The King is Dead, Long Live the King

The King is Dead, Long Live the King. I always thought that was a peculiar turn of

words.

But here we are.

Wacko Jacko, as the Aussies called him went to the big venue in the sky yesterday

and who is going to replace The King of Pop?

Some rapper who wants to pop a cap in some mother

fucker's ass? I don't think so.

I wasn't a big MJ fan. I never bought one of his LPs or CDs.

I did buy Thriller on a cassette, but who didn't?

Like him or not, you have to admit that they guy had enormous talent.

Was he about as screwed up as any individual still walking free in society?

Hell yes, of course.

You couldn't be in the national public eye at such an early age as him

and not pay a very large price.

So that's it. No more Micheal to laugh and snicker at.

Is he black or white? Is he a boy or a girl?

It's over, so be it. Amen.

The King is Dead, Long Live the King

New York Food, Big Deal

We've been in the New York area for the last five days now. There was a few things that I wanted to try while I'm here. Pizza, Corned Beef and "New York" Chinese.

I've said all along that you just can't get good pizza west of Chicago. New York has the thin crust and Chicago has the thick. In Cleveland, where I arguably "grew up", which is approximately half-way between these two standards of pizza, the crust is not so thin. And not so thick. I tried a slice, or two, near Times Square a few years ago. It was, in a word, pizza. Not manna, but not bad either. I tried another pie again last night, same same. What the hell is going on here? Do I have to go to Cleveland just to reset my pizza benchmark? That's an awfully big price to pay for pizza enlightenment. The so called "New York" Chinese that we had the night before was, how should I say? Chinese. Not much different than what you'd get in Long Beach or even, God forbid, Cleveland.

We were given a jar of Sabrett's Red Onion sauce a while back.

To a native New Yorker, this stuff brings back sweet memories of the hot dogs off of the Sabrett push carts back in Brooklyn.

Ya know what? Maybe this is what drove the Dodgers clear across the country until they ran to the end of the road and settled in LA. La La Land. The red onion sauce isn't what you'd think it was. It doesn't contain red onions at all. What it really is, is basically onions dredged in catchup. Thanks, but I'll pass. Gimme some good mustard, on a good dog like a Nathan's. And maybe a dab of relish. That's it. Don't get your fingers in the way because I'm grinding it up.

We did have a Nathan's hot dog at the Newark airport coming in. Just to get in the New York state of mind. They are pretty good. But not world class. Forget the "combo meal" with the fries. The fries are terrible. Gag me with that little plastic spoon over there.

I've also heard all of the hype about the NY water. Now water and my mouth are close-to-perfect strainers. But what the hell. When in Rome--- Maybe in the morning I'll venture up to the tap and sample a glass of the stuff. I've been laughing for years at people who pay over a buck for a bottle of water. Water? You twist a knob and get a virtually unlimited supply practically for free and you willing to pay a buck to get 12 ounces in a creepy plastic bottle leaching PCBs and maybe toenail clippings of snakes for over a buck? I have to admit that back in Signal Hill the water there is so bad that when I brewed beer there, I did pay a buck for five gallons in my trusty reusable Arrowhead bottle at the water store. By the way, the Gourmet Water Store in Orange CA has gone out of business. I guess the demand for "gourmet water" didn't live up to expectations.

OK New York, you've been warned. I'm going to get a corned beef sandwich to take on the plane tomorrow and the honor of the whole region is going to be riding on this one sandwich.

You better not fail me, or I'm going to tell rat you out!

Beer, Rolling Rock

Near and dear to my heart is beer. It's a genetic thing I think. My, dad being of German decent sure drank his share. I do and so does one of my sons. I always liked "good" beer. Coors, Olympia and Rainer were good beers. Not great beers, but good beers. Coors still is. Budweiser never was, too sweet and the barley malt was cut with rice. Which probably was a cost cutting measure and added to the sweetness. Beer alcoholics drink Bud. I don't. ABB, anything but Bud. After spending time in Germany, I "stepped up" from good beers to better beers. The Germans not only make good stuff like Sham-Wows, they arguably brew the best beer in the world. Good American beers like Sierra Nevada and Sam Adams. It didn't hurt things for me that Jim Koch is the owner of Sam Adams. Rolling Rock was always, to me, a pretty good beer. If not a great one. If somebody offered me a beer and the choices were Bud or Rolling Rock. I'd choose the Rock, ABB. I'm in New York state this week and was offered a beer and sure as hell the choice was, you know what and RR. ABB, I opt for the Rock. I hadn't had a RR for some time now and it seemed to taste about the same. I read the painted on label as I had a hundred times before and, Oh Oh. Instead of saying Latrobe Brewing Co., Latrobe PA. It said St. Louis. I hope you know by now that any beer, regardless of what brewing company the label says, if it's from St. Louis, it's Anheiser-Busch. If some the label of some beer like Killians says Golden Colorado, it's a Coors product. The same goes for wine. If the label says Modesto CA, it's a Gallo product. Gallo probably has more than twenty different brands that don't reference Gallo on the label. But if it says Modesto, it's Gallo. To get back to the point, I Googled Rolling Rock and did a little homework on Wickapedia. It turns out that AB bought RR from InBev in 2006 and promptly shut down the Latrobe PA brewery and moved the label to it's Newark NJ mega-plant. Ironically, two years later, InBev bought AB and acquired RR back again. Moral of this story is this. I like to patronise the little guys like Latrobe. AB and InBev aren't going to miss the couple of hundred dollars that I spend on beer every year. That paltry sum does impact the little guys a lot more. So, I am never going to spend another dime on this AB product unless I see Latrobe PA on the label and know that all of those people in PA who were pushed into the unemployment lines are once again painting Latrobe PA on the bottles.

The Big Apple

Were off in the morning to NYC. The City, The Big Apple, the city that never sleeps. If we can make it there, we can make it anywhere except where we are actually going. Which is Montrose NY, just a headless horseyback ride north of Sleepy Hollow. Yeah, there really is a Sleepy Hollow. Lots of history there. Churches built in the 1600s- West Point, if you're queer for Army cadets. You know, cultural crap like that. It's actually pretty nice there, good pizza everywhere. Not like most of the crap you get west of the Mississippi. But most of the wine there really sucks. It's all like Manachevitz. sweet Concord grape stuff. It's like Welches grape juice spiked with Sterno. So after about for or five days, I do get Jonesing for a burrito and a Dos Exxes and the sound of surf. But for now, let the trip begin.

Oil Island White

We were planning on either going to the Isthmus at Catalina for the Summer Wine Festival or failing that, sail to Long Point and anchor either at White's Landing or Hamilton Cove. The weather sucked so we didn't do either. Instead, we just motorsailed out to Oil Island White in Long Beach harbor and dropped the hook overnight.

It was Cynthia's first time on an overnight anchor out but all went well and there were no disasters.

Dawn broke nicely and we had a leisurely coffee and breakfast. These two pictures were taken with my "phone". They call it a cell phone and you can actually call people up with it. But the damned thing also has a camera on it and also is a Walkman and has a bunch of games with it as well. All very noble things to try doing while barrelling down the San diego Freeway at 75 MPH. 

This is the waterfall at the island which is as phony as the island itself. But when the fall is "on", and illuminated with the white lights, it's well worth showing up for.

We would have like to stay a bit longer but Miss Sadie hadn't done her toilet ritual for over a day and she looked like she was really suffering. As soon as we hit the marina dock. she jumped off and promptly made up for lost time, several times.

Sadie is four and a half now and apart from all of the hair that she sheds, she is the perfect boat dog. I've been trying to train her to go on the boat. But no deal. What kind of lady do you think I am she must wonder. She would rather breed with a Rottweiler that is owned by Nancy Palosi than do dirty on the boat. I even tried making a small puddle up on the bow by the anchor windless which would be the ideal spot, but she shot me a very dirty look and promptly dived down the ladder into the cabin below in order to distance herself, like I'm not getting blamed for this one smart guy.

I think I'd like to be reincarnated as a Golden Retriever. Life sure is good. Now let's go find some ducks to chase.

We went.

As you can see, we went. Cynthia and myself, plus the kids. Dave, Amy, Marcus Dilday and Sadie.

We did the usual sail around Oil Island White, out Queens Gate out five or eight miles, Polish Jibe and back in Queens Gate. Ran down the inside of LB Breakwater and down the jetty. Boring? Hardly. Just like the good old days. The dog was in her element, as was the captain. We drank lots of beer, nobody got hurt and we didn't sink. I'll take it.