What with the Middle East in flames, Japan underwater, and Charlie Sheen leaking crap everywhere (he is apparently still full of it), I missed a truly important story; I wouldn't even have known about it at all if MamaCharlie hadn't seen it on the crawl on Fox News.  Ferlin Husky died on the 17th of March.  He hadn't been heard of much lately, but in the fifties and sixties he was one of country music's top acts.  I grew up listening to country music and Ferlin Husky was large in...

The door bell would ring, usually a weekend but occasionally a weekday; when you opened it, there would be a handsome young sailor, about twenty-five-ish, blond brushcut almost-a-flattop hair, medium height and weight, just slightly uneven teeth creating a smile with character, crinkly skin around blue eyes, holding a blonde wood Japanese made guitar...and he would start in on Don Gibson's "Oh, Lonesome Me". "Everybody's going out and havin' fun..." Beside him would stand his tiny Japanese w...

  It bothers me to see the "Peace Sign" displayed in so many ways everywhere you look. It is on t-shirts, pants pockets, on posters, in advertising, just all over the place. I see it displayed by kids who have no idea the pain and division that symbol generated in this country...it is just a fashionable "retro" look to them. I want to grab them and tell them how offensive it is to me and a heck of a lot like me, but I am just a fat old man that is past the point of being considere...

  This picture was taken in front of the Mount Lemmon Inn, sometime in the summer of 1967;  MamaCharlie and I were dating then. We drove up the mountain from Tucson; it was a winding twenty-seven-mile drive up through three or four different levels of vegetation from desert floor to piney forests. There were rock formations and huge cacti and amazing views. It was a great drive and a great day together. We stopped at the Inn for lunch; I had a steak...I d...

She was a petite blonde, nearing sixteen, rather pretty, and she lived across the street from one of my very best friends. Her daddy was rich...like all-the-KFC-franchises-in-Oklahoma rich. She came out to California so she could go to high school in a cooler place than Oklahoma. So that is how she came to be living on Galena Dr, across the street from my buddy, in the summer of 1967. As the magic birthday approached (in SoCal in the good old days, 16 was the magic number...drivers' license d...

We had just come back from Germany and reported in to Fort Hood in Killeen, Texas. We lived in Lampasas, about thirty miles from Hood, for several months, and then moved in to a better house in Copperas Cove. We extended my ETS (the day I was to get out of the Army) from October to December so that I could complete a course at Central Texas College. The Army paid for me to go to an air conditioning and refrigeration course under a program called "Project Transition". I completed the course an...

Sometime after the Korean War, the Army decided that not everyone needed to be a sergeant, but everyone needed to have regular promotions and raises to be enticed to stay in the Army. They created the "Specialist" ranks, for folks who could do well at their job but weren't necessarily good material for leadership. In many of the combat service support MOS's (Military Occupational Specialty) this was actually a pretty good policy. For example, in my world, I have had many excellent drivers who...

In his great novel "Once An Eagle", Anton Myrer traced the careers of two soldiers from WWI through the Vietnam War. One soldier was a front-line platoon leader who came up through the ranks from the mudholes of France to high command positions as a three-star general. The other was a "corporate climber" type of officer who served on the staffs of mighty generals and spent minimal time in actual command of troops. The staff type, of course, rose to great heights while the troop leader suffere...

In the movie "Pulp Fiction" (which I have never watched all the way through...too much for me) Sam Jackson tells Vinnie Barbarino that sewer rat might taste like pumpkin pie but he would never know...he would never eat the nasty *&%%$. In the last couple of weeks, MamaCharlie and I have had the occasion to use the expression "...but I'll never know" to describe the way we feel about some things we would never do. "Alligator tastes just like chicken..." "Hugging a polar bear looks ...

When MamaCharlie and I were younger, before the kids started popping up, we had an expression we used, to depict what we considered a "good night out". We called it "Makin' noise ... carrying on". So when we were heading out without a firm plan, one would ask the other "What are we gonna do?" The answer was often "You know...make a little noise...carry on". That lasted until we saw "Bonnie and Clyde"; then the answer could just as often be "We gonna have a time". (If you aren't dialed in, wat...

Obi-wan sat in the shotgun seat of the speeder and waved his hand at the storm troopers manning the roadblock.  He told them that these weren't the droids the stormtroopers were after.  The stormtroopers repeated that these weren't the droids they were after.  Then Obi-wan told them that they could go.  The stormtrooper repeated that they could go.  Later Obi-wan explained it was an old Jedi mind trick. As I drove past the 7-11 on Fountain Mesa yesterday and notic...

Let me start out by saying a few things about myself.  I absolutely do not want to come off braggy.  I spent most of my adult life as a soldier.  I am not a stranger to the application of violent action or those who would apply it.  I spent a lot of time training myself to be the best soldier I could be no matter what role I was expected to play.  I choose to avoid violence at all costs.  Some may have perceived that to be out of cowardice.  I prefer to think ...

I had just turned onto the road that led to our compound.  The gate was only a few yards ahead;  I knew they wouldn't open it until they had me stopped and checked me for whatever they were checking for.  The VC were really good at putting things in jeeps when you weren't looking that made big booms later.  I was slowing and getting set for the turn when something landed with a ringing thud in the back of the jeep.  Processing sounds in your brain can be lightning fast....

I was fortunate to be raised in a family that celebrated Christmas well.  And I have always tried to make sure that Christmas was special to my own family, too.  I was exceptionally lucky, for a lifetime military man, for out of the 46 Christmases since I left home, I have only had six that were not with my parents or my family.  Only four when I was not with my wife and kids.  Of course, some of those Christmases I count as being home were interrupted by travel, other dutie...

I don't know what his personal life was like;  I never heard him associated with any scandals or exposes.  I vaguely remember him being a Cowboy quarterback.  I spent a lot of his career wrapped up in things besides football.  My strongest memories of him center around his broadcast and acting career after he retired from the NFL.  He was by far my favorite color commentator ever.  His wit and insights added a fun flavor to Monday Night Football that hasn't been ba...