Teeth

I broke a tooth the other day and once again in the category of how things are improving, as I sat in the dentist's chair I was reminded how much better this was going to be than years ago.  Today, it's almost impossible to have any work done without a local anesthetic.  And it's not given with a needle the size of a hollowed out six-inch nail either.  Furthermore before the needle you get a little pad held against the gum by the nurse to numb the area - Wow, that's some improvement right there. 

I remember years ago having a sore gum just from the needle and it went on for days.  The anesthetic also wears off about the time you get in the car afterwards, and doesn't last all day and make you spill soup down your shirt front at lunch.  Then the filling itself is now a resin, treated with a little lamp, and not half a pound of lead that would weigh you down for the rest of your life.  So the next time you're tempted to think things were better years ago think about a future visit to your friendly dentist.  If you are new to the blog or didn't catch it, here is a clip sent to me back in June about an Indian street dentist - pretty crude work but effective. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WR8tIjTykbE

Movie Number 5

This week we reach the halfway point of my favorite movies of all time.  Number 5 is "Master and Commander" with Russell Crowe.  I've mentioned this movie before in an earlier post when I was writing about my grandfather who was in the Royal Navy.  He first served his apprentiship aboard a sailing ship and the traditions he endured were not that far removed from the setting of this era in history, which was during the great period of Admiral Lord Nelson.
The film shows the life aboard one of Nelson's fighting ships under the command of its Captain played by Russell Crowe.  I love his understanding of the ship, the men and his responsibilities - truly a man in the right job at the right time.  There is one scene where he stands on the bowsprit hanging onto a line, charging through the foaming water, obviously loving every minute of it. The battle scenes are horribly realistic, but I believe very accurate as is everything else about this film.

Health

Like me you probably receive a number of emails listing out how good things were years ago.  While it's interesting to reflect about this sort of romance, there are a number of ways that things have definitely improved.

Over the weekend the paper stated that San Bernardino was the best place in the US to recover from TB.  And there I was thinking it was just the best place to get mugged!

It took me back to my very early childhood when the "White Man's Burden" was a fact of every day life.  Lots of people had, or knew someone who had TB.  Sufferers would disappear to sanitariums for long periods.

I wonder how many people remember that on every bus in the UK was a sign saying: NO SPITTING

Remarkable that people had to be told this.  But with dirty air, a lot of smoking and also chewing tobacco, people used to spit regularly, and saliva was a great carrier of the virus that spread tuberculosis.  I can't say I'm sorry to be rid of the habit of spitting, although I think we do need to educate baseball players not to do it.  It seems the only place now where it's acceptable.

Cruise Round-up Part II

Our third port of call was San Diego.  This is a city we know quite well, although we didn't know the new Gaslamp Quarter which we walked around in the afternoon.  It's a couple of blocks of shops, restaurants and bars that was just getting started for the day's customers.  It's a huge improvement on the old downtown area which used to be quite scuzzy.

The highlight of the visit was a trip around the USS Midway which is now a museum.  I'll  be writing a piece on it for the paper.  Too bad I wasn't able to call in advance and get free tickets - as a powerful member of the elite liberal media!!!!

"The Island" where the admiral controls things.

The aircraft carrier which starred in Tom Cruise's movie, Top Gun, was the biggest ship afloat when it was launched in 1945.  It was finally retired in 1992.

A couple of days ago two S. Californian college football teams played a match on the flight deck, and there was plenty of room for spectators.
The piece in the Sun should come out on Nov 27th.

The Flight Deck - big enough to play a football match!

Our final port of call was the small Mexican town of Ensenada.  Fortunately, the cartels have left this alone so far and we took a shuttle into the center and a walk back.  As usual we were regaled with the usual vendors who all seem to think that they can't sell anything unless they're making a nuisance of themselves.  We had lunch at a real "locals" place called La Comadre.  It was superb. Handmade tacos with a variety of meats to put in them and all sorts of toppings too.  Lunch for three came out at about $7.  I had to have more as well.



On the way  back I took a picture of our travelling companion, Charlie,  with S.W.M.B.O.  The Mexicans do like big flags.



And finally, the sharp end of the Sapphire Princess - it's big!



Sunday' Column - Norton Simon

King and Queen by Henry Moore

Viewers in one of the many galleries

Millionaires are currently getting a bad rap with the Wall Street protesters.  However some of them, apart from providing jobs and inventing things, do provide other benefits to society.  Take for instance Norton Simon.  He was a 50's, 60's and 70's man.  His empire included Max Factor, Avis, Canada Dry and McCall's Publishing.  He was immensely rich and he became a huge collector of art. 
His collection was so large that when he died in 1993, it had to be housed in a museum just to cope with the size of it.  It is impossible to see everything in a few visits.  This was my second trip to the place, located in Pasadena, and once again I took Evan along with me.
Like the last time, we spent a lot of time looking at the Impressionists but then we went out into the garden.  Simon liked sculpture and he amassed a lot at that too.  Above is a piece by Henry Moore the great English sculptor.  It was originally designed to sit on his native Yorkshire hillsides, but there have been some half-dozen made since, and they are now all over the world.  To read the entire column go to www.sbsun.com/trevorstravels

Music Track - Dudley

I'm not a great fan of Jazz, but when I was living in Southampton in the very late 50's and early 60's the local TV Station - Southern Television, as I remember - often used to put on the Dudley Moore Trio late at night and I used to watch them.  Not a lot of people knew in his later career that "Dud," was a very talented musician and had won an organ scholorship to Magdalen College, Oxford. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5h52d0I1VpE

Wonderful Short Video

I'm rather fond of animals, therefore it was upsetting on Wednesday morning to wake up to hear about the escaping wild animals in Ohio being shot to death.  Some 48 were killed - all very sad.  But then this morning we awoke to hear of another animal being put down - the famed Col. Ghaddafi.  Absolutely no tears shed there at all.
In a more upbeat mood though, my friend Don, in Orange County sent me this marvelous video of an owl on final approach.  It only lasts about 45 seconds and it's well worth watching for the last few seconds.  Imagine being a small rodent looking up to see those talons! http://www.dogwork.com/owfo8/

Trash

I watched an old movie the other day - it's not going on the list of ten best, by the way.  It was called Act of Vengeance with Robert Ryan, and it was made in 1949.  A lot of the scenes were shot in downtown Los Angeles - almost next to Angels' Flight as it happened.  (Refer to the archives for more on that interesting LA landmark.)

What I also noticed in the film was the enormous amount of trash blowing around on the streets.  Now I know that things are not exaclty pristine in that area of town, but they are a heck of a lot better than they used to be.
I think we often believe that matters are getting worse in life, but trash is one way of seeing an improvement.  The above picture is always a possibility, particularly after rain, but more and more things are a lot tidier around Western societies.  Does anyone remember the Keep Britain Tidy campaign in the 60's.  I think it worked.

Movie # 6

Movie number six is Apocalypse Now.  I saw this movie when it came out, in the north of England which is not one of my favorite places.  I'll try and explain that in a future post.  But at the time I was not in a very happy state and I found the film to be very depressing.  Also the final part where Martin Sheen meets up with the mad Col. Kurtz, is it?  Played by Marlo Brando it is very weird.  ("Oh, the horror!)  However like a lot of moves over the years, I've watched it several more times and come to appreciate it, hence its position here on my list of the top ten movies.  I wonder if you agree with me so far.  If you're new to the blog you can go into the index at the side and click on "Movie," or go into the previous month's postings.

Fall

It seems that the East Cast is not getting its fair share of colors this year due to rain.  In fact we have some friends who took a cruise along the north east coast and were quite disappointed.
Now of course, living as we do up at 6,750 feet above sea level we don't have the profusion of trees that turn in the autumn, although if you look at the left hand tree here you can see that its needles are going brown.  This is just before they drop to allow the new ones to come through.


However, we do have some wonderful maples in the area and this gives us quite a bit of lovely color.

Cruise Round-Up

The week's cruise we just completed was a little different, in that it was based mostly along the Californian coast.  Of course, as foreign ships are not allowed to ply among US ports we had to tack on a trip to Ensenada, thereby permitting Princess to avoid all the US labor laws and the huge price of doing business here as a US company.  I think it's the Jones Act of 1920, but I might be wrong on that.

This is our third trip aboard the Sapphire Princess and it is a very beautiful boat.  It is 116,000 tons and caters to 1900 passengers.  Cruising has sometimes cruelly been called an activity for the "newly wed, or the nearly dead!"  And there were not too many of the former category on board.  In fact this was the oldest cruise we've ever taken in terms of the age of the other passengers.  I would say that at least 80% were over 80 and many of these weren't carrying it too well.  As such the company had modified their programs to deal with the habits of the passengers.  Very few late night shows in the theater as most of the audience had retired.  At least they weren't overweight!
Santa Barbara, San Francisco, San Diego all gave me material for future columns and I've already got two of them written.
The food was terrific and the service excellent.  The weather was superb and we missed a storm that swept through and blew our fence down. Now repaired.

This is Francisco our cocktail waiter.  He worked very hard serving the obligatory drinks before dinner.  If you look carefully, you can see his wallet is on fire.  He used to do small conjuring tricks to keep every one amused.  Mostly I'm not fond of such stuff, but he was pretty good.

One evening show they put on was done by the crew and they were all very talented - naturally Francisco was on the bill.

We had a wonderful day in Santa Barbara, a day at sea next and then arrived in San Francisco, where we made a return trip to Alcatraz where we had been 25 years ago.  Not much has changed I can assure you.  It's a very popular site even though it has been nearly fifty years since they had any prisoners there.  The last one, Frank Weatherby, left in 1963 from the prison which had held the worst of the worst since 1934.  This was where Al Capone was held for evading taxes, which goes to show you don't mess with the IRS!

Looking out across the bay with San Francisco being only

1.25 miles away, one can only imagine the sense of isolation felt

by the 1576 prisoners who were incarcerated there in its history.

The movie, Escape From Alcatraz, starring Clint Eastwood gives perhaps the best understanding of life on The Rock.  Playing the role of Frank Morris he and two others dug their way out of their cells using spoons.  It took a year and they managed to get into the passage behind where the pipes ran up to the roof.

The cell number 152 shows the dummy's head that Morris used to fool the night guard while they ran across the roof, down the wall and onto the beach.  They used inflated macintosh's to help them float across the bay.  They were never heard of again and there is still controversy as to whether they made it.  Personally I doubt it as I'm sure someone would have sung like the proverbial canary after so long.  I think it's human nature.  Part two of the report to follow soon.

Sunday's Column - Alpine Slide

About ten years ago when my grandson, Evan, was about 6 or 7, we were left alone in the house one afternoon.  Both his mother and grandmother had gone out on female type business.  We got bored and so I asked him if he fancied a ride on the Alpine Slide, which is only a mile down the road from us.  He readily agreed and we took the trip up on the chair lift before climbing on a small plastic sled, which is how you go down this half-pipe ride set into the mountain.  I had ridden it before and knew that unlike many other things in S. California there is little margin for error, and in fact you can hurt yourself.

Reaching the end of the Alpine Slide - Safely!

There is a handle set between your knees, and as we went in to the second bend I had it as far forward as possible to get the maximum speed.
Unfortunately I should have applied the brake at that moment and the result was that all three elements of the speeding unit came apart.  The sled went left, I went right, and Evan being quite light went straight up.  When we all collected ourselves, most of the sticking out parts of us were damaged with cuts and abrasions.  The sled appeared unhurt.  At the bottom, we limped off to the car and went home where I applied various unguents and plasters to the boy as well as myself.
I knew I was in trouble as soon as the distaff side of the household appeared.  Both of them turned glaring looks at me for putting the apple of their respective eyes in danger.  I was forbidden to ever take him on anything like that in the future, and how could I, etc. etc.  No one showed any interest in my own considerable grazes.  Nor the first class efforts I had made to staunch the boy's bleeding.  Dear me!  You can read the entire column and find out about other features at the Alpine Slide at www.sbsun.com/trevorstravels

QR Codes

Like me, you've probably been noticing a few of these strange little boxes on things recently.

No doubt unlike me, you know what they are, but for those of you also uninitiated, they are QR Codes.

It seems they were developed by Toyota to ensure quick response to ordering spare parts - that's what it stands for Quick Response.

Well, the other day I was on an assignment and my guide pointed this little square out to me.  He said they were installing QR's alongside all their exhibits so that people could get more information on each piece they had on show.

When I got home I check on the applications available for my iPhone and sure enough one was there for these codes.  It was free so I downloaded it.  Now all I need it to try it out.

My friend Paul, who normally is in England but now is in Florida for three months, sent me this video which is rather interesting.  I suspect that we'll all be very familiar with QR codes soon. http://www.flixxy.com/virtual-grocery-store.htm

Music Track - Mehta

http://redux.com/stream/item/2036283/Mehta-in-Spain-HAPPY-BIRTHDAY-VARIATIONS?

 

This was sent to me by my friend John in England.  If you sometimes get confused by the styles of Bach, Mozart, Beethoven and the rest, this will help to clear it up.  This is a concert for the Queen of Spain given by Zubin Mehta.  It's quite clever.