UNWOKE, A BOOK REPORT

A wise man said “knowledge is power”. There are things going on in our Country that we need to understand and act on. Ted Cruz has written a book: Unwoke; How to Defeat Cultural Marxism in America”.

In it, he provides an insiders view of what is going on to subvert our Country’s values and culture and what can be done to counter it. I had an idea of what was happening but didn’t understand the extent of it. I feel strongly that this book contains information that everyone needs and should be widely read. It is available at Amazon and Walmart online.

Knowledge is power!

 

THE FLEA

By Allen L Phillips

“It looks like a f***’n flea”, said Stan.  George and Jack, two of my best friends, had pooled their money and bought a boat.  They had some left over and decided the boat needed some pin-striping.  This was 1957 after all, in L. A., and pin-striping was all the rage, enhancing the car culture of the time.  

Stan was our local pin-striper and when he saw the boat he asked if they also wanted a name on it.  They  hadn’t thought of a name and asked Stan what he thought.  And that’s when he uttered those famous words.  “It looks like a f***’n flea.”

THE FLEA was 13 feet long with a white fiberglass hull and a dark mahogany plywood top with a sexy air scoop in the foredeck in front of the windshield.  It did look a little like a flea, especially when bouncing across larger boat’s wakes.  It had a 40 horse power Mercury outboard motor, about all the little boat could handle, and came with a decent trailer.  They planned to use it for water skiing and were assured by the seller that it would do the job.  So Stan pin-striped the little boat, painted the name on it along with a nifty image of a hopping flea, and THE FLEA was born.

THE RIVER

“Hit it!” I yelled, with a nod of my head.  The Flea was idling about 50 feet away in THE RIVER with about 25 feet of the 75 foot ski line lying slack.  I was standing on my left foot in about a foot of water, with my right foot in the forward binding of my water ski and holding on to the handles of the ski line.  The driver gave it full throttle and the rest was up to me.   When the line came taut I “stepped off”, shifting my weight to my right foot in the ski and, somehow, I was skiing.  I quickly slid my left foot into the rear binding and off we went.

THE RIVER was the Colorado River, specifically the 14 miles between the town of Parker, Arizona and upstream to Parker Dam.  This was a boating Mecca with camps on both the California and Arizona sides.  We became regulars at Big Bend Camp on the California side.  On maps now they call it Big Bend Resort.  Then they just had sun shades set up along the edge of the river with a launching ramp and a few picnic tables and we slept on cots or on the ground. 

We usually went during the summer and sometimes it was so hot at night that we slept under wet towels.  When the towels dried out we just walked into the water, wet them again and went back to sleep.  The River bottom was sandy, the water was clean and we slept in our bathing suits anyway.  We had a pup tent to change clothes in, mostly for the girls, but nobody slept in it.

Big Bend was so named because the main current came close to the California side then ran into a substantial rock formation, which also defined the downstream end of Big Bend Camp, then the river made a sharp left turn around that rock.  There were also some small caves in it and bats came out at dusk to hunt for insects, spooking the girls and providing the evening’s entertainment. 

Then there were the inch long man-eating horse flies.  We must have worn shirts most of the time when we weren’t skiing since I don’t remember much trouble with them.  But we watched grown men run screaming into the water to escape.  They can take a chunk out of you an 1/8″ in diameter and they go for the upper-middle of your back, knowing that us humans can’t reach there.  It was always good for some laughs to watch new people arrive that weren’t horse fly savvy.

Upstream from Big Bend on the California side, 15 minutes by boat, was River Lodge.  They had a dock and a restaurant/bar with pretty good food and the bar tender had a garden out back and made really good mint juleps.  We brought our own food but we usually found an excuse to have a mint julep at least once on each trip.  River Lodge still shows on current maps but no word on the Mint juleps.

Across from River Lodge on the Arizona side was a outdoor restaurant with a dock where you could reserve a steak in advance then cook it yourself on their grills.  When you were done grilling they gave you a baked potato and fixings.  This restaurant, sadly, does not show on current maps.

Late afternoon at the River was cocktail hour and everyone would line-up their beach chairs on the shore for the entertainment.  The big boys went racing with their inboard boats that were more racing boat than ski boat.  These boats seldom had much freeboard which meant that they sat quite low in the water. 

The cocktail of choice was the wine cooler – red wine and 7-Up on ice.  We brought cheap jug wine, large bottles of 7-Up and the camp had an ice machine.   And it seemed like all the restaurants and bars served a version of the wine cooler.

Few tried to water ski during cocktail hour since the racers churned up large waves.  We were at the cook-your-own-steak place late one afternoon and someone had parked their low sitting inboard in a boat slip headed in and the waves came over the stern and sank the boat.  Just the air trapped in the bow was holding the front up.  They say the two best days in a man’s life are the day he buys a boat and the day he sells it.  This is one of the reasons.

Mel, another good friend, had the Flea out one day and was in a slow turn when a larger boat came by and the wake flipped the Flea upside down.  Mel scrambled out from under the boat and the driver of the  larger boat came around and told him to hold the bow down to create a “bow lock” to try to keep the Flea afloat by trapping air in the bow.  Mel said he could hear the air escaping through that “sexy air scoop” in the bow and was afraid the flea was going down.  But other boats quickly arrived and they managed to tow the Flea ashore, get it upright, bailed out and back on the trailer. 

There was concern about engine damage from water intrusion since the engine had been running, albeit slowly.  But the camp had an engine repair shop and the mechanic quickly removed the spark plugs and cranked the engine over to clear water out of the cylinders.  He dried out the spark plugs and put it back together and it fired up, apparently none the worse.  But I’m sure this event caused George and Jack to start thinking about that second best day in their lives when they would sell the Flea.

Across from Big Bend on the Arizona side was a shallow area with a nice sandy bottom where the current wasn’t as strong and we often took beginners there to teach them how to ski.  Kirk, another friend, came on one trip with his girl friend Patti and we took her there.  She was almost up on two skis when her bathing suit top came off, ending her efforts for the day.  I was driving the boat so I missed it.  Being the observer has its advantages.

HEY, WE CAME HERE TO SKI

Oh yeah, the skiing at the River was amazing.  We always tried to stay in a quiet area of the camp away from the partiers.  Cause while they were sleeping-in we were out on the River skiing.  We could find some fine ”glass” early in the day when the sound of the ski in the water would change from a ‘pitty-pat’ or chattering sound to a barely audible sizzle when we hit the “glass”.  And we wanted to hit it fast to enhance the effect so the boat would head up river to the left of the “glass” and the skier would pull hard right across the wake so that he was going faster than the boat when he hit the “glass”. 

It’s really hard to explain – – kind of surreal – – like skiing into an alternate reality.  What caused the “glass”?  We guessed there were rocks under the surface that turned the current upward causing what looked like flat boils on the surface.  This knocked down any chop and created a perfectly smooth surface just for us.  We’d stop, change skiers and do it again and again.

When we skied behind the Flea it was at full throttle.  And when a skier pulled across the wake it made the little boat hard to control.  Driving the Flea while pulling a skier was hard work, requiring full attention, so an observer was critical to let the driver know what was going on with the skier.  This was less of a problem in larger boats with more power but, even in those days, most used an observer.

And while having 25 feet of slack ski line when “stepping off” worked with the Flea because it was so slow getting up to speed, larger, more powerful boats needed little or no slack.  Jack and George were both pretty big guys and the Flea struggled when they were skiing.  We met people with nice inboards and skiing behind them was a totally different experience.

But alas – priorities change – the Flea was sold and neither George nor Jack had another boat.  My employer transferred me to San Diego and a new boating saga began.  But that’s another story. 

GHOSTS FROM THE WINE CELLAR – CHAPTER 2

By Allen L Phillips             

Well, we sold the wine cellar – well, actually, we sold the house that the wine cellar was attached to.  It was traumatic.  I always enjoyed going into the wine cellar to select a wine for dinner, part of a ritual that extended the process and turned eating into dining.  There was always lots of wine in there and some of it was good.  I could usually find something drinkable, occasionally even exceptional. 

We live in a retirement community now, exchanging the too large 1,000 bottle wine cellar for a too small 50 bottle wine fridge that we put in the garage.  It was wrenching to pare down the list of what wine to keep and we wound up leaving some drinkable wine for the new owners.  During that process I found some wines I’d forgotten I had and probably 20 of the 40 odd bottles in the new fridge are 30 to 40 years old. 

We mostly eat in the community dining room now and I occasionally take my own wine to drink.  It’s hard to take the old wines to the dining room because they usually have a lot of sediment that needs to be strained out which requires decanting.  We do prepare meals at home sometimes and there are outdoor gas grills if we want to use them.  We are still adjusting to our new dining ritual.

One of the old wines I found was an 1987 Thomas Fogarty Pinot Noir.  Think about that – 35 years have gone by since those grapes were picked.  I’ve never intentionally aged pinot noir and most experts would agree that pinot does not age as well as, say, a cabernet sauvignon or a French Bordeaux.  I like pinots because they are a lighter red that can go with a wider variety of foods and, as it turned out, that old Fogarty had held up pretty well.

I can’t talk about Pinot Noir without recalling lines from the 2004 movie ‘Sideways’.  Miles is an eccentric lover of Pinot and Maya is a waitress he meets in Solvang who is also a wine lover.  They are talking as they sip an exceptional Pinot.

Maya:  “Miles, can I ask you a personal question?  Why are you so into Pinot?  It’s like a thing with you.”

Miles:  (laughing)  “I don’t know – I don’t know.  Um, it’s a hard grape to grow………Its thin skinned, temperamental, ripens early.   You know – it’s not a survivor like Cabernet which can just grow anywhere and thrive even when its neglected.  No – Pinot needs constant care and attention.  You know – in fact, it can only grow in those really specific little tucked away corners of the world.  And – and only the most patient and nurturing of growers can do it, really.  O-Only somebody who really takes the time to understand Pinot’s potential can then coax it into its fullest expression.  Then – aw its flavors are just the most haunting and brilliant and thrilling and subtle and ancient on the planet.  I mean, you know – Cabernets can be powerful and exulting too but they seem prosaic to me, for some reason, by comparison.”  

That last line sent me to my dictionary to look up ‘prosaic’:  “having the style or diction of prose, lacking poetic beauty; commonplace, unromantic”. 

In 2004, when Sideways hit theaters, all that was true.  But something has changed since then; grape growers and winemakers have apparently figured it out because there are lots of pinots available now and many, quite drinkable, under $10.  OK, few of those under $10 would inspire Miles to wax eloquent but some are quite good which suggests that, without breaking the bank, one might actually find one whose flavors are “haunting and brilliant and thrilling and subtle and ancient”. 

I tasted one that was close to that at a friend’s home several years ago.  While pinot is typically a lighter wine, this was more bold, more complex, closer to what you would expect from a good cabernet but without the heaviness.  Our host poured it for me but was going to drink something else until she heard my response after tasting it, “Oh!  That…will…do!”  Then she tasted it and we all wound up drinking it.  I don’t even remember what brand it was but I remember how it made me feel.  Wine can do that to you.

I enjoy shopping for wine at Trader Joes as they primarily stock affordable wines.  I especially enjoy finding a pinot at under ten dollars that is quite enjoyable since those are my daily drinkers.  Among those purchased and enjoyed over the last several years are Butler Pond, Cherry Blossom and their own Charles Shaw organic which sells at 4.99 a bottle when they have it.

As a marketing strategy Trader Joe’s feels that Charles Shaw organic wines are a value offering that they must sell for under five dollars.  If the cost factors don’t allow that price point they just don’t offer it.  So availability is spotty but when they have it, I buy it.  If interested, more information can be found at http://www.shaworganicwine.com. 

Another option is the Trader Joes Reserve label.  I just bought a pinot noir at 9.99, quite good, which I shared at a wine club meeting.  While Miles might look down on it, we all enjoyed it.

THE GIFT

By Allen L Phillips

“He’s a gift from Malia.” Said Todd.  Our 17 year old son had just walked into the house with a white dog with black spots.  The gift looked up at us and wagged his tail. 

Malia was Todd’s girl friend and a pitcher on the high school softball team.  Todd was a pitcher on the baseball team so of course they got together.  I can’t remember if we had a dog at the time.  It seems like we always had a dog.  Maybe we were between dogs.  We did have a cat – a white cat with a few black spots.  Our daughter had named her Mercedes. 

“Does he have a name?” I asked.  “No” said Todd, “just got him”.  “Looks like a Dalmatian” I said.  “Think so” said Todd.  Thoughts came to mind of the Dalmatians sometimes seen riding on fire engines.  ‘That’s kind of cool’ I thought.  So he stayed.  The dog – not Todd.  Todd was so busy with high school activities and his girlfriend that we didn’t see much of him.  He would soon graduate and we would see him even less.

Since the gift was similar in color to our cat Mercedes we named him Benz.  Then we noticed that the medium sized Dalmatian that we thought was nearly full grown just kept on growing.  The slim 35 – 40 pound gift soon became a hefty 65-70 pounds and barely fit through the dog doors to get outside. 

We began to notice other idiosyncrasies about Benz.  When we sat in the family room watching TV in the evenings he would take short naps, awaking with a start and looking around as though expecting an attack.  Then he would move to a different spot and settle down again.  We did some research on the breed and found that they were bred to trot along next to the lead horses in a team pulling a carriage, pacing the team.  Then when the carriage stopped for the night the Dalmatian would circle the encampment to warn of danger, taking only short naps.

We also found out that the male Dalmatian is noticeably larger than the female and the dogs seen riding on fire engines are typically female.  Another trait is that even though they are short haired, they shed the year around and their hair has barbs that make removing the hair from clothing or upholstery difficult.  Benz wasn’t allowed on the furniture but I came home from work one day and Benz was having some kind of panic attack, shaking and whining. 

I sat down on the floor with him and held him until he settled down.  Then he was fine and it never happened again but I realized that the dark blue sweater I was wearing was full of his white hair.  I had to decide how bad I wanted to keep that sweater because the only way to get the hair out was to remove each hair individually with tweezers.  I did it over several days while watching TV. 

In spite of his size he was somehow very graceful.  I was in the back yard walking toward the far corner when I could hear him galloping up behind me.  As he passed me I felt a slight cold wet tap on my left hand from his nose – a love tap.  And my wife and I frequently had glasses of wine sitting on the family room coffee table.  In all those years of Benz wagging his tail around the coffee table he never once knocked over a wine glass.

And Benz was no dummy.  One night while we were watching TV he startled himself awake and started barking at the door to the patio.  He wouldn’t stop so I got up and opened the door so he could go out.  He just looked up at me like I was nuts so I looked out the door and there was a large coyote staring back at us from the middle of our yard.  Benz just wanted us to know that we had a visitor.  He was doing his job.

Had we been looking for a dog we would have done our homework and probably not picked a male Dalmatian.  He was larger than any other dog my wife and I have had, although my family had large dogs when I was a kid.  The restlessness probably would have put us off and the 24/7/365 shedding would definitely have been a deal breaker.  But we weren’t looking and we didn’t pick him.  He somehow picked us and won  us over with love.  All that restlessness around the sofa and coffee table in the family room was him circling our encampment to keep us safe – he was watching over us.

Of all the dog’s I’ve had, the memory of having to put Benz down is the one I can’t shake.  He was getting so weak that he needed help getting up.  Dr. Watson, the wonderful vet we had at the time, let us stay while he gave him the lethal injection and Benz just went to sleep.  I visualize him in doggie heaven startling himself awake periodically just as he was bred to do.  He was a lovable oaf of a dog and gave us many years of unconditional love.

THE OLDER WOMAN

by Allen L Phillips

September 10, 2022

She came into the auto repair shop where I was working with my son.  She said she had been referred by a friend who told her we were a family shop and wouldn’t take advantage of her.  She said she was just a poor widow and wanted to know if we had any discounts.  When we said no she said, “What about a senior discount?” 

We told her we don’t offer senior discounts.  We just do good, honest work and stand behind it.  But you could tell she was in sales because in all the time we spent talking, doing the paperwork and she left her car, the question of a discount was still – somehow – unresolved.

My career in accounting and financial management for manufacturing companies was beginning to peter out in the 1990s due to declining local manufacturing and my increasing age.  So when Todd called me and said he needed a service writer at the shop, I accepted.  So began a second career in the auto repair business.

Late in the day, in July 1997, Todd asked me “What do we do about the senior discount for Pat Watkins?”  I thought for a minute and said ”I don’t think she is old enough – check her ID”.  A short time later she walked into the shop to pick up her car.  I was occupied several feet away as Todd explained the work we did on her car and when she brought up the discount he asked to see her ID.  After looking at her ID he turned to me and said “Dad, she’s older than you are”.  We gave her a 10% discount on her bill.

She came in several more times after that and, while always good natured, she was concerned about the cost since it always seemed that her car needed expensive repairs.  Finally she stopped coming in, her last visit sometime in 1999.

In January, 2002, my wife of over 40 years lost her long battle with cancer.  It had been a good marriage and, having been living alone for the 9 months she spent in various hospitals, I was ready for whatever was next.  I’d had a lot of time to think and memories had cropped up of juvenile discussions where guys talked about connecting with an older woman.  So a few months later I dug through the files and found Pat Watkins’ phone numbers.

I planned my strategy.  Though I had both her work and home numbers I wanted to call her at home and leave a message on her answering machine.  I wrote out my pitch and rehearsed it – then about mid-day I got up the courage to call.  “Hi, this is Al at Del Mar Auto.  I remember that you said you were a poor widow and I recently lost my wife.  I was wondering if you would like to get together for coffee.”

I assumed that she would call back later that day after she got home from work or even the next day, since I had only left the shop number.  Best laid plans……It turned out that she was off work recovering from  surgery and had just gone to the store.  So when she called back about an hour later I was totally unprepared and got so tongue-tied that I finally said “Let me call you back”.  My life-long lucky streak held – she thought I was just busy.  I gathered my thoughts, rehearsed possibilities and called her again. When she answered, I said “Hi, this is Al Phillips”.  She said “Who?” 

She had never known my last name.  To her I was Al At Del Mar Auto.  Somehow we got through that glitch and met for lunch at the Beach House in Cardiff.  We sat on their outside deck on a beautiful spring day and just talked.  I said, “So you just had some surgery?”  “Yes”, she said, “a hysterectomy.”  Stifling my emotions, I managed an “Oh?”, and she went on to explain why – assuming that I was grown up enough to handle such a discussion. 

Pat and I will have been married 19 years next month and we still celebrate that anniversary of our first “coffee”.  When the Beach House closed in 2014 we moved to the Chart House next door.  Since our move to Silvergate in Rancho Bernardo we celebrate at the Brigantine in Escondido. 

Pat and I were both born the same year, she in early September, I in Late December.  So every year for about 3-1/2 months she is the older woman and I am her boy toy.   And we celebrate that!

SIGNS OF LIFE

By Allen L Phillips

In what seems like a dark time in this world there are signs of life.  My granddaughter and her husband will boldly welcome a daughter, my great granddaughter, into this world later this year.  In a time when many of their friends are choosing not to have children, they have the faith to go for it.

There are many signs of life now.  Even the slowest to revive among deciduous shrubs and trees are now in full leaf with many bursting into bloom.  Everywhere I look I see new life.

Last Thursday I drove to the foot of Garnet in Pacific Beach to meet friends for breakfast at Kono’s.  We arrive by 7 am when they open, the only time there’s no line.  We enjoy the great food on their beach deck which overlooks the beach, the surfers gathered for their board meetings and the Crystal Pier with its rental cottages out over the water.

We are always the first ones there and take the seats at the far right facing the water.  We had just sat down when a noisy, disheveled bird about the size of a dove landed on the corner of the railing just a few feet away.  It was a very young American Kestrel and it soon became apparent that his mother, who was to our left on the roof of one of the cottages, was not happy with him.  She sat screeching “GET OVER HERE!” and flapping her wings until he finally flew to her.  The American Kestrel is our smallest and most colorful falcon with a 22″ wingspan when full grown.  This guy was on one of his first flights, having recently been brought into this world – another sign of life.

Yesterday, Pat and I were sitting in our patio when a bird flew into the patio over our heads and straight through the open screen door into the house.  After a brief exploration it attached itself to the screen of one of our living room windows.  Pat got a broom and I extended it to just under where he was perched and he hopped onto it.  Then I carried him out to the patio and rested the broom, still flat, on top of the railing where he just sat listening to us talk to him and posing for pictures.  Finally he flew toward some nearby bushes where he was met by his irate mother who flew up and batted him smartly with her wing.  “WHAT WERE YOU THINKING??” she squawked as she flew away with him dutifully in her wake.  This was a Bewick’s Wren, with an adult wing span of 7″, and was our first wren sighting since we moved here 6 months ago – another sign of life.

Are these signs of life – these messengers – telling us that there is hope, that the rancor in the world will pass and peace and prosperity will prevail.  I SAY YES!

GEORGE

June, 9, 2022

By Allen L Phillips

“Al, this is Duane, George’s youngest son.  Please call when you get a chance.” 

At age 86, with severe diabetes, one of the few things George could do was be active on his computer with emails and Facebook.  I could typically count on one or more contacts  per day from George – but he had been quiet for over a month. I was about to inquire of his wife, Jean, when this text arrived.  There was only one reason Duane would be trying to contact me.  George was in trouble. 

I can’t remember when I first met George.  I know he was there in boy scouts, explorer scouts, high school and in the Counts of So Cal car club that met at the South Gate police station in the late 50’s and early 60’s.  He was there when we went drag racing and after we were both married with family gatherings and trips to the Colorado River water skiing. 

“George is in hospice” said Duane when I called. 

It seemed like an era was coming to a close.  As I mentally flipped through my memories for snippets about George I stumbled over something Jack Murphy wrote in the old San Diego Union-Tribune.  Murphy, a revered San Diego sports writer, wrote about his old hound dog Abe of Spoon River about once a week.  When Abe died, I cried all through Murphy’s article.  The closing line was haunting me now:  “He’s all over the house….but I can’t find him anywhere.”  I broke down and cried.

George was bigger and stronger than most of the rest of us but he never pushed anyone around.  He was quiet, unassuming – a really nice guy with a great sense of humor.  I can’t remember seeing George mad.  He had a way of just talking to me if I screwed up and he made me a better person.  And he had another skill that I had almost forgotten.   The dude could flat drive a race car.

The Counts car club rented several garages in Huntington Park providing space for us to work on our projects.  It was here that George built the GMC “Gimmy” engine he eventually installed in his 47 Chevy.  And Dolan worked on his 1948 flat head ford  engine, not knowing what he was going to do with it – he just wanted to build it.  Others pitched in and helped as needed.  

The flat-head ford V-8 had been popular in racing because it didn’t require a big investment.  Then  Chevrolet came out with the overhead valve V-8 in 1955 and the flat-heads suddenly became irrelevant.  When we went racing in about 1958 to 1960, the Lions Associated Drag Strip (LADS) in Long Beach still had a separate nostalgia class for flat-head dragsters so we didn’t have to compete against the Chevys.  All we needed was a chassis, a car to put the engine in.

Just down the alley from the club garages a guy was working on a dragster who had just acquired a lighter custom rail chassis.  George talked him into letting us use his old “A-rail”, a modified Ford Model-A chassis, if we would put a “For Sale” sign on it at the drags.  It was heavy but the price was right and it came with four wheels so we painted it dark blue, installed Dolan’s flat head in it, painted signs on each side that said “Count Quick” and went racing. 

Several of us drove the dragster in test runs but it soon became clear that if we wanted to go fast either George or Tommy Oliveras had to be in the driver’s seat.  Those two alone were able to overcome the noise, the vibration and their fear to focus on speed.  Tommy later went on to drive professionally.

“Dad passed around 5 am” the text from Duane said several days later.  I cried again.

George then moved to Orange County and I moved to San Diego so we saw less of each other but kept in touch.  Jack, another very old friend, who is already in heaven waiting for George to finish up, lived in Fullerton in later years and organized several gatherings for the old car club bunch.  I drove up from San Diego, Tom came from Tucson, Mel from Manhattan Beach and George from Anacortes where He and Jean had found a wonderful retirement home.

My wife and I were blessed to visit George and Jean at their home in 2012.  Anacortes is on Fidalgo Island and there is a bridge from there to Whidby Island.  They lived in paradise with access to beaches and bays and the wonderful seafood of Puget Sound.  They were already half-way to heaven –  just a short hop to where George is now.  I know he will soon organize a meeting of the Counts Car Club.  There’s just a couple of us left down here.  Go ahead, George – we’ll catch up.

THE ATTACK

By Allen L Phillips

The squealing was deafening, startling us out of a deep sleep in the middle of a summer night.  It started just outside the open sliding door leading from our bedroom to the back yard.  The squealing then lessened as it seemed to move down the side of the house.  We were both up now and realized the squealing had gone through the side dog door into the garage.   It soon burst through the second dog door into the laundry room.  It was our little dog, Brandy.

Brandy was mottled brown, the runt of a neighborhood toy poodle mix litter for which the father refused any responsibility.  Rumors abounded that the father was Duke, a toy Dachshund belonging to Mr. and Mrs. K, but the fund raising effort to determine paternity floundered and Mr. K, while taking some pride in the rumors, declined to pay for the test. 

Brandy and our white cat Mercedes were about the same size and were great buddies.  Summer nights often found them dozing together on the small brick patio outside our bedroom window.  Something happened out there and Brandy was having a panic attack, shaking and whimpering.  We picked her up, sat her on the washing machine and realized she was bleeding from a wound on her side.

Then Mercedes came in through the dog door and, while seeming more calm, her white fur was standing on end.  She had obviously been part of the fracas and closer inspection found that she, too, was bleeding from a wound on her side.  Had they been shot?

We did our best to bandage them up and were the first arrivals at our veterinarian’s office the next morning.  Dr. Watson was a wonderful, caring vet and we left them in his care.  When we picked them up later in the day he had found a total of four puncture wounds in each animal, two on each side.  He had shaved the fur off around the wounds and applied bandages.  He ruled out a shooting because the punctures didn’t go all the way through and, by some miracle, no vital organs were damaged.  Our pets would be fine but we had a mystery on our hands – a perfect job for the Ultimate Family Detective Agency (UFDA).

The next morning I am sitting in our family room staring at the painting on the wall.  We had moved from Long Beach into this house in San Diego in 1969 and made frequent trips south of the border at a time when it was easy.   On one of those trips to Tijuana, we found several paintings on black velvet.  After several years just this one remained – an owl perched on a tree branch staring wide-eyed directly at me.  But, as UFDA’s lead detective, I wasn’t looking at the eyes but at the feet.  The owl pictured had 3 talons on each foot wrapped around the front of the branch.  If an owl was suspected, this did not jibe with 2 holes on each side of our pets – but something had attacked them in the night.

UFDA’s investigation determined that there are only a couple of wild things that would threaten animals this size – in our neighborhood – at night; large owls and coyotes.  In a meeting of UFDA’s executive committee, we judged that the wounds were not consistent with canine (coyote) teeth.  We had seen a pair of great horned owls in our large back yard and it was common to hear their hooting at night but we still had a problem with the orientation of the toes as depicted in the painting.

Every good detective agency has resources and UFDA had encyclopedias (remember those?), as well as wildlife books, which we studied –  there was no internet then.  Our research found that the owl in the painting was correctly depicted in that when perched they grab branches with one toe in the back and three in front.  But further study revealed a fascinating fact; when hunting, owls have the ability to turn one of their front toes around so that they can better grasp prey with two toes, and talons, opposing the other two, like having two thumbs on each foot.  So it had to be an owl but which one? 

According to the Peterson Guide which was the birders bible at that time and verified by our newer Sibley Guide there are only 2 owls found in this area that are large enough to hunt mammals that size; the Barn Owl and the more likely culprit because we knew they were here – The Great Horned Owl.  This is a large bird with a 44 inch wingspan, about the size of a red tailed hawk but more bulky.

Then, as we were finalizing our data in another meeting of UFDA’s executive committee, the head of forensics pointed out that Brandy and Mercedes would have had to be either standing or sitting up for the wounds to present as they did.  In other words, the puncture wounds in each side could not have occurred if they were laying on their sides.  Did their instincts alert them that something was up (no pun intended), causing them to sit or stand up just before the attack?  A good detective has to be able to put himself in the perpetrator’s shoes and visualize the event as it happened. 

UFDA’s summation:  Gary, a young adult great horned owl, was cruising under cover of darkness over the homes in the cul-de-sac.  He looked down and saw Mercedes, the white cat, laying on the brick patio behind one of the houses.  Brandy was laying next to Mercedes but, in spite of Gary’s superior eyesight, the dog escaped his notice as he started his dive.  Gary’s night vision would make the white cat appear like a bright light, blinding him to the dog whose coloring blended in with the brick surface.

Gary was mentally savoring the meal he was about to have as he moved his adjustable front toes around so they were in the grasping position.  Just then, even though owl feathering is uniquely designed for silent flight, Mercedes the cat stirred, her instincts warning her of a potential threat.  Brandy sensed her alarm and they both stood, ready for flight.  Gary, nearly upon them, saw Brandy’s movement and only then realized there were two animals……and with no time to think….grabbed them both….. one with each foot.  Then things happened really fast with Brandy squealing and squirming and Mercedes silently fighting for her life.  Gary briefly thought he could take home a double prize but was struggling with the weight of the two animals, Brandy’s deafening squealing and Mercedes claws.  Then the bright light….the light that suddenly came on in the house just a few feet away…..really startled him. 

He let go…..Gary let go of both animals and hobbled behind a bush out of the light to catch his breath.  Brandy and Mercedes disappeared down the side of the house and finally….finally….the squealing stopped.  With quiet once more in the cul-de-sac and the occupants of the house distracted, Gary silently lifted off to continue his hunt…..a little bit wiser.

BILL, DONNA AND THE RABBIT

by Allen L Phillips

It’s a few weeks before Easter, 2007.  Pat and I are at the drug store looking at Easter stuff and there’s this rabbit.  He’s about 12 inches tall, white and fuzzy.  He’s sitting upright and between his legs is what looks like a bird’s nest.  In the back of the nest between the rabbit’s arms is a green frog.  (Now stay with me here.)  In front of the frog in the nest are two yellow baby chicks.  The sign on the demo box says “Press my Left Foot”.

The bunny and his friends launched into an animated version of “Let’s Go to the Hop”, with the rabbit singing lead, the chicks singing the chorus and the frog jumping in on the bass parts.  It was hilarious and Pat and I were laughing out loud in aisle four.  One of us said “We need to get one for Bill and Donna – they need cheering up”.  So we got one for ourselves and one for Bill and Donna, picked up a card to go with it and headed out.

Donna had been fighting off cancer for many years, working valiantly and painfully through any treatment that held promise.  They were now out of options.  Bill had a hospital bed set up in their bedroom where she could enjoy their Mission Bay view, and she would soon be moving on to a cancer free afterlife.  So we left the rabbit by their front door with the card and called to let them know we left a gift for them.

Soon we got a call back from Bill, thanking us for the Easter Bunny.  From the way he talked, we thought they may have missed something so we asked if he had pressed the rabbit’s left foot.  There was a short pause and then we heard “Let’s Go to the Hop” over the telephone and then we heard something even better.  We heard Bill and Donna both laughing.

Life does go on and Bill remarried.  I still meet him every Thursday morning at the foot of Garnet in Pacific Beach for breakfast at Kono’s and a walk along the boardwalk.  This last week as we talked about this article, Bill mentioned that that day, Thursday, April 14th, was the 15th anniversary of Donna’s passing.  We both reflected on that for a moment.

We still have our rabbit.  We found that by removing the batteries after each Easter and with careful storage he still comes around when juiced up.  He has a prominent spot in our house every Easter season.  And now when we press his left foot, watch, and listen to, the zany performance, we hear Bill and Donna laughing 15 years ago. 

Searching on line I found this link which shows the rabbit and his friends in action performing the classic song by Danny and the Juniors.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2zU-Oy0c88

PAYING ATTENTION TO BEING ALIVE LXXXIII

1/27/2022

By Allen L Phillips

Well, we made it.  Since our move to a Rancho Bernardo retirement community on December 1st, life has been a whirlwind of unpacking, rearranging, hanging pictures, looking for things, learning how things work and meeting new people.  Our two bedroom cottage includes a full kitchen with dishwasher, refrigerator, stove and microwave plus a laundry room with washer and dryer and there are no instruction manuals for anything.  We had to get a tutorial from a staff member but still have trouble with the stove.  It’s a good thing we can go to the main dining room to eat.

We finally put up an oriole feeder to bring in some hummingbirds and be ready for March when migrating orioles begin to arrive.  The mature palm trees and giant bird of paradise that were common to our old neighborhood appear to be somewhat scarce here.  These are what attracted whole extended families of orioles to the old neighborhood as they like to build their nests in them.  Back in 1968/1969 the developer planted a giant bird of paradise in every front yard.  Did he realize that would attract orioles?

We have a small patio which is ours but outside the patio, the landscaping is maintained by the community.  We can put things like birdbaths and feeders outside in the landscaped area close to our unit in between the plants.  Yard maintenance is one of the chores we were ready to give up and they do a nice job here.  I have tentatively identified the taller plants surrounding our patio as Leucadendron Jester, a member of the Protea family which grows to about 6 feet.  We think the “flower” is not much more than a pinecone shaped 1-1/2 inch bulb, rather than the showy flower of many proteas, but time will tell.  They are just now starting to form.

This will be my farewell to the Clairemont area on Nextdoor.  After posting this I will change my area code so that future postings will appear in the Rancho Bernardo area.  I will miss the banter with many of you good people as I feel I came to know some of you.  We can all hope that with this latest variant, Covid will begin to fade from our lives and things can return to “normal”.  Do any of you share my feeling that “normal” may have to be redefined?

“Paying attention to being alive” is a line from a poem by Jack Gilbert and came to my attention when quoted in The Yellow House, a compelling memoir by Sarah M. Broom  (For past articles in this series go to allenlphillips.wordpress.com and click on the heading “Life”.)