1000 buffalo stampede

Yes, of course … The Shadow – he knows. That catch phrase is also trademarked, by the way. Regardless, The Shadow is one of my favorite crime-fighters, and always has been. He’s also remained the most elusive as well, proving to be as difficult to find in print as his enemies and aides found him to be in the fictional world they inhabited. I had read two stories back in middle school, locating the hardcovers at the Lucy Robbins Wells library. Past that, any of The Shadow’s pulp adventures remained out of sight.

Imagine my surprise when a few weeks ago, strolling through a Berkeley comic shop after a pub dinner, I encountered The Shadow – or, more accurately – a book of reprinted novels.

Nostalgia Ventures has been collected the classic pulp novels of The Shadow (and Doc Savage) into 128 page trade paperbacks. Very reasonably priced, I treated myself to the first one, which consisted of the tales “Crime, Insured” and “The Golden Vulture“. Those took me a week to get through, given work, schedule, etc. Fortunately, I thought ahead and ordered up the next two (as well as the first two for my Mom, also a fan of The Shadow).

I’m now about halfway through the first story of the second book – “The Chinese Disks“. All of the stories have been the expected pulp goodness (with some minor cringing – as happens with stories from the pulp days – the late 1930’s in this case – the protrayals of minorities can be a bit … ah … unflattering to the modern reader).

No doubt, I’ll be branching out into the Doc Savage tales soon. I’m also told Baen books has been reprinting tales of the Spider. I sense more summer reading ahead …

As I try and reform my night owl self, the last thing I need to find is a decent tea bar that’s open until midnight. “Sadly”, that’s just what I found and finally got around to checking out L’Amyx Tea Bar down on Piedmont. Had myself a few pots of dragonwell tea, and chatted with the nearly world famous MoE (not to be confused with Big Moe, my Dad, who celebrated his birthday a few days ago).

I had also spoken with a physical therapist about my knee a few days ago (which, really, isn’t nearly as optional as finding a late night haunt), and picked up some new stretches for the knee. I had been mainly working on building up the muscles that track the knee cap; she gave me some stretches to limber up in addition. I was fairly stiff the last few days, and realized as I was walking home tonight that my stride was much better. Hopefully, an improvement that will continue (cause you can bet I’m sticking with the new routine).

The recent news about the drowning of a 4 year old boy at the Great America wave pool is certainly very sad and tragic.

Unfortunately, the mother is wrong in blaming Great America, or at least solely them.
As a retired lifeguard, pool director and water safety instructor, let me share a few things:

“He was in 2 feet of water. How could he drown?“

A child (or person) can drown in 6 inches of water. Two feet of water? Most certainly. I’ve seen children drown in a wading pool less than a foot deep.

Flores said she had not been in the pool with her son at the time and does not know how he drowned

Forgive me for criticizing a grieving mother; it’s a tasteless thing to do, I know. However, there is no excuse for a parent not watching a four year old child in a pool or other body of water. A pool is a lethal weapon to a child. No excuse whatsoever.

You never let take your eyes off a 4 year old child in a pool. Never. Frankly, you had better damn well be in the pool with them – four year olds are not swimmers.

“I want this to be known,” Flores said between sobs. “I want to warn all parents that they need to watch their kids at all times, because (Great America) doesn’t do their job.”

… and I want this to be known: a lifeguard is not a babysitter. You do not relinquish responsibility for a child of that age to a lifeguard, whether there are 4, 6, or 20 of them at the pool.

Every parent should watch their kids at all times around a pool.

As I said earlier though, there’s enough blame to go around. Whether Great America had four or six lifeguards is irrelevant: you do not operate a pool without having adequate lifeguard coverage for the size and number of swimmers.

Someone should have been able to make that save. It’s tragic that no one did, and it suggests that the pool did not have proper coverage, design, or lifeguard training. Unfortunately, accidents happen, and even the best lifeguards can be unsuccessful.

But, at the end of the day … letting your 4 year old play in a pool (a wave pool of all things) is setting up for a tragedy.

B Restaurant, in Oakland, began serving Sunday brunch today. Having woken up late (or re-woken, given I got up early and then went back to bed) and being hungry, I headed down to get me some breakfast / lunch. The card they had given me a few days earlier for a complimentary bloody mary did nothing to sway my decision I’m sure.

I’ve already eaten at B for lunch and dinner several times, and am generally very pleased with the food and service. Brunch was, in two words, teh awesome (as all the kids are saying these days). The bloody mary was spot on, and they brought me a pilsner beer back for it. I went for the eggs benedict, and wow – were they good. They tied with the Eggs Omni (at the Hotel Omni in SF) as best eggs benedict I’ve had. B put theirs together with rustic bread, spinach, eggs, prosciutto, and a brown butter hollandaise sauce. Fan-f’ing-tastic.

Of course, after a bloody mary, half a beer, and two large cups of coffee, I left buzzing. Fat, dumb, happy and buzzing to be precise, and 8 hours later, hardly hungry.

Definitely a great breakfast, and you bet I’ll be back.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all [people] are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness

July 4th, 1776 – the Declaration of Independence

Well there are people in the darkness
And they just can’t see the light
And if we don’t say it’s wrong then that says it’s right
We got to feel for each other
Let our brothers know we’re here
Got to get the message and send it out loud and clear

That none of us are free
None of us are free
None of us are free if one of us is chained
None of us are free
Well it’s the single truth
We all need to see
That none of are free if one of us is chained
None of us are free

Barry Mann, Cynthia Weil, Brenda Russell

Happy 231st birthday, America.

We can do better.