High Priced Mutt

Took Kennedy the dog into the Vet today for teeth cleaning and the removal of two subcutaneous fatty deposits. they gave me AN ESTIMATE of $947.00 !!! Do human surgeons give estimates before they take out your gallbladder? It's like a muffler shop without the bad coffee. Anyhow I hope the big guy is OK, he's a good boy and a great example of Truman's maxim that if you want a friend in Washington DC: Get a Dog.

Elton John From The Friends Soundtrack

Seasons
Music by elton john
Lyrics by bernie taupin
Available on the soundtrack friends

For our world, the circle turns again
Throughout the year we've seen the seasons change
It's meant a lot to me to start anew
Oh the winter's cold but I'm so warm with you
Out there there's not a sound to be heard
And the seasons seem to sleep upon their words
As the waters freeze up with the summer's end
Oh it's funny how young lovers start as friends
Yes it's funny how young lovers start as friends

ANICÉE ALVINA

I just noticed Anicee Alvina died in Paris last year. She played Michelle in the 1971 film Friends. The movie kind of launched Elton John as he did the soundtrack.

Anicee was perhaps the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. I'm sure it helped that I was 16 when I saw the film, but I fell in love and stayed that way with her all these years. The soundtrack is great, and I recomend the film..very romantic. You can find it on Amazon.


Adieu Anicee: l'amour tojours l'amour......

New Blog / Old Poem

This is a new Blog..but I have a lot of really old poems.. I never published any, and most have never been seen by anyone, but I'm at the point I feel a need to put them out there. I suspect its the hopefully distant footsteps of mortality that prompt me to re visit and share these old pieces. This one I wrote a week or two after my mother died in 1980.

For Lucile

Lucile, I've laid out your cup

with sugar and spoon

Yet the coffee grows cold

I cannot hear your laughter

Can I blame the gardener

who finds one rose, more beautiful

And says " you shall grace my home"

Lucile, I've laid out your cup

with sugar and spoon.

I Dreamed Last Night

I dreamed last night that I was outside a villa looking through the kitchen window. It was warm, and perhaps we were in Italy somewhere like a novel I'm reading now. I could see a woman chopping vegetables at the sink, her back to me. She wore a yellow dress, and had dark hair in a pony tail. At first I thought it was Nicki..but it wasn't.. maybe I dreamt of the woman from the novel. But I think I heard Nicki's voice warning me of something. Often hers is the voice of warning I hear...and I have no idea why. Oddly the message of the dream seemed to be that I am exhausted and should get some rest. Casey and I plan to go to Italy next fall.. I wish I could be in that scene now...to feel the spring breeze, see the washing on the line in the sun, feel welcome in the woman's kitchen. How very fucking Freudian....

I Dreamed Last Night is a lovley song from Justin Hayward and John Lodge's Blue Jays Lp.

Damn Flyboys

I came up with what I thought was a good tag line for a recruitment campaign for volunteer Fire/EMS here in the county. The campaign was to be tagged:

Do Something Amazing Join The Whatever Fire Department.

I got a domain name for dot org, and dot info..but dot com was taken, and Go Daddy didn't show me by whom. I thought..aww it's most likely some porn thing: I think we can all add a visual to the amazing line.... er uh well anyhow... it turns out yesterday I discover that the fucking US Air force has a new campaign called: Do Something Amazing. !!!!! Pricks with wings the lot of them. So I guess I'm well and truly fucked on that deal.... oh well maybe I'll use this one:

Show That You Give A Shit ... Volunteer Today

Nice ring to it eh?

St. James Second Law of EMS

The More They Weigh, The More Likely They Are To Wedged Behind A Toilet On The Top Floor.

( And There Will Be No Elevator )

POTUS, XM, Just Give Me Some Truth

Went last week to the launch party for the XM POTUS channel. Nice party, lots of C-SPANers were there. Lewis Black was the entertainment, and I loved how he zinged the WPC as a bunch of " insufferable pricks". ( WPC= Washington Press Corps ). My friend Joanne is working now at POTUS...I was tempted when I heard about it, but the question remains what happens the day AFTER the election? She says the management of XM promised her there will be a job there. I think she may be a bit young to fully understand that the promise was made by RADIO guys... duh.

It reminds me of some movie where Christoper Walken is playing a gangster; and does some sort of double cross on this young guy. The young dude is all hurt, and Waken says:

"What did you expect? We're criminals" .

My bigger issue with XM ( other than that Clear Channel and Mel have hands in it ), is this: Yeah there is some cool music, some good imaging, a nice brand, and good stationality. But what chanel do I need to tune in to change the world? Which one makes me feel part of something? How do I plug in to a movement, and not just consume a brand? I saw Lee Abrams at the XM POTUS gig, and said hi. I knew Lee back in the day in Detroit at W-4 when he consulted. I remember him telling us all to "be like the mafia on the phones". WTF Lee! I never did figure that one out. Anyhow Lee is a very smart fucking guy, he likes my man Justin Hayward, and he flies..so he's always cool in my book.... but, the question I have for Lee is this:

Where on XM do I go to get my mind blown, my soul expanded, my horizon extended, my possibilities enlarged.... in short: which channel helps me change the world?

I'm tired of being a rock and roll consumer Lee... marry politics and rock.. snarl and passion ... give me Michale Moore doing a morning rave, give me Bono talking about Africa and playing with the Edge.. give me the guy from Doctors Without Borders... give me a way to get involved, give me some truth. Don't just give me radio...

I've fallen and I can't get up !

One Down

Ran another medic alert button call Sunday AM about 0730. 87 YOF did a vasovagal on the loo over night, and spent several hours naked on the bathroom floor pushing the stupid panic button on her neck chain. Somehow the alarm didn't reach the company until day side. She was in pretty good shape all things considered, maybe a rib FX. Worried when I moved the towel to examine her ribs that I was seeing her naked. when the day comes I get my ya yas looking at 87 year old tits, just shoot me. ( Unless I'm 88).

We ran one a week or so ago, some wacky Chinese guy who's 90 YO mom fell in the loo, and he spent from 2300 the night before until 0800 that AM arguing with her over if they should call 911.. all while she lay on the floor in great pain from a hip FX, and became dehydrated. When we rolled up, the weirdo son met us on the stoop with his moms purse strapped around his neck. What a fucking moron!

( See St. James 1st Rule of EMS).

Mercy is Strained

Blessed are the merciful, for mercy shall be thiers....

Where is Mercy to be found these days? Who is heard calling for it? Where does mercy enter into any of our equations? Into politics? Into our lives?

Where is the candidate with the platform of Mercy?

K Zoo Poem

I promised poetry... so here's one form around 1983. I wrote it about a woman I knew for a moment in college.

Just Few Miles South of Kalamazoo

Just a few miles south of Kalamazoo

waits the married lady

her kids are asleep

in the living room

we tiptoe over them

up the stairs

till her scent hangs like the heat

just above the floor

as we sweat

and listen to the boards creak beneath us

in this lonley summer farmhouse

just a few miles south of Kalamazoo

St. James First Law of EMS:

There Ain't No Cure For Stupid.

It's Tough To Be A.....

Well then.... the title for my blog is a pun yes... but perhaps the larger question I'm thinking about these days deals with what it means to be a Saint In The City..

This blog is intended as a place for that bizarre intersection of poetry,politics, radio/TV, music and art, and of course EMS/Fire Rescue. This precise combo I'm sure is popular with millions of bloggers the world over. Er well maybe not this PRECISE combo..but anyhow this is who I am and what I give a shit about so here it is.

Fire Rescue Intersection Tip #1
When you see an Emergency Vehicle approaching from behind you at an intersection... don't I repeat DO NOT just floor it and scoot out into cross traffic...that gets ugly fast. (See St James 1st Law of EMS.)