Thursday

Good morning,

Quote of the day:

“Be willing to sacrifice what you are for what you will become.”

                                                 Buddha

Back in 1941 a man/child was born in Dawson, Georgia. Soon thereafter his family moved to Macon, Georgia and this man grew up in a very religious family. From the time he was 7 year old he sang in the church choir. Times were hard for the family and when he was 16 he became a driver/songwriter for a local band named Johnnie Jenkins and the Pinetoppers. One day they stopped at the Stax recording studio in Memphis, Tennessee for the band to make a couple of recordings. At this man's insistence the president of the studio allowed him 2 minutes to record one of his songs. He did These Arms of Mine and the president of the studio said that the hair on his arms stood up and he knew what a great singer he had in his studio. Stax signed him to a recording contract two days later. His fame skyrocketed with the help of another singer name Jerry Butler who was famous already. He went on several tours in Europe and the United States making a fortune very quickly. He ended up with his own airplane that would carry he and his band. In 1961 at the age of 26 his private plane crashed in Wisconsin killing him and his band. In addition to These Arms of Mine he gave us Try a Little Tenderness, R-E-S-P-E-C T made famous by Aretha Franklin and the immortal Dock of the Bay. That's right, y'all, it was Otis Redding. What a damned shame.

This Date in History June 11

1944 As we all know five days earlier the Allies assaulted the Normandy, France coast in five different locations covering about 60 miles. Before the actually beach landings occurred, hundreds of United States and British paratroopers and glider forces landed behind the beaches the night before to suppress any attempt at a counter-attack and destroy artillery covering the beaches. In spite of ferocious resistance by the Germans, especially at Omaha Beach, all the goals set for the assault troops were achieved but at a bloody cost. On schedule, on this date a combined force of 330,000 Allied troops joined up into a solid front, began a pivot toward the east and the heartland of Germany. As I have said in the past, during this pivot to the east over 20,000 German troops were trapped near the town of Falaise, France and all but a handful were killed by the British VIII army from the north and the American 3^rd Army from the south. It was a massacre, y'all. Just a few hundred Germans escaped. Once the Allies had assembled this gigantic front, the outcome of the war was assured even though many days of bloody warfare were still ahead because as General Eisenhower said, “The German infantry dies hard”.

I have added the following by special request:

Two cases of “Sophistication”

A while back I was in Pensacola, Florida and I went into a very large fish market with a small delicatessen attached. I gathered up that evenings dinner which was a grouper filet, about 12 prawns (extra large shrimp) and a quart of jumbo oysters. I went through the check-out line for the seafood first because they iced it down for you. Then I decided that I needed vegetables to counter-balance all that protein and cholesterol so I drifted into the deli. The deli had all Boars’ Head meat and nearly everything else in there is of gourmet quality. They even had a small collection of fresh vegetables including asparagus. I figured steamed asparagus with butter and garlic would be a great addition so I grab some and headed to the small checkout counter manned by a girl that looked to be about 16 . The girl looked at the asparagus and said “What is that?” I said “It is asparagus.” She said “How do you spell it?” obviously looking for it on the touch screen but could not find it. By then the others in line behind me began to giggle so I said “Never mind, sweetie, I have changed my mind” and took the asparagus back to the case and left hoping to spare that girl any further embarrassment. Actually, I was the one that was embarrassed. To those that are familiar, it was Joe Patti's Seafood Market.

You never know the level of sophistication of the other person no matter how basic. This and one other event taught me a valuable lesson in not assuming the other person knows what you do.

The other event was when I was with a woman that I had been dating a few weeks and we were riding down the Main Street of Greenville, SC when we stopped at a traffic light. She pointed to a large building on the corner and said “Al, what is that building?” I said “It is the Peace Center.” She said “What is it for?” I said “Well, they have Broadway shows, operas, concerts and special entertainment events of all kinds. Surely you know about it, it has been in the papers for almost a year.” Then she said “Al, I can’t read.” Then it dawned on me why she had always had me order for her at restaurants, she could not read the menu. Needless to say, you could have knocked me over with a feather. I apologized and mentally made a note to never assume anything about the other person, again I was the one that was embarrassed.

After all, I had never laid eyes on, or even barely heard of a pizza until I joined the Air Force. I had never had “fast food” other than a very rare chili dog, either. In fact there was no “fast food” restaurant chains invented yet. There were “drive-in restaurants” such as two or three “Clocks”, two or three “Pete’s”, a “Palmetto”, a “Carolina”, a “Rainbow” and a “Sam’s Lunch” downtown where everybody used to go get a hot dog and a Coke after a basketball game that was about it. We did not go those places to eat anyway; we went there to meet girls. My brother, sister and I led a pretty Spartan life, but I do not ever remember being unhappy.

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow