ON THE STREET WHERE I LIVE

I live on Sylvan Avenue in Mountain View, California. One charac-
teristic that strikes me, despite all the years I’ve lived here, is how green this area is. It is indeed "sylvan". Now by “area” I mean many of the neighborhoods here in northern California. In the summer time one may look at some of the brown hills that surround us, and realize just how dry this part of the world can be. But not around here. We often, as now, are asked to watch our water consumption under threat of water rationing. But still we have our green neighborhoods.




Here we are looking down the street in one direction.













And here we are looking the other way.











There are a mix of dwellings on this street. That sign says SYLVAN
SQUARE APART-
MENTS.














There are also duplexes and ...








single family houses like these two, and ...









this lovely two story, two car garage home.






Of course they all have access to
Sylvan Park,
which is pretty centrally located.







Is there such a thing as "green" humor? Well, whatever the color, enjoy :

LIFE AS A RETIREE

Question: When is a retiree's bedtime?
Answer: Three hours after he falls asleep on the
couch.

Question: How many retirees does it take to change a
light bulb?
Answer: Only one, but it might take all day.

Question: What's the biggest gripe of retirees?
Answer: There is not enough time to get everything
done.

Question: Why don't retirees mind being called
Seniors?
Answer: The term comes with a 10 percent discount.

Question: Among retirees what is considered formal
attire?
Answer: Tied shoes.

Question: Why are retirees so slow to clean out the
basement, attic or garage?

Answer: They know that as soon as they do, one of
their adult kids will want to store stuff there.

Question: What do retirees call a long lunch?
Answer: Normal.

Question: Why do retirees count pennies?
Answer: They are the only ones who have the time.

Question: What is the common term for someone who
enjoys work and refuses to retire?
Answer: NUTS!

Question: What is the best way to describe retirement?
Answers: The never-ending Coffee Break.

Question: What's the biggest advantage of going back
to school as a retiree?
Answer: If you cut classes, no one calls your parents.

I SCREAM, YOU SCREAM...

we all scream for ice cream! Sunday afternoon, August 16, Cliff and I, along with a lot of help from other park residents, are putting on an Ice Cream Social. It’s kind of amazing the assistance that comes forward for our various monthly events. Two or three of the men will put up the tables in the clubhouse, several ladies will decorate them, and several other ladies will make cookies. One person even volunteered to make a fresh fruit topping. That will be in addition to the other toppings we will provide.

Of course I will be taking photos, both for the park magazine, and for posting to my blog. The blog gets the best of it because the magazine is printed in black and white, while photos in the blog will be in color. Yes, yes. I know that vanilla is white, but let’s not get picky, please.
There will also be chocolate, and all those toppings!

Humor:

OBSERVATIONS

Love is grand; divorce is a hundred grand.

Time may be a great healer, but it's a lousy beautician.

Conscience is what hurts when everything else feels good.

Talk is cheap because supply exceeds demand.

Even if you are on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there.

An optimist thinks this is the best possible world.
A pessimist fears this is true.

There will always be death and taxes; however, death doesn't get worse every year.

In just two days, tomorrow will be yesterday.

I plan on living forever. So far, so good.

A day without sunshine is like night.

It's frustrating when you know all the answers, but nobody asks you the questions.

The real art of conversation is not only to say the right thing at the right time, but also to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.

Brain cells come and brain cells go, but fat cells live forever.

Age doesn't always bring wisdom. Sometimes it comes alone.

Life not only begins at forty, it also begins to show.

COULDN'T RESIST

A few days ago, on my way out of the park on my scooter, I noticed some flowers that I hadn't seen before. Gotta take some more pics! And so I did. These take little or no comment from me.
























Yes, those are lemons. Many residents have fruit trees.

















































































































Okay, something funny -

Here are the rest of the Burma Shave signs:

Around the curve lickety-split
Beautiful car wasn't it?
Burma Shave

No matter the price
No matter how new
The best safety device
in the car is you
Burma Shave

A guy who drives a car wide open
is not thinkin' he's just hopin'
Burma Shave

At intersections look each way
A harp sounds nice
but it's hard to play
Burma Shave



Both hands on the wheel
eyes on the road
That's the skillful driver's code
Burma Shave

The one who drives
when he's been drinking
Depends on you to do his thinking
Burma Shave

Car in ditch
Driver in tree
The moon was full
and so was he.
Burma Shave

Passing school zone
Take it slow
Let our little
Shavers grow
Burma Shave

Don’t stick your elbow
out so far
It may go home
in another car.
Burma Shave

TRIPPED UP

I thought I was finished with my army stories, but then I remembered this one:

May and June, 1951 -- our heavy weapons training company was going on a week long field trip out in the boondocks of Fort Ord, California. We had good weather, thank heaven, because we were going to be sleeping in our tents for the week. Now “tents” was an interesting way to put it. We each carried in our backpacks what was called a “shelter half”. That is, we each had one half of the tent we’d be sleeping in.

Our company was divided into two platoons of four squads each, a squad consisting of 15 men in a column. When we got out to the bivouac area, the platoon leaders paired up two soldiers to make two shelter halves. Now I was at the end of my squad -- number 15 -- so there was no one left in my squad with whom to pair. That also happened to the last guy in the squad next to me, and the platoon leader paired the two of us together.

Here is where it got interesting. The ground was reasonably flat, but there were clumps of little bushes all over, and the trick was to find an empty space big enough to set up our tent. Before we started the setup, we had no idea how much room we would need, and since we were last, the really good spots were already taken. Finally, our platoon leader found us a place he said was big enough, so we started our setup. Well, the tent itself fit in the space, but our front tent rope extended into the path in front of our tent, so that’s where we hammered it into the ground.

Now the fun began. We were told that there was an “enemy” company in the area that might try to raid us. Each squad was designated a time to guard our perimeter; our squad was on early, and nothing untoward happened on our watch. When it got dark, about 8-8:30 p.m., it was too dark to see, so we crawled into our tents and went to sleep. Along about midnight I awoke to shouts of “There he goes,” “Cut him off,” and “Stop the S...” I could hear the thud of boots running up and down the paths, and at one point a loud crash and swearing for what we found out later was when one of the “invaders” fell into one of the tents. My tent buddy was swearing softly to himself, and I kept thinking about our tent rope that extended into the path in front of us. And I heard the thud of running boots getting closer and closer -- a steady clomp, clomp, clomp, clomp, clomp, -- a brief break in the clomping -- and then CRASH - as (we found out later) one of the “invaders” tripped over our tent rope, and crashed to the ground, there to be “captured” by our perimeter guard. My buddy and I had helped catch an “enemy” without even getting out of bed!

A bit of humor:


Johnny's Mother looked out the window and noticed Him "playing church" with their cat . He had the cat sitting quietly and he was preaching to it. She smiled and went about her work.







A while later she heard loud meowing and hissing and ran back to the open window to see Johnny baptizing the cat in a tub of water. She called out, "Johnny, stop that! the cat is afraid of water!" 

Johnny looked up at her and said, "He should have thought about that before he joined my church.."

WHERE IT COMES FROM, CONCLUSION

When we last saw Editor Don, he had been hurled off the cliff headed toward the river 6 miles below ... Oh, wait --this is not a Saturday movie serial. Anyway, here is where we left off:

By 2001 - 13 years since I’d started, I was really getting tired, and I wrote an article saying that the June, 2002 issue would be my last one. Ten or eleven more months went by with no volunteers, and I was quite prepared to shut it down.

Then suddenly somebody realized that another month would go by, and there would be no more magazine. I don’t know how this happened, because I wasn’t there, but one day I was contacted by a small group of residents who said they had an editor with a computer, but could I possibly do the computer work until she caught on. I didn’t have to do any writing, or typing, or proof-reading -- just put the pages together. Well, I agreed to that. Unfortunately, this lady didn’t know much about editing, either, and then just a few short months later, there was a crisis in her own family that required her to be on the east coast for some months. The one most positive thing this lady did was to recruit a number of different people to write articles. That was a big step forward.

One other fellow and I took the bull by the horns, and talked to one gal whom we thought would be an excellent editor. We pitched the idea that she would be editor, and I would continue to put the pages together; a task she did not want. She agreed, and now she and I have worked together since mid 2002. She is an outstanding editor, great at choosing the proper articles, and, where needed, rewriting copy. She has retained a group of writers who contribute on a regular basis. She emails me copy as she has it, which makes it easy for me to format articles properly. I’ve introduced photos to the publication, and made other formatting changes to make the magazine more readable. (Should you doubt me, ask Alison.)

Oh, following my last issue as editor, they did throw a party for me. And I was presented with a plaque:
To finally answer your question, Ms Knitalot 3, about where do I get what I put in my blog, you’ve probably guessed by now, but I have on disc every issue she and I have done, dating back to 2004. I just go through, and pick out what I think are the funniest items for posting.

Humor, coming from above explanation:


WEEKLY CLEANING LIST

Monday - Turn keyboard over and shake out crumbs.

Tuesday - Wet finger and wipe smudges off monitor.

Wednesday - Arrange tubes in alphabetical order.

Thursday - Clean up cookies and temporary files.

Friday - Do disc scan and defrag.

Saturday - Time to shake out keyboard again.

Sunday - Day to play. Worked hard all week!

WHERE IT COMES FROM

Knitalot 3 recently asked, “Where do you find this stuff?!? LOL!” Well, let me tell you.

I had the brain injury that disabled me in 1986, and I did very little for many months. Then one day in 1988, the then park manager said to me, “Hey, you’re not doing anything! You do this!” “This” turned out to be a monthly publication for mobilehome parks printed by a local printer, who made his money by soliciting advertising aimed at mobilehome owners. There was no cost to the individual parks, and the printer allowed some 20 pages for the park editors to submit their own local stories. The rest of the magazine (as we came to call it) was filled with ads.

What the park manager handed me was pretty pitiful. The only copy he had was a handwritten calendar for the coming month, and a brief article from himself.

Well, as the firefly whose tail was removed said, I was delighted no end. I doubt that the manager knew that I had worked on various publications since I was a teenager. This was right up my alley!

At the time I had an Apple IIe and a dot matrix printer. My wife Amalie offered to do typing for me, and I started looking for copy. I was quite excited about it. I interviewed park residents, wrote up stories about park activities, a few people sent in articles, and I would fill in with any decent humor that came my way, often by email.

This went on for some years. Over time, I made improvements. Dot matrix copy was not very satisfactory, and eventually I bought an ink jet printer. Never did get to a laser printer, but my current ink jet turns out beautiful copy.

It used to take me 10 days to two weeks from start to finish to get copy ready for the printer, and Amalie and I would plan our vacations around the magazine requirements. Anyway, after about 10 years I was getting tired, and started asking for help. Not much happened. After 12 years I started writing occasional articles saying that I was going to retire, and would someone please take over. Nothing happened. Now one must remember that this is a senior park, and at that time very few residents had a computer. It’s quite different today.

By 2001 - 13 years since I’d started, I was really getting tired, and I wrote an article saying that the June, 2002 issue would be my last one. Ten or eleven more months went by with no volunteers, and I was quite prepared to shut it down.

TO BE CONTINUED. Tune in soon to find out what happened next. And Knitalot 3, I realize I have not yet really answered your question, but all will be revealed in the final installment. You may already have a clue.

Fun time:
This video came in a few days ago. Enjoy!

FANTASTIC!

Just a half mile down the block from us, on El Camino Real, is the

I’d been told that in the lobby of that building was an absolutely fantastic chandelier, absolutely worth seeing!

So one day I scootered down there, with camera, to see what this was all about. The fact that it was right across the street from a Baskin Robbins ice cream store might have had something to do with it. (No, no, not basking robins -- that’s a house joke, Willie.)

It took a bit of figuring out how to get into the building, but when I did, I found myself on the second floor lobby, known as the

More about that shortly.

And here is what I saw!














There is an information desk near the entrance, so I scootered over to ask if it was all right to take photographs. “Oh, by all means,” I was told.












Did I know that there was a second chandelier one flight up? No, I didn’t.















Now the Dowd Pavilion, it turns out, is three stories deep, so I went down to the first floor to get a shot looking up.














The literature I was given says, in part, “This two-tiered sculpture was a gift to the Camino Division of the Palo Alto Medical Foundation from a grateful patient, Mr. Edward M. Dowd."











"The sculpture is comprised of a total of 442 individually crafted pieces, weighing a total of 1600 pounds. It was created in the Dale Chihuly studios, lauded for revolutionizing the Studio Glass movement. Chihuly’s work is marked by intense, vibrant color.”


Ed Dowd made his fortune in investment real estate. Fourteen years ago he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. He was most grateful to the Palo Alto Medical Clinic for the treatment and care they gave him, that when the current building was built just a few years ago, he donated the $4.1 sculpture that opened in 2007.



You can get an idea of the size of this sculpture by noting the people in the background.













And finally, the third floor chandelier gets a lot of natural light.









From glorious art to something funny:

HIGHER POWER
A Sunday school teacher said to her children, "We have
been learning how powerful kings and queens were in
bible times. But, there is a higher power. Can anybody
tell me what it is?" One child blurted out, "Aces!"