We took a drive down the coast today on a nice day. We took a walk out on the beach at Seal Beach where I snapped this photo of a pink iceplant blooming on the sand.
Buck Owens 1929-2006
I have to admit to having been a Buck Owens fan at one time. I still have a Buck Owens and the Buckaroos CD which replaced my scratched up and worn out LP album. One of my favorites was “I’ve Got a Tiger by the Tail” in 1962 when I was an air crew radioman in the U.S. Navy. Rest well, Buck.
Here’s an excerpt from Owens’ bio from WikiPedia.
Alvis Edgar Owens, Jr., (August 12, 1929 – March 25, 2006) was an American country music singer widely credited with helping to create the gritty “Bakersfield sound”.
Image: Buck Owens and the Buckaroos — circa 1962 Album Photo
Owens was named the most promising country and western singer of 1960 by Billboard, and his top-10 duets with Rose Maddox in 1961 earned them a nod as vocal team of the year in DJ polls. But it was in 1963, after updating his sound again, that Owens’ career went ballistic. He moved away from the traditional country shuffle to a more upbeat, driving style (“…like a freight train coming through your livingroom,” as Buck said) with the single “You’re For Me” in late 1962. A few months later, “Act Naturally” became his first No. 1 hit. It was rock ‘n’ roll with a country feel. The Beatles later covered it without changing much of anything. It crossed over to the pop charts, and it began an astonishing run: for the next four years, every Buck Owens single went to No. 1. Fifteen in a row. At one point, he had a B-side, “My Heart Skips a Beat,” alternating in the top spot with its A-side, “Together Again.” “Love’s Gonna Live Here,” the follow-up to “Act Naturally,” was No. 1 for 16 weeks. He even sent an instrumental — the signature “Buckaroo” — to No. 1. The streak finally ended in October 1967 when his tribute to his fans, “It Takes People Like You (To Make People Like Me),” underachieved, stopping at No. 2. The next single, “How Long Will My Baby Be Gone,” went to No. 1, as did three more songs in 1969.
Charlie Sheen – Star Whore
We’re adding a second inductee in as many days to the Star Whores Hall of Shame; actor Charlie Sheen.
Sheen, who comes by his delusional fear of government honestly (son of Martin Sheen, activist, moonbat), says he believes that someone in the US Government orchestrated the 9/11 attacks, to wit: “it looked like a controlled demolition when the towers came down.” Sheen goes on to imply that 19 terrorists were amateurs with box cutters and unlikely to take out 3 out of 4 objectives without inside help.
Pardon my skepticism, but what a crock of unmitigated feces . . .
Wikipedia has this additional information about Sheen:
September 11th
Sheen declared on the March 20, 2006 broadcast of the Alex Jones radio show that he doesn’t believe the official government story about September 11th.
This event was covered by CNN in what Alex described as a “Balanced Piece”. [The] New York Post and the Boston Herald also covered this, in what Alex described as a [sic] “hit pieces that seek to smear Sheen as an unstable crackpot”.
The same day, March 20th, Google censored the information by not adding indexing to articles reporting on the issue, the search string “Actor Charlie Sheen Questions Official 9/11 Story” returning no hits three days after the story broke out for the first time. The index was added after a three days, while Alex Jones was talking about the Google issue on his radio show. On the 24th, Google gave 17,300 hits on that same search string.
Private life
Sheen has been dogged by trouble, including drugs and a shooting, and he has frequently had problems with the police. Though he was involved with a number of Hollywood personalities, his long-term relationship with adult actress Ginger Lynn in the late 1990s garnered the most media attention. In 1993, his name was found among Hollywood Madam Heidi Fleiss‘ list of her most frequent customers, and it was revealed that Sheen hired top-class prostitutes and spent huge amounts on escort agencies. During this time, he also had a serious cocaine addiction.
Sheen was married to Donna Peele from September 3, 1995 to November 19, 1996. He then married another actress, Denise Richards, on June 15, 2002. They had two daughters, Sam J. Estevez (born March 9, 2004), and Lola Rose Estevez (born June 1, 2005). In March 2005, Richards filed for divorce, but the couple were able to reconcile briefly afterwards. In January 2006, Richards continued with the divorce.
That bit about Google supressing the story is interesting and further implicates the software giant as a hard-left media outlet of the new kind. But I digress . . .
Summarizing, Sheen has the “feeling” that there was a conspiracy to inflict the 9/11 attacks on the US from within. When we listened to the tape of the Alex Jones interview, it was clearly the ravings of a bipolar, psychotic, cocaine-tooting, narcissistic sex maniac and not any sort of clear, rational deduction or reasoning. The man is a degenerate, and a second-generation one no less. Sheen seems to be an over-privileged loose cannon, either with serious psychological problems, or bent on spreading the sort of political manure for which the left is so infamous.
Nonetheless, we welcome Charlie Sheen to the “hocus-pocus psychosis” exhibit of the Star Whores Hall of Shame.
Richard Belzer – Star Whore
While appearing on Bill Maher’s show, this creep had the following to say about our military men and women:
According to actor and comedian Richard Belzer, American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan are too uneducated to be expressing support for the U.S. military mission since they’re just “19 and 20-year-old kids who couldn’t get a job” and “they don’t read twenty newspapers a day.”
You can read the entire article here.
Now, I don’t want to appear uneducated about who’s who in TV Land, but I never heard of this buttugly actor (looks like a cross between Helen Thomas and Ramsey Clark) before he shot off his big mouth on Maher’s show. The article refers to this degenerate as a “comedian” – “commodian” is more like it, given his crappy foul-mouthed way of describing the finest men and women in uniform anywhere. He implies that he “reads twenty newspapers a day.” It’s no surprise this idiot is misinformed if he reads the unsuitable-for-wrapping-garbage LA/NY Times or Washington (com)Post. Hopefully this degenerate, intellectually-challenged weirdo will disappear into obscurity save for his induction into our SWHOS.
Welcome Richard Belzer to the “bad genetics” exhibit in the Star Whores Hall of Shame.
Hat tip Blackfive
Stealth Air Force One?
Completely unedited, the photo below seems to make the vertical fin on Air Force One look almost invisible! What’s going on?
Right: View of the vertical stabilizer from the first level.
I took this photo from behind the famous aircraft on the 3rd mezzanine level of the Air Force One Pavilion in the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library when I noticed the unusual reflection pattern on the glossy surface of the rudder and vertical stabilizer. I knew immediately that I had a great shot! The lighting angles and the highly-polished surface of the airfoil rendered this intriguing optical illusion of near-invisibility.
Photo © 19 MAR 2006 by Damsel. Canon Digital Rebel EOS camera. Permission to publish is given provided credit and a link is given to Cap’n Bob and the Damsel
Update: Fix4RSO linked with “The Great Disappearing Air Force One Trick!“
Belltower
Busily recovering from an extended weekend, we’re short of blogging today. I thought this was an interesting photograph of the belltower at Wayfarer’s Chapel on the Palos Verdes peninsula in Southwestern Los Angeles County.
Ronald Reagan Presidential Library
“The doors of this library are open now and all are welcome. The judgment of history is left to you, the people.†— Ronald Reagan, Remarks at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library Dedication (November 4, 1991)
Damsel and I finally took the opportunity to visit the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library which is about an hour’s drive from here. We arrived mid-morning and began our long-overdue tour. We were greeted by a passenger shuttle van in the parking lot the moment we got out of the car. A very nice gentlemen drove us to the front door of the library. When we got inside, we saw the gift shop. Near the entrance to the shop was this portrait of President Reagan – not in oil or watercolors, but entirely out of jelly beans!
We toured the galleries and saw a virtual history of president Reagan as well as other things that interested him. We learned things we never knew about the life and interests of President Reagan. We also saw an exhibit of the Oval Room as it appeared in Reagan’s tenure. A number of docents stationed throughout the galleries answered questions and called our attention to special attractions. Left: The tail section of former Air Force One
As we emerged from the galleries, we walked into a giant hangar where we saw Reagan’s Air Force One aircraft, a former Marine One helicopter, Reagan’s Presidential limousine, another gift shop and an Irish Pub!
We walked out into the garden on the west side of the library; a bigger-than-life bronze bust of the Gipper smiled down on us as we approached the Berlin Wall monument. An actual segment of the infamous wall stands tall and awe-inspiring in spite of the panoramic vista in the distance. A replica of the White House Lawn and walkway lead to the Reagan Family Tomb where one of the best presidents ever to hold the office lies in repose.
We sure had a great day visiting the library and museums! We’re already planning our next visit since there is always going to be those little things you may have missed the first time through. We give this place two thumbs up and five stars on our places to recommend that you visit.
We’ll close this article with an excerpt from the Gipper’s timeless Berlin Wall speech:
Mr. Gorbachev, Tear Down This Wall!
And now the Soviets themselves may, in a limited way, be coming to understand the importance of freedom. We hear much from Moscow about a new policy of reform and openness. Some political prisoners have been released. Certain foreign news broadcasts are no longer being jammed. Some economic enterprises have been permitted to operate with greater freedom from state control.
Are these the beginnings of profound changes in the Soviet state? Or are they token gestures, intended to raise false hopes in the West, or to strengthen the Soviet system without changing it? We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace.
General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! (Click to read the entire speech.)
All photos courtesy and © Damsel