BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

February 20th is one of those really, really momentous days in history…

Some of you may remember, and by the same token, some of you may simply be too young to remember. You may have read about it in history books, but that would be as close as you came to touching it…

So, what am I rambling about?

47 years ago, on February 20, 1962, Astronaut John Glenn left this earth, and returned safely,  aboard a Mercury Space Capsule, dubbed Friendship 7. In doing so, he became the first American to orbit the earth.

Just for the record, Alan Shepard was the first American Astronaut in space, aboard the Mercury Capsule Freedom 7, in May 1961. The distinction of first human being in space was earned by Russian Cosmonaut, Yuri Gegarin aboard Vostok 3KA-2 in April 1961, beating out the US by nearly a month.

Those of you who know me, or have been following my blog for some time already know of my fascination with the space program. Even those of you who became readers of Brainpan Leakage only recently, are probably aware of this fact if you have been following the Mahwage series of entries. So, my apologies for spewing space trivia at you… It’s just one of those things.

Still, taking all of the above, and more, into account, I suppose NASA and our space program have been major landmarks for some of the most important events in my life…

• The Challenger Disaster and that fateful job interview that led me to meet, and eventually marry the love of my life, E K.
• Apollo 11, the first manned mission to land on the moon. This would be when my teachers in elementary school suddenly realized I was academically way ahead of the curve. I believe what tipped them off was me walking into class with a detailed scale model of a Saturn V rocket I had built from scratch out of things I found around the house… (As in, I had no plastic modeling kit, just junk, pictures, and my imagination.)
• And, yes, among other things, February 20, 1962…

You see, I have to admit I don’t clearly recall Astronaut Glenn’s historic orbits around the earth. At the time, I was in a small town called Fulton, Kentucky, and I  was somewhat preoccupied with being slapped around by a doctor, as I ventured naked,  screaming, and kicking into this world.

Yeah, today is my birthday. I awoke this morning to a Friday  just like any other Friday. Cleaning litterboxes, taking out the trash, getting my wife off to work, my daughter off to school, starting laundry, making calls to order parts for the kitchen faucet that elected to break at an inopportune moment, and even sitting down with a cup of coffee to get some other work done.

But, today, in addition to that work, as  gift to myself I have spent my time piddling around on the Internet instead of tossing words at an upcoming novel… I mean, after all, it’s my birthday. I should have a little fun, right?

Ever since last evening I’ve been receiving numerous emails from folks, countless postings on my Facebook wall, and even on my Myspace comments, all wishing me the best for the day and the year to come. I thank each and every one of you for those kind thoughts. I appreciate you taking the time out of your day to send me those notes, because I am the first one to admit that I am terrible about doing so myself. I get a bit preoccupied and often forget about such things, especially since we didn’t really make a big deal about birthdays in my family. Still, I want you all to know that I appreciate it.

Late this morning, I was even rousted from my comfortable chair here at my desk by someone pounding on my front door. To my surprise, when I answered it a lady presented me with the flowers pictured above… A gift from Samantha Beaty and 13 Magickal Moons, my favorite bookstore, (and bookstore owner), for signings, workshops, and even just plain visiting. I have a ton of friends there. Too bad they are in Virginia and I’m here in Missouri or I’d drop by and have a few drinks with the crew.

A few days ago, I received a delivery from my touring buddy, Dorothy Morrison. She sent me a bottle of booze, go figure.

But, seriously, she knows I happen to be a big fan of Maker’s Mark, so she and her husband sent me a “patriotic” bottle of the fine Bourbon.

She also made me promise I would open it and drink it… I said I would, but I’m not going to get in a hurry about it. I already have some Bourbon open, and besides, the red, white, and blue bottle looks pretty good up there on the shelf.

Knowing my penchant for  odd T-Shirts as well, the box included one of those too. It is emblazoned with a furry critter and labeled with an easily recognizable stylized script, proclaiming him to be “Hairy Otter.” You can expect to see me wearing it at an upcoming gig this spring / summer / fall…

…And who knows what’s in store for this evening. I couldn’t help but notice that E K laid out a bunch of leather items, stiletto heels, and such like before she left  for work this morning… Just kidding… Fact of the matter is, the poor woman had a horrid tension headache when she headed out, so I figure she will be the one on the receiving end of  the attention this evening. She’ll have to get all “Evil” on me some other time… And besides, like I said, birthday’s aren’t that big a deal on my side of the family, so we usually just have a quiet celebration with a few close friends, some stir-fry, and a whole mess of Sushi. I’m afraid that won’t be happening tonight, due to schedules and such, but we’ll be taking care of it in the near future… Tonight we’ll probably just sit around and watch Sarah Connor Chronicles, Dollhouse, and Numbers… Maybe I’ll even toss back a quiet Bourbon or two to celebrate…

And, so, here I am… This old farm boy is another year older, officially and everything. Whether or not I am any wiser remains to be seen…

On that note, Tammy Jean, a good friend of mine sent me an email a bit earlier, wishing me well on this day… In my response to her I discovered an interesting mathematical anomaly. I mentioned that my brain still felt 25, but that when I get up in the morning my body feels every bit of 72.

Those were just the numbers than happened to roll out of my brain, for whatever reason… It wasn’t until I did the math that it made an odd sort of sense…

You know, what with 72 minus 25 being equal to 47…

I wonder if there is a similar calculation for that elusive wisdom?

More to come…

Murv

Yo and stuff…

So, I just got back from Ohio… Yes, I went back to Ohio, but the city was still there… Not MY city, but then my name isn’t Chrissy, and I’m not pretending, so hey… (Hopefully everyone is getting that reference… If not…well…I guess I’m just showing my age again…)

Anywho, I was in Ohio for the First Annual Earth Warriors Festival. This fantastic gig was organized by Heather of Violet Flame Gifts in Newark, OH, and an amazing staff of folks who worked their tails off and hearts out to make sure the fest was a rousing success… They had a great turnout for a first time festival, and what was even more impressive was the fact that after the remnants of Ike tore up their original venue, this incredible crew managed to find a new venue and have it ready to go, all in the matter of two weeks. And, even with the last minute change they drew in a more than respectable crowd.

The first night was pretty much staff and presenter time, with all of us hanging out around the bonfire telling stories and having a few drinks. Due to the size of the venue, they had rented some golf carts for the staff to use – mainly to shuttle folks around, carry excess stuff, and be able to respond quickly to needs or situations. Well… as we know, when Morrison and I get together there can be some mischief. We happened to be standing on the back patio of the dining hall after supper and I was pacing around looking at the area. Upon peering around the corner of the building I saw a golf cart sitting there. Thinking it might be one of the staff folks I wandered around to say hey and visit for a bit. However, all I found was the golf cart… The problem here is that it still had the keys in it, as well as a radio tuned to the staff channel. Apparently the driver was inside the dining hall doing whatever… Anyway, I motioned Morrison over and then next thing you know we had committed Grand Theft Golfcart.

Fortunately for us the staff – and Heather – found this amusing. In fact, at one point, after appropriating a paper chef’s hat from the dining hall and fitting it to my head, Heather and I raced about the site in the cart, her swinging a large plastic stirring paddle, and we “cooked up some trouble”… There are supposed to be pictures… I’ll see if I can get my hands on them.

Day two found us doing a seminar to a wonderful group of attendees, meeting up with George Knowles – owner of Controverscial.com, and generally hanging out. That evening there was a rousing concert around the bonfire with the Dragon Ritual Drummers. They are a great group of guys out of Canada, and they can definitely pound out some killer beats. We had a funny moment with them earlier in the day – Morrison and I had just stumbled out of the presenters cabin and were having a cup of coffee before heading off to our respective shower houses. The DRD guys walked by and I commented that they looked much brighter and awake than we did. They replied, “That’s because we’re Canadian.”

Day three brought us back around to another seminar with a great group of attendees, followed by a book signing and hanging out with folks – including the Pie-Rats (well, that’s what I call them)… The pirate camp was a blast, and there was plenty of “Yarring” and official Grog to go around. Morrison and I were also fortunate enough to share the presenter cabin with Wendy Rule and her son Reuben. They were absolutely lovely folks who were great to hang out with, and Wendy put on a killer concert Saturday night with Reuben accompanying on the accordion. Haunting stuff and the whole crowd was mesmerized.

Throughout the entire fest, Silver the Kitchen Witch, was doing everything in her power to kill us – By that I mean she was cooking up a storm and everything was so fantastic we just kept eating, even when we weren’t hungry. So we pretty much ate until we burst. Not only were there three huge and fantastic meals each day, but on top of that there was a hospitality cabin where we could go to kick back, and Silver and her staff kept it stocked with all manner of munchies – Crudites, chips, M&M’s, coffee, antipasto platters, and some absolutely killer meatballs… These meatballs were so good that when I went in for a cup of coffee and smelled them I said to myself, “hey, I gotta try one of these…” Well, it didn’t stop there. Before I knew it “one of these” had turned into a half dozen…

So, if all that weren’t enough I got to hang out with Heather, her husband Max, Phelina, Kira, Kim, Alan, Ron, Bill & Maxine, the pirates, and a whole ton of other good friends whom I hadn’t seen in quite a while…

Now, that was the good… (Actually, it was the great!) … What about the bad and the fuglee…

Well, it certainly wasn’t possible for the universe to allow me that much fun without slapping me in the back of the head… It seems that every single time I fly out of Columbus, OH, I end up getting delayed and this trip was no different. It all started a month or so back when they changed my straight through flight to one with a connection in Chicago. Then, yesterday I went to the airport a little early with Morrison so that the festival folks wouldn’t have to make two trips to the airport. I figured I could occupy myself for that extra couple of hours no problem… But after I got Morrison on her plane and away, I kicked back to relax and soon discovered that my flight was getting more and more delayed according to the monitors… Well, eventually I had to see a gate agent to have my flight changed in Chicago because I wasn’t going to arrive there in time to make the connection… Well, they got me on the first thing out of there with seats, but I still ended up not getting home until around 10:30 last night. So, from around 11:30 AM yesterday until 10:30 PM last night, I was either in the air or in an airport. I actually could have driven and been home sooner…

But, oh well. That’s just one of those things and I blame American Airlines for it…

So, now I have to wash clothes and re-pack. Thursday I fly out for DC and Morrison & I start off on the book release tour. Hopefully I’ll be able to check in from the road…

More to come…

Murv