The Terrible Catsafterme

This was my second visit with Jack Hanlon – and I have to maintain that he is one of the nicest fellas you could ever hope to meet. Jack was a former child actor who had appeared in at least three of the silent Our Gang films: Ten Years Old, Olympic Games, and The Glorious Fourth. In addition, he had a role in the Buster Keaton classic The General. It was just over five years ago that Jack’s nephew contacted Bob and they arranged a meeting for the first time. Read the rest of this entry »

I remarked at the last campfire that this was my final year at camp – and rather than going out with a ‘bang,’ I went out with a ‘nice quiet week.’ I’m not sure why this was, but I’m sure it had something to do with the fact that I had aged – so to speak – several years once I became a father, and was facing the future of ‘adulthood’ head on. Also, I recall that there were only two groups at camp and smaller somtimes meant less. This was my tenth and final year at Camp Woodland Altars, having consecutively attended every year since the Summer before fourth grade. Read the rest of this entry »

Sons of the Desert conventions in the past had usually begun in the evening with a mixer and little else following a day of registration. Therefore, I had assumed that the Seattle convention in 2000 would be the same. Only Denise and I travelled to this convention. Lisa had decided not to go for some reason that I do not recall. We left on the afternoon of Thursday, July 20 – and not terribly early.

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If the first part of our Myrtle Beach seems rather uneventful, that is because it was. I sometimes love to take vacations that are go-go-go, seeing as much as possible, and keeping so busy that I need a rest by the time I get home. California is always one of those types of trip. This one wasn’t. Mostly we ate…and watched TV…and played games for the first couple of days. The weather wasn’t quite warm enought to do a lot of swimming, so we found a lot of indoor fun, combined with jacketless trips to some local tourist draws. Read the rest of this entry »

I was really looking forward to seeing the Cirque du Soleil performance of “Love” – the epic Beatles production of which I wrote about the soundtrack here – on the evening of February 10. Our tickets were for the late show at the Sahara, so Bob, the Wileys, and I had plenty of time to walk over to the casino following our dinner at Battista’s – and our jam-packed day of visiting the Hoover Dam and other adventures in Nevada. We had excellent seats near the front of the stage. It was a theater-in-the-round style staging and we could see everything from where we were sitting. Read the rest of this entry »