Thoughts

Blog Post
Larry-Lambert

 

 

History: This is the Last Known Photograph of Wyatt Earp, 1929. Born in March 1848, he grew up with four brothers.​​​​​​​​​Earp began his career in law enforcement in Missouri, where he was elected local constable in 1870. However, following the death of his pregnant wife, he left town. His journey took him to Kansas, and by 1878, he had become a notable lawman and gambler in Dodge City, Kansas, forging alliances with legendary figures like Doc Holliday and Bat Masterson.​​​​​​​​​In 1879, Wyatt and his brothers moved to the bustling town of Tombstone in the Arizona Territory, seeking fortune and opportunity. Wyatt worked as a gambler and saloon guard, while his brother Virgil became the town marshal. Tensions with a local outlaw gang led by Ike Clanton escalated, culminating in the infamous gunfight at the O.K. Corral on October 26, 1881. The shoot-out, which lasted only about 30 seconds, involved Wyatt, Virgil, Morgan Earp, and Doc Holliday against the Clanton gang. Three outlaws were killed, but the violence persisted.

Virgil was ambushed and wounded in December 1881, and Morgan was killed in March 1882. Seeking revenge, Wyatt and his allies pursued and killed several suspects. Facing murder charges, Wyatt fled to Colorado and then moved through various boomtowns before finally settling in California. There, he engaged in police work, gambling, mining, and real estate.

In his later years, Wyatt collaborated with Stuart N. Lake on a biography titled “Wyatt Earp, Frontier Marshal,” published in 1931. Some claim that Wyatt was a self-promoter, but he lived larger than life for the most part. RIP.

** ** **

Personal Retrospective: I lived across the street (diagonally) from the Redondo Beach (CA) Pier when I was young. We lived on Esplanade St., and in those days, there were still gun emplacements left over from World War 2 in what is now Veteran’s Park. There was no park then, just dunes, sea grass, and gull nests (which the gulls defended). We’d walk across the street (when I outgrew the stroller) and buy freshly cooked shrimp from Fisherman’s Haven (pictured). I still love shrimp; my mind returns to this place when I eat them. Isn’t it strange that I can still smell the ocean all these years later, taste the shrimp, and recall watching the fishermen on the pier haul up their catch?

I walked along the sand at the shoreline with the surf curling around my feet, holding my grandmother’s hand. I couldn’t have been over five years old, but my memory remains. I’ve been back, but it’s nowhere near the same. You can never go home.

I indeed lived in a few places, moving, etc., while growing up. I don’t know whether it was a good or bad thing, but kids go where their families go or where they are sent. It’s a condition of childhood.

** ** **

Bullet Points:

** A man came by asking for a donation for the local swimming pool, so I gave him a glass of water.

** It takes guts to be an organ donor.

** Why are male boxers allowed to compete as females in the Olympics?

** The Dude abides…he just does.

** Chilidawg short – back by popular request. Michael Castleberry (also known as Chilidawg)

 

Coming Soon to Netflix

 

Identify the Armor Twofers

1

 

2

 

3

Identify the Aircraft

4

 

5

This made an appearance earlier. It had three designations.

 

Xtra

This was a US concept aircraft only. Because of that, you don’t need to ID it – on the graphic.

 

Identify the Feature Film

5

Hint: Brando hated his guts.

 

 

Parting Shot

 

End

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64 thoughts on “Thoughts”

  1. Aporkalypse now. For somebody who has been living in the jungle, his nails are sure clean and manicured.

    1. I detect nail polish – I don’t know if Hopper walked on the wild side. Don’t ask, don’t tell.

        1. 90% of actors are weird people. (Might be overestimating…or underestimating, hard to know.)

          4. Weird is in the eye of the Aakvavit holder…and LL, MrsPaulM might agree, she worries about me all the time.

  2. Identify the Armor Twofers:
    1. BREM-K ARV, BTR-82A IFV
    2. MT-LB artillery tractor, MT-LB with ZU-23-2 mount as a SPAAG
    3. BTR-4
    Identify the Aircraft:
    4. Gotha Go 242
    5. Boeing B-54 Ultrafortress. Prototype was YB-50C (never finished).
    Identify the Movie:
    Apocalypse Now

  3. The female boxer got in the ring. She empowered him. She should not have.

    After she realized she was going to quit, she should have kicked him in the nuts. Send a message.

    1. X2…then landed an uppercut for a proper “attitude adjustment” so he understands boxing with woman is unacceptable. I knew that as a little kid…hit my sister and both mom and dad would straighten me out. Only needed to happen once and I understood. Clearly this coward never got the message.

  4. Being raised in such an interesting environment would have to influence your life choices.
    IIRC, your father did oceanic work, so I imagine that also influenced your path.
    It’s good to have pleasant memories of your youth.

    1. It’s very easy to take shots at Southern California now. However there was a time (and DRJIM will back me up) when it was a bit of paradise. Perfect weather, beach, mountains, desert recreation, things to do, energy and we made money. MRSLL didn’t work for the first 22 years of our marriage and we had cars, a house, boat, etc. I didn’t inherit, I made it on my own. We raised four girls. We lived in a 4000 sq ft home on a quarter acre with a pool, RV parking, etc. It was very much the American dream.
      **
      As a boy, I started out there, but we moved around. I was able to return with the Navy and as you say, I was already comfortable swimming in the ocean.

      1. Redondo Beach.. I lived on Camino de Encanto just south of the downtown, pier area in 67-68. Funny how you can remember a street name from so long ago just by someone saying “Redondo Beach”.
        It was a good place!

        1. The Redondo trench right off shore made it possible for sailing ships to come right up to the pier because of the drop-off. As you pass the surfline and reach a depth of about 35 feet, you start down a steep slope to about 75-80 feet, which quickly drops to below 100 feet and then to the abyss. When I was a kid, there was an abundance of pink and white abalone. Greens were very common. Now they’re all gone. You can find them at San Clemente Island if you’re in the Navy and allowed to dive there or at St. Nicholas Island.

      2. I moved to SoCal in May of 1982. It was wonderful at the time. High-paying jobs in Aerospace, construction, medical, and excellent schools. Airshows, museums, world-class restaurants and entertainment, it had quite a bit going for it.
        .
        Then it all went downhill faster than a Malibu home in a mudslide.

  6. Bridges- Too bad he opened his “White Dudes For The Not A Black Vapid Poseur” mouth. But actors need their constant 15 minutes in order to bolster their self worth and stay relevant. A long way from Sea Hunt. Wonder if Lloyd would approve.
    *
    The Olympics is dead to me…sad really, but overt offensive worldly garbage coupled to the non-amateur athlete’s…well…The Left has infested and wrecked another institution.
    *
    Love the recollection…I can still feel Ocean City’s Boardwalk underfoot, the sound and smell of the surf, and the taste of still warm Johnsons Carmel Popcorn (if we’re talking about beach and sea experiences). Moments and places that stay with you is the richness of life. But like the chief said to the brave, “Never the same stream.” You might never be able to go home…but it will stay with you.

    1. About the Dude: X2 He has joined the list of actors I can’t watch anymore.
      It’s a shame really. Many of them are good at their craft, but when I see their face on screen I’m constantly reminded of their stupidity.

  7. The film is Apocalypse Now, of course.
    Earp was an interesting guy. I read Lake’s book and while he may have known Earp, it plays pretty freely with the facts. I understand he also served as a consultant on the Hugh O’Brien TV series which also danced around the facts. IMHO the best thing Lake was involved in was the film Winchester ’73 which is a pretty good movie. Earp appears briefly as a character in that one.

  8. I’ll take a guess and say that 1, 2. and 3 are death traps in the Ukraine war with what drones are doing to them.

    1. Javelin missiles do more damage to armor than drones, but they are improving the drones.

  11. Your post reminds me of two of my favorite fishing spots of the past. One is now a boat launch/park. The other is a shipyard, where offshore rigs are repaired. Both once yielded speckled trout, and flounder. Now, all I have a memories with my brother, and my grandfather, as we sipped a beer in a lawn chair, or waded to the edge of the channel to cast, and find, the right depth for the feeding fish. The memories are vivid; filled with the sound of water lapping against the bank, the smell of salt air, and days that seemed to go on forever.

    1. Yes, so many memories. I had black hair then, and age hadn’t brought the challenge of remaining fit that it does to us all. Endless summer, family still living, etc.

  12. Ramirez hits it out of the park again.
    /
    Your thoughts on going back are spot on. Makes me somewhat reluctant to go back to some of the places I lived when I was much younger. The memories are better than the reality. Some of the places seem so much…smaller, less grand perhaps.

  13. “kids go where their families go or where they are sent. It’s a condition of childhood”.
    My parent moved many times for work. I attended six different schools by the 7th grade. The upside was learning to survive without the approval of others.

    1. With every new school comes a few fistfights when you’re a boy. I remember a big kid – at least 6-4 picking on my younger brother. I had to leap to grab him around the neck and then let gravity drag him to the ground where I could begin to pound his face soft. Lord of the Flies. Then power perceived is power achieved and they let you be.

      1. Right. First day they appraise you. My first day looked for the bully. Second day jumped him. Third day my parents met with the principal. Often the bully was two grades ahead of me. When I was five a boy three years older than me stabbed me. I opened his scalp with a piece of firewood. Imagine; age five I was already a dirty white boy.

        1. I went to Catholic grade school but rode the public school bus. After things settled down it was okay but right at the start I came home pretty disheveled a few times. You can use a tie (not clip on) for quite a few things to help you out in a fight. The worst thing that happened to me was getting stabbed in the hand with a number 2 pencil.

          1. I learned to sharpen the edges of the cowboy belt buckle and “fight like a Marine.” — Back before I knew that Marines were big belt fighters. It works in the absence of something better.

      2. Only had to do that once. The “school bully” was picking on me, and after repeated request to leave me alone, he started getting physical. The “boxing lessons” my Dad taught me came in handy. Even though the kid was 6″ taller than me, and outweighed my by quite a bit, I saw an opening, and went for it.
        Wound up with all my might, and I planted my fist squarely in his mouth, removing a couple of teeth in the process. My knuckles hurt, my dad was proud, and the kid never even got near me for the next two years.

        1. I was in therapy as a child.
          I only found out when I entered the Air Force (my recruiter requested the records and left them where I could read them) that it was because I picked a fight often with other kids as reaction formation to mask my generally passive nature.
          That makes no sense.
          I met bullies and took them on having learned that even if they whoop you, they’ll respect you.

          1. I didn’t go the therapy route. I went in the Navy where channeled aggression was appreciated.

    1. I’m with you – I hope it was. A lot of it was. Henry Hook’s ranch in AZ where they hung out, etc. and all that was real. Some of it still remains. Reading the book about Al Sieber reminded me that I live in the middle of it now. Respect.

  15. On the not a female boxer , I read somewhere it is deformed . Born without a pecker, didn’t say if it was nut free. But he is chromosomeaticaly a dude.

    1. And the thing about it, is actual trannies in Algeria? That’s a death sentence. So how did a ‘dude-lady’ from Algeria become a boxer and not a statistic?

      2. I’m no Algeria expert, much less an “Alergian sexual oddity” expert, but I imagine there are many societies where homo and trans stuff is officially forbidden, but there’s a lot of dude-on-something, something-on-dude, and plain old dude-on-dude action going on that everyone knows about but no one has the bad manners to rub the public’s noses in it. Let’s face it, there’s lots of buggery going on in the Muslim world. Just on the down-low. And the same for the subculture here in the US from which we get the infantile-sounding, 70-IQ expression “down-low” in the first place.
        —
        Sexual deviance is often tolerated in those societies, so long as those involved observe the proprieties in public. Only Judeo-Christian societies are so morally superior and enlightened that they tolerate, and even support, weirdo activists intolerantly taking over the public spaces, in both the physical and spiritual domains.

          1. Muslims are heavy into buggary when there are no human males available to enter. It’s a cliche based on common practice and understanding that goes back to Mohammed and likely well beyond. Various forms of STDs are said to originate in the digestive tracts of camels and sheep. I don’t think that they regard release into an animal to be abnormal. Since no offspring results, Sharia is not invoked.

  17. Ah, the fauxlimpics. Screw them. No interest at all.

    I wish they’d televise the Camp Perry shooting matches instead. Or some IPSS or 3-Gun competition.

    As to the Dude, he abides. Bridges, not so much.

  18. I used to fish off the R.B. pier; my Zebco outfit redeemed by Blue Chip stamps. There was a slot car track nearby which we patronized. Body surfed at the avenues and partied at Burnout. Cruised the Esplanade on occasion and later visited the clubs. Cheap midnight movies at the theater on the corner of Torrance Blvd.
    That was over 55 years ago.
    Meanwhile, the Torrance malls grew and then withered- they are ghost towns now. Sea World is gone, too.
    The Pier is a Tourist Attraction with multilevel parking to accommodate the crowds. Apalling.

    I still hit the Esplanade a couple times a week.
    Matter of fact, I think I will do it today…

    1. Do you remember the Pike in Long Beach? I never saw its tawdry side when I was a young boy. I recall descending in the diving bell.

  19. Ahhh…..the Redondo Pier. Spent a bunch of time living in Redondo, a half-block from the beach. It was nice during the week, but nutso berserk on the weekends, as in NO parking anywhere.
    .
    LOTS of aerial tankers zooming around the last couple of days. It takes Big Brass Ones to fly a DC-10 like that.
    .
    Netflix…….occasionally great programming, lost in a sea of flotsam.
    .
    Why does that B-29 derivative remind me of Dolly Parton?
    .

  20. Self defense story. My buddies family moved from Smith Center, Kansas, population 1,500, to south Wichita because of a job change for his dad. A couple of thugs jumped them on the way home from school on their first week of living in the big city. His sister took a one pound coffee can to a couple of concrete workers pouring a sidewalk, and in her sweetest voice asked them to fill the can with concrete. They thought it was real cute. The next day on the way home the same two losers accosted them. His sister in her cute little pink dress with matching pink purse, went upside of one of their heads with the pink purse with the can on concrete in it. Knocked him out. His buddy took off like a scalded rabbit leaving his buddy lying unconscious. Never had a bit of problem in south Wichita again. Her brother never had seen that side of her before!

    1. The original Hushpuppy was a S&W model 39, but the Browning Hi-Power was also fitted with a longer threaded barrel and tall sights to see over the silencer and used. I own and shoot an earlier model Hi-Power suppressed with a KKM barrel. Since it’s an all steel handgun, it absorbs recoil effectively with the suppressor on it.

      I hand load subsonic for suppressed 9mm fire.

  22. Earp ‘was’ a self-promoter, big time. He obviously did a lot, in a lot of places, and knew a number of folks. How much of the ‘other’ stuff is true? We’ll never know. There was also a powered version of the 242, called the 244. I’m pretty sure Fairchild took one look and went, “Hmmm… C-119 anybody?

    1. He was a dentist — like Boron, who visits this blog — further explanations are not necessary.

  24. I might be wrong but I believe Wyatt Earp spent some time in Nome Alaska in the saloon business during the gold rush!

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