SO LONG NOVEMBER!

 Time slips by...

We got emerged in a Special about John Baluchi   Great documentary!

SUNDAY FUNNIES!! Fabulous Freak Brothers!

  artist Gilbert Shelton (the same who brought you WONDER WART HOG.

Jason with State Farm Can't Beat This

 

Not long ago some of us were talking about the thickness of The Atlanta Journal and Constitution Thanksgiving edition vs the Christmas edition and we mentioned some of the higher-ranking distribution bosses in Marietta and surrounding area.

I want to also mention C., an older brother of a childhood friend of mine.  Before I had a route of my own my friend and I would help C. on his morning route, the Constitution.  We got the Park Street, Fraser Street area..

C. had MS which effected his walk and speech.  In their back-yard C. had a big pile of bicycle parts which he collected and assembled as needed.  But he preferred his Cushman Motor Scooter.

I think he stayed working for Tom Gordon a long time, longer than anyone else.

I heard C. was in prison.  I researched why and found out why.  He was in prison for murder.  According to what I read he murdered his wife, shooting her dead.

I think she may have talked C. into.  Clay had to take a certain medicine for his MS and flatly could not afford it.  His wife had an incurable disease and had only weeks to live anyway. 

Now C. is in prison where the cost of the medicine and/or treatment is not a problem.

Sad.

Wanted: Sharp Proofreader

 

Fact 1: The Marietta Daily Journal no longer publishes a paper Sunday.

Fact 2: The Marietta Journal needs a proofreader. They left my name off the survival list of my father’s obituary in 1988. My mother made them do it over.

Our Marietta Daily Journal today’s front page announced today’s weekly magazine insert is in today’s paper. The insert was not in our issue. I enjoy reading their supplement, it is professionally done and is interesting. Actually, their magazine insert is monthly.

So, I called the office of the paper, hoping they would send me the missing magazine insert right out. The lady told me that was a misprint, it is not scheduled until mid-December.

Fact 2: As I said, The Marietta Daily Journal needs a proofreader.

How to Lose While Playing Horseshoes With Your Boss

 

In our subdivision, about 3 blocks away I saw that my friend Roy Lantz’s house was “Under Contract”.

Roy is selling his house!  Old Roy is moving.  Actually, he is old like an old friend, actually Roy is younger than me.

Roy’s wife Bonnie died a couple years ago.  Just a day or two before she died women friends in the neighborhood and their church came over to hold sot of a prayer session for Bonnie on her death bed.  As they talked about different things, Bonnie said to the effect, “If any of you single ladies are looking for a man, Roy will be available in a couple of days.

Roy had a Santa outfit.  Years ago ‘near Christmas “Santa” visited the Hunter Household and had Rocky and Adam sit on his lap and he listened to what they wanted for Christmas, with a “Ho Ho Ho” thrown in here and there.

Roy has a book out “Never Beat Your Boss Playing Horsehoses”  He tells a true story of at a company pickup one time he beat his boss at playing horseshoes.”  His career with ghat company slid downward and out the door.  The book tells of methods of how to climb the success ladder in a corporation.  I think that book led him into the career of being a motivation speaker.  I saw him give one for the Marietta Post Office one time.  He was a good speaker, with wit and foresight thrown in.

He was also a very worthy member of the American Legion, Horace Orr Post.  I think he was voted as th man of the year a few years back.

Roy and I used to sometimes  run together on Sandy Plains Road.  Sometimes we ran into other (not literally) while running and we would walk back.  One time when we ran into each other he was walking.  He was walking because his car broke down and he left it.  Ever since I have know Roy he had a thing about red red convertibles.  .He loved.  I think since I knew him he went through three or four.  So, that morning we walked to his house, got his other car and he chained it up to the broken down red convertible.  I forgot which one drove and which one steered the towed red car but something went wrong where the convertible tapped the pulling car, but nothing serious.

Now, we are up today.  I was driving home from the Post Office and at the stop light at thr street that goes into the subdivision was a red convertible waiting for the light to turn.  I turned in the street and stooped.  It was Roy, of course.  I said, “Moving?”

He said, “Old people move to Florida!”

I said, “Well shit!”  He shrugged his shoulders, which somehow cause a big question mark appear above his head.

I had not noticed until then, but he had a deep tan.  That rascal had already been there and just came back to put his house on the market.

CHRISTMAS SHOPPING SEASON OFFICALLY OPEN

 

Up until Rocky and Adam were old enough to appreciate it, on 

Thanksgiving Thursday night, Riches  Department store on Forsyth

 Street in Atlanta had the Lightening of the Christmas Tree.

 

On Forsyth Street for a long time Riches was on both sides of the street.  Up high enough for trucks to drive under was a glassed in, three or four level bridge with indoor temperature.  Normally each level were just different  shopping areas.  But on Valentine Thursday night different kinds of live Christmas music was sounded from each level.  Some were church choirs, solo songs, and popular singers.

It was a sight with sounds to behold.

All of Forsyth Streets, blocks going each way was very crowded.

I remember we went once or twice before kids, and I think once, maybe twice with the boys.

But it got where people did not like to go down town, too dangerous.  They moved the Christmas Lightening to Lenox Square, miles away.

When the songs are sung and the tree is lighted, it means, or meant

LET THE CHRISTMAS SHOPPING BEGIN!

Peachtree Road Race on Thanksgiving Day, maybe

 

Because of the virus the Peachtree Road Race, which has always been held on the 4^th of July has been moved up for today, Thanksgiving Day.  Although many people paid their fees  are not expected to run the Peachtree Road Race today.

I know I’m not!  I didn’t pay my entrance fee anyway.

I haven’t ran the Peachtree Road Race since 1987, 33 years ago.

Here I am bragging, saying without words, “Look!  I ran the Peachtree Road Race!”

THANKSGIVING NEWS PAPERS

 

I just walked through the light drizzle to get today’s paper AT the end of the driveway.  The paper is thicker than usual this morning.

It reminds me of being a paperboy and on Thanksgiving the paper was huge.  Almost too big to handle big.   Plus the over 100 more you have to move to door steps. 

I thought “Wow!  If the paper is big on Thanksgiving morning Christmas morning will be a living hell.”

Surprisingly I was wrong, the Christmas morning paper was one of the smallest papers of the year.

What my little brain didn’t think of were advertisements.  Of course the Thanksgiving paper would be huge, advertisements at the beginning of the Christmas season!  And on Christmas day, the buying of the season is over, fewer ads.

Duh.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Family of Our's

 

Here is a poised picture of Rocky and Adam we made for a Christmas card one year.   The 3rd picture is the final product.  Actually, I had in mind the second picture which I got the idea from a picture (1st picture) in the book FAMILY OF MAN.  Plagiarism?  You bet!

I Do Not Get Out Often

 

I do not get out much.

Anna bought a Thanksgiving cake from a baker friend of ours, Mary Beth.  They live in Ellijay so we picking it up or they delivering it was a logistics problem.  Not that it could not be done, it just had to be planned.  Mary Beth’s husband had a doctor’s appointment this morning.  It was agreed I would meet him in the doctors’ office parking lot, near the hospital.  I would hand over the agreed amount and he would give me the box with the cake in it.

That could look suspicious, meeting someone in a parking lot, one handing over cash money and the other handing over a box.  But I suppose when you are old like me, the surveillance  people look the other way.

I got back into my truck, put the key in the ignition  and turned the key.

“CLICK!”

The engine was dead as doornail.  No lights, radio, or not anything was working.  How did it even turn it on to drive me through Marietta to get me there?

Now, is the time I am thankful we have AAA.

I called AAA.  They sent an official AAA on the side van out.  He tested the battery and was on the verge of being dead.  He sold me a new battery which comes with a warranty and all that.

I called Anna and she drove down to give me backup if needed, she had a hair appointment in a couple of hours.

I stopped by the seed store and bought some bird feed and the post office without cutting off the engine either time.  When I got home I turned it on and off and it works fine.

As I said, I don’t get out often.  I felt as free as the birds I feed must feel.  We should have discussed techniques.

Celeste Headlee, My Claim to Fame

 

My Claim to Fame:  This morning on THE TODAY SHOW one of the guests was Celeste Headlee.  Celeste has made a name for herself as a journalist, author, speaker, and musician.  She wrote a book on how to have meaningful conversations titled WE NEED TO TALK.

She was also at one time an announcer on NPR and lived in East Cobb.  That is where I got to meet her, at Sweat Mountain Dog Park, in East Cobb.

I think she has moved on now.

SUNDAY FUNNIES!! HELP #23, WONDER WART HOG!

 From HELP #23. Mar, 1965.  From one of my favorite underground cartoonists Gilbert Shelton (FABULOUS FREAK BOTHERS).

Click on page to make it bigger and readable.

You Remember

 

I bet you remember what you were doing 57 years ago from today.  November 22, 1963 to be exact.

I do.

 I had just went back to Marietta, Georgia, got my car, and drove through the night back to the base in New Jersey.  I was so tired I had slight hallucinations.  Example:  As I rent around three giant 18 whelers thy suddenly turned into three giant elephants with their trunks wrapped around the tails of the two leading ones.

I got to the base and still had about 24 hours of leave left.  I was exhausted.  I went to the barracks, fell onto my bunk and slept.

Sometime in the early afternoon I was awaken by the ruckus of clomping feet and loud talking.  Everybody was excused for the rest of the day,

President John F. Kennedy had been assassinated!

Irene Myrtle Jones Foster "Granny"

 

Myrtle Irene “Granny” Jones Foster (1895-1991).  Granny is Anna’s grandmother, her mother’s mother.  Granny was born and raised in the Milton- Alpharetta, Georgia, area.  She had 6 siblings, 5 sisters and  a brother.

Irene married Paul Everette Foster.  They had eight children, four died at birth.  Paul was a Singer Sewing Machine Salesman.  They moved to Marietta, Georgia.  Paul died as a young man leaving Irene to care for their four children.  They lived all around Marietta.  On several streets I see the houses or lots they used to lived in.  They jokingly said they moved often, when the rent was due.  But I think they probably moved in town during school months and further out during growing season.

Irene took over part of her late husband’s skills.  She became a Singer Sewing Machine repair person.  She also was Nannie and practical nurse.  All her four children reached adulthood and did good with families of their own.

Merritt Park

 

Today Amy and Krista gave us a video tour of the neighborhood of the Merritt Park area.  Merritt Park is at the corner of Wallace and Barnes Mill Road in Marietta.

I lived in the late 50s as a teenager with my family on Richard Street which  runs into Cobb Parkway, North, across the street from White Water Park.  Before White Water it was all woods until there was an abandoned rock quarry.  One time a few of us camped out at the rock quarry and fished.  No luck.  About 500 feet beyond the rock quarry was the lake which became Merritt Park.  A high school class mate of mine, Nancy M. lived there..

Nancy was very good writing notes for us, like:  “Please excuse Eddie from school yesterday because he was sick.”

And

“My son Eddie Hunter has my permission to play pool at Past Time Grill and Billiards.”

Wallace Park separates what used to be a lake an Wallace Road.  In that bordering area is children’s playground.  I think it was Krysta in the video that said something about when they drained the lake no bodies were found.   Well, no, not in the lake, however, I remember the news one morning a body of  man  discovered was hanging from on a rope from a limb high up in the tree.  If I remember correctly  they were undecided if was murder or suicide.  I think the person may have had a Latino name.

A few blocks west of Wallace Park is/was a Potters’ Cemetery of unmarked graves.  A blind old man, Charley, and his sister  I used to visit who lived on Glover Street were  buried there.  But are their bodies and other bodies still there?   The highway builders had to dig up a good portion of Potters’ Cemetery to make way for the new I-75.

This below has nothing to do with the Merritt Park area, but it does for Mr. Mereritt with an additional story:

In their research they found that Mr. Merritt, who owned most the land in that area tried to build a subdivision for blacks only just south of what would be Southern Tech (now, Kennesaw State College, South Campus) and the white public would not allow it

Which brings up something else mean and interesting.  In the 1960s the Smyrna mayor and city council ejected all black neighborhoods in Smyrna.  Black neighborhoods in the middle of the city were not part of the city of Smyrna, any longer,  so got none of its protection, such as police or fire rescue.  Sad and inhumane.

Sad

 

Trump and His Flock of Chickens

 

Never Mind All The Below! Lock Her Up!

 

Take Me To Your Leader

 

Tales from the Creep

 

click on above to make the balloon readable.

Dixie Inn in Woodstock, Ga

 

Actually this is a copied and pasted blog from years ago.

Ed Mulkey, Jr.  died two weeks ago.  He worked with my sister Frances at the First National Bank in Marietta.  When I hear his name I don’t first think of the 1^st National Bank of Marietta, but of the Dixie Inn in Woodstock, Ga, just north of here.  His father, Ed Mulkey, Sr. owned it.

 

I remember the Dixie Inn well.  It was in Woodstock on Canton Road, about just north of Hwy 92.  My family liked to pick up fried chick in white to-go boxes on sometimes on Sundays.  I do not know if it was the fried batter or the thin white boxed that kept the heat in, but whatever, it worked!

 

I worked as a carry out boy at the Big Apple Grocery Store on weekends when I was in high school.  If they had a special  worth driving to Woodstock for after work chances are we would go.

At times, we have bought their specials and then go to the Drive-In Movies.  

 

The evening that I remember with a chill they had “all you can eat” fish, I think it was red snapper. 

 

While enjoyed the fish and seeing how much I could eat suddenly a fish bone lodged in my throat.  I fell to the floor kicking.  I thought I was dying.  I couldn’t breathe.

 

No one seem to help me.  I think a waitress, ignoring me, had to step over me to deliver her food.

 

Somehow, it wasn’t my time, the bone popped out.  And I jumped up back into my seat, somewhat embarrassed.

 

And I’m still here.

The Dixie Inn isn't.  The building is a tire company now.

 

SUNDAY FUNNIES!! MAD's #8, Kurtzman's HEY LOOK!!

 When Harvey Kurtzman was a starving young artist, Marvel editor gave him some freelance  opportunities to use as "fillers".  Lee let Harvey to keep those as, I suppose, intellectual property".  Later, as editor of MAD Kurtzman recycled them.

Click to make sense of the cartoons, if posible.

 

Book Report BEGINNER'S GOOD BYE by Anne Tyloer

 

Book Report:  THE BEGINNER’S GOODBYE by Anne Tyler

I think all of Anne Tyler books takes place in or near Baltimore.  I feel I could drive down the Bay Tunnel and know my way around pretty good.  Even go to my favorite crab house that I have never been to.

 

The story is about a guy, who recently lost his wife who was a doctor.  The house was hit by a storm and caved in on her.  I read the book because I heard his late wife kept coming back from the dead making appearances.  It was nothing like I thought.  She came back several times but it mostly to give her late husband advice or suggestions.  And I wasn’t actually sure it was really her or his imagination.  It was not like an episode of TOPPER, like I was hoping for.

The book was about a brother and sister who inherited a publishing company from their parents.  The kind of books they mostly published was sort of like “PHOTOGRAPHY FOR DUMMIES”  or other FOR DUMMIES books.  That is how the title came about.

Like other Anne Tyler books it was a people and interaction study.  Very interesting and good.

The Picture is of the TOPPER sitcom back in the 50s.

Trust

 

click on above to make it bigger

Trump's Support Group

 

Nowhere Man

 

You might have to click on the above to get it readable.

Stan Lee, was a slave in his last years

 

In the October/November 2020 issue of AARP has an  interesting article about the last years of Stan Lee and how three bully-like characters and his daughter controlled his life and got him to attend comic-cons sand other public appearances to get him to sign autographs at something  like over a hundred bucks a pop.  He was signing his name in almost an unconscious state.  It was not unusual for Stan to fall asleep, slump over in his chair while signing.

I admire Stan Lee and appreciate what he did for Harvey Kurtzman to help him along with his comic-art career. 

Check it out, it is a good eye opening article.

BEWARE OF FRIDAY THE 13TH!

 Beware!

Our Friday the 13th came early. Our shower faucet broke and our dehumidifier clunked out on Thursday the 12th.!

Who is that masked man?

 

Today I had on my black mask.  I thought no one could recognize me.  I pulled out my blade and was about to tell the cashier to give me all the money and back in the back of the line someone hollowed,

“Eddie Hunter! – do you shop here??”

Bloodbah or Catsup Bath?

 

Yesterday evening we went to Jim & Nick’s BBQ to take advantage of their Veteran’s Day Special, all Veteran’s eat free (with limits). Well, I’m a Veteran.

We got takeout and brought it home to eat.

The barbecue pork sandwich and fries had a little plastic catsup tube and one free drink.

I like catsup on my fries so I took the little plastic tube and tried to break it open at a seam. It didn’t work. I read the directions to say something like “Squeeze the tube until it works.”

I squeezed the tube and it resisted. Then, I took both hands and squeezed until both my hands and face were red.

I heard the catsup tube make a spirting noise and saw a red line fly across the dining room. The catsup made a red line across the dining room table, onto my ipad, and skidded, leaving puddles across the carpet, splattering on the door frame and heating remote.

After Anna cleaned it all up and we were about to sit down to eat, she looked up and saw red catsup splatters also on the ceiling. This time I got the ladder to clean more.

For a few minutes it looked like we had a blood bath celebrating Veterans Day.

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HAPPY VETERAN'S DAY!

 

Ahoy there.  I eats my spinach!

Shanghai is not only a name of a city it is also what the action of snatching up people near the docks and putting them to work on ships.  Their incentive to do ship work was if they didn’t the would be thrown overboard.  Portland, Oregon, led the count on most people in the U.S. that was   Shangehaid. 

Here I am sailing aboard the USS NEWPORTS NEWS.  KAKAKAKA (that’s me imitating Popeye chuckling).  My work area where I was Shanghaid.  Nah I was just joshing you.

This post also has my friend Reuben a few seconds after or before my picture was taken.  We each took turns taking each other pictures.  Reuben me in August 1963 at Lakehurst, New Jersey, and have kept up with each other since.  He made a lifer’s career in the Navy retiring as a Warrant Officer, now living in Thailand. 

 

HAPPY VETERAN’S DAY!

My Favorite Marine Story

 

Here is my favorite Marine story, copied and pasted from previous blogs of my ramblings:

In 2008, we went to the Descendants of John Hunter Reunion in Blairsville, Georgia.  We have been going to this reunion, off and on,  at Track Rock Campgrounds since1980.  There I always see some distant cousins I got to know at a earlier reunion and get to meet some I haven't met before.

In 2008 I met a distant cousin that I did not remember his name after he told me.  I took the above picture that day.  He had on a Marine cap.  I asked him where all he served and he told me.  When one of the places  he said, was THE USS NEWPORT NEWS I lit up.  I did too!  I asked when, when he gave the dates and I said I was there part of that time, January 1965.  He was part of the Marine detachment there.

It is small world, we were cousins on the same ship in the city of Jacksonville, Florida, Atlantic Ocean, Gulf of Mexico, Mississippi River, and the City of New Orleans and did not know we were blood kin.

Later another distant cousin, Bob Reece, from Blairsville and Marietta and I became Facebook friends and we are related the same way the Marine and I are related, descendants of John Hunter (1775-1848).

I sent Bob the same picture above and asked him if he knew this man, since they both were Blairsville natives.  He said the face look familiar, he would have to think about it.

Then months later Bob wrote:

Eddie, I just realized who this guy is. It's Eric England. He is a legendary Marine. Sniper with a huge amount of kills. If he is related to you, you should research him. Top marksman in the Marine Corps for years.

Helicopter Ride Over a Nudist Colony

 

Sunday Morning News jerking memories.

Sunday Mornings we usually watch the Sunday mornings news programs.  First, NBC and then CBS.

 

I think it was NBC that had a piece about Sophia Loren making a movie in her 80s and her son is the director.  Anna and I went to the Radio City Music Hall about 1970 and saw the Rocketts and then the movie SUNFLOWER.  Before the movie Sophia and her director husband was asked to stand up.  She waved. 

Then on the CBS News they had Steve Martin on.  It was mostly about Steve teaming up with a NEW YORKER cartoonist for a project.  We saw Steve Martin in person at the Southern Music Hall, on Piedmont Avenue AT Broadview Plaza in Atlanta,  about the same time period as our NYC trip..  Steve Martin, then, was a brunette, but he had his banjo and arrow through the head prop.  I don’t remember if we knew of him before we saw him in person or not.  He kept the crowd roaring with laughter.

 

At the end of the CBS Sunday News they always have a nature scene of a bird feeding her young or something.  This morning  it was butterflies fluttering around the flowers at Cape May, New Jersey.

Cape May!

When I was stationed in New Jersey with a helicopter squadron (HU-4) our pilots were doing training flew over Cape May often, especially flying the nudist colony at Cape May.

Our division officer had to log in I think 50 hours of flight training a month.  He was always bragging about Cape May and I asked him to let me go on one of his missions.

So, I went up with him one day in a Bell Helicopter.   Hot Diggy!  We were going over a nudist colony and wave at the naked girls and they were going to wave back!

Here is a picture of me in a Bell Helicopter.

When we got high up, still over the huge hangar he said watch this!  We went straight up very high.  The big hangar did not look big at all.

Then he said watch this!  He turned off the engine and props quit working.  He took both hands off the controls and we fell.  And we kept falling with him looking at me laughing.

  I was cursing him, officer or not!  Which made him laugh even more.

The ground got closer and closer.  Suddenly on its own the engine turned  itself on, the propellors started spinning seriously hard.  It let us down gently.

What I did know was the helo science of auto-rotation.  As the helicopter got closer to the ground it was like a fan, with he blades spinning,  It turns itself back on.  Well!

But what does that have to do with Cape May?

 

SUNDAY FUNNIES!! HUMBUG's FRANKENSTEIN

 From HUMBUG #7, in the mid 50s.  Story likely by editor Harvey Kurtzzman and art by Will Elder.