Comments?

Blogger, who host this blog, is very careful to stop unwanted comments from getting through. The procedure is so efficient in fact that I've had a lot of emails from people who couldn't get into the comments section.  There's nothing that I can do about this except to suggest that if you can't post a comment easily and want to make one, please email me at trevorsummons@hotmail.com and I promise to answer you.

Music Track(s)

This week I'm putting in a link to a site that has literally thousands of tracks by hundreds of artists.
http://www.songstube.net/  It's called songstube and it allows you to click on an artist and then choose from all their popular songs.  I'm grateful to my friend Alan for sending this to me.

Bucket List

My friend Paul in England suggested that I list my ten favorite works of art, which ended last week.  He also suggested that I post my "bucket list" - the things you want to do before you kick the bucket - a name that was made famous by the film with Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman some time ago.

So here goes, in no particular order. 

There is a cruise that goes from Rio de Janeiro to Montevideo, to Buenas Aries, to the Falklands, round Cape Horn, to Oshaiea and up to Santiago in Chile.

I don't know S. America at all and my father turned down a job in Buenas Aries in the late 40's which gave the place a sort of "what if" romance factor.

This is certainly a cruise I'd like to do as it takes in a number of other interesting places I don't know.  The weather in the Falklands is sometimes so bad the big ships can't get in there, which would be a huge shame.  Also dear Christina, the President of Argentina is starting up that old nonsense about Las Malvinas again.  Will they never learn?

Prang!

Some time back I wrote a post about how much better I thought driving skills were compared to years ago.  It accompanied a video of some Chinese driving which was still going through the learning stage.  I should also have mentioned that I considered my driving skills to have improved immeasurably in the 50+ years I had been active in the area.  However as we saw from the Chinese tape there is always room for improvement.

The other day, I was positioning the car onto the trailer - I'm sure my neck doesn't swivel as much as it used to - and it seems that I hadn't got the distance quite right.  When I got out to see exactly where the wretched ball was, I found it was sunk into the wrap-around plastic on the rear quarter - I thought I was still about a foot off.
I was pretty PO'd about it I can tell you, having been accident free since I can't remember.  But Nick, our local garage guy, was able to push it out completely once he got it on the ramp, so no harm done.  Thank Heaven for plastic!

Are you ready for some football, er, lawsuits!

In a few weeks, we shall be watching the start of football pre-season, or perhaps not.  Currently there are several thousand lawsuits lining up by players wanting to sue the NFL - National Football League.  It seems that over their careers they have sustained injures due to the violence of the sport and now they want compensation.  Now it seems to me that if you elect to join a game where large 300 pound men throw themselves at you and in particular your head, you are likely to get hurt.  Surely everyone gets that, don't they?

It appears not, as now we are going to tie up the lawcourts with cases where mind dumbed robots are going to say that if a warning label had been placed on their helmets they wouldn't have used their heads as weapons.  Ah me!  Perhaps we could take the helmets and the padding away and see how hard they hit each other then.  I don't think you get the same injuries in Rugby, but in that game if you don't want to be hit you best get rid of the ball quickly then you're safe - or at least supposed to be.

Video - Red Sparrows

I'm indebted to my friend Stan in England for this dare-devil video of some of England greatest acrobatic flyers. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_lXqMmevog  It takes about 4:30 mins.

Sunday's Column - Medical Museum

I'm sure you often receive those emails that laud how things were years ago.  Funnily enough, medicine is never one of the things that people want to experience how it used to be.  Just as well.
In Riverside is a museum devoted to things medical and it's one of my favorite places.  It's quite refreshing to see how far we've come along in that area.

This is one of the big cabinets that shows the range of medicines that were doled out by the medical profession 100 years ago.  A few years ago I met a docent here and he explained to me that most of the cures were 80% to 90% alcohol.  It had the effect of making people feel better.  I guess that one way of dealing with the problem.  You can read the entire column at www.sbsun.com/trevorstravels Oops, I see that The Sun has not yet posted the piece on the Web site.  I'll have to see about that!

Waitress

The other evening we had popped out for "a couple" at our local watering hole. It was mid-week and so it was fairly quiet, until a large party came in - they come every month to talk about their group's activities.  There were about 50 of them.  I was sitting at the bar and could watch the waitresses doing their thing.  Of course, I've seen it all before but this time I really took notice of what they had to do.  Granted, there is a computer system to log all their orders and which sends the food orders down to the kitchen.  But the drink's orders were filled by the waitresses themselves with some help from the barman.  They ranged from plain water, with ice of course, to iced tea and a strange one called an Arnold Palmer - half ice tea and half lemonade I was told.  Then there was a bewildering array of wines - Pinot Noire, White Zinfandel, Chardonnay etc. etc.  Frankly apart from the fact that I would no doubt not be able to read my own writing, there would be the problem of remembering in which order the drinks were supposed to be served.  I would have wanted to put the tray down in the middle and get the customers to sort it out.  After watching this for about half-an-hour I came to the conclusion that this was yet another job in life I would be unable to do!

Music Track - Ella

I saw a little of the film De Lovely the other day.  I had seen it when it came out, and I found it to be an interesting movie.  No doubt Cole Porter was one of the very best of American composers of popular songs.  Here is one of his finest sung by the "First Lady of Song," Ella Fitzgerald. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDLevsbqZkw

Favorite Works of Art - Last one!

On April 12th I posted that I was fulfilling a request from my friend Paul in England to give a list of my ten favorite works of art.  It's been quite difficult to do this as our lives are so full of beautiful images.  In fact I have sometimes dodged the actual work by substituting just an artist on occasions and merely listed the name with a couple of examples.  Also this has not been a list of favorites in any particular order.  For the last one I cannot leave out the greatest of the innovators of modern art - Picasso.

This picture, Les Demoisselles d'Avignon painted in 1907, is believed to have been his first cubist painting. Another of his cubist works is Friendship painted around the same period.

Even far along into the 50's when I was starting to pay attention to art, Picasso was still very controversial, but today his art has a feeling of great familiarity about it.  Next week we begin a series of my personal Bucket List.

Summer

Today is the start of summer.  As usual with the change of season I change the lay-out of the blog together with a new photo. 

I hope you like the alterations but I am to some extent limited by the choices that Blogger offers.  I also hope you have a wonderful summer filled with sunny things, and happy moments.

Ducks Update

A new pair of Mallards enjoying their free breakfast.

Recently I posted that S.M.B.O. had formed an attachment to a pair of Mallards that had been coming to our garden for the last couple of years.  Well, it now seems that they have been quacking off in the local Mallard Bar about their treatment, and several of their friends have cottoned on to free grub.  We are definitely on the list of watering holes for other Mallards.  Naturally, She Who Must Be Obeyed is catering to their needs as well.  She's pretty sure she knows "her" ducks as they are bolder and a little larger.  This means that the smaller ones are younger, and like our glorious federal government we are certainly building dependence at an early age!
But like many of our human young it seems that there are problems.  The other morning there was evidence of fighting - feathers strewn around - as there were some four or five of them waiting for us to get up and feed them. Once the seed was thrown too, they started fighting over it, and also the females.  Who could have seen this coming?!!!!!

Video - Geography

I have problems watching this as it's so depressing. http://www.safeshare.tv/v/fJuNgBkloFE
As Churchill once said: The greatest argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter!

Sunday's Column - Father's Day

Fishermen at Lake Arrowbear

This Sunday's column was a suggestion that for Father's Day take Dad out to one of the mountain lakes.  Of course, there's always Lake Arrowhead and Big Bear, but there are a number of smaller and interesting lakes in the San Bernardino Mountains.  For instance, Lake Arrowbear is a very small lake that will almost certainly dry up by the end of September - it does most years.  Currently it is full and has some fish in it.  Green Valley Lake is across the same highway (18) but on the other side about four miles up.  It's higher than Arrowhead too and you have a view of that one on the way up.  No motors allowed, but row boats and canoes are available for rent.  You can read the entire column at www.sbsun.com/trevorstravels