Good Morning All & Happy Sunday!
Here’s to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the great civil rights leader, whose birthday we celebrate tomorrow during the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Holiday! May all of us follow the principles he championed…that all of us should be judged not by the color of our skin, but by the content of our character. May his memory live on…
Speaking of birthdays, here’s to friend and educator extraordinaire, Clare Keen in Wisconsin; and to friend and accomplished attorney, Mark Gorgos in Binghamton NY, who is celebrating his 66th birthday today! Happy Birthday to you and have fun on your special day of celebration!
And Happy Birthday to legendary Indianapolis 500 car racer A.J. Foyt, who is 87 today; to singer/songwriter Ronnie Millsap, who turns 79 today (I’ve always admired his ability to overcome his physical disability of blindness to excel in music); to model Kate Moss, who is 48 today; to one of my very favorite singers, Sade of “Smooth Operator” fame, who turns 63 today; to choreographer (and terrific dancer) Debbie Allen, who is 72 today; and to Broadway musical writer, director and actor Lin-Manuel Miranda of “Hamilton” fame, who turns 42 today (what a genius…”Hamilton” is a must see musical…seeing it on Broadway some four or so years ago was a thrill!).
Thank God there’s lots of sports on T.V. right now…a good diversion from the “COVID virus blues.” Try as I might, I finally got it and I’m so glad I got double-vaccinated and boosted because this stuff is nasty….like nothing I’ve ever had before…not your usual virus/cold. It seems to attack your respiratory system. I wonder what it would have been like to have it and not have been vaccinated and boosted…maybe a trip to the hospital??? I’m rooting for the Green Bay Packers and the Los Angeles Rams to meet in the NFC Final for a shot at the Super Bowl…we are all big Aaron Rodgers and Cooper Kupp fans here (Cooper used to play for the Eastern Washington University Eagles just down the road from us here in Spokane…he’s one heckava football player, don’t you think?
Speaking of sports, it was just this past Saturday in 1967 when the very first Super Bowl was held, featuring the Green Bay Packers and the Kansas City Chiefs. I was 12 years old back then and remember that game pretty well (I think we had just gotten color T.V.!). I was fun to watch quarterbacks Bart Starr and Len Dawson…I have old football cards featuring them, not to mention legendary coaches Hank Stram and Vince Lombardi…wow!
I received a lot of great books for Christmas and I’m now reading “Wild River Pioneers: Adventures in the Middle Fork of the Flathead, Great Bear Wilderness & Glacier National Park” by John Fraley. It’s an interesting read and makes me want to be full-time hiker/adventurer in that part of the country (of course with a Motel 6 and hot shower close by…ha!…ha!…ha!). Those early trappers and homesteaders had to be some pretty tough customers to make it through the winter year end and year out. They had many fascinating stories to share of life in the wilderness. If you’re interested in that part of the country, this would be a good book to pick up and read sometime…
You know, for the life of me, I just can’t quite understand why it is so difficult to get firm, fair and effective voting rights legislation enacted in all of the states. It doesn’t seem like it’s “rocket science”…require voters to show proof of identity & citizenship at the time they register to vote; allow them to vote by mail or in person; allow easy access to voting for all registered voters (i.e. extended hours to vote on election day and not require voters to stand in line for an unreasonable amount of time to vote). “Ballot harvesting” should be outlawed (voters should cast their own votes either by mail or in person and not have their votes submitted by others). Doesn’t that sound pretty reasonable? If so, why all the “fall-der-all” about how voting should proceed? Our state (the State of Washington) has had a long history of well-run elections and we have a well-established vote by mail system that seems to have withstood the test of time. We’ve been fortunate to have had five secretaries of state that have done a good job of ensuring the integrity of elections. Unfortunately, our current Governor chose to name a state legislator as a replacement for our elected Secretary of State who was asked to come to Washington, D.C. to supervise efforts to ensure election integrity who has no prior experience supervising elections. I had hoped he would have picked a current county elections official (i.e. county auditor or someone in the Secretary of State’s office) who was knowledgeable concerning our current elections system & protocols. It seems like current political leaders like to politicize appointments these days! How do you think the integrity of elections should be upheld going forward?
I lost my Dad in 2015 to Alzheimer’s Disease and there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think of him and wonder what he would think and/or say about what is going on in the affairs of our country and the world. He was a source of inspiration and wisdom that I draw upon as best as I can, even though I can’t speak with him. I feel very fortunate to have had a father like him. I wish everyone had someone like him in their life.
Speaking of my father, I’ve been sharing parts of the interview that he did in connection with the Washington State World War II Memorial Foundation and here are some more excerpts from that interview:
Question: “Now you were, you were a radio operator (at the assault on Iwo Jima) is that right?”
Answer: “Yeah.”
Question: “So you had the backpack radio?”
Answer: “Well, I carried…the Army had a better deal, I was a little jealous. As I recall, they had a 283 or 284 I think it was, or a 184 or 183…It was a light unit to carry, and it was effective enough as range went, because I carried what they called a Navy TBX. Much heavier, bulkier, heavier batteries and everything.”
Question: “Self-contained though?”
Answer: “Yeah, except you had to have a generator that you had to carry separate to crank the…the generator cranked the power to run the radio normally, that’s what you had to have. You couldn’t rely on batteries solely. But I had a fellow with me that cranked the generator.”
Question: “Do you remember…cause this is, you came on one landing craft and the front opened?”
Answer: “Dropped open. First thing I saw to my left was a guy going up…cart wheeling about 15 feet into the air. He had been a near miss, hit by an artillery shell or something. He was flying just as I had stepped out…and I thought, holy crud, you know…I’m in…this is not a nice place you know.”
—Donald M. Newbold, “Washington State World War II Memorial Foundation Interview”
(More to come in a future “Thoughts For The Day From Papa ‘a.”)
Here’s the trivia question for the day:
Q: The “Pod” in “iPod” was inspired by which film…”Alien”?…”Blade Runner”?…”Back To The Future”?…or “2001: A Space Odyssey”?
A: In keeping with Apple’s forward-thinking and artistic character, the “Pod” in “iPod” was inspired by Stanley Kubrick’s film “2001: A Space Odyssey.” The credit for naming the iPod goes to copywriter Vinnie Chieco, who drew his inspiration from the line “Open the pod bay doors, HAL” in the 1968 film. The thinking was that the music player was to be part of a computer’s broader digital hub, like a shuttle docking at a spaceship. The shuttles in Kubrick’s film were called pods, which resembled the look of Apple’s new music player, and the rest is history. Unsurprisingly, the “i” is a nod to the internet.
Here’s the thought for the day:
“All the diamonds in this world
That mean anything to me
Are conjured up by wind and sunlight
Sparkling on the sea…”
Bruce Cockburn, “All The Diamonds In The World,” from the album “Salt, Sun And Time” (1974)
Here’s to a great Sunday and lots of love & good wishes always!
Press on,
Papa ‘a (Dad, Uncle Mark, Mark, etc.)