Republication Opposition Arrogant
Don’t you just love the unmitigated arrogance of Republican leaders Mitch McConnell and John Boehner and their unswerving opposition to the president’s health care reform bill. I mean their continually referring to the bill as a government takeover of one sixth of the economy, where it is really has the government serving as a policeman of health care providers, making sure that insurers provide the service their customers have paid for rather than arbitrarily dropping them when they get sick.
And selling coverage to all regardless of pre-existing conditions. I mean, all other insurance companies are regulated by states, which force them to make good on services they promised. Why shouldn’t health care insurance companies have some kind of regulation? There’s a lot that isn’t in the bill that should be, but it is a start, and over time it does reduce the deficit.
There’s a lot more to the plan too, but what it is not is what the Republican leaders claim it is. The measure actually provides over a billion dollars in debt reduction over ten years, a fact which Republicans choose to ignore. Will the legislation prove the Waterloo to its Democratic supporters as they run for reelection next fall? Or will the voting public realize once it becomes law that it is not the draconian disaster hapless Republicans holding hands as they encircled their wagons in the halls of Congress, have been portraying it.
And for the Republican Party, whose arrogance in running up more unpaid debt spending than all previous administrations combined (two wars, Iraq and Afghanistan, seniors prescription drug relief, plus Katrina cleanup, all on unpaid credit) for them to claim that Obama and the Democrats are tax and spend, that does ring a bit hollow, and takes arrogance and fantasy to entirely new heights.
Good luck in your vote counting Democrats. Use your voter given majority in the service of people for a change, not of the special interests. Prove once and for all that you can govern. Once again Good luck Democrats. This is your weekend to Do Good!§
Live, from New York, it’s . . .
well, you know what it is
You know that Saturday Night Live has reached a brand new pinnacle of success when a comedian of the stature of Jerry Seinfeld will appear on the program unannounced. Seinfeld appeared on last Saturday’s SNL to join regular Weekend Update anchor Seth Meyers in a roasting of former congressman Eric Massa in a skit which they entitled, “Really? In case you missed it, here it is.
Saturday Night Live has quietly become the longest running comedy and variety show on television. It was born October 10, 1975 and in October of this year it will be thirty-five years old. The first episode was hosted by George Carlin with musical guests Janis Ian and Billy Preston, and comedy by Andy Kaufman. How do I know this? I have DVD’s of its first three years.
SNL and I go a long ways back together. I moved back to Houston the year it began, and I used to have my sons on weekends as they were growing up, and on Saturday nights guess what we never failed to watch. Channel two in Houston had SNL at 1030, and followed that at midnight with Monty Python’s Flying Circus. We in Houston were truly blessed.
The second SNL was hosted by Paul Simon, it was the year of “Still Crazy After All These Years” and “40 Ways to Leave Your Lover,” and the program became a mini concert as among his guests was Art Garfunkel and together they had a Simon and Garfinkel reunion, in addition to musical guests Randy Newman and Phoebe Snow.
By it’s third week SNL began to get into shape. The show opened with Chevy Chase taking a fall, capping it with his trademarked, “Live, from New York, it’s Saturday Night!” Rob Reiner was the host, and he was joined by his wife Penny Marshall. And the original Not Ready for Prime Time Players (Ackroyd, Belushi, Chase, Curtin, Morris, Newman, and Radnor) finally got a chance to let their talent show through. Plus on hand again was Andy Kaufman, and my personal favorites, Jim Henson’s only slightly twisted Muppets, with that delightful Great FaVah, built in the image of Nelson Rockefeller.
However it took until its third season before the show could actually call itself Saturday Night Live. ABC had used the title for a variety show, modeled after the historic Ed Sullivan Show, and hosted by another sports personality, Howard Cossell. That show debuted the same year, but ahead of SNL. It lacked originality, however, and only lasted two years, after which SNL was able to claim its true title.
The first five years of SNL are available on DVD as listed in Amazon.com, and if you’re into comedy in our opinion there isn’t a better use for your DVD dollars. Used DVD’s range from $11 to around $20, depending on the year.
Featured early on was the comedy team of Al Franken and Tom Davis. They were both listed as SNL writers, and they did recurring bits in the early years. Al Franken, now Senator Al Franken, was caught recently doing a YouTube video trying to interest Google in bringing high speed internet to his home state.
Last week as we were perusing Techmeme and getting our technology fix Sunday morning, we ran across a video which we just couldn’t help but want to include in our last week’s blog. It is a YouTube video featuring Senator Al Franken, who used to do bits on SNL as, among other things, the Duluth Answer Man. He tells of how when Google came along it did the job so much better, it freed him up to run for the U. S. Senate. He made the YouTube as a plug for the twin cities to get some of Google’s fiber optic high speed internet. We attempted to add it to last week’s blog, but we failed. And so now, a week later, we finally get to present it in our blog.§
We searched far and wide for a photograph that would actually terrify you uncontrollably, send you screaming through nightmare after nightmare. Thanks to 4chan.org we happily present the following:
Our SCARE of the Week
Continuing Our Recall of Teen Camp
In last week’s blog I began for the first time really to write about what I consider my most substantial contribution to children’s camping in my 22 years of working in camps. Blueberry Cove set their children adrift at age 11, just as they were entering puberty. A lot of Blueberry Covers went on to Camp Killooleet in Hancock, Vt. which was where I first heard of Blueberry Cove. I remember that ex Blueberry Covers got a special look about them as the recalled their time there. And so I came over to BBC in 1963, delighted to learn that Henry and Bessie were okay with trips, and groups had up to three in a summer.
When Ann Goldsmith, Bob Hellerson, and I took over the running of the camp after the Haskells retired, I began thinking in terms of establishing a program for teenagers. For more information on my proposal I refer you to last week’s post. This week I would like to continue delving into some of my memories of teen camp.
Average enrollment was15 boys and girls, with 4 counselors, including me. On the first day campers were introduced to our storage building, which we nicknamed the “Moxie,” after that New England soft drink which had a medicinal taste about it and which our builders had drunk incessantly during its construction. It was a well built building which had no facilities for people, it was for the storage of our food, with a freezer, a refrigerator, and shelves for dried food, and a water heater to heat the two outdoor shower heads which were out back.
First off we showed the campers the wood stored under the building, which was there for their use to build their living quarters for the summer. Hammers and nails and saws and an ordinary level device pretty much completed our construction needs.
Campers chose their tree or trees, pulled out their lumber and trudged off to begin construction of what would be their summer home. Most of the campers picked a partner and worked in teams of two. A few of the boys stayed independent, however, and these usually built their treehouse high up in the trees, hammering extra boards to serve as access ladders.
We were careful to make sure that platforms over four feet from the ground had side boards to prevent rolling out during sleep. The counselors pitched in helping the campers as requested. Several days before the campers arrival the counselors had picked out their tree and built their own quarters for the summer. The more secure campers picked locations as far from the counselors as possible. Those less secure picked out a site near one of the counselors.
When lunchtime rolled around we had sandwich makings for that first meal. However, we assembled down where the fire pit was so that campers could be introduced to the place where our meals would be prepared and served. During lunch we gave out assignments for menu planning, kitchen duty, and meal cleanup. We worked out lists for this which we posted on a nearby tree. Since there was hot water available at an outdoor sink near the showers the cleanup crew would carry the kitchen utensils there for cleanup. On trips the cleanup would have to be in fresh water streams, but there was no need to rough it here in camp.
Many of the platforms were completed by lunchtime, and those that weren’t found others pitching in to help finish them off following lunch. You would think that there would be a sameness about the platforms, but that was not the case. A great deal of individuality went into the campers’ shelters. We didn’t do anything to encourage this, there were no awards for most ingenious platform, or anything like that. But it just happened naturally. Some platforms had wooden roofs, some merely had tarps for a roof.
We pause our Teen Camp memories long enough to honor one of the most remarkable scientists of the 20th Century, Linus Pauling, whose work in chemistry and physics, and whose work with scientists opposing the use of atomic weapons, won him two Nobel Prizes, including the Nobel Peace Prize. We celebrate Dr. Pauling as we follow his prescription of massive amounts of vitamin C in the treatment of a cold and sore throat. The inventor of the Linux kernal, Linus Torvalds, was named for Dr. Pauling.§
When the platforms were complete we had a meeting down by the harbor where we discussed the activities we would have. We had our own teen camp boat, a large fishing skiff, which we could use for rowing and fishing activities. There was paper and drawing materials stored in the Moxie. Exploratory trips along the peninsular would be popular, although there wasn’t time that first day. We could have a swim anytime the tide was in, providing the young kids camp wasn’t having their swim period. It would also be possible to take short trips in our converted school bus to nearby locations on occasions.
We had hotdogs cooked on the open fire for dinner that first night, follow by Smores, which were toasted marshmallows and a chocolate bar sandwiched on Graham crackers. Afterwards as it got dark we had a skinnydip followed by a sing and storytelling around the campfire, and some of the nervier among the campers introduced themselves and told us a thing or two about them. We counselors did the same. By its end everyone was pretty tired from that first day out, and we retired for the night.
The first week’s menu was planned, and the food stocked by two counselors, but immediately we began to involve the campers in the second week’s menu planning. Campers would also be involved in planning the menu for trips. Menu planning was voluntary, we didn’t think forcing someone into it would produce very good results. However, a counselor worked with the menu planners for the entire summer. And after a few days of planning, planners would get fresh ideas of what campers wanted to eat by querying other campers.
Most of our campers had come through the young children’s camp, and I feel my biggest mistake in conceiving Teen Camp was trying to artificially separate Teen Camp from the young children’s camp. For instance I blazed a trail through the woods to the parking lot, where our School Bus sat with the other camp cars, rather than have campers cut through the camp in a more direct path.
The idea was to get the campers used to following a marked trail, as well as keeping them out of the children’s camp. In hindsight though it gave campers practice in following a blazed trail, it was probably impractical. Of course campers who had come through the children’s camp wanted to have contact with the children’s camp. Why wouldn’t they? Their childhood was branded by their experiences in the camp.
Of course more than one of them might want to lord it over the younger kids rubbing their new status in their faces. But that was natural and to be expected. I should have worked with A.G. and other counselors at the young children’s camp to have a few events we could share with them. We did do a sing with them as I remember, but there could have been much more we could have done. And so much for pretending the children’s camp wasn’t there by forcing teen campers to take the woods trail to the parking lot.
Our first full morning of activities occurred on day two. Several campers elected to go boating and fishing. A smaller group wanted to take drawing pads and draw the campsite for their friends and parents. Two of the campers wanted to sit with me and plan the summer’s activities. All in all, it was a busy and productive morning.
The day was broken up like this. Morning activities lasted from the end of breakfast cleanup, until around noon when it was time for the kitchen group to begin to prepare lunch. We held a counsel after breakfast cleanup to assign the morning’s activities.
Lunch usually happened on or around 12:30. After lunch it was decreed that there would be time for reflection in our respective living quarters. We didn’t call it rest hour, although that was what it was. After rest and depending on the tide we had swimming at the camps dock area if it wasn’t being used by the camp, and if it was we swam at our own part of the harbor, with a counselor watching over the proceedings in the boat. After swim there was a period of free time.
Music has always been very much an important part of my life. And right up at the top among my possessions was my sound system and lp record collection. I spent fall, winter, and spring in those days living in Brooklyn. Because there was no one in the city to look out for my interests during my summer in camp, I was forced to bring up my sound system and record collection to camp, or else lose it to thieves. Knowing how teenagers love music it seemed criminal not to allow campers access to the system. I decided to hook it up the system to one of the electrical outlets in the Moxie.
One of my earliest occupations had been as a disc jockey at 2 FM stations in Houston. However, no one, least of all me, wanted to simply turn over use of the equipment without restriction, having it blare music indiscrimately. So I made a few rules for it. Music would only be allowed at the free time period in late afternoon, and then only two or three times a week.
And only one person at a time would have access to the equipment, and they were directed to work out well thought out programs using the music. They would get acquainted with the music playing it in low volume with the door closed. After they were familiar with the music they would play the music through the large speakers outside of the building. In other words they weren’t to play the music haphazardly, but instead put together well thought out programs. Records I had at the time included the Beatles, Elton John. James Taylor, Pink Floyd, and others of what in those days were considered serious contemporary music, the kind Rock FM stations of the day were playing. Needless to say, each year we did the program the Beatles ended up being the most popular and most played artists.
There are completely unexpected problems which can come up when suddenly you begin living completely out of doors. We were faced with a minimum of protection against the outdoor’s number one predator, mosquitoes. One of our first problems during one summer was a twelve year old girl whose body seemed to be especially attractive to mosquitoes, and whose torso had become replete with bites. She had scratched the bites absently and with frequency, which was allowing infection to creep in. By the time she brought it to our attention her condition was rated serious.
Upon noticing her situation we sent her straight to the camp nurse, and the nurse in turn sent the camp’s buyer, a long time counselor named Cuz, into town to find something with which to relieve the girl’s bites. Cuz came back from the local feed store proudly holding a product called Bovine Teat Balm. It seems that cows get covered with insect bites on their mammary glands, probably because drops of milk splash there and that part of a cow’s body is not protected by fur. This balm was supposed to have both healing and antiseptic powers, which sounded perfect for our mosquito ravaged camper.
The balm arrived in the nick of time. We gave her the balm at her shower period. The girl did seem to have bites in the most intimate of places, and many of them she had scratched just to the edge of infection. Her bunkmate was encouraged to apply the balm to those places where she couldn’t see the bites herself.
And hats off to Cuz, the balm seemed to have worked wonders. After only a few days her sores had healed completely. She was a high spirited girl who didn’t let her excessive bites get her down at their height, and once they were cured she was quick to be one of our more stable campers.
And so after that in spite of its intrusive odor the girl learned the inherent sensibility of using an insect repellant. And fortunately none of the other campers were so ravaged by mosquitoes, and so after praising its qualities on high we passed the remaining BTB back to the camp nurse for use as needed in the young children’s camp.
Next week I’ll tell you more about Teen Camp, especially focusing like a laser on those trips which fleshed out our summer of adventure.
And so we reach the end of yet another Little Eddy Blog. It’s not many weeks where we can sound of about health care, Saturday Night Live, and Teen Camp all in one big blog. But this week the planets were aligned perfectly, and we were able to double and triple dip, as it were.
We’re here each week with our rants and raves, and with part of our memory focussed on the New England Children’s Camps where we spent the most engaging 22 years of our life. We hope you can join us again, anytime next week, for the next episode of our blog. Meantime, hang in there and keep smiling, no matter how lousy a hand you’re drawn. Bye, bye.
Blog # 132:
Republication Opposition Arrogant
Don’t you just love the unmitigated arrogance of Republican leaders Mitch McConnell and John Boehner and their unswerving opposition to the president’s health care reform bill. I mean their continually referring to the bill as a government takeover of one sixth of the economy, where it is really has the government serving as a policeman of health care providers, making sure that insurers provide the service their customers have paid for rather than arbitrarily dropping them when they get sick.
And selling coverage to all regardless of pre-existing conditions. I mean, all other insurance companies are regulated by states, which force them to make good on services they promised. Why shouldn’t health care insurance companies have some kind of regulation? There’s a lot that isn’t in the bill that should be, but it is a start, and over time it does reduce the deficit.
There’s a lot more to the plan too, but what it is not is what the Republican leaders claim it is. The measure actually provides over a billion dollars in debt reduction over ten years, a fact which Republicans choose to ignore. Will the legislation prove the Waterloo to its Democratic supporters as they run for reelection next fall? Or will the voting public realize once it becomes law that it is not the draconian disaster hapless Republicans holding hands as they encircled their wagons in the halls of Congress, have been portraying it.
And for the Republican Party, whose arrogance in running up more unpaid debt spending than all previous administrations combined (two wars, Iraq and Afghanistan, seniors prescription drug relief, plus Katrina cleanup, all on unpaid credit) for them to claim that Obama and the Democrats are tax and spend, that does ring a bit hollow, and takes arrogance and fantasy to entirely new heights.
Good luck in your vote counting Democrats. Use your voter given majority in the service of people for a change, not of the special interests. Prove once and for all that you can govern. Once again Good luck Democrats. This is your weekend to Do Good!§
Live, from New York, it’s . . .
well, you know what it is
You know that Saturday Night Live has reached a brand new pinnacle of success when a comedian of the stature of Jerry Seinfeld will appear on the program unannounced. Seinfeld appeared on last Saturday’s SNL to join regular Weekend Update anchor Seth Meyers in a roasting of former congressman Eric Massa in a skit which they entitled, “Really? In case you missed it, here it is.
Saturday Night Live has quietly become the longest running comedy and variety show on television. It was born October 10, 1975 and in October of this year it will be thirty-five years old. The first episode was hosted by George Carlin with musical guests Janis Ian and Billy Preston, and comedy by Andy Kaufman. How do I know this? I have DVD’s of its first three years.
SNL and I go a long ways back together. I moved back to Houston the year it began, and I used to have my sons on weekends as they were growing up, and on Saturday nights guess what we never failed to watch. Channel two in Houston had SNL at 1030, and followed that at midnight with Monty Python’s Flying Circus. We in Houston were truly blessed.
The second SNL was hosted by Paul Simon, it was the year of “Still Crazy After All These Years” and “40 Ways to Leave Your Lover,” and the program became a mini concert as among his guests was Art Garfunkel and together they had a Simon and Garfinkel reunion, in addition to musical guests Randy Newman and Phoebe Snow.
By it’s third week SNL began to get into shape. The show opened with Chevy Chase taking a fall, capping it with his trademarked, “Live, from New York, it’s Saturday Night!” Rob Reiner was the host, and he was joined by his wife Penny Marshall. And the original Not Ready for Prime Time Players (Ackroyd, Belushi, Chase, Curtin, Morris, Newman, and Radnor) finally got a chance to let their talent show through. Plus on hand again was Andy Kaufman, and my personal favorites, Jim Henson’s only slightly twisted Muppets, with that delightful Great FaVah, built in the image of Nelson Rockefeller.
However it took until its third season before the show could actually call itself Saturday Night Live. ABC had used the title for a variety show, modeled after the historic Ed Sullivan Show, and hosted by another sports personality, Howard Cossell. That show debuted the same year, but ahead of SNL. It lacked originality, however, and only lasted two years, after which SNL was able to claim its true title.
The first five years of SNL are available on DVD as listed in Amazon.com, and if you’re into comedy in our opinion there isn’t a better use for your DVD dollars. Used DVD’s range from $11 to around $20, depending on the year.
Featured early on was the comedy team of Al Franken and Tom Davis. They were both listed as SNL writers, and they did recurring bits in the early years. Al Franken, now Senator Al Franken, was caught recently doing a YouTube video trying to interest Google in bringing high speed internet to his home state.
Last week as we were perusing Techmeme and getting our technology fix Sunday morning, we ran across a video which we just couldn’t help but want to include in our last week’s blog. It is a YouTube video featuring Senator Al Franken, who used to do bits on SNL as, among other things, the Duluth Answer Man. He tells of how when Google came along it did the job so much better, it freed him up to run for the U. S. Senate. He made the YouTube as a plug for the twin cities to get some of Google’s fiber optic high speed internet. We attempted to add it to last week’s blog, but we failed. And so now, a week later, we finally get to present it in our blog.§
We searched far and wide for a photograph that would actually terrify you uncontrollably, send you screaming through nightmare after nightmare. Thanks to 4chan.org we happily present the following:
Our SCARE of the Week
Continuing Our Recall of Teen Camp
In last week’s blog I began for the first time really to write about what I consider my most substantial contribution to children’s camping in my 22 years of working in camps. Blueberry Cove set their children adrift at age 11, just as they were entering puberty. A lot of Blueberry Covers went on to Camp Killooleet in Hancock, Vt. which was where I first heard of Blueberry Cove. I remember that ex Blueberry Covers got a special look about them as the recalled their time there. And so I came over to BBC in 1963, delighted to learn that Henry and Bessie were okay with trips, and groups had up to three in a summer.
When Ann Goldsmith, Bob Hellerson, and I took over the running of the camp after the Haskells retired, I began thinking in terms of establishing a program for teenagers. For more information on my proposal I refer you to last week’s post. This week I would like to continue delving into some of my memories of teen camp.
Average enrollment was15 boys and girls, with 4 counselors, including me. On the first day campers were introduced to our storage building, which we nicknamed the “Moxie,” after that New England soft drink which had a medicinal taste about it and which our builders had drunk incessantly during its construction. It was a well built building which had no facilities for people, it was for the storage of our food, with a freezer, a refrigerator, and shelves for dried food, and a water heater to heat the two outdoor shower heads which were out back.
First off we showed the campers the wood stored under the building, which was there for their use to build their living quarters for the summer. Hammers and nails and saws and an ordinary level device pretty much completed our construction needs.
Campers chose their tree or trees, pulled out their lumber and trudged off to begin construction of what would be their summer home. Most of the campers picked a partner and worked in teams of two. A few of the boys stayed independent, however, and these usually built their treehouse high up in the trees, hammering extra boards to serve as access ladders.
We were careful to make sure that platforms over four feet from the ground had side boards to prevent rolling out during sleep. The counselors pitched in helping the campers as requested. Several days before the campers arrival the counselors had picked out their tree and built their own quarters for the summer. The more secure campers picked locations as far from the counselors as possible. Those less secure picked out a site near one of the counselors.
When lunchtime rolled around we had sandwich makings for that first meal. However, we assembled down where the fire pit was so that campers could be introduced to the place where our meals would be prepared and served. During lunch we gave out assignments for menu planning, kitchen duty, and meal cleanup. We worked out lists for this which we posted on a nearby tree. Since there was hot water available at an outdoor sink near the showers the cleanup crew would carry the kitchen utensils there for cleanup. On trips the cleanup would have to be in fresh water streams, but there was no need to rough it here in camp.
Many of the platforms were completed by lunchtime, and those that weren’t found others pitching in to help finish them off following lunch. You would think that there would be a sameness about the platforms, but that was not the case. A great deal of individuality went into the campers’ shelters. We didn’t do anything to encourage this, there were no awards for most ingenious platform, or anything like that. But it just happened naturally. Some platforms had wooden roofs, some merely had tarps for a roof.
We pause our Teen Camp memories long enough to honor one of the most remarkable scientists of the 20th Century, Linus Pauling, whose work in chemistry and physics, and whose work with scientists opposing the use of atomic weapons, won him two Nobel Prizes, including the Nobel Peace Prize. We celebrate Dr. Pauling as we follow his prescription of massive amounts of vitamin C in the treatment of a cold and sore throat. The inventor of the Linux kernal, Linus Torvalds, was named for Dr. Pauling.§
When the platforms were complete we had a meeting down by the harbor where we discussed the activities we would have. We had our own teen camp boat, a large fishing skiff, which we could use for rowing and fishing activities. There was paper and drawing materials stored in the Moxie. Exploratory trips along the peninsular would be popular, although there wasn’t time that first day. We could have a swim anytime the tide was in, providing the young kids camp wasn’t having their swim period. It would also be possible to take short trips in our converted school bus to nearby locations on occasions.
We had hotdogs cooked on the open fire for dinner that first night, follow by Smores, which were toasted marshmallows and a chocolate bar sandwiched on Graham crackers. Afterwards as it got dark we had a skinnydip followed by a sing and storytelling around the campfire, and some of the nervier among the campers introduced themselves and told us a thing or two about them. We counselors did the same. By its end everyone was pretty tired from that first day out, and we retired for the night.
The first week’s menu was planned, and the food stocked by two counselors, but immediately we began to involve the campers in the second week’s menu planning. Campers would also be involved in planning the menu for trips. Menu planning was voluntary, we didn’t think forcing someone into it would produce very good results. However, a counselor worked with the menu planners for the entire summer. And after a few days of planning, planners would get fresh ideas of what campers wanted to eat by querying other campers.
Most of our campers had come through the young children’s camp, and I feel my biggest mistake in conceiving Teen Camp was trying to artificially separate Teen Camp from the young children’s camp. For instance I blazed a trail through the woods to the parking lot, where our School Bus sat with the other camp cars, rather than have campers cut through the camp in a more direct path.
The idea was to get the campers used to following a marked trail, as well as keeping them out of the children’s camp. In hindsight though it gave campers practice in following a blazed trail, it was probably impractical. Of course campers who had come through the children’s camp wanted to have contact with the children’s camp. Why wouldn’t they? Their childhood was branded by their experiences in the camp.
Of course more than one of them might want to lord it over the younger kids rubbing their new status in their faces. But that was natural and to be expected. I should have worked with A.G. and other counselors at the young children’s camp to have a few events we could share with them. We did do a sing with them as I remember, but there could have been much more we could have done. And so much for pretending the children’s camp wasn’t there by forcing teen campers to take the woods trail to the parking lot.
Our first full morning of activities occurred on day two. Several campers elected to go boating and fishing. A smaller group wanted to take drawing pads and draw the campsite for their friends and parents. Two of the campers wanted to sit with me and plan the summer’s activities. All in all, it was a busy and productive morning.
The day was broken up like this. Morning activities lasted from the end of breakfast cleanup, until around noon when it was time for the kitchen group to begin to prepare lunch. We held a counsel after breakfast cleanup to assign the morning’s activities.
Lunch usually happened on or around 12:30. After lunch it was decreed that there would be time for reflection in our respective living quarters. We didn’t call it rest hour, although that was what it was. After rest and depending on the tide we had swimming at the camps dock area if it wasn’t being used by the camp, and if it was we swam at our own part of the harbor, with a counselor watching over the proceedings in the boat. After swim there was a period of free time.
Music has always been very much an important part of my life. And right up at the top among my possessions was my sound system and lp record collection. I spent fall, winter, and spring in those days living in Brooklyn. Because there was no one in the city to look out for my interests during my summer in camp, I was forced to bring up my sound system and record collection to camp, or else lose it to thieves. Knowing how teenagers love music it seemed criminal not to allow campers access to the system. I decided to hook it up the system to one of the electrical outlets in the Moxie.
One of my earliest occupations had been as a disc jockey at 2 FM stations in Houston. However, no one, least of all me, wanted to simply turn over use of the equipment without restriction, having it blare music indiscrimately. So I made a few rules for it. Music would only be allowed at the free time period in late afternoon, and then only two or three times a week.
And only one person at a time would have access to the equipment, and they were directed to work out well thought out programs using the music. They would get acquainted with the music playing it in low volume with the door closed. After they were familiar with the music they would play the music through the large speakers outside of the building. In other words they weren’t to play the music haphazardly, but instead put together well thought out programs. Records I had at the time included the Beatles, Elton John. James Taylor, Pink Floyd, and others of what in those days were considered serious contemporary music, the kind Rock FM stations of the day were playing. Needless to say, each year we did the program the Beatles ended up being the most popular and most played artists.
There are completely unexpected problems which can come up when suddenly you begin living completely out of doors. We were faced with a minimum of protection against the outdoor’s number one predator, mosquitoes. One of our first problems during one summer was a twelve year old girl whose body seemed to be especially attractive to mosquitoes, and whose torso had become replete with bites. She had scratched the bites absently and with frequency, which was allowing infection to creep in. By the time she brought it to our attention her condition was rated serious.
Upon noticing her situation we sent her straight to the camp nurse, and the nurse in turn sent the camp’s buyer, a long time counselor named Cuz, into town to find something with which to relieve the girl’s bites. Cuz came back from the local feed store proudly holding a product called Bovine Teat Balm. It seems that cows get covered with insect bites on their mammary glands, probably because drops of milk splash there and that part of a cow’s body is not protected by fur. This balm was supposed to have both healing and antiseptic powers, which sounded perfect for our mosquito ravaged camper.
The balm arrived in the nick of time. We gave her the balm at her shower period. The girl did seem to have bites in the most intimate of places, and many of them she had scratched just to the edge of infection. Her bunkmate was encouraged to apply the balm to those places where she couldn’t see the bites herself.
And hats off to Cuz, the balm seemed to have worked wonders. After only a few days her sores had healed completely. She was a high spirited girl who didn’t let her excessive bites get her down at their height, and once they were cured she was quick to be one of our more stable campers.
And so after that in spite of its intrusive odor the girl learned the inherent sensibility of using an insect repellant. And fortunately none of the other campers were so ravaged by mosquitoes, and so after praising its qualities on high we passed
Blog # 132:
Republication Opposition Arrogant
Don’t you just love the unmitigated arrogance of Republican leaders Mitch McConnell and John Boehner and their unswerving opposition to the president’s health care reform bill. I mean their continually referring to the bill as a government takeover of one sixth of the economy, where it is really has the government serving as a policeman of health care providers, making sure that insurers provide the service their customers have paid for rather than arbitrarily dropping them when they get sick.
And selling coverage to all regardless of pre-existing conditions. I mean, all other insurance companies are regulated by states, which force them to make good on services they promised. Why shouldn’t health care insurance companies have some kind of regulation? There’s a lot that isn’t in the bill that should be, but it is a start, and over time it does reduce the deficit.
There’s a lot more to the plan too, but what it is not is what the Republican leaders claim it is. The measure actually provides over a billion dollars in debt reduction over ten years, a fact which Republicans choose to ignore. Will the legislation prove the Waterloo to its Democratic supporters as they run for reelection next fall? Or will the voting public realize once it becomes law that it is not the draconian disaster hapless Republicans holding hands as they encircled their wagons in the halls of Congress, have been portraying it.
And for the Republican Party, whose arrogance in running up more unpaid debt spending than all previous administrations combined (two wars, Iraq and Afghanistan, seniors prescription drug relief, plus Katrina cleanup, all on unpaid credit) for them to claim that Obama and the Democrats are tax and spend, that does ring a bit hollow, and takes arrogance and fantasy to entirely new heights.
Good luck in your vote counting Democrats. Use your voter given majority in the service of people for a change, not of the special interests. Prove once and for all that you can govern. Once again Good luck Democrats. This is your weekend to Do Good!§
Live, from New York, it’s . . .
well, you know what it is
You know that Saturday Night Live has reached a brand new pinnacle of success when a comedian of the stature of Jerry Seinfeld will appear on the program unannounced. Seinfeld appeared on last Saturday’s SNL to join regular Weekend Update anchor Seth Meyers in a roasting of former congressman Eric Massa in a skit which they entitled, “Really? In case you missed it, here it is.
Saturday Night Live has quietly become the longest running comedy and variety show on television. It was born October 10, 1975 and in October of this year it will be thirty-five years old. The first episode was hosted by George Carlin with musical guests Janis Ian and Billy Preston, and comedy by Andy Kaufman. How do I know this? I have DVD’s of its first three years.
SNL and I go a long ways back together. I moved back to Houston the year it began, and I used to have my sons on weekends as they were growing up, and on Saturday nights guess what we never failed to watch. Channel two in Houston had SNL at 1030, and followed that at midnight with Monty Python’s Flying Circus. We in Houston were truly blessed.
The second SNL was hosted by Paul Simon, it was the year of “Still Crazy After All These Years” and “40 Ways to Leave Your Lover,” and the program became a mini concert as among his guests was Art Garfunkel and together they had a Simon and Garfinkel reunion, in addition to musical guests Randy Newman and Phoebe Snow.
By it’s third week SNL began to get into shape. The show opened with Chevy Chase taking a fall, capping it with his trademarked, “Live, from New York, it’s Saturday Night!” Rob Reiner was the host, and he was joined by his wife Penny Marshall. And the original Not Ready for Prime Time Players (Ackroyd, Belushi, Chase, Curtin, Morris, Newman, and Radnor) finally got a chance to let their talent show through. Plus on hand again was Andy Kaufman, and my personal favorites, Jim Henson’s only slightly twisted Muppets, with that delightful Great FaVah, built in the image of Nelson Rockefeller.
However it took until its third season before the show could actually call itself Saturday Night Live. ABC had used the title for a variety show, modeled after the historic Ed Sullivan Show, and hosted by another sports personality, Howard Cossell. That show debuted the same year, but ahead of SNL. It lacked originality, however, and only lasted two years, after which SNL was able to claim its true title.
The first five years of SNL are available on DVD as listed in Amazon.com, and if you’re into comedy in our opinion there isn’t a better use for your DVD dollars. Used DVD’s range from $11 to around $20, depending on the year.
Featured early on was the comedy team of Al Franken and Tom Davis. They were both listed as SNL writers, and they did recurring bits in the early years. Al Franken, now Senator Al Franken, was caught recently doing a YouTube video trying to interest Google in bringing high speed internet to his home state.
Last week as we were perusing Techmeme and getting our technology fix Sunday morning, we ran across a video which we just couldn’t help but want to include in our last week’s blog. It is a YouTube video featuring Senator Al Franken, who used to do bits on SNL as, among other things, the Duluth Answer Man. He tells of how when Google came along it did the job so much better, it freed him up to run for the U. S. Senate. He made the YouTube as a plug for the twin cities to get some of Google’s fiber optic high speed internet. We attempted to add it to last week’s blog, but we failed. And so now, a week later, we finally get to present it in our blog.§
We searched far and wide for a photograph that would actually terrify you uncontrollably, send you screaming through nightmare after nightmare. Thanks to 4chan.org we happily present the following:
Our SCARE of the Week
Continuing Our Recall of Teen Camp
In last week’s blog I began for the first time really to write about what I consider my most substantial contribution to children’s camping in my 22 years of working in camps. Blueberry Cove set their children adrift at age 11, just as they were entering puberty. A lot of Blueberry Covers went on to Camp Killooleet in Hancock, Vt. which was where I first heard of Blueberry Cove. I remember that ex Blueberry Covers got a special look about them as the recalled their time there. And so I came over to BBC in 1963, delighted to learn that Henry and Bessie were okay with trips, and groups had up to three in a summer.
When Ann Goldsmith, Bob Hellerson, and I took over the running of the camp after the Haskells retired, I began thinking in terms of establishing a program for teenagers. For more information on my proposal I refer you to last week’s post. This week I would like to continue delving into some of my memories of teen camp.
Average enrollment was15 boys and girls, with 4 counselors, including me. On the first day campers were introduced to our storage building, which we nicknamed the “Moxie,” after that New England soft drink which had a medicinal taste about it and which our builders had drunk incessantly during its construction. It was a well built building which had no facilities for people, it was for the storage of our food, with a freezer, a refrigerator, and shelves for dried food, and a water heater to heat the two outdoor shower heads which were out back.
First off we showed the campers the wood stored under the building, which was there for their use to build their living quarters for the summer. Hammers and nails and saws and an ordinary level device pretty much completed our construction needs.
Campers chose their tree or trees, pulled out their lumber and trudged off to begin construction of what would be their summer home. Most of the campers picked a partner and worked in teams of two. A few of the boys stayed independent, however, and these usually built their treehouse high up in the trees, hammering extra boards to serve as access ladders.
We were careful to make sure that platforms over four feet from the ground had side boards to prevent rolling out during sleep. The counselors pitched in helping the campers as requested. Several days before the campers arrival the counselors had picked out their tree and built their own quarters for the summer. The more secure campers picked locations as far from the counselors as possible. Those less secure picked out a site near one of the counselors.
When lunchtime rolled around we had sandwich makings for that first meal. However, we assembled down where the fire pit was so that campers could be introduced to the place where our meals would be prepared and served. During lunch we gave out assignments for menu planning, kitchen duty, and meal cleanup. We worked out lists for this which we posted on a nearby tree. Since there was hot water available at an outdoor sink near the showers the cleanup crew would carry the kitchen utensils there for cleanup. On trips the cleanup would have to be in fresh water streams, but there was no need to rough it here in camp.
Many of the platforms were completed by lunchtime, and those that weren’t found others pitching in to help finish them off following lunch. You would think that there would be a sameness about the platforms, but that was not the case. A great deal of individuality went into the campers’ shelters. We didn’t do anything to encourage this, there were no awards for most ingenious platform, or anything like that. But it just happened naturally. Some platforms had wooden roofs, some merely had tarps for a roof.
We pause our Teen Camp memories long enough to honor one of the most remarkable scientists of the 20th Century, Linus Pauling, whose work in chemistry and physics, and whose work with scientists opposing the use of atomic weapons, won him two Nobel Prizes, including the Nobel Peace Prize. We celebrate Dr. Pauling as we follow his prescription of massive amounts of vitamin C in the treatment of a cold and sore throat. The inventor of the Linux kernal, Linus Torvalds, was named for Dr. Pauling.§
When the platforms were complete we had a meeting down by the harbor where we discussed the activities we would have. We had our own teen camp boat, a large fishing skiff, which we could use for rowing and fishing activities. There was paper and drawing materials stored in the Moxie. Exploratory trips along the peninsular would be popular, although there wasn’t time that first day. We could have a swim anytime the tide was in, providing the young kids camp wasn’t having their swim period. It would also be possible to take short trips in our converted school bus to nearby locations on occasions.
We had hotdogs cooked on the open fire for dinner that first night, follow by Smores, which were toasted marshmallows and a chocolate bar sandwiched on Graham crackers. Afterwards as it got dark we had a skinnydip followed by a sing and storytelling around the campfire, and some of the nervier among the campers introduced themselves and told us a thing or two about them. We counselors did the same. By its end everyone was pretty tired from that first day out, and we retired for the night.
The first week’s menu was planned, and the food stocked by two counselors, but immediately we began to involve the campers in the second week’s menu planning. Campers would also be involved in planning the menu for trips. Menu planning was voluntary, we didn’t think forcing someone into it would produce very good results. However, a counselor worked with the menu planners for the entire summer. And after a few days of planning, planners would get fresh ideas of what campers wanted to eat by querying other campers.
Most of our campers had come through the young children’s camp, and I feel my biggest mistake in conceiving Teen Camp was trying to artificially separate Teen Camp from the young children’s camp. For instance I blazed a trail through the woods to the parking lot, where our School Bus sat with the other camp cars, rather than have campers cut through the camp in a more direct path.
The idea was to get the campers used to following a marked trail, as well as keeping them out of the children’s camp. In hindsight though it gave campers practice in following a blazed trail, it was probably impractical. Of course campers who had come through the children’s camp wanted to have contact with the children’s camp. Why wouldn’t they? Their childhood was branded by their experiences in the camp.
Of course more than one of them might want to lord it over the younger kids rubbing their new status in their faces. But that was natural and to be expected. I should have worked with A.G. and other counselors at the young children’s camp to have a few events we could share with them. We did do a sing with them as I remember, but there could have been much more we could have done. And so much for pretending the children’s camp wasn’t there by forcing teen campers to take the woods trail to the parking lot.
Our first full morning of activities occurred on day two. Several campers elected to go boating and fishing. A smaller group wanted to take drawing pads and draw the campsite for their friends and parents. Two of the campers wanted to sit with me and plan the summer’s activities. All in all, it was a busy and productive morning.
The day was broken up like this. Morning activities lasted from the end of breakfast cleanup, until around noon when it was time for the kitchen group to begin to prepare lunch. We held a counsel after breakfast cleanup to assign the morning’s activities.
Lunch usually happened on or around 12:30. After lunch it was decreed that there would be time for reflection in our respective living quarters. We didn’t call it rest hour, although that was what it was. After rest and depending on the tide we had swimming at the camps dock area if it wasn’t being used by the camp, and if it was we swam at our own part of the harbor, with a counselor watching over the proceedings in the boat. After swim there was a period of free time.
Music has always been very much an important part of my life. And right up at the top among my possessions was my sound system and lp record collection. I spent fall, winter, and spring in those days living in Brooklyn. Because there was no one in the city to look out for my interests during my summer in camp, I was forced to bring up my sound system and record collection to camp, or else lose it to thieves. Knowing how teenagers love music it seemed criminal not to allow campers access to the system. I decided to hook it up the system to one of the electrical outlets in the Moxie.
One of my earliest occupations had been as a disc jockey at 2 FM stations in Houston. However, no one, least of all me, wanted to simply turn over use of the equipment without restriction, having it blare music indiscrimately. So I made a few rules for it. Music would only be allowed at the free time period in late afternoon, and then only two or three times a week.
And only one person at a time would have access to the equipment, and they were directed to work out well thought out programs using the music. They would get acquainted with the music playing it in low volume with the door closed. After they were familiar with the music they would play the music through the large speakers outside of the building. In other words they weren’t to play the music haphazardly, but instead put together well thought out programs. Records I had at the time included the Beatles, Elton John. James Taylor, Pink Floyd, and others of what in those days were considered serious contemporary music, the kind Rock FM stations of the day were playing. Needless to say, each year we did the program the Beatles ended up being the most popular and most played artists.
There are completely unexpected problems which can come up when suddenly you begin living completely out of doors. We were faced with a minimum of protection against the outdoor’s number one predator, mosquitoes. One of our first problems during one summer was a twelve year old girl whose body seemed to be especially attractive to mosquitoes, and whose torso had become replete with bites. She had scratched the bites absently and with frequency, which was allowing infection to creep in. By the time she brought it to our attention her condition was rated serious.
Upon noticing her situation we sent her straight to the camp nurse, and the nurse in turn sent the camp’s buyer, a long time counselor named Cuz, into town to find something with which to relieve the girl’s bites. Cuz came back from the local feed store proudly holding a product called Bovine Teat Balm. It seems that cows get covered with insect bites on their mammary glands, probably because drops of milk splash there and that part of a cow’s body is not protected by fur. This balm was supposed to have both healing and antiseptic powers, which sounded perfect for our mosquito ravaged camper.
The balm arrived in the nick of time. We gave her the balm at her shower period. The girl did seem to have bites in the most intimate of places, and many of them she had scratched just to the edge of infection. Her bunkmate was encouraged to apply the balm to those places where she couldn’t see the bites herself.
And hats off to Cuz, the balm seemed to have worked wonders. After only a few days her sores had healed completely. She was a high spirited girl who didn’t let her excessive bites get her down at their height, and once they were cured she was quick to be one of our more stable campers.
And so after that in spite of its intrusive odor the girl learned the inherent sensibility of using an insect repellant. And fortunately none of the other campers were so ravaged by mosquitoes, and so after praising its qualities on high we passed the remaining BTB back to the camp nurse for use as needed in the young children’s camp.
Next week I’ll tell you more about Teen Camp, especially focusing like a laser on those trips which fleshed out our summer of adventure.
And so we reach the end of yet another Little Eddy Blog. It’s not many weeks where we can sound of about health care, Saturday Night Live, and Teen Camp all in one big blog. But this week the planets were aligned perfectly, and we were able to double and triple dip, as it were.
We’re here each week with our rants and raves, and with part of our memory focussed on the New England Children’s Camps where we spent the most engaging 22 years of our life. We hope you can join us again, anytime next week, for the next episode of our blog. Meantime, hang in there and keep smiling, no matter how lousy a hand you’re drawn. Bye, bye.
Next week I’ll tell you more about Teen Camp, especially focusing like a laser on those trips which fleshed out our summer of adventure.
And so we reach the end of yet another Little Eddy Blog. It’s not many weeks where we can sound of about health care, Saturday Night Live, and Teen Camp all in one big blog. But this week the planets were aligned perfectly, and we were able to double and triple dip, as it were.
OMG.
I almost forgot. Today's the first day of Spring. Which means it's my birthday. 84 Jesus, where did it all go?
We’re here each week with our rants and raves, and with part of our memory focussed on the New England Children’s Camps where we spent the most engaging 22 years of our life. We hope you can join us again, anytime next week, for the next episode of our blog. Meantime, hang in there and keep smiling, no matter how lousy a hand you’re drawn. Bye, bye.
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