Checking Into the Morrison Motel

Let's talk about death. There are more death euphemisms than there are for body parts or even sex. Jim Morrison, for example, has been dead for 40 years.. We've been to his grave in Paris four times. Jim's headstones are frequently stolen and the graffiti changes often. The last time we visited a bored Paris cop was watching Jim's grave...They have Jim far enough away from Proust, Oscar Wilde, and Heloise and Abelard that those graves don't get much punk vandalism...Oscar's grave featured a lovely angel with a full set of male genitalia. those organs ended up on the desk of the cemetery superintendent and eventually disappeared...

Jim stole an umbrella from a police car in 1963 while he was a student in Tallahassee at Florida State University. He was drunk at the time and got busted for urinating in the wrong place while holding the wrong umbrella. Jim was born, like me, in 1943. I was also arrested in Tallahassee as a student in 1964. I drove my Harley Davidson at speeds over 100 MPH past the Tallahassee police station at 2 AM...I was drunk on 151 rum at the time...The policeman who arrested me was shaking badly...I remember the judge asking me if I was insane...I pleaded out with the simple military serviceman ID card and paid the $110 fine...

Jim was a roommate of my friends, the West brothers. They played "Strange Days" for me on vinyl and told me that Jim had moved out just before I moved in. You would have thought that Jim would have outlasted me based on his feeble law-breaking attempts at umbrella theft and my own high-speed drunken exploits...Instead, here I am 52 years later having a good time...and Jim, at age 27, is in the great Golf course where we all get a hole in one...Taking a dirt nap...Pushing up the daisies ...Passed on...Deceased...At room temperature...Stone-dead ...Demised ... Ceased to be..No more expired ..Gone to meet his maker ..Stiff ..Bereft of life ..Resting in peace ..Off the twig ..Kicked the bucket ..Shuffled off the mortal coil ..Run down the curtain ..Joined the choir invisible ...That good night ..In a better place.. Six feet under ..Crossed over ..crossed the bar. Crossed the River Styx ....Wandering the Elysian Fields ...Paid Charon's fare...Sleeping with the fishes.. belly up ..bloodless...defunct ..departed..done for.. erased .extinct ..gone ..inanimate.. .late.. .lifeless..liquidated ..mortified ..offed ..perished ..in repose ..rubbed out ..snuffed out ..wasted ..lost ..be taken ..bumped off ..bought it ..cashed in..checked out ..conked ..croaked ..Danced the last dance ..ate it ..finished .Kicked off ...Got a one-way ticket ..Popped off ..Snuffed ..Sprouted wings ..Succumbed..No longer with us ..Ashes to ashes, dust to dust ..Returned to the ground ..With the ancestors. Gave up the ghost ..Wacked. Terminated ..Put down.. going to the big ___(whatever) in the sky"...Wormfood ..Fragged.. Bought a pine condo. Gone into the fertilizer business .....Become living-challenged ...tits up

Jim is definitely done dancing....He checked into the Morrison Motel...Jim's eating at the Rotten Skull Cafe...Jim's gone belly up...He's gone to the last roundup...He went past his "sell-by" date...Jim has left the building...Jim's no longer with us...He's on the unable to breathe list...Jim's permanently out of print...The lizard king is six feet under...Jim is sleeping with the fishes...He's wearing a toe tag...He's in the past people plantation...Been assigned to the Hale Bopp project...Become peasant under grass...He's playing harp duets with Hoffa...

So...Jim was a pretty boy, but, actually, I think I was at least as good looking as Jim. Not only that, but my crimes were more exciting...and I appear to be a much better survivor type...C'mon baby light my fire...As far as Jim goes, he's at room temperature...belly-up....bought a pine condo...ceased to bee...danced the last dance...inanimate...no longer running the human race...pushing daisies...paid Charon's fare...stiff...wandering the Elysian fields...gone into the fertilizer business...worm food....resurrection eligible...kicked the oxygen habit...passed his sell-by date...examining the radishes from below...

Mrs. Phred went into Newport, Oregon to get her hair done yesterday. I took the camera downtown to get pictures of all the seafood processing plants and marine mammals.

I liked this T-shirt. It reminded me of certain degenerate English gambler friends...

Today we passed over the mighty Columbia River to an RV park north of Portland in Vancouver, Washington. We want to see Mount Saint Helen's again. It blew in 1980. The last time we went there was 1992. Looking at the recovery after another 20 years should be interesting.

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Laura came to visit Mrs. Phred back on the Siletz River. Mrs. Phred has her own online life with the women's RV Forum...Personally, my own online activities are at "Second Life", where my avatar is extremely attractive and rich...I spend a lot of time in "dance bubbles" with attractive avatars who claim to be female...Probably most of them are unshaven middle-aged fat men from Cincinnati, fingering keyboards while wearing their "wife-beater" T-shirts and drinking Budweisers...

The House of the Rising Sun

New Orleans

Now the only thing a rambler needs
Is an RV and a gun
And the only time he's satisfied
Is when he's on a run

This is one of Jim's old guitars in a store window. They only wanted $55,000 for it. If you've been following my blog for awhile, you must know by now that I was Jim Morrison before I faked my death in Paris back in 1972 and moved to Tampa under an assumed name to become a CPA.

Past the touristy areas of the French Quarter you wander into the ancient residential areas. Looking at the bases of the homes, there was no sign that the water had lapped up here during Katrina..

We found an entertainment area on Frenchmen Street just outside the quarter. It was lined with places that play music. Most of them opened somewhere between 7 PM an 10 PM. One building at the end of the street has a sign describing the execution of six Frenchmen by the Spanish Governor in 1769.

We stopped in the courtyard of the Mojita for the Pinot Grigio and little plates of tapas (excuse the redundancy). This one was crab and avocado drizzled with garlic and melted cheese. They also had deviled quail eggs and grilled gator tail sausages, but we wanted to save room for dinner.

We wandered on though the French Market near the Mississippi River. They had some cool voodoo dolls, gator heads and feather masks.

Outside the market is a golden statue of Joan of Arc on a golden horse. Apparently she was 19 when she died. The statue was a 1991 gift from the citizens of France to the City of New Orleans.

Mrs. Phred shopped for shoes in St. Charles Square. Nothing kills the blues like a new pair of shoes. They had nothing that fit her feet.

I talked to some colorful residents on a park bench while she shopped.

Mrs. Phred led me to the other side of the Quarter to a place called Tommy's Cuisine. The veal picata was covered with crab pieces. Mrs. Phred had some really disgusting sweetbreads. The waiter asked her if she really knew what they were...Ugh! Gag me with a spoon!

It is a great place to visit. I could live here. We spent about seven hours of walking the streets of NOLA, listening to music and eating fine chow. What a place.

Father's Day 2010

Percé, Quebec

Between childhood, boyhood,
adolescence
& manhood (maturity) there
should be sharp lines drawn w/
Tests, deaths, feats, rites
stories, songs, & judgments

The Lizard King

On Father's day I want to pay homage to a really great father. I was lucky to have a job as a college professor when Ken was young, so we had some great adventures on long camping trips out West and in Canada. Once he got covered with leeches in a Canadian stream. It was like African Queen on steroids.

He is a father with seven oak leaf clusters. We learned to SCUBA dive together. I was worried about bringing him back when I lost track of him at age 16 on a 110 foot deep night drift dive in the Gulf Stream off Palm Beach and his light stick disappeared , but he turned up like a bad penny and saved me an awkward explanation to Mrs. Phred..

His name is Ken and he is my son, a electric guitar player, master soccer coach, poet and minor genius. He never got into trouble growing up ( I told him what my father taught me: don't get caught).

His favorite joke is "Have you lost some weight?" If you say yes he says, "Turn around, you'll find it." Another of his favorites is "What's green and flies over Russia?" The answer of course, is "Snotzies".

But then I may be remembering more infantile humor before Ken became an attorney and teacher and mature protector of my seven lovely and talented grandchildren.

Unfortunately all my analog pictures of young Ken are in storage back in Tampa. Maybe I'll scan some of those in this winter. Every Dad should be so lucky.

Sweet Memory

There's a killer on the road

His brain is squirmin' like a toad
Take a long holiday
Let your children play
If ya give this man a ride
Sweet memory will die

At age 66 I seem to live more and more within a memory palace and think about the past.


My first memory is of a snake sticking its head out of a hole in the front yard of my grandmother's house in New York. It was probably the Spring of 1945. I also remember attacking my father with a toy hoe after he came back from Germany in early 1946 and tried to assert his authority. I was astounded with the ease with which he disarmed me. I have lots of other childhood memories. I hope they don't just slip away.

Mom's memory is gone at age 86. She knows who I am so far, but that may not last long.

I remember the Junior High School hazing that we had to endure. They painted us with lipstick on our way to class in the seventh grade. Then there was the bully Billy Mitchell. He had been held back so many times that he towered over everyone else. Also there was Provo, a very muscular bully who was later fried in the electric chair for murder. I had to fight them both, knowing I was doomed to lose...but A man has to do what a man has to do.


It was double session Junior High school for me so I was left alone in the morning. My brother and sister were in regular sessions in grade school and both Mom and Pop were working. Sometimes I made donuts with a can of Crisco. I remember doing push ups to try to develop my strength and playing 45 RPM records very loud like Jerry Lee Lewis' "Great Balls of Fire".

The girl next door was really hot and she often sat with me in a tree and tried to make me interested in her, while not really being interested in me. I often wonder what she looks like now at age 66. At 13 she was special. There's a certain memorable fire in being 13 and getting your first fondling and French kiss from a pretty girl. Maybe I won't forget.


Anyway, most of my friends are dead already. Some at 19, some at 21, some in airplane crashes, some at 35 and others at 53. I sometimes think that my life is somehow charmed and I'm immune from death from lung cancer or other causes. If I died somehow, the universe would immediately cease to exist.

Last summer I took Mrs. Phred to Jurarez, sister city of El Paso. There are 3,000 murders a year there related to drugs and we are the only Americans crossing the border that day. We bought some wallets and had lunch. Last night Mrs. Phred saw a TV program about the out of control Juarez murders and chastised me for taking her there. I explain that by standing tall with a steely-eyed glint it protects her from cowardly miscreants

We lived on a Tampa street where the city kept dumping oyster shells to keep the street passable. The Mosquito control people kept coming by with the Fog trucks and we all ran behind them breathing in the poison. At least we didn't get Yellow Fever or Malaria.

You Say It's Your Birthday?

Sarasota, Florida

This is the end
Beautiful friend
This is the end
My only friend, the end
Of our elaborate plans, the end
Of everything that stands, the end
No safety or surprise, the end
I'll never look into your eyes...again
Can you picture what will be
So limitless and free

I can visualize the 2010 calendar. Mrs. Phred has her birthday today. She tells me she is 39 today. I cannot doubt it. Sometimes I believe six impossible things before breakfast.

We have a reservation at "La Europa" at 7:30 tonight. I can already visualize a bottle of chilled Savignon Blanc. We've been going there together for 40 years. Apparently she was very young to start.

Jackson Hole has some great scenery. The Grand Tetons, Yellowstone and other places.

Maybe some of these pictures will make the calendar. Maybe not.

This is somewhere around Utah near the Dinosaur National Monument. The in situ Allosaurus bones were not very pretty.

Black Canyon of the Gunnison.





Pike's Peak

Driver, where you taken us?

Tampa, Florida

The blue bus is callin us
The blue bus is callin us
Driver, where you taken us?

We say goodbye to the old motorhome and hello to the Blue Bus. Our new home is the one shown above. You push a button and it whines and whirs and brings itself to a level position on uneven ground. Another button makes the satellite dome on the roof lock into satellite TV. It's seven feet longer than the old RV, has two bathrooms and even has a washer/dryer. There are two air conditioning units for those hot summer desert days and a much more powerful generator for boondocking. We'll be very happy here. Plenty of room for the SCUBA gear in the huge basement...lots of ceiling headroom...Oh!...I can plug my IPOD directly into any of the onboard radios...

Cmon baby, take a chance with us
And meet me at the back of the blue bus
Doin a blue rock
On a blue bus
Doin a blue rock
Cmon, yeah
....Jim Morrison

Dark Rum and Wall Street Bail-0uts

San Juan, Puerto Rico

First off, I would like to wish my Little Brother in Wendover a happy birthday and a future life of happiness, equanimity and love....I don't have his telephone number with me. Happy Birthday, David!

I'm drinking more than my fair share of dark rum. I go down to the local liquor store and treat myself to a bottle of dark Bacardi select...I eyeball the Bacardi 151... but that way lies madness...

Flashback to 1964...I have a roommate, Ted, who is a blond good-looking fraternity guy from Palm Beach...He tells me about "pig parties". That is where you compete to find the least attractive possible date and then delight in their embarrassment when they realize that they have all been invited to a party for ugly women. He actually seems a little guilty relating this to me...maybe there was hope for him?

My deviant non-empathetic roommate produces a bottle of Bacardi 151. I end up with a traffic ticket for driving my Harley-Davidson Sportster at 110 MPH in a 30 MPH zone at 2 AM in front of the Tallahassee police station. Only a year earlier Jim Morrison, my former almost roommate, was charged for stealing an umbrella from a police car. The judge gives me a break after seeing my military ID, but he chews me out good...but at least I didn't get caught stealing a stupid umbrella...

Outside the hotel room tonight, they are blasting away with Puerto Rican tunes...one of the songs is about "muchos saxophones"....I sit in an Audit Committee meeting with 12 staff and volunteers...it's embarrassing to be the only non-bilingual person in the room...they all speak English for my benefit...If I come back, I will be fluent in Spanish...

My pay grade is GS0...I'm a volunteer.

So what about that credit freeze? One problem is colateralized debt obligations (CDOs). These are bundles of securitized sub-prime mortgages. They were rated AAA by the rating organization when issued primarily because of "insurance" against defaults...more about that later.

The banks are using models to value these CDO assets which reflect home price declines in metropolitan areas. For example. the San Francisco Metropolitan Area (SFMA) has just experienced a 24% house price decline. The problem with that is that housing prices in some San Francisco areas are down 70% and in other area only 5%. The banks should be using zip code data to value mortgages and CDOs. This would result in valuing CDOs at near market value. For example, many banks are carrying CDOs worth 15% on the dollar at 75% or more.

I don't think $700 Billion is going to do much to correct the "exuberant excesses" of the last seven years. It's a ten trillion dollar issue...but wait...what about credit default swaps?...and what happened to the Investment Banks?

A Credit Default Swap is like an insurance policy against CDO defaults. Warren Buffet called these instruments of financial mass destruction five years ago. The Investment Banks collected big fees on these policies for years but never set aside payment reserves or anticipated any defaults on mortgages. So when the housing market went south two years ago, eventually "hedge fund" managers panicked and withdrew assets from the investment banks leading to the collapse of Bear Sterns, Merrill Lynch, AIG Insurance, Lehman Brothers and others...what's a "hedge fund"? Please...Don't even ask.

While "subprime" mortgages, borrower fraud, speculative greed and low interest rates created a huge housing and mortgage bubble, a bigger problem now looms...negative amortiztion or "pay option" mortgages. These have brought down Washington Mutual and Wachovia, two of the biggest US Commercial banks. How's this for a deal...sign an 8% mortgage but pay only 2% until your mortgsge balance reaches 125% of the original loan...then you get a letter that your payments have doubled or tripled. You owe maybe twice as much as your home is worth after a 30% decline in value...to walk or not to walk...that is the question...

Meanwhile, inter-bank lending has virtually dried up because banks realize that mortgage assets of other banks are significantly overvalued or impossible to evaluate based on current valuation models. Depositors are making panicked (but somewhat justified) withdrawals from banks where they hsve more on deposit than the $100,000 FDIC insurance limit. The $44 billion in the FDIC fund won't go all that far in the current climate.

I've evaluated the finances of my own credit union. Here is some scary stuff on their provision for bad debts:
2005 $12,000,000
2006 $12,000,000
2007 $60,000,000
2008 $150,000,000

So what about suspension of the "mark to market" method of accounting for mortgage assets that just got signed into law as part of the bailout package? Now banks don't have to writedown assets to what they fetch in similar sales...how helpful..

Maine: Lake Sebago

Lake Sebago State Park, Maine

A few days ago we went to see The Dark Knight. I was impressed by the performance of the actor who played The Joker. I asked Mrs. Phred yesterday who the actor was, expecting great things in the future. She tells me that he died of an overdose before the movie was released.

That got me thinking about my old roommate, Jim Morrison and other people born in 1943: me, Janis Joplin, Keith Richards, Joni Mitchell and Mick Jagger to name a few. Some have managed to handle life fairly well, others failed along the way. I think Keith Richards possibly had the best quote of that generation: “I've never had a problem with drugs. I've had problems with the police.”


Joni Mitchell had a sweet thought: “All I really, really want our love to do is to bring out the best in me and in you too.”
We spent a relaxing day here on the beach. We dragged our lawn chairs down to the sand, under a shady elm, and watched the kids and families play and swim. We read for about six hours in the shade.


A little boy asked me if I had a boat or a jet ski. I told him no, but that I had a bicycle. He stared at me dubiously and told me that I was too old to ride a bicycle. This is a popular family park in the summer, full of tents, hammocks and children.

Today we head south 200 miles to find a base camp between Boston and Cape Cod. The water should get warmer as we move south.

Desert Drive

Southern Utah Desert

Hi. How you doin'?
I just got back into town,
I was out in the desert for awhile
Yeah. In the middle of it
Right...

Hey, listen, man, I really got a problem
When I was out on the desert, ya know
I don't know how to tell you
but, ah, I killed somebody

It's no big deal, ya know
I don't think anybody will find out about it, but...
just, ah...
- The Doors

Well....you know
We went on this drive
46 miles of unpaved road..,

We walked up into a box canyon
then, it..ah...just ended

We found a cave under a cliff
and desert wildflowers and strange stunted trees
we walked a mile into, like, a slot canyon
I walked out alone

Some of the mesas looked like, ah...
Variegated confectionaries
and, ah...
It's just that...

I'm worried that, ah...
somebody might find the body

So anyway...here's a slideshow of some Utah desert scenes...