Sixty years ago, on a Sunday night, the Beatles invaded America, and I watched in glorious black and white as they captivated every teenager in the country. The next morning, I told my mother that there would be no more haircuts and that I needed an electric guitar and amplifier. At this point, I had been playing guitar for two years on an old Gibson D 45 and was ready to take the leap into electrified instruments. I took extra vitamins and found a few special exercises to generate hair growth. It was a painstaking process.
Halfway through my school year, my family moved to Plano, Texas, and I was befriended by my good pal, Jarry Davis. He and I both had that special itch to play rock music. He knew a drummer and a sort of bass player, and I took on the lead guitar duties, playing a Japanese electric with six pickups and twenty knobs that did nothing. We called our band The Dolphins, later changing it to The Orphans, which sounded a bit tougher and fit us because of our long hair and general surely attitude; we were not the Monkees.
My rock n’ roll journey started on that February night and lasted until 2019, when my band, The American Classics Band, retired our setlist. Not a bad run of it.
A classic quote from an old sailor that fits my frame of mind lately. Tell me your thoughts; you can send the “Oh no, the elves went too far” emails and comments after you hear me out.
The Devil Worshiping-Narssisistic-Scum Bagging-God Hating- Ozempic Shooting Grammy Awards
Not shown for shock value..nothing shocks us these days
I didn’t watch them this yearand haven’t in many. But, the articles on the websites cover the schmooze-fest quite well. The show, according to Rex Reed (I didn’t know he was still around) may have reached a new low. From the pictures on the net, most of the folks attending looked like characters from the Star Wars Bar. Swifter Girl is enough to keep many of us away, as well as all the gangster Devil-worshiping rappers carrying a 9 MM or a Uzi in their tux pockets. One poor girl actually performed a Satan Worship routine while singing about vampires sucking her blood, which at the appropriate time, she cut a vein and rubbed her own joy-juice all over her wokie body; ( it may have been Hawaiian Punch concentrate). I watched that video on YouTube and found it disgusting. The crowd loved it, stood up, and clapped, and Taylor Swifter danced and clapped. Okra Winfrey was filmed jamming it to the devil’s song while giving herself a shot of Ozempic. So, I guess digging out on that Devil’s music cancels Tay-Tay’s best-selling ” Study Bible,” which is being smuggled into the children’s section of our public libraries and on display in your neighborhood Wokie bookstores. A frail Joni Mitchell may have been the high spot of the broadcast. In her 80s and not too mobile, she sang one of her biggest “back in the day” hits. Bless Brandi Carlise for her friendship. Joni did an admirable job singing and just getting through the performance. I watched, with one eye covered, Miley Cyrus’s performance on YouTube. Good Lord, what a demonic little moron. Hopping around on stage, 95 percent naked, she sounds like Cher when she sings and like an 85-year-old whiskey-soaked five-pack-a-day smoker when she speaks. Pretty sure she’s shooting up the Ozempic, too. The music industry has gone to Hell in a Beelzebob Ozempic-loaded handbasket.
The Crisis At The River -Everyone Gets Baptized
I don’t have much left to say when it comes to the invasion on the border. I’m worn out and burned out. The Crazy Texas Wire Dealer is doing all he can, as are the Texas National Guard and The Texas Rangers. One man of the cloth, and I’m not sure which cloth he wears, or even if he is an ordained preacher, well, at least he had the TV preacher hair, said, “All those poor unfortunate sinners swimming in the river, it’s as if the good Lord is baptizing them before they reach the Texas shore.” That pretty much sums it up, folks.
Toys in the 1950s, you gotta love them. The one pictured above, the machine gun that shoots wooden bullets, is a weapon I could never get my paws on. I did manage a Fanner 50 western pistol and a Colt snub-nose version that shot plastic bullets, but nothing like a machine gun. That would have been the ultimate weapon for our neighborhood battles against each other and “the hard guys” across the railroad tracks. All of these potentially lethal weapons were advertised in comic books. Did any responsible adult ever check these ads before the book was printed? Hard wooden bullets mowing down kids; talk about shooting an eye out or death. These weren’t ads dreamed up by New York Mad Men, but ones from back alley shops that made money off the gullibility of children, me included. My buddy Georgie ordered a so-called real hand grenade from the back page of a Richie Rich comic. A month later, he got a real steel WW2 surplus hand grenade in the mail. It wasn’t live with explosives, but damn, it gave his parents a shock. His father had thrown more than a few of them when he fought at Guadalcanal.
I ordered the Super Man X-Ray glasses from my Super Man comic book. The first pair I ordered for $1.49 called “Magic X-Ray Glasses,” got me into trouble. I told two girls from my neighborhood baseball team that I could see their bones and guts, even though I couldn’t see a thing. They ended up giving me a beating with their Hula Hoops! Who knew a Hula Hoop could hurt so much? I had the word WHAMMO imprinted on my back for a week. My mother dispensed the fake glasses to the garbage can in the alley and saved me from further assaults. Most everything bad that got me in trouble wound up in those alley garbage cans.
Faster Than A Speeding….
Yep, I had to have one, so for Christmas, mom coughed it up. It was a cheesy-looking costume, not much better than cheap pajamas. My Aunt Norma, a seamstress extraordinaire, added tufts of foam and cotton padding to give the appearance of super muscles. She made gold material covers for my PF Flyers and made a new cape. I was hot stuff. Naturally, all my buddies assumed this suit would enable me to leap tall buildings in a single bound, fly faster than a speeding bullet, and all that super stuff. I actually believed I could, so I climbed to the second-story roof of our house, stood on the roof line, cape blowing in the wind, and stared at my buddies thirty feet down in the backyard, awaiting my takeoff. Down the roof, I ran and launched off the edge into the spring air. I landed on top of two of my friends, which saved me from injury. Mother, who saw the whole performance immediately busted my butt with a Tupperware container while dragging me into the house. The suit was in the alley garbage can the next morning. I never flew again.
Back in the 1950s, before the internet and home shopping networks, us kids were convinced that anything sold in a comic book had to be the real deal. Tiny Sea Monkeys, X-Ray Specs, Space-Ray-Guns, Real Hand Grenades, and yes, like the one above, a real Rocket Ship. What a gullible bunch of schmucks we were.
It took me nearly a year to gather and cash in enough soft drink bottles to purchase my very own rocket ship. I was just a quarter short, and fortunately, my grandfather came to my rescue; he knew where I lived! I was beyond thrilled, trembling with excitement like a dog trying to pass a peach pit, as I sent the order form by mail. In six weeks, my ticket to Mars would be in my hands: a bona fide rocket ship complete with illuminated controls, atomic fuel, a disintegrator ray gun, and space for a buddy and me. When I proudly showed the advertisement to my neighborhood scientist and mentor, Mr. Mister, he tactfully agreed to help me assemble the contraption upon its arrival, not wanting to burst my small bubble. According to my mother’s calculations, my rocket ship should arrive just after Thanksgiving but before Christmas, allowing Mr. Mister to assist me in assembling my celestial chariot. My nights were filled with restless anticipation, I developed a rash, and my appetite vanished; I was a jittery, nervous wreck of a kid.
A week after stuffing my face with turkey, the postman dropped off a ginormous flat box at our doorstep. The moment of truth had arrived. With my mom’s assistance, we lugged the package into our living room, and I eagerly began unpacking my “spaceship.” Instead of finding an epic disintegrator gun or an atomic fuel cell, I only uncovered a pile of flat cardboard, a string of Christmas lights, and two measly C batteries. Oh, and to top it off, the instructions were in Japanese. Talk about a recipe for a miniature meltdown! In my time of need, my mother summoned Mr. Mister from next door. After assessing the comical catastrophe, he instructed me to head over to his place for some cookies with Mrs. Mister while he worked his magic on assembling the rocket ship. Now that’s what I call outsourcing! What a guy! All of us boys wanted to be like Mr. Mister.
Two hours later, I returned home to be greeted by the sight of a rocket ship chilling in the middle of our living room. It was a real looker, decked out in red, white, and silver, all prepped for a space adventure. So, I hopped in, ready to blast off into the great unknown. I couldn’t locate the blastoff switch. I turned to Mr. Mister for some wisdom, and what does he say? “Looks like they forgot to send the engine with the ship. Let’s see if we can piece one together out of spare aircraft parts I have in my garage.” Yeah, right. We both knew it was BS. As I climbed out of the rocket, I accidentally fell backward into the ship. We tried patching it up with tape, but nope, it was toast. There I stood in the dim alley, staring at the crumpled remains of my dream rocket ship to Mars. The things we do for adventure!
Risking blasphemy and a quick trip to Hell by evoking one of our sacred cows we Texans hold so dear, I believe this picture says more than any news blurb. Yeah, I know it’s fake, likely done with AI, but it represents how we feel and how much of our country feels. This time, we have more than 200 defenders, but the invading force numbers are in the millions, and the lawless folks in Washington are added. I’m not a violent person, but I will admit that I own firearms and am not afraid to use them, so I guess Momo and I might be open to joining these fellas on the banks of the old Rio Grande to protect our state and country. Just to make things right, before I wrote this, I ate two Whataburgers and offered a prayer to Saint Willie, so I should be good to go and forgiven of my trespasses and all that.
“Remember The Alamo,” the battle cry that changed the course of American history. “Come and Take it,” the flag that solidified Texas’s place in history. I don’t expect a body from New Hampshire or Deleware to understand our heritage; those states have the revolutionary war to wax about. If Texas seceded from the United States, we would have the tenth-largest economy in the world and could easily sustain ourselves as a republic without the interference of those grifters in Washington. What’s evolving by the hour at our border is a preview of things that might be coming. Yeah, we are all braggarts bordering on insufferable assholes at times, but everyone wants to live here. Wonder why? God Bless Texas and Davy Crockett.
Yes, Dear Hearts, she has now taken over the Super Bowl. It’s not about football anymore; it’s about a singer with an average voice who knows four chords on a guitar and always holds her microphone near her rear end. What is up with that? We can be assured that the camera will show her face every few minutes; maybe they can catch her squeezing a zit. Poor Kelce, there will be a song about him in the near future, and he knows it: what an unlucky schmuck. I have no plans to watch the “Swifter Bowl:” there are too many good movies on Netflix and Amazon.
American Classics playing our acoustic set at The Georgetown Winery, Georgetown, Texas 2012. L to R: John Payne, Jordan Welch on drums in the window, Danny Goode, and myself.
My back is killing me, and my left hand and fingers may never be the same, but damn, it was fun. Last Saturday, my friends Jordan, our drummer, and his wife, Jonelta, hosted a Mardi Gras party in their home. Jordan is a certified Coon-Ass from Louisiana, so he always makes two types of gumbo, shrimp and sausage, which I love both. Add homemade bread, cajun cake with a baby inside, pralines, wine, and a good group of friends, and you have the perfect setting for an impromptu reunion of the American Classics Band. We haven’t played together since April of 2019, and since then, our good friend and lead guitar and fiddle player, John, has passed away, so now we are three old guys wondering what happened and who’s next. We had a good run of it, the same four pickers playing together since 2001.
After eating ourselves into a Gumbo-induced coma, the three surviving members of the band took the stage in our old practice room. This is not a cheesy garage band setup; it’s a large room in Jordan’s home with a stage, a kick-ass recording studio sound system with a board, and speakers mounted on aluminum trusses suspended from the ceiling. My pal, Jordan, didn’t hold back in giving the band a good practice room.
Not me, but very close….
After a mic and instrument check, we kicked off some of our old tunes that we could play without a lead guitar. Our vocals were always the strongest part of our music, and we missed John’s third harmony voice and his guitar and fiddle. It was a bit of a sad shock at how different our songs sounded, with a large part missing, but we made the best of it and played for two hours without a break. After that, we collapsed in a heap. Voices shot, fingers on the verge of falling off and Jordan, behind his drum kit, was huffing and puffing. We all agreed that for us, men in our middle and upper 70s, any gig outside of this practice room would not happen.
We hope for a repeat performance soon because we ” Ain’t dead just quite yet.”
To do my duty to God and my country and to obey the Scout Law; To help other people at all times; To keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight.
I was a Boy Scout; before that, I was a Cub Scout. My sons and grandsons were, and are, Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts, so the tradition runs deep in my family. We are not an army, one that can bear arms and fight the enemy, but if pressed, we could, with the right arms, cause our invaders to re-think their decision. Send some scouts to the border, give us some Daisy pellet guns, and hide and watch. Pellets may not wound them, but damn they hurt.
Father Frank, my priest at The Lady of Perpetual Repentance, has mobilized the Holy Sisters to the border. Mother Agnetha and the ladies have had the honor of winning the state rifle range championship five years running, and they are putting their Winchester prowess to work on the border, defending their home state. When things get tough, call in The Nuns With Guns.
My 24th cousin, Annabelle Oakley. She’s been shooting things since she was a wee-one after joining the Barnum and Baily Circus, so now she is heading for the Texas / Mexico border to do some trick shooting through razor wire.
There’s a sanctified saying that’s been used in Texas for at least 40 years, ” Don’t Mess With Texas,” and we damn well mean it. Our governor, Greg Abbot, has the cajones of a penned-up bull, giving the middle finger salute to those elitist som- bitches in Washington. Old Gov is now known as the “Crazy Texas Wire Dealer.”Here’s an excerpt from his commercial that’s running on the radio down by the border.
Hey folks, It’s Governor Abbott here; I’m now called The Crazy Texas Wire Dealer! You want wire? well hoss, I got a wire. I got me some Razor wire, Constantina wire, Barbed wire, Hog wire, Horse wire, Rabbit wire, Chinchilla wire, Chicken wire, prickly wire, smooth wire, Viet Cong wire, wire with little bells on it, wire with $ 50.00 ATM cards hanging like ornaments, Bud Light wire, Amnesty wire, Biden Wire ( it’s invisible), Go to Jail wire, Cartel wire, Terrorist wire, wire with little bombs attached, 10,000-volt electric wire, poisoned wire, Telegraph wire, Western Union Wire, Walmart Wire, Taco Bell wire, wire with little Don’t Tread On Me flags hanging off it, I got wire for every occasion, and if I don’t have it, I can get it. We also got Alligators, Nile Crocodiles, Nile Pirahna fishes, Electric EEls, little remote-controlled submarines that shoot missiles, swimming Dingo Dogs, Scuba Pit Bulls, Wives with guns going through The Change, Crazed Teen Girls with guns having their period, Swimming Zombies, Air Boats with machine guns, Armed Boy Scouts, Cub Scouts, Girl Scouts, Indian Guides, The Boys Choir, The Highway Patrol, George Strait and his band, John Daley, The Neighborhood Patrol, the Shooting Grannies, the Proud Boys, the Ploughboys, The National Rodeo Association, Nuns With Guns and every armed Texan that can make it to the border. Come on down; it’s gonna be some kind of fun.
“In Remembrance.” How many times have you rolled your eyes at that phrase? Obituaries, Eulogies, sympathy cards, and Life Celebrations all bring it to mind, but to me, it feels like a worn-out catchphrase from the past. Not the most fitting expression, but it has that eye-roll-inducing charm. My grandparents, bless their hearts, were professional funeral attendees. They never missed a chance to show up for the bereavement and raid the potluck table – family, friends, neighbors, and even strangers. Their dedication to mourning and food was truly unmatched. Some months, my grandmother didn’t cook a meal; they lived on leftovers from the family gatherings after the service. Ham, roast beef, tater salad, rolls, they ate better than anyone in the family. Death is final, but it comes with good food.
I’ve taken that old phrase, “In Remembrance,” and revamped it to perfectly encapsulate my childhood adventures. It has nothing to do with shuffling off this mortal coil, pushing up daisies, biting the dust, buying the farm, ashes to ashes, or any other worldly farewells. It’s all about the good ol’ days, mischief managed, butt whooping, and the epic tales of my early youth. I’m an old guy now, so time is of the essence, and my keyboard is hot. My punch card could run out at any time, anywhere.
There will be a flurry of “In Remembrances” hitting my blog. I figure a small novella broken into multiple chapters will about do it. I will, because of being blessed with a crazy-assed family, be using them as fodder and foils in many of the recounts. To protect the guilty, I will change some names because a few of them are still among us.
My direct family, Mom and Dad, are floating around in the clouds now, so what I write about them will be respectful and kind, even though my dear Mother whipped my little kid’s bony rear thousands of times with everything from Tupperware to a Mimosa Tree switch. My neighborhood pals and, of course, my mentors, Mr. and Mrs. Mister, played a large part in my development into what I am today. According to my wife, Momo, I should get into a time machine, return, and start it all over. I’ll give H.G. Wells a ring.
Notes From The Cactus Patch 