Autumn vs Fall. And other stuff in the air besides leaves.

Obligatory photo of turning leaves and mildly threatening sky...

This isn't about that, but I had to mention it anyway. Some author got his tighties in a wad and said he thought Autumn was pretentious, why not just say Fall. Maybe it was Andy Rooney, that was his kind of BS. Or Hemingway used to get all uptight too. (Truman Capote said on late night TV, "I think Ernest was really more like me than he preferred known," or words to that effect. Anyway i was out walking with the dogs and humming "Autumn Leaves," an old favorite. I decided to substitute Fall for Autumn and the result was really crappy. Made me laugh (at a lot of these guys who say shit, like they had little else to do). So much for that. Hey if they can, I can too. Hence my glob. Blog.

Another splendid Ben Carmean cover...

Anyway. September. Big month. I got a contract for Ruined Days. Cool. Paperback and ebooks, hardbacks if sales warrant. Thought it was the other way around but what do I know? Really. Anyway, I'll have two books out. More on the way. We'll see how that goes. In the works are these covers. Plus a collection of short stories titled Resume Speed. Awaiting word on these. (All the covers are Ben Carmean designs, wizard stuff)

The invitations to the events: Above, the Denton/Accardo spectacular, Below right, zee plane zee plane.

Also this: "Life Illuminated" by two brilliant minds from VML, Mars Denton and Stefania Accardo. These young ladies put together a "mural" that won the competition hands down--I'll try to explain it: It's a big board that has moss or some growing, living plant that represents the oceans, and on the land areas a myriad of colored, flashing LED pinpoint lights showing conversation about various current exciters such as #GMO, #Gaza, #Ebola, other topics. The moss has to be spritzed and cared for periodically which, to me, exemplifies the care we should be taking with our world water.  Ideally, the hashtags will change to reflect the various topics of world social media. The thing is mind-bending in its implications. And, important enough, in my opinion, to be in a museum or at CNN or NBC news headquarters or somewhere. Just SO impressive.

The Illumunati and this, two more Carmean designs.

The same night I saw that, I saw an airplane of mine installed at the VML-Wise Gallery, which they kindly named after me when I left.  I'm so proud it houses that Life Illumination mural for now, and my plane along with it as a permanent fixture.

They asked me to put some words on it and here they are:

Something in the air.

Might have been the various chemicals I ingested as a kid building model planes, planes that flew with fuel-propelled engines. The balsa wood frames were covered with a tissue-thin paperlike substance that, once glued in place, was painted with something called airplane dope that tightened and strengthened it into a shell. Dope. That's what it was called. You asked for it at the hobby shop and they sold it over the counter, no furtiveness. No asking if you were a cop.

Dope. That and the tube of cement, or glue, emitted fumes. As did the glo-fuel with which you filled the little hornet engines. Heady fumes. No wonder some kids went on building these things into high school and beyond. The aerospace industry is filled with these happy people.

And when I hear a piston-prop plane, I shade my eyes and look for it in the clouds, sometimes a dot, sometimes low enough to read the numbers. And it means freedom.

When I came upon the fuselage-looking thing in a flea market, the stove dashboard, it beckoned to me. I didn't know quite why until I started on it. Without the benefit of dope I might add. Some loom spindles became floats. A discarded motor from the old days supplied the dream power. Parts jumped to it as to a magnet. It became the ultimate in freedom; a bush plane! In my mind it flew over the hump and landed in glasslike fjords in shangri-la and the whitecaps of moose country. Anywhere. The great uncharted Anywhere.

There were no directions, no instructions. Sort of like VML when it took its maiden flight. Dreamers built it. And the damn thing flew! Did it ever. Flight has been a constant thread from the pre-VML TWA days, the Northwest adventure, the Southwest and Korean Air clients of today. And this bush plane symbolizes the audaciousness of that dream.

Thanks, VML, for letting me be a part of it. And for the honor of the gallery name, and for lots more.

G.

Late addendum: Got two new stories into the literary journals. Noteworthy (to me, anyway) since they get 500+ submissions per issue, and accept few. One editor said " Not our usual stuff, but I like it very much. I'd like to have it in the Winter issue, if still available. No sir, not my usual stuff, but tight, well-written, and I was on page 4 before I knew I started. That's what I'm looking for." Feedback like this is pure nourishment to a writer, as we get little feedback at all except rejections, and they don't really have time to send you anything but a form note. They could be saying why are you sending us this crap, or hey just missed, try again. Sometimes they "strongly suggest" you continue to send them material. Which is feedback of a sort, thus welcome.

If you care to see other, older blogs, on everything from skiing to Dylan Thomas to Revelations click "Next" when you see it at the bottom. Thanks for reading.

Retorna Me, O Lead Sled Of Dreams...

Been a year or so since the 1949 Ford left Wise Acres for a makeover. Bart, who works on it some weekends and a couple nights a week, is a methodical, ex-racer safety-minded dude with a good sense of design and car looks. Also wields a mean spray paint gun. He took on the Butchmobile for a low-mileage, 1984 New Evo Harley that had been retrofied to an Indian/WWII olive drab look. And soon it will be done, the Butchmobile.

Bart took this in Butler, MO. Soon, I will be ghosting the town square, oldies issuing from the radio, mellifluous tones from the smitty glasspaks, then the bluedot taillights will disappear like tracers in the dusk, down the two-lane blacktop...

The name comes from a similar-looking Ford I had in high school. A lowered, rumbling, primered, vapor-locking beast of a flathead V8 that attracted cops like a cow pie pulls flies out of a summer breeze. My name was Butch then. And the Ford was my car through thick and thin. Much thin. That Ford and I exploded the myth that cops couldn't chase you across the state line from Missouri into Kansas. Turned out they could, of course, would, did with impunity. One of many aha moments for me at that downy-cheeked, often misinformed stage of life.

The main apprehending cop's name was Rocky. He was a young man, and he laughed when he said "You actually believed that?"

Well, Rocky and I would meet often on the streets of Kansas City. First-name basis. His name was Sir. Mine was whatever came to mind and mood. He would search my trunk and glove box if I had passengers, just for the embarrassment it caused me. But I digress. This car is not that car, and I am not that callow youth. I'm a callow older guy.

Here it comes, out of the past, watch out...

This Ford, this Butchmobile II, has been upgraded in every possible way, from stronger solenoids in the door-openers, to a leak in the back window that eluded Bart for over a month. The fender skirts have been reshaped to fit more aerodynamically--they were meant for a Mercury, but I wanted them on this car. The parking brake cables rubbed the air bags. Fixed. Major things like the clunky C3 trans (out of a 70's Ranchero) replaced with a recent Mustang 5-speed manual. I can hardly wait to get my hands on that. The primer-looking dull matte paint job has been glossified just a bit, still a fresh primer look, but cooler. There were rust bubbles everywhere. Gone. The automatic windows stuck. No more. The gauges have been revamped and placed for more convenient reads of the 1988 Mercury engine's activities.

The gas tank sprouted rust that clogged the fuel pump, and that's been dealt with. There went a month. First was, why doesn't this #@%^$ start? The steering wheel locked and it wasn't even a GM product. Remove pin. And much more, much more.

Dino rode shotgun, as did Elvis, Jerry Lee, and Duane...

Anyway, in the words of Dean Martin, "Retorna me, cara mia ti amo, solo tu solo tu, mio cuore" which means, of course, "Return to me, lead sled of my heart, badass car, badass car, my cruiser of night beauty."

Remember that song? It was on the charts in 1958 along with Duane Eddy's Rebel Rouser. And it was probably on the radio of Butchmobile #1, up loud, the ducktailed driver shifting into second to make the smittys pop, a KCPD prowl car turning around, its driver craning to see what makes this robust sound. Ahh, that hot rod 1949 Ford, that's what.

Siren on.

Luck. Rhymes with.

Raindrops keep fallin' on my head...

I'm beginning to feel like that Lil' Abner character, the rain cloud guy. My Chevy, it seemed, was under a recall shadow. So was my wife's. I liked mine so much that I had them put a crate engine in it when it shot craps. That was costly, but less than a new car. And it still had the cheap shitty ignition that would turn off at inopportune times and kill you by shutting down the airbags and everything else.

It's still not fixed.

The parts trickle into the dealers at about three a week. Maybe they're waiting for everyone to die off so they have fewer ignitions to fix.

My wife's is fixed, but she still can only use the ignition key with nothing else on it. Seems they're not sure of their fix.

"Open wide. Your wallet, not your mouth."

Then my front tooth developed a problem wherein my body was trying to reject it. It requires a post, implant, temporary tooth, amazingly equal to cost of a crate engine for an HHR Chevy. Almost to the penny.

The house needs painting. The ceiling has leak stains and bad places where several rains tested it and found it wanting. The soffits around the guttering are crap. Today I had the appliance guy (who I'm getting to know well--we're on first name greeting) over to look at a leak in the dishwasher. He found it easily. A rust hole. "Look here. it gushes right out on the floor."

A new one is coming from the appliance store. Sometime next week.

I was out cutting vines away from the gutters before I cleaned them, and cut right through the TV antenna cable. Looked just like a vine! I tried to strip and tape it, but something having to do with "impedance" impeded any chance of a picture. Guy came to fix it. Not Bill, the appliance guy. An impedance guy who also knows fixit stuff like bad soffits.

The hay is still uncut. Too much rain the last few days. Raining right now.

A sculpture bull I'm working on gave me fits and I had to cut a leg off, start over. Had to pay the vet for horses' shots (about as much as a dishwasher) and the lucking John Deere mower needed repairs at more than the new dishwasher.

Telemarketers call and blather on, the ones who get through caller I.D., and I tell them bad word bad word. They want money for every conceivable thing. Highway patrol fund. The home for blind mice. Drugs.

BUT. This week, BOOM, during all the shitstorm, I got a story accepted. Shortly before that, another story was selected to be in an anthology of Best New Writing of 2015. And Killer Nashville allowed me into their guest blog string. And, at the sculpture opening, early in June, we sold a couple sculptures at the gallery, plus another one sold even before the show started.

Good things are comin'. Positivos. Bueno haps. Boom chicka boom.

Don't get me wrong. I'm grateful. Whiny, but grateful. For the writing and the sculpture that's selling. For beautiful days and happy old dogs and elderly horses that thunder up to get their grain in the afternoon, for coffee in the morning, the BLT's my wife gets me and which I eat while watching House of Cards season II, for the AC that's still working (shhh, don't tell the fates about that, it takes three units to do the house and the studio, and somehow, they're working) for the eventual slowing and maybe even shutoff of the streak that has been trying to make me crazy. I fooled it. I already am crazy. As those who know me will genially and emphatically agree. Luck. Rhymes with pluck. And luckily I have some. It runs low now and then, but dammitt, it's there.

Damn Good Advice. And some of it is.

Way back in the day, 1960 or so, I got to attend some Advertising Age ad workshops at the Edgewater Beach Hotel in Chicago. The excitement and galvanomter level were about the same, I imagine, as at today's Austin SXSW; the giants were there. Bill Bernbach. Commander Whitehead. Howard Gossage. Maybe George Lois was there but if he was I don't remember him, and I think I would have. But the place was thunderous with the footsteps of real giants, and their shoes proved hard to fill in the decades to follow.

This was the beginning of something big...

Bernbach stands out as one who changed advertising forever, made it resonant with intelligence, meaning, lightning-like speed of benefit-recognition.  "Think small," was the headline that started it all, in a full-page newspaper ad for Volkswagen that showed the car small in a corner, surrounded by space. Wasted space, some would say. Ogilvy would have filled it with words, but that's neither here nor there--he was just another kind of giant, albeit in love with words. His. 

Heady times. I came back from that workshop and began my career in earnest. That workshop was the rocket booster that put me in my smallish orbit.

Oddly, the advice I remember from Bernbach was, "Keep your health." I took notes furiously, sat near him at his table at lunch, listened intently to all everyone had to say, but all I can recall from that career-fueling few days in Chicago was Bernbach advising, "Keep your health."

I remember puzzling over it when he said it. I was young, indestructible, smoked like a coal plant, pulled all-nighters, dove into impossibly stressful situations, and health was, well, not a factor.

It was the best advice, not just some throwaway. Of course I wanted advice on how to have great ideas. I didn't realize that good health was the linchpin for that and all else. I came to that realization gradually over many years.

Keep your health.

Oh, right, this was to be a review of Damn Good Advice by George Lois. And so it is. Somewhat.

And this helped George along the way...

The abrasive, audacious, self-congratulatory, legendary George Lois wrote a book of bite-sized and numbered recommendations, all illustrated, usually with some paean to his own wit and creativity. I'm not denigrating Lois for any of this--he can back it up with accomplishment. And I mean stellar meaningful accomplishment. He joins that company of giants, that pantheon of MVPs, because he performed admirably in the arena, time after time after time. He kicked marketing ass. And maybe an AE or two's butts along the way. I seem to recall that.

He fired a racist client. A big client. He stood by his principles, unwaveringly, without apology. Still does.  He's as free with compliments for others as he is for himself. He simply takes his own advice, number 91 in the book, "When you got it, flaunt it!"

If you're a "creative," you'll find yourself smiling, nodding and even laughing as you read this compendium of smarts and smart-ass. It's a, yes, must-read, for all of you in the arena.

And here's to your health.

Galveston. A beautiful kick in the ass. Really.

Not sure why I chose this book. But I'm really, really glad I did. I'm writing some semi-noir stuff, have been for awhile, and I say semi-noir because a steady diet of noir is like too many Edward Hopper paintings, or waking up with a hangover in Duluth on a hot Sunday, in a roachy room by the railroad yards.

So, Galveston. It wasn't the name. And it wasn't the white label proclaiming "From the creator, writer and executive producer of the HBO crime series, True Detective." Nic Pizzolatto, is the author. I hadn't seen his series, only read snatches about it, and thought, well, formulaic maybe, but then I saw "Edgar Award Finalist," and this blurb by Dennis Lehane:

"The best roman noir I've read in a decade. It's dark, brutal, sexy, sad, and filled with so much drop-dead gorgeous writing that I felt authentic envy while reading it."

Lehane, in my estimation, is a hellaciously good writer, and for him to say that, transcends blurbing. So I bought it.

It is, in one word, beautiful. The NY Times Book Review said, in part, "...fever dream of low-rent, unbearable beauty..." and how true that is. The other reviews were by people who obviously hadn't read the book and threw names like Chandler and Hammett around. Or said the book captured Galveston, which is so beside the point as to be odd.

Roy Cady, the protagonist, is a sort of enforcer, collector, odd-job guy. Big, intimidating, pretty tough, sliding into lushdom, forty and feeling older. He's deeper than he first appears, and this other Roy, while not prone to discussing philosophy or much of anything else, does become the conduit to the reader of breathtaking asides about the weather, the light, the feelings that things like dust and wind and refineries and motel ceiling stains cause in a sensitized, though often brutal observer.

Observer is the key word, and he is that, and it makes the pages so enjoyable. There's a nice balance between Roy as observer and some other voice, so one never gets the impression he is saying these brilliant things. That would be distracting, and this novel is so not distracting; I may read it again just for the writing. Mr. Lehane and the NYT nailed that, allright.

And the story is way beyond badasses doing awful stuff to one another and escalating consequences. At no time does the story become a matter of "get on with it," or bogged in its own intricacies or its own pathos. It's deftly told.

This fuel-injected, darkly powerful debut novel is so much better than most of what's out there. I trudged through a Pulitzer winner and just could not finish it. I won't say what year that one won, but it was like work to read. Galveston is one of those books that pisses me off to finish it, because I know that the next ten will be like that big prize winner; sailed across the room, pages flapping, to gather dust. 

What I'm saying is buy this. Enjoy it. It sets a high bar for your next read though.