizzaiola, but I am at least capable of throwing together an Italian Slangwich.

Ukulelely Yours . . .

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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DOGS, VOMIT, FOOLS AND FOLLY (ANNEX)

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Link: No Backmasked Messages

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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“CAN YOU WEAR ME NOW?”

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It will be nearly impossible for anyone who has known me during the 666 years I’ve lived here in Phoenix, Airheadzona, to believe this but, in fact, I DO have a personal style when it comes to clothing.

The reason no one who currently knows me “in the flesh” will accept that statement is because no one who knows me now has seen my “style”. And that’s because the majority of the year, Phoenix is hotter’n ‘ell and so I dress purely for comfort, not for style. I have been forced to abandon my style preference solely in order to survive the blasted heat!

I’m fast approaching the 17th anniversary of my move to Phoenix, but much of my life here has been so hellish that it only FEELS like 666 years. When I arrived here in the Summer of ’95, I almost immediately adopted my brother Nappy’s lifelong style of dress, which can be summed up thus: Put on the first T-shirt at the top of the stack in the chest of drawers.

So, unless I’m working “on the clock”, I’m almost always just wearing jeans and a T-shirt. I’d love to re-adopt my “natural” style, but that won’t happen in the foreseeable future. I own a couple of stylish overcoats. One is grey - it was originally owned by my dear friend Martin Brumer and given to me by his Mom after he passed away. The other one, which I purchased for myself in 1988, is either black or navy blue. The fact that I’m not entirely sure which color it is gives you some indication how long it’s been since I’ve seen it.

My own “style” of preference, however, is jeans and a dark vest worn over a light colored long-sleeved shirt (such as white, tan, pale blue, pale yellow, or even a pale pink). I still have the vests, but they usually just hang around together in the closet, gossiping about what a maroon I am.

Before the unfortunate move to Hell, Airheadzona, here’s the way you’d usually find me dressed:



In my twenties, I pretty much lived in that black leather jacket you see in the ‘Statue Of Liberty’ photograph at the top of this blog. As I matured, I gradually gave up the urban “hoodlum” appearance and replaced it with the classier “Western” vest look. And as I said, that (strictly through necessity) eventually degenerated into the T-shirt thang.

I can tell you precisely what I’ll be wearing for the next three days just by going to my chest of drawers and checking which 3 T-shirts are at the top of the stack:

Tomorrow it will be my ‘U.S. Constitution* - *Void Where Prohibited By Law’ T-shirt. On Saturday it will be my T-shirt with the Henry David Thoreau quote printed on the front (“Always you have to contend with the stupidity of men.”); and the following day it’ll be my “Revelation Riders Rodeo” T-shirt. Oh, boy!

The only thing I am very fond of and still get to wear regularly is the blue-‘n’-green checkered, thermal-lined cotton shirt my Sister gave me for Christmas eons ago. Along with my vests and my black leather jacket of old, this has been the most beloved article of clothing in my lifetime. It has been so practical that it’s been almost like a cowboy hat to me.

I have worn this shirt while camping, walking, flying, and driving. I’ve worn it while horribly sober and while pleasantly drunker’n you could possibly imagine! Innumerable are the nights I’ve gone to sleep in it! And almost every evening from December through March, I wear this shirt in my house to fight off the chill. (I’m wearing it right this very moment as I type this sentence!)

So many times I’ve told my Sister that she needs to find and buy me a new one 'cause I almost done-have worn this shirt out! It’s been one of the best Christmas gifts I’ve ever received.

Think I’m exaggerating? Below are photographs I took of this very shirt at about 16:30 this afternoon (that’s 4:30 PM to those of y’all who don’t know Military Time). I realize the shirt looks like a dog has been roughhousing with it for about six years but, take my word for it, no dog has ever had this shirt in its choppers. It was love, and love only, what dun this to the shirt. [Love’ll do this to ya!] :





The label just inside the collar gives the brand name of this shirt as ‘GRAND BANKS Outfitters’ and indicates that it was “Made In Guatemala”.



I’m sure this was a fairly inexpensive article of clothing, most likely found at a Ross Dress-For-Less store or something along those lines. All I know for sure is that . . . I NEEDS ME ANUDDER ONE O’ DEEZE SHIRTS!

This great shirt has outlasted most automobiles, marriages, wines, and fruitcakes. (Well, OK, maybe not fruitcakes – those things last forever!) But, clearly, as proven by the photographs above, this shirt probably has no more than another decade of service to provide before it bites the dust.

Two Qs:

#1) Anyone know where I can get me another one o’ these shirts?

#2) What is your own all-time favorite article of clothing, past or present?

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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THE HIGHS AND LOWS OF GRAND MARNIER IN ROCK ‘N’ ROLL HISTORY

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‘THIS WHEEL’S ON FIRE: Levon Helm And The Story Of The Band’ by...(yup, you guessed it)...Levon Helm.



[Cool photo borrowed from The Nicole Nelch Blog]

It’s a 300+ page book that was given to me for Christmas by my good friend The Flyin’ Aardvark. (The Flyin’ Aard knows what this boy wants!) And I had probably finished reading the book a week or two after unwrapping it on Christmas Day.

Levon Helm was always my favorite member of THE BAND. And I liked his down-home name so much that I even borrowed the first half of it for a short story I wrote in 1994. The character was a small-town newspaper journalist named Levon Rendman whose research leads him to discover that the local legend is actually more myth than fact and when he publishes the “nonfiction” version - thinking the inhabitants of this “wide spot in the road” will appreciate learning the truth - he unexpectedly finds himself both dogged and ostracized by the community to the point that he up and moves his family out of the state.

Levon Rendman . . . Rendman. Get it? He tears the local legend apart – rends it – and suffers the consequences.

Anyway, whatever.

I found Levon Helm’s story of The Band plenty interesting. I’ll tell you this much: Robbie Robertson does not come off looking too good in this band biography. Hoo-Wee! Talk about getting hit with a heavy wordstick!

But this blog bit is not about Robbie Robertson, The Band, nor even Levon Helm; this blog bit is about Grand Marnier, or “GraMar” as I sometimes call it (because we are such close friends).



Grand Marnier is an 80-proof liqueur made in France from cognac and the essence of oranges. It’s pretty much the only thing that keeps me from despising the French to the degree that I should and would like to.

Grand Marnier (you can call it “GraMar” too, if you like it as much as I do) has, in two ways, figured prominently in Rock ‘N’ Roll – a high point, and also one of Rock’s real low points.

THE “HIGH” POINT:

Well, it’s not news to anyone who has followed ‘STUFFS’ for awhile to learn that I feel the cover of Nils Lofgren’s debut solo LP is the best that Rock ‘N’ Roll has ever given us.



It’s a bottle of Grand Marnier our hero is tilting in that album cover photo.

I’ve already written about this a couple times and I’m not going to repeat myself yet again. If you’re interested in learning WHY I think ‘Nils Lofgren’ is the best Rock ‘N’ Roll album cover and how I think it probably inspired my own ‘Statue Of Liberty’ picture [see photo at the top of this blog!] you can read the older blog bits titled ‘Music’s All-Time 15 Best Album Covers’ and ‘Yakkin’ With Rock Stars Nils ‘N’ Norman’. (I’ll include links again at the bottom.)

OK, the “high” point has already been covered. That brings us to the other.

THE LOW POINT:

Richard Manuel was a member of The Band. He was primarily a keyboardist but he could play just about anything, including drums. He was also one of The Band’s songwriting vocalists.



[Richard Manuel is at the far left in this album cover photo.]

Unfortunately, on March 4, 1986, Richard Manuel committed suicide by hanging himself in a Florida motel bathroom. It seems the last drink Manuel ever consumed was Grand Marnier, as Levon Helm tells us in his book that when he entered Manuel’s room on that morning, there was an empty GraMar bottle on the dresser.

Now if that’s all there was to this, I wouldn’t have bothered composing a blog bit about it. You see, among the many other interesting things I learned by reading ‘This Wheel’s On Fire’ is that Richard Manuel was a Grand Marnier hound!

[Warning: What’s coming next is rather sad.]

On page 246, Helm tells of how Manuel, at one point, moved into a bungalow on Zuma Beach in Malibu, near the Shangri-La recording studio. (My grade school, junior high school, and high school buddy Eric used to live just a few blocks from Shangri-La and I remember him showing it to me on one of my many weekend visits to his Malibu house.)

At any rate, Manuel’s Zuma Beach bungalow was originally a shed where TV’s talking horse Mr. Ed used to live. Levon writes: “We had Mr. Ed’s stable converted to a bungalow, and Richard moved in and basically stayed there for the next year, drinking seven or eight bottles of Grand Marnier...a day, relying on the sugar in the liqueur to keep his weight up.”

HOKEY-SMOKE! Seven or eight bottles a day? If I had seven or eight GLASSES of GraMar I’d be gassed! At 80-proof, Grand Marnier is the same strength as most whiskey, vodka, and tequila. Some hard alcohol is a little stronger, such as absinthe and most gin. But 80-proof is the standard “adult dose”. 7,8/80/7? (7 or 8 bottles of 80-proof 7 days a week?) Sheesh! It’s a wonder Manuel lived long enough to hang himself!

Levon later tells us that when they finally managed to get Manuel to move out of Mr. Ed’s Zuma Beach stable, it took “a couple of days to clean out the two thousand Grand Marnier bottles they found.”
[Page 277]

If only I could AFFORD that much GraMar! That stuffs ain’t cheap. I’ll tell you this much though: it’s a helluva high. I’m not surprised that Richard Manuel (and Nils Lofgren) liked it so much. The chemical reaction is different for everyone, of course, but various alcoholic drinks provide various effects.

Examples: Beer usually just makes me sluggish; tequila makes me crazy; wine and GraMar make me happy; gin just tastes good; and vodka . . . well, vodka, I just won’t touch the stuffs - that’s for Rooskies in Commieville.

So, anyway, now you know the Highs and the Lows of Grand Marnier in Rock ‘N’ Roll history.

Hmmm... "Thought I’d something more to say".

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

Links:

‘Music’s All-Time 15 Best Album Covers’

‘Yakkin’ With Rock Stars Nils ‘N’ Norman’

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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AMERICA’S FIRST SPORTS DRINK? (Or, "SHAKE YOUR YOO-HOO!")

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Back when I was a youngster there were no home video games, iPods, or cell phones. And, in fact, there were very few malls. So we boys spent most of our time playing sports. It was always Twinkie, Wally Murphy, my brother Napoleon, and me (plus whoever else had found a way out of doing their household chores) and we were always playing something.

If we weren’t involved in an organized baseball game at Sunset Little League then it means we were out on the street playing Wiffle Ball. Or if it wasn’t that, then we were at Marine Park playing tackle football, Over-The-Line, or Pickle. How many boys today could even explain Over-The-Line or Pickle?

Pickle – as in “you’re in a pickle” – was a way for three boys to practice their base-stealing skills. One kid would be trying to see how many bases he could steal back-and-forth, while the other two boys were trying to get him in a run-down and tag him out. The player who managed to steal the most consecutive bases by the end of the Pickle session was the winner. And a Pickle session ended when the boys were too tired to run anymore or when it was time to go home for dinner. Meaning, of course, the latter, because we boys NEVER reached a point where we were too tired to run anymore! For Twinkie, Wally, Nappy, and I, the bases at Marine Park were usually represented by two trees. (I wonder how big those trees are today!)

And if we weren’t playing Little League Baseball, Wiffle Ball, tackle football, Over-The-Line, or Pickle, then it means we could be found in the backyard playing “Birdie Ball” - a form of baseball we had invented using a miniature souvenir bat and badminton birdies.

Anyway, there were very few fat kids during my boyhood era because we were all too busy playing sports. We never thought of it as “exercising”.

Nowadays, there are a lot of fat kids around because the only thing they exercise are their thumbs via texting and Xbox (“virtual” sports).

In that same era, Twinkie, Wally, Nappy and I also drank a good deal of YOO-HOO. Yoo-Hoo, which is still around today, is a chocolate flavored beverage. I would describe it as tasting like a nonfat or lowfat chocolate milk.

Of course, the packaging design changed a great deal over the years, but back in ‘The Days Of Pickle’, the labels used to say “Shake! It’s Great!” and also “A Chocolate Flavored ACTION Drink”.

Although in our Santa Monica stores we always found Yoo-Hoo bottled, read the label on the second can from the left in the photo below:



You always had to shake a Yoo-Hoo well before drinking it because otherwise all the chocolate syrup would be coagulated at the bottom of the bottle. “Shake! It’s Great!”

About three years ago, Yoo-Hoo entered into a conversation that brother Nappy and I were having about “the good ol’ days”. And recalling how the labels used to read “A Chocolate Flavored ACTION Drink”, I jokingly remarked: “Forget Gatorade. Yoo-Hoo was America’s first sports drink!”

I thought that was kinda funny in a facetious sorta way. That is until a year later when I acquired a copy of ‘THE YOGI BOOK: I Really Didn’t Say Everything I Said!’ by Yogi Berra.

You know Yogi, right? The great Hall Of Fame catcher who played for the New York Yankees and who is almost as well known for all his famous malapropistic sayings.

“It ain’t over ‘til it’s over.”

“It’s déjà vu all over again!”

“We were overwhelming underdogs.”

“The future ain’t what it used to be.”

“A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore.”

“We’re lost, but we’re making good time!”

“Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.”

“If people don’t want to come to the ballpark, how are you going to stop them?”

And many more . . .

Well, I was greatly surprised to discover in ‘THE YOGI BOOK’ that way back when – long before I was drinking Yoo-Hoo and playing Pickle with the boys - Yogi and some of his Yankees teammates were acting as spokesmen for that “Chocolate Flavored ACTION Drink”. So, in a sense, I mighta been sorta correct: It seems Yoo-Hoo might really have been advertised as America’s first "sports" drink. (And here I thought I was being clever!)









And wouldn’t you know it? There’s even a screwy Yogi Berra remark associated with Yoo-Hoo! ‘THE YOGI BOOK’ contains this little anecdote:

At a YOO-HOO convention, a woman asked Yogi, “Is Yoo-Hoo hyphenated?” Yogi answered, “No, ma’am, it isn’t even carbonated!”

One of my favorite players on the 2001 World Champion Arizona Diamondbacks team was Reggie Sanders. He only played that one season with the D-Backs, but he had a pretty good year for a power-hitting outfielder: .263 Average; 33 Home Runs; 90 RBI; 14 Stolen Bases.



I’d noticed that Sanders had a quirky little habit. When he was standing near home plate, about to enter the batter’s box, he would often hold his baseball bat at the center of the thick barrel and shake it back and forth three or four times. Whenever I saw him doing that in important, pressure situations, just for good luck, I would call out to Reggie through the TV screen, “Shake your Yoo-Hoo!” It was amazing how often that seemed to bring positive results.



Hey, baby, show us your Yoo-Hoo! . . .



Hmmm... I think I’d rather have Yoo-Hoo in me than on me.

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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