The leaves have now fallen. The sweet smells of crackling oak logs emanate from chimneys through the neighborhood as we take that brisk walk before the feast. Everybody is too old or too cool for touch football. Besides now that we live in the city one must sport their tweeds and scarves to match the moth-eaten but very camp corduroys that still fit. Let the games begin.

We along with 46 million other households in America will soon lay eyes on that succulent bird festooned with stuffing and cranberries of all sort. His or her well tanned skin looks like they just came back from two weeks poolside at the Fontanblue in Miami Beach. Of course there are idiots everywhere for whom the oven is not good enough and they will attempt once again to deep fry that Tom without setting themselves and their house on fire. There’s a 50/50 chance they will spend the evening in the Emergency Room or the psychiatric ward. Stay tuned. Live updates at 10:00.

Now this plump creature is actually native to North America but has undergone several changes from the wild to domestication. Like most of us it has grown large by overeating and lack of physical exercise. The average used to be 18 pounds in the 60’s and now comes close to 30. Steroids and breeding have given these babies enormous boobs. Turkey breast. Get it? They are so top heavy they have bad knees and weak legs to the point that they fall over when they walk. Sound familiar?

The males are the all stars of plume. The “Toms” flap their 5000 multicolored feathers to the “hens”. That red fleshy thing hanging off his nose is called a snood. It fills with blood and droops down when mating. I kid you not. I can’t make this up. It’s where “strutting your stuff” came from.

They all have wattles. These are the multi level folds around the neck where they can pass for either Churchill, Alfred Hitchcock or Mitch McConnell in a look alike contest. The ones that are warehoused have 1/3 the sized brain of the wild ones. As I grow older sometimes I feel that way.

They gobble, cluck, purr and yelp. Now you would think this is talking turkey but that would be too easy. That phrase is really derived from pleasant talk around the dinner table. They haven’t seen some favorite repasts where Uncle Joe gets smashed and Aunt Sarah starts lighting into him. The kids start a food fight and the dog hurls from eating too many table scraps. Aah. Home for the holidays.

Makes you want to go cold turkey on this whole festive thing. The nearest we can figure this out is that when one is weaned from booze or drugs it resembles a cold plate of turkey. No frills and Elmer Gantry is hanging on your slurred speech to do some straight talking. Another variation is that a person in withdrawal looks the carcass of a cold turkey. Nice visual, TTG

All this anatomy brings us to the wonderful world of giblets. In the old days there was a bag of goodies stuck in the avian from the butcher that contained the heart, liver, neck and other visceral organs. My grandmother actually cooked the heart and then asked me if I wanted some. “It’s good for you. It”ll put hair on your chest” she said. What are you nuts? Good thing she didn’t give it to my sister. They now sell those tender goodies to pet food companies for gourmet cat food. A sucker born every minute.

Speaking of marketing. The wild turkey is capable of flying and reaching speeds of 55 miles per hour. I know a lot of my low life friends who can do 110 when they have a bunch of Wild Turkey in them. In its early days these prized spirits were somewhere between anti freeze and moonshine. The boys would take it hunting and at the start of every trip they would say,”Let’s bring some of that Turkey stuff.” Some enterprising redneck put label on it and sold it to gullible Yankees with a 12 on it. They thought it was years old and of course it was days.

While we are in the South one of my Savannah savants is claiming Turkey is a state. Not on the Eurasian border but because it borders on Georgia. They actually think it is right next door to Grease. I was going to bring up the Black Sea but that would open a whole new can of worms. Like Old Rufus, we will let sleeping dogs lie.

Okay I give up. I could go on but you and I have a meal to eat. I could flip you the Bird but you would  probably  cancel your subscription. Like the infamous “Balls” treatise I decided to sit down and put the feisty TTG away. For the day let’s forget about ISIS and immigration and yes even Ferguson.  It is amazing what this sick mind can come up with when I am allowed to just let it fly. It’s great fun. You should try it some time. Say a prayer for those who are not home and those that have no home. We are bunch of lucky dudes and dudettes. Give thanks. Happy Thanksgiving to all.

As always
Ted The Great

Factoids:

In lieu of useless information, here below for your review is a reprint of “Balls.” Merci for your patience.
Balls…..1/07/14

“Balls”, said the queen. “If I had them I’d be king.” What an interesting word. Without getting into anatomy 101 let’s contemplate spheroids.

The obvious are sports objects. But when we think of a football it is oblong and not circular. Cogitating even  further you forget whether you could be talking about soccer or the USA brand. They all seem to have seams and some even have laces. They spiral. They rotate.

Now baseballs are great but we always want to improve them fresh out of the box. There is some kind of river mud that umpires apply to every shiny new one to make them appear dirty. I’ll accept that but who decides when the ball is too dirty to be used in the game? The same guy who soiled them in the first place. Sounds like job security.

Awhile back Mr Doubleday said they had to be so wide and the seams just so but who had any sort of measuring device to make sure they were all perfect in the early 1900’s? Some clever guys discovered if you loaded them up with saliva they did some strange things and prolonged the pitcher’s career. They banned that idea soon thereafter. Purity of the game.

Then they tried Vaseline which was also the hair tonic that cool guys doused themselves with back in the day. How were they  to know that rubbing their hair and  balls ( remember we are talking baseballs) at the same time would do anything? Ditto gaping holes created by belt buckles and sand paper. You thought they were all dumb jocks.

In the wonderful world of golf before Bubba Watson, the objet d’art was a thing called a featherie. It was a bunch of feathers sewn into a wad of leather. Next there was the gutta percha which was just a ball of rubber they painted. Then some savant decided there could be a good use for rubber bands and he wound the longest rubber band into the middle of the little white capsule. Of course we as kids could not wait to perform surgery on the good old Spalding Dot and unwind that baby from end to end.

Now tennis balls were a whole other matter. They were white as the driven snow and the country club tennis ensemble. No colors allowed which of course had a lot of connotations in the days of white shoe WASP establishments. Then Jimmy Connors et al decided to shake up the high brow set and we went to orange and the effervescent yellow of today.

One time in a fit of cosmic thinking I tried to imagine how many balls were in the air throughout the world? Just think of all these things defying gravity? Of course they all fell back to earth at some point. This was both in a literal and figurative way. But I digress.

Now we also have balls as in parties. Many are debutante soirees where a young lady is introduced to society. The lovely lass is escorted by her dad usually and a host of whackadoo collegians. The latter’s sole purpose was to drink heavily and be available to dance with some stuffy old lady or the deb herself if they were still able to stand.

I actually attended one of these fetes at the Garden City Hotel. White tie and tail. A couple of my father’s buddies, Art Florence and Bill Dailey, decided I should juice up my act. Bill had a top hat and cape that he added to the pot. Artie wanted me to wear a ribbon sash with a few old war medals but I begged off on that affectation. I do have my standards. Any way I was a big hit with the guy at the Greenvale Diner at 6:00 AM while I was trying to sit steady on the stool all the while popping the top hat in his face.

Now you could say from time to time I am on the ball. Where the hell did this come from? Some people think it refers to being on the ball of your feet. That is the large protuberance from your foot just aft of your big toe and forward of your instep. It’s supposed to give you get up and go power. Not the right answer.

It actually comes from keeping your eye on the ball. In most sports it is a must. You can’t not look at a baseball coming at you at 100 miles per hour. In golf your best excuse for screwing up a shot is “I looked up” thereby avoiding the reality you have a lousy swing.

I was playing tennis one time with former Aussie pro Colin Dibley. We had a great game and then your favorite smart ass here started chiding him about his serve. You see he held the world record for fastest serve of 134 mph and he had not displayed it in our match. He told me to stand back in the return court and if I could get a racket on any of the three he whistled at me, he would buy dinner. After the second one I was just standing with my Wilson T whatever protecting my you know whats.

Well I guess if you have gotten this far you realize that I am now balls up. That is really any disastrous situation. The balls referred to are NOT testicles. The term dates from the days of wooden sailing ships when the existence of a shipboard disaster, such as plague, lack of food or water, mutiny, etc. was communicated to the outside world by hoisting largish, brightly painted wooden balls up into the rigging. Balls of different colors represented different disasters and therefore served as either requests for assistance or warnings to stay clear. How do I get out of here?

Now before you start bawling I will go. But just think all of you slugs with minds in the gutter way back in the beginning when I just said the word “balls”. We all let our mind wander this way or that. And honestly it is a good thing. No politics or angst this week. Just fun.  I hope Ted’s Head  got you into just a little bit of crazy thinking. We need it every now and then.

As always
Ted The Great
Factoids:
Ted’s Head was viewed over 5500 times last year. There are some 300 lost souls that read it from time to time. They actually come from 40 countries and I am sure many are involved in Al Quaeda, Hammas, the Muslim Brotherhood and the Tea Party. This is #148 and counting. The post, “Would You Date An Undertaker?” received the most comments.
I would ask you to take your email list and just once send them either a copy of Ted’s Head or just the address:

https://tedsheadco.wordpress.com

I would love to add to our bunch of loonies. Not for self-aggrandisement but just to try to get more people thinking. On second thought maybe you should wait a week.

It’s been a wonderful week for human interaction. ISIS is slashing throats. The Israelis and Arabs are killing each other. We have the myriad of serial killers, hostage takers and lone wolves. If you watch the news blood and gore sells and we are going down the toilet. Even Charles Manson is taking out a wedding license. Geez Louise.

Excuse me while I go to the other end of the spectrum. There was a surgeon who died of Ebola. Doctors Without Borders volunteer not hours but months in a hard hit area. There are religious of all sorts who are not hell bent on killing people but saving them in hospitals, orphanages and schools. People here man food banks and banks of rivers to keep them from flooding their neighbors.

While I was giving platelets last week I was thumbing through the Robb Report. It thrives on the materialistic life style and ostentatious. Store after store has been announcing an earlier than ever opening on Thanksgiving to give you a leg up on buying crap for Christmas. But then the likes of Bill Gates and Bono give like there is no tomorrow. Are we all cut from the same cloth or did one of us get saint dust and the other an evil serum to determine how we would look at life?

I am leaving deviant behavior on its own. I want to understand altruism, charity and empathy. I want to understand how people can go beyond a few hours a week and sometimes volunteer for their entire lives. Not with a sense of duty but true joy at helping their fellow man.

It must take a wonderful person to be altruistic. It is the belief in or practice of disinterested and selfless concern for the well-being of others.Sounds lofty enough but think about it. You are putting someone else’s needs completely ahead of yours. It is the opposite of selfish and says somehow I am going to make your day better. I don’t matter. You do. You spend your whole day where your radar is pointing outward and not within. Is it just me or is that incredible stuff. I am not sure I can even come close.

Easy TTG, these people are of a special breed. Must have been their upbringing. Probably had very special parents. Maybe there was some particular moment where they got struck by a bolt of lightening. Maybe there is a different way to look at this than holier than thou art. Perhaps we can adjust our sights.

I get worried about our world today. Cell phones, internet, cyber cafes, all claim to help make us more connected. Do they? You hear stories of guys spending hours on end on their computers without ever seeing the light of day or a breath of fresh air. I can shop online. Don’t have to talk to a salesperson. No bank tellers. We will soon be to a point where we won’t have to see a doctor. Just put your IPhone next to your epidermis and we will have it all figured out. We will send you your meds and voila you are healed.

Now if I don’t know what you look like or sound like then you are just bits and bytes to me. You are no longer a person. I don’t care what happens to you because you never physically invade my world. The anonymity of all this says the only person I really have to be worried about is me. No feeling. No emotion. No empathy. Just keystrokes on my IMac.

I have a bad habit of asking when I go to Starbucks if people say please or thank you. The highest percentage I got was in Madison, NJ at 30% and the worse was Edwards.CO where it was 0%. Now if I feel for you and understand who you are and that you matter in the world how can I do that? I was in Sienna Italy and Kathy and I were checking out. The girl behind the desk thanked me. I said for what? She had been in a bad mood all morning and when I came up to the desk with a big smile on my face she said she really felt better. She was cute and Kathy belted me. Told me charity begins at home. Just kidding.

So what I am really saying is we all can’t go to Angola or join the Peace Corps even if we wanted to. The Mormons take a year off to proselytize. That’s a stretch. But how many of us who are retired could spend some time somewhere helpful. Writing checks is wonderful but how about getting our hands dirty? Could a mom or a dad help out at an inner city school ? Could you just rake some little old lady’s leaves? Over 60 million people volunteered last year. Big number but still just 20% of the population.

Busy? Giving blood takes about a half an hour. You couldn’t possibly spend and hour or two at a food bank could you? Maybe your local park or river could use some TLC. This thing called charity can wear a lot of faces. How about just holding a door for someone. Instead of yelling at a service tech or waiter what about saying I feel your pain. Corny? Deep down do you really think so?

Generosity, forgiveness and unlimited love are probably the antithesis of laissez faire and caveat emptor. Prosocial sounds a hell of a lot better than antisocial. Am I in the spirit this season? Not quite but at least I think I am pointed in the right direction. Who are these people? No different than you and me.

As always
Ted The Great LOFO

Factoids:

There have been 215,000 volunteers in the Peace Corps in its 50 years of service spanning 139 countries.
Doctors Without Borders sign up for a tour lasting from 3 months to a year. They performed of 77,000 surgical interventions, helped birth thousands of babies, manned a burn center in Haiti, worked in the war of Syria and inoculated millions.

Americans give an average of $2974 per family per annum and that amounts to 2% of our GDP. $335 billion. 2/3 is given by individuals, 5% by corporation and 15% by foundations. The rate of giving is actually a horseshoe with the very poor and very rich giving 4% of their income and the middle around 2 1/2%.

40% of Americans are capable of giving blood but only 10% do so. It’s amazing how that 20-25% participation in these things keeps cropping up.

Veterans Day always seemed like a holiday for old farts. When you were young and invincible the flag waving was nice but I wasn’t about to go to the American Legion hall or join the VFW. Now when I visit the VA I see guys in the lobby, hunched over and beaten up and a lot of them wearing “Viet Nam Veteran” ball caps. Am I that old?

I joined the Navy in the late 60’s. Nam was ever-present and the draft was in all ahead full mode. There were guys that got a deferment for this or that but most of us joined something. It was a sense of duty because quite frankly everyone was doing it. If it was all volunteer I can’t say one way or another whether I would have joined.

That being said I really treasured my years spent with Uncle Sam as my boss. I was 22, fresh out of Georgetown and we didn’t really take career paths too seriously at that time. I didn’t know what I wanted to do in life so why not see the world.
My first ship was a prototype of a new Garcia class Destroyer Escort out of Newport,RI. About 420’ long and with a ships compliment of about 250 including 13 officers. The Navy sent me to communications school and of course when I came on board was made First Lieutenant which is about as far from electronics as you can get. Made perfect sense.

This was the deck crew and was for the most part the repository for every raw recruit and misfit in the service. You chipped paint and heaved lines. Bosun mates had a rep for hard drinking, cussing and fisticuffs. I knew the Uniformed Code of Military Justice by heart. I would go to quarters in the morning and from the look at bloodshot eyes or big shiners knew part of my day would be spent writing guys up. C’est la guerre.

As an officer you stood watch on the bridge. There were four hour increments and that is where you started to grow up. On the Mid Watch (12:00-4:00 AM) you were in command as officer of the deck. Everyone else was sleeping. There is a ceremonial tradition in the Navy where you say “I relieve you” and the off going Ltjg or whatever salutes and says “I stand relieved”. You are now in charge both under Navy regs and maritime law. Pretty heady stuff for a young turk. Light up a Marlboro Red under the Southern Cross and you were king of the world.

Well of course my big mouth and bravado had me on my second tour in Viet Nam as skipper of Swift Boat. It was a 50’ gun boat with a crew of 5. The next step in my maturation process. I was still calling the shots but now on a 24/7 basis. A little older and I hope a little wiser. You developed your leadership style that would probably carry on in years to come. For better or worse you came into your own.

I won’t bore you with war stories because that would take too much time and too many scotches. But I will tell you that if I didn’t want to get married and have kids there is a good possibility I would have stayed in. There was an exhilaration of going to sea and feeling the gentle roll of the hull as we picked up speed. It was exciting to tail a hurricane to see what the big ship could take. It was bone jarring to transit the Gulf of Siam in 20 foot seas in a 50’ beer can. And then who can beat Navy Whites on liberty. All part of the job.

When I got out, there was a petty officer who looked over my papers and very unceremoniously said,”You can go now.” No thanks. No good luck. Just see ya’. That was a little deflating. But it was the way I came in. In OCS there first thing they do is shave your head. Everyone looks alike and they don’t really care who your daddy is. A newbie chirped up and asked when he would see his wife. The chief growled back,”If the Navy wanted you to have a wife it would have issued you one.” When status and background don’t mean a thing it is good. We should all have to go through that for some period of time in our lives.

Today among contemporaries if I run into people who haven’t been in service I sense a sense of unease. They will say they did this or that and that is why they couldn’t serve. It really makes no matter to me. They don’t know what they missed. Over the years I have formed close friendships with many of those with whom I served. These are wonderful men and very decent people. I am so glad I have them.

When I see these guys in Iraq and Afghanistan I am in awe. Some of them have not put in three years but 8-10 tours over 10 long years. When I go to Normandy I look at battlefields that raged for days on end. Their three to four years were a lot different than mine. But then again today we are still a Band of Brothers and Sisters. I take my hat off to all of them.

A couple of years ago a close friend had a retreat in the mountains near Vail. He set it up so that injured warriors from Walter Read could come out and have a little time off. The airlines were more than generous. There were cabins and fishing for them and their families. He asked me to come out. I donned a Navy sweatshirt and tooled down country roads with not too many cares.

When I got out of the car I was floored. A I met these fine young men and their cute wives and kids. I was in awe. Their broken and missing limbs and wounded psyches were hard to fathom but even more their spirit. They were upbeat and even more than humble. Each man came up to me and said, “Sir, Thank you for your Service”.To each one I choked back emotion and said,” No son, thank you for yours.” Happy Veterans Day and God Bless to one and all.

As always
Ted The Great

Factoids:
1. 30 of the 43 Presidents served in the Army, 24 during time of war, two earned the rank of 5-star General (President Washington and President Eisenhower) and one earned the Medal of Honor (President Theodore Roosevelt)

2. Less 28% of Americans between the ages of 17-23 are qualified for military service, that’s only about 1-in-4. Drugs,obesity and education are the main disqualifiers

3. The Department of Defense employs about 1.8 million people on active duty. It is the single largest employer in the United States, with more employees than Exxon, Mobil, Ford, General Motors, and GE combined.

4.There were 400,000 military deaths in the Civil War, 458,00 in WWII, 58,000 in Viet Nam, 2,229 in Afghanistan and 4,488 in Iraq.

5.Non-lubricated condoms are distributed among the armed forces not just for safe sex, but as an emergency water canteen. A non-lubricated condom is part of the United States Military Standard Issue Parachute Pack Survival Kit (SRU-16) and can carry a liter of water..and that’s the truth.

Here we are on election day, ready to put x, y or z into office or continue the same. High school civics tells us that a democracy is a form of government by the people wherein we elect representatives to do our bidding. Everyone should know that.

We each have a philosophy of what government should be and the majority rules. Smart democracies don’t make it a winner take all but try to provide for input from all sources. For so many years in our country the middle was where the business got done and the lunatic fringe just swayed us a little to the right or left depending who had the reins. That was then.

I have pointed out in the past that with few exceptions no one gets all the votes. We consider a landslide to be 55-45 but that still leaves a lot of people who did not see quite eye to eye with the winner. Mandates are few and far between but we just can’t seem to wear victory nor defeat very gracefully. Up yours now substitutes for a hand shake and the whole prospect of “we will get them next time” sets a stage for contention and not compromise.

Now you will say it is politics as usual. I say it is politics getting worse. Incredibly we are wusses. It is so easy to throw up your hands and pout. My vote counts for nothing. In the last presidential election 90 MILLION people didn’t vote. Good for you. You exercised your right not to participate. Bad for us.

Unfortunately this turnout leaves the whole process in the hands of very few. An average person can’t get nominated but if they do they don’t have the wherewithal financially to get elected. There are party machines to make sure their select ones get the nod. Then the money machines further winnow the field and then they set about getting payback for their largesse and we all sit here cursing the system while doing absolutely zip about it. The entire process from nomination to election is dependent on one thing…money.

The estimates on expenditures for this election come in around for $4 billion. Most of this has gone into negative advertising. The most bizarre part is that it works. Time after time you can see a race mosaic change colors depending on the amount of mud slung. People are actually swayed. Guess that says something about all of us.

But if we stood up and demanded they talk about issues and not berate their opponent the money would have no effect. Is it just me or is this patently obvious? But as dutiful robots we take what they feed us. I actually think this relates to not only politics but life in general when we accept crummy service or bad attitudes. But that is a whole other story for a different blog.

Enter the hero or heroine. Webster tells us they are someone to be greatly admired for their fine qualities or exceptional deeds.They are willing to make sacrifices and take a risk. Hold that thought.

We have a bad habit of hero worship today whether it be in academia or rap music. We have a great desire or need to look up to people for the slightest bit of excellence. Is it because they are so good or because we are so ordinary or wanting? LeBron, Peyton (maybe not this week), Lady GaGa, Hilary Clinton, Oprah…all bathe in the adulation.

To me the closest thing to a hero is the Sergeant at Arms in Parliament in Ottawa or that female teacher in state of Washington who confronted the student gunman. But in a very practical way they were just doing their jobs. Instead of calling them out for attention I wonder if we should just simply say that’s how we should all be? Is it a sign of our complacency when we call someone out for just being ordinary. I remember after 9/11 the NYSE gave Dick Grasso, the boss, $5 million for just just getting the Big Board open after several days of being down. Wasn’t that his job?

Point being? We are at a critical point in our relatively young democracy where we have to make a decision. First is are we really going to get involved or let the monied and power brokers call the tune? Leave it there and we get what we paid for or should I say what they paid for.

Secondly and more paramount is what are you going to demand? Are we going to meekly let them sling crud and dodge any culpability or are we going to develop a fourth estate of our own? Money talks but so do the people. Look at the umbrella revolt in Hong Kong. Everybody thinks they are gong to burn out but it doesn’t quite look as if the revolt has run its course. Catalonia? Arab Spring? Why not us?

Right now I would demand action on three things. I would say I want a bill on tax reform, immigration and trade. On taxes I would throw out every loophole except for mortgages and charitable contributions..Lower rates and simplify both personal and corporate.   Any other break or deduction would have to be brought up and voted on in a specific bill not a hidden line in a defense appropriation. It would also be a roll call vote.Everything out i nthe open.  Having trouble compromising? You work 10 hours a day, seven days a week and no adjournment until it is done. Handle them all the same way.

Yes, we need heroes and heroines. We need as described above people of exceptional character who are willing to sacrifice and take a risk. But it’s not just the politicos and bureaucrats. It’s us too. That’s right. You and me. Averages Janes and Joes. If this thing is really worth it and even more so what will ensure a prosperous future for us and our kids then it is time to stand up and be counted. A good friend told me he was just too busy to worry about it. Maybe he was being blatantly honest but how incredibly sad.

As always,

Ted The Great

Factoids:

The $4 billion spent on the elections is obscene but even worse when you consider there were only ten Senate and 50 House races that were considered competitive.

In 2010 the financing of congressional elections was as follows:
11% Candidate’s personal or family funds
48% large donors..up to $2500
23% PACS Political Action Committees
13% Small donors…up to $200
5% other

change.org is a site where one can start a petition drive. It outlines every step in the process.

Both Harry Reid and John Boehner have incredible power in what gets to the floor for a vote. I would propose a website of all bills and amendments to current bills be posted on a website, tell where they are in the queue and why they are not moving forward. I would also post how long the houses are in session for that week and what they accomplished from the week before.Lastly both leaders would have to hold a press conference twice a month with unlimited questions from the press.

The 113th Congress was in session 133 days or an average of 2.6 days a week. They spend 40 weekends a year at home. They have 110 days of recess ,travel and state work. The average American works 240 days a year. Kathy and I went on vacation 9/15/14 and Congress was already out of session and they still are out. I am going to have a very tall scotch.

Freaking Out…..

If you are at all timid or concerned about life the last few weeks have been a lulu. Ebola? You get to the point where you start looking around at everything from the locker room at the gym to the server bringing you dinner while you are out. Hand shake of peace in church? Well, maybe a little longer. If I am required to get a space suit for everyday living instead I think I will just put on my bathing suit, light up a fat one and enjoy a larger than normal glass of red.

If you are approaching old fartdom the recent stock market plunges will put the fear of God in you. I am not as concerned about how much I have but rather will it last long enough for Kathy and me to sneak quietly out the door?

The shootings in Canada and Washington were really the coup de grace. Lone terrorist? I have suspected my brother Brian of that for 60 years. If you really let it get to you you would be frozen in place and not prone to any activity. It really got me pondering about this whole fear thing.

Psychologists will tell you fear is healthy and is a form of information. Your current situation, this wonderful cocoon we have built for ourselves is threatened in some way. Physically, financially or psychologically our fortress comes under attack. The first thing we do is ascertain if it is real or implied. Am I dreaming this up and overreacting or do I have to take action and fast?

It seems to me that we want to control every aspect of our life…and death. We want to make everything predictable. One of life’s uncertainties is health. We have made incredible strides in the area of medicine. We can fix anything. That is why something like Ebola is so frightening.

We spend millions and billions trying to make our products safer which indeed is a noble cause. We worry about wearing helmets and pads on bikes. We panic about batteries being ingested by infants. We have created air bags on cars and are floored when they could be weapons in their own right. We stop and frisk and pat down at airports. Pull out every last stop.

In a truly ironic twist it makes us more vulnerable. As we strive to squeeze every last threat to anything we have greatly impaired our ability to think for ourselves. We are so dependent on others to safeguard us we don’t know how to fend for ourselves. We have lost the ability to be vulnerable and deal with it.

Our education today is designed to be rewarding of the perfectionist and memorizer. We don’t encourage free thinking but rather coloring inside the lines at all cost. And some of you think the nuns were bad? I have made a ton of mistakes over my lifetime but hopefully I have learned from them and become a better person for them. I could have played it straight and been a lot more secure financially but I sure would have missed a lot of fun. I think my family feels that way too.

We all have phobias of some sort. Spiders? Heights? Failure? Those are all valid parts of the human psyche. Show me someone without fear and I will show you someone who has never taken a chance.There have been multitudes of books written on all types of fears.

Take a mom or dad today. They want to micromanage their kid’s lives down to the last minute detail. We have boys and girls in a bubble. I laugh when I think about my mom. She was always there but in the background. If I was stuck up town I learned how to use my thumb. If I was in a crazy situation somehow I figured it out. I think today you would call it street sense but we all seemed to have it back then. My mother had control but in a wonderful way I never knew it.

There are two ways to get over your fears. First is to have a loved one kiss you and make it all go away. Take that to mean we want someone in finance or government or medicine to say we have this under control. Guess what gang? That ain’t happening. Positions of responsibility have failed miserably over the past few years. Better not look there.

The other is to meet them head on and admit our deficiencies. Grapple with it and at least come to terms with it. Our world is tumbling at warp speed and we will have complexities to deal with at every turn of the wheel. For me I would rather get out in front of a problem than get run over by it.

I am afraid for our country but instead of looking for a bunker I am going to try to attack it full bore and bring it up to you. I am not afraid of terrorism or Ebola because I could just as easily get hit by a car walking down the street. I can’t live my life looking over my shoulder for some rogue gunman. Most of all I am not afraid of speaking out. When I write I am not sure how you will take it but that is not the point. It is an incredible feeling to express my thoughts openly and in some small way say I am doing something. I hope in a sense I am speaking for you. But please, don’t let me freak you out.

As always
Ted The Great

Factoids:

Fear: noun
a distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, evil, pain, etc., whether the threat is real or imagined;
Synonyms: foreboding, dismay, dread, terror, fright, panic, horror, trepidation, qualm.
Antonyms: courage, security, calm, intrepidity

Beyond claustrophobia, acrophobia etc there are:
hedonophobia…fear of having fun
prosophobia…fear of progress
Scatophobia…fear of feces
Scriptophobia…writing in public…I don’t have it
Epistemophobia…fear of knowledge
Cenophobia…fear of new things or ideas.

Fear is actually a healthy response to a fight or flight situation and is probably one of man’s(woman’s) oldest and most valuable emotive reactions. It gets your adrenalin going and in a controlled situation can be vital to your survival.

Fear can paralyze you, keep you in desperate situations, and stop you from living the life of your dreams. That should be enough motivation in and of itself to get after it and master it.

Vote Early and Often

I am sitting here contemplating my navel and staring at my mail in ballot. It is one of our most treasured freedoms but I can’t say I am doing handstands to participate. But before I put down my X for this one or that I am trying to figure out just what the hell I am.

About ten years ago I reregistered from Republican to Independent. I don’t think it was any seismic shift in beliefs or values but just one man’s protest against a flawed system. Like most of my other railings it passed without any due notice.

Now I not in favor of big government so I guess I am a Conservative. I am Pro Life with reservations and believe wholeheartedly in the principle of free enterprise. I think the institution of family should be valued and enhanced. Law and oder has to be paramount but it should not be a license to bully.

Now the wall starts to have chinks in it. I really don’t like the status quo. I thrive on innovation and upsetting apple carts. I don’t want to go back to yesterday much less the good old days. I believe our constitution is marvelous document but some facets must be con temporized. Strict constructionist? No.

Guns? I don’t mind if you have a hunting rifle or a hand gun for your house but arsenals in an increasing urban environment just don’t make any sense. It’s kind of interesting that we want the rule of law but don’t want it to apply to us vis a vis regs on the stock market, commerce or drug standards.

I know there are users of the system but I just can’t look at some poor bastard that has lost his job with three kids and say suck it up and go to work at Burger King. I don’t like Obamacare but our market system has not done very well for someone who needs immediate care. I think FDR had it right to provide for poor people or more specifically widows and orphans to have some kind of safety net but as usual we have taken a simple system and turned it into an “Entitlement.” Whether we need it or not.

For all those who feel they are owed something we conveniently overlook actuarial tables and viability. It’s incredible that we have so many MBA’s and market makers covering the land but we can’t read Uncle Sam’s balance sheet and see serious problems. Conservatives don’t want the debt but were blind to a trillion dollars worth of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Liberals say just tax the rich. It’s only fair. Just wonderful.

Now what is a guy going to do as he fills out his ballot? I will try to figure out what a particular candidate stands for. Immigration? We have got to do something about it. Taxes? Yup, we have to get right on that as soon as the new Congress is sworn in. Jobs? Who isn’t for jobs? But first I want to blitz you with ads telling you what a dirt ball my opponent is. I am sorry, that really wasn’t my ad but some obscure PAC that I have no control over who was slinging the mud. Corporations are people too if you haven’t noticed.

I know. I know. But could you possibly give me some specifics as to how you are going to handle, jobs, immigration and taxes? Well you see those are very complex questions that need a great deal of thought and deliberation my good man.We are working on a position paper that will be out shortly but you can trust me to get the job done. Right!

I guess what I am looking for is a Democrat who is to the right of left or a Republican who is to the left of right. Confused? You shouldn’t be. I smell something in the wind and it is not a foul odor. I think we as a country see this isn’t working. We are not willing to sit idly by and just wait for the next election. At least I hope not.

I was reading an oped by Mac McClarty in today’s Journal. He was Clinton’s Chief of Staff at one point. He was advocating for Obama to shake things up. He said it worked for Reagan and Clinton. I thought about this. He was calling for injecting new ideas and invigorating the staff. As I thought more about this my thoughts wandered toward our Congress.

The President is elected at most for eight years. My current Congresswoman is going for her tenth reelection. I have not received a piece of material as to where she stands on anything. She is in a “safe” district and couldn’t care less. She is knee deep in the Beltway culture and somehow we consider this to be a good thing…for our state. What about the country? To keep electing the same old hacks over and over is a sin. We are all guilty. Which way do you think I am voting on this one? Not because she is left or right but because we have to shake up the system.

We have had failures at the FBI, CDC, IRS to name a few. These are not failings of underlings but the higher ups. To say they are incompetent is to be kind. When you have a good old boy or girl Congress it sends a message. When the bureaucracy is so convoluted that it takes a long time elected official to understand it we have a serious problem. Mediocracy that gets rewarded breeds more mediocrity. Now, now TTG you don’t understand. Really? I think it is up in flashing lights.

Man, do we need new ideas and fresh faces. They can’t possible be any worse than what we have got. Kids we have to get off our butts and start asserting ourselves. When you look at the ballot don’t just see donkeys or elephants. They both smell. See who is going to attack problems and not just exacerbate a ridiculous situation. I am voting early. I wish I could vote often.

As always
Ted The Great

Factoids:

Political scientists say high turnout is generally seen as evidence of the legitimacy of the current system. That is kind of interesting because you would think if you didn’t like the system you would turn out in force to change it. Disgust or frustration seems to be a strong deterrent.

In 2012 voter turnout in the US was 57.5 % Of the eligible voters 126 million cast their ballots and 93 million didn’t. What that further shows is that approximately 28% of the eligibles elected our president.

The current Rothenberg Report lists 386 of 435 seats in the House to be safe. Of the remaining 49 only 19 are considered to be tossups where either side could win.

Reps Dingel and Conyers have been in Congress for 58 and 49 years respectively. Both are from Michigan. Hmmm. There are 11 others who have been there for 37 years or more. The average age of the House is 57 and the Senate 63.

I have been trying to figure out how to close this thing. By the time we get home tomorrow we will have travelled some 13,000 miles visited over 16 cities and places and met innumerable interesting and wonderful people. Our version of the Great Race. Good thing they didn’t have the cameras on in the rental car for various map readings in Tuscany. Actually it was rather humorous as we circumnavigated a couple of roundabouts several times until we got the right exit point.

Let’s start with countries first. Denmark, Finland, Estonia and Holland were beyond charming. Russia was predictable if not disappointing. Lithuania and Italy were worrisome in their own way. Germany and the UK seemed open for business. Not only each city but their respective countries had their particular quirks and personality traits. It is odd but we have had very little discussion about politics here. It does not seem to be the center point of conversations as it is in the States.

Europeans as a whole stick to themselves and are not overly friendly unless approached. Take the Brits. They appear a tad cold and detached but when you engage them they are both upbeat and quite humorous. Their way of phrasing things causes one to pay attention carefully so as not to offend by saying “What?” several times in a row.And we supposedly speak the same language. The saddest and most forlorn had to be in Russia. The most laid back were the Finns. You felt like you were in Maine.

The Continent as a whole has the same problems and challenges that affect us. Their postal services are somewhat quaint but fast becoming irrelevant due to our cyber world. The pressing problem everywhere is the Aging Generation. People are living a lot longer but their care is becoming more complex and that in turn is putting pressure on the young.Retirement funds of all sorts are unfortunately underfunded.

Russia, Italy, Lithuania and Estonia are seeing populations contract and it is not good. The young people are fleeing in droves for opportunities elsewhere. Those bright lights appear to be in Germany and the UK and you can see it reflective by both the young people on the streets and the soaring real estate prices here in London. With less of a working population to tax the lesser states are forced to curtail services or raise taxes even further. Either way the situation is borderline untenable. Everyone understands that they have to lengthen the retirement age but no one is willing to broach the issue.Sound familiar?

Whether in the more socialistic countries or traditional states the taxes are high…for everyone. They probably range from a low of 35-40% for lesser incomes to 65% on the high end. Everyone pays. Especially in places like Holland and Denmark they really don’t complain because they feel they are getting a lot for their buck and they probably do with free healthcare and education through college.

In the latter they seem to be happy with their lot in life and don’t slack off but don’t become so rabid about their careers that they forsake quality of life. Many of these countries are minimalistic in their life styles. Homes are not chock a block with furnishings and are usually small and functional. I am sure there are manses and estates in the countryside but there is not a large presence in the cities. Square footage is expensive and they make every one of those square meters work.

Most of all these people like to eat….big time. In the morning there are sweet things of all sorts to choose from….almost to the point of distraction. There are croissants and pastries of every description and taste with a cappuccino or expresso to take away.
Lunch features paninis etc and snacks follow mid afternoon. Dinner doesn’t start any time before 7:30 and it goes on for 2-3 hours. That’s not non stop eating but a very leisurely pace between courses. People just linger as meals are an event and not merely a chore to be done with. There is not huge amounts of drinking either. In 30 days we only saw one well inebriated chap and he was a visitor.

I come away from all of this without a true sense that I would move here or there. We have a wonderful country and most definitely more than most. We should be proud but not haughty. As it relates to commerce and national success it is survival of the fittest here. I am not quite sure how the EU will survive if the top two or three have to keep footing the bill for the weaker allies? You get a good or bad feeling coming into the country by the airport and its major cities. Germany and UK are exemplary. Not always the rest. You ask yourself would you invest here or there and the answer is usually quite evident.

As with all the cities I have been to, the nations have a personality of their own. When you see all the countries in relative proximity to one another you can’t help but think of our United States. Some are dynamic and creative and others live off their more successful kin and not really contributing anything to the process. Some assemblies are thoughtful and demanding while others are politicians in the truest sense of the word. More talk than action.

We have met incredible people from a plethora of nations and a true diversity of occupations. Fellow passengers, passersby, waiters and bartenders. Hotel clerks, ship board stewards and maids. Talk about interaction. Incredibly there was a minute percentage of rude or obnoxious denizens of our planet. I’d have to think hard to recall them.

People are truly like you and me. They’re trying to make their way on this big blue marble.There are immigrants banging on the door here as well as America. Funny thing how people just want a better life and that is a universal concept. How we can accommodate all of them is our mutual challenge but an exciting one. There are a lot of very smart and talented citizens of the planet Earth.We just have to figure out how use these abilities to everyone’s advantage

As always and Ciao Bella for the last time this trip.
Ted The Great

Factoids:
Too many to figure our for this tired body and brain.
Will close with one thought projected by graffiti on a wall in Florence:
“If it is tourist season,why can’t we shoot them?” I hope not.

Posted from Siena,Italy

Well the trek continues as we eventually are wending our way home. Last seen in Amsterdam the dynamic duo were amazed by the confluence of history and modernity. That city was so full of life and verve. There are some 300,000 bikes for a city of 500,000. They ride them everywhere and in ways they are more dangerous to a pedestrian than cars or busses.

It was not unusual to see a mum or dad riding two or three kids on the velocipede. All without helmets which seem to be for wusses only.They have contrived a wooden bucket of sorts on the front of the bike and of course have seats to the rear. We saw one chap riding four in the front and two in the back. All smiling and somewhat oblivious to danger which is as it should be.

All the while these Dutch have practiced the fine art of engineering and hydrology to a whole new level of expertise. The city was built on concentric circles that have grown throughout the centuries. Starting as a moat at one time they have grown into a fascinating system of canals that tie the city together with serendipity as well as functionality. Yet all the time you get the sense that these are with it people who have fashioned a liberal lifestyle not from hedonism but because they have accepted so many oppressed and battered souls throughout history. Truly one of our favorites.

The trip from Holland to Italy took us through several time warps known as Munich and Genoa. The German hub like its sister, Frankfurt takes air travel and transfer through its paces with ease. There are Lufthansa planes as far as the eye can see. They use remote landing sites and a fleet of busses to speed people on their way. Don’t be late or you don’t get on. The concourses are wide and modern with the blinds and lighting systems geared to synchronize with departure. A short while before the boarding process the fluorescents pop on and the rising curtain of a colorful transparency of imprint of a golf fairway or the like reveal your aircraft on the tarmac. Quite a demonstration of German ingenuity.

Fast forward to Genoa and Chistoforo’s birthplace and behold a step back in time in more ways than one. You immediately understand why the citizens state with a shrug of the shoulders,”That’s Italy.” As we disembarked it was a short walk to the terminal and you climbed stairs to a drab array of carousels. There was only one plane but a lot of capacity. The cart machine was inoperable and you got the feeling they had to wake up the boys to get the luggage off the plane. Customs was not even a cursory look at our passports but a wave through that was equal parts disinterest and disdain.

As I noted last week the Baltics seem to want to work hard to live. The Italianos seem to want to live because there is nothing better to do. They are a charming people and you get a little emotive trying to give your best Bonjourno or Ciao. It’s just fun. The beaches are littered with sunbathers. Speedos and bikinis abound but that’s a problem. Overweight is in season in many parts.…literally Topless is not all it is cracked up to be but hey, who’s looking?

A ride on the Italian Railway System is a study in opposites. You must always change trains and you go from a sleek bullet to an ancient carriage in just a matter of miles. From shiny steel to a graffiti wielder’s canvas. What track is the train coming in on? You get another shrug. It’s whacky but a ton of myrth and merriment.

We are now in Florence. It is probably the most manageable city you can conjure up with pedestrian walks everywhere. It was the birthplace of the Renaissance and the plazas and Duomos reek of antiquity in a wonderful way.Yesterday afternoon we met David face to face and he was beyond incredible. He stands about 17’ tall and weighs 5-6 tons for you who are not in the cognoscenti. The feat of Michelangelo grows in renown when you find out he did the sculpture with no models and no helpers.

He fashioned the masterpiece in a covered courtyard over a two year period. When he revealed it to the Medicis they undertook a journey that was both dramatic and comical if you ever have watched Italians in action. They had to get this behemoth some 5-6 blocks to the town hall. Now just picture the pedestal mounted on a cart of sorts and supported by wooden wheels. They moved it inches at a time and took several weeks. Michaeli stayed with it the whole way sleeping right beside it every night. Everyone brought food and drink….and of course provided plenty of advice on how to do it. Can you just see them talking rapidly and gesticulating every which way for several weeks? Fantastico!
Well I have to go for now. Church bells are ringing out the call to afternoon vino and we are getting ready for dinner. For that we have to cross the Ponte Vecchio. No easy feat for we have to wend our way along a couple of via whatevers. Instead of bikes these people take to motorcycles and scooters of every sort. We figure it is some sort of arcade game where they try to mow down as many pedestrians as possible. The assassins are not just the suave senors but the cutest little seniorae fatales who have murder not lust in their hearts. And they would just as soon cut yours out. Mama mia!

Ciao bela and multa bene.

As always
Ted the Great

Factoids:
We attended Mass in the Duomo today because mea culpa we have been MIA in the church department. The priest, Francis Fox was from Morris Plains NJ right next door to Morristown where Kathy grew up. He knew our good friends and Reverends Paddy O’Donovan and Jack Carroll very well.

The Medicis ruled Florence for over three hundred years from the mid 1400’s to the mid 1700’s. A combination of totalitarian but benevolent rule.They finally went down in flames due to the harshness of Cosmo Medici. So much for term limits.

There are 3000 house boats of every description on the canals of Amsterdam. They cost a fortune even if in disrepair because they have not issued any new slip permits for years. The Dutch were always good traders.

The Dutch play a big part in the history of our part of the world. Think of the Dutch West Indies Company. Peter Minuit bought the Isle of Manhattan for about $29 worth of trinkets and beads. He then sold it all to Donald Trump for billions after promising hair spray for life.

Posted from Amsterdam,Holland

We are about to leave our floating hotel. One of the best parts of cruising is you only have to unpack your bags once. The worst part? Trying to keep your waistline intact in the midst of a non stop onslaught of great food. Get your butt to the gym, TTG.
While I pound away on the treadmill or elliptical machine I have a choice of three programs on the TV: BBC,FOX or MSNBC. In the latter two I get to see Hannity or Rachel Maddow. ????? I do flip back and forth from these outer limits of the Twilight Zone and my thoughts turn to concepts such as life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Success. Common Good. Now there are a lot of calories to be burned trying to figure those out.

We have been a lot of places and met a lot of people.You try to glean what is good and what is bad. You look to see if somewhere hidden is a person who has figured this out. I hearken to Finland, Estonia or even Lithuania to set the scene. These people live simply. As a matter of fact they seem to work to live rather than the contrary. Life is something to be enjoyed and not endured. This does not preclude the denizens of big cities but you do have to make your own way and not get caught up in the flow.

What is success? To me it is making the best use of your talents. Living up to your potential. That has to include making money of some sort but the amount seems commensurate with what’s important in life. If things mean a lot to you by all means make as much do,re,mi as you can. On the other hand being a hermit and eating locusts went out of style a long time ago. You do have to earn a living and here living off the state is proof it has its consequences.

For me it is saying at the end of the day I done good. Or at least more good than bad. I hope I related to people. I didn’t shun responsibility if it was warranted. I hope I made someone’s life a little better by maybe just recognizing them.If I saw I injustice I at least tried to call it out. If I witnessed a wrong at least I said STOP and did not look the other way. I tried to be fair in my judgments but should also realize I have no right to judge. My way is not the highway. Don’t get it right all the time but I am trying.

Most of all it comes down to living honestly. I think in terms of us as a country. We have got to realize that we can’t be all things to all people but democracy says that everyone should have a say. It is interesting when we say so and so won by a landslide garnering 55% of the vote. Hello! There were 45% that didn’t like the winner. But the majority of the vote was just a little right or left of center and not on the radical fringes.

Honestly speaking we have to be mobile. We have seen over here whole populations move to find food and shelter. In the US there are jobs that are wanting but we don’t want to pull up to leave home. That may be true but my grandmother and her sister left home at 14 and 16 respectively to come to America from Ireland.Get the picture?

Honestly speaking we are not all going to make it to the top or at least not in our vernacular. Big houses and bank accounts don’t always mean happiness. There are incredibly gifted people who work with their hands. There is nothing wrong with being ordinary. We seem to have set this goal for everyone to be financially self sufficient by the age of 40. It doesn’t always work this way.We all have a place. Mark Twain said we are all perfect. Just at different things.

Honestly speaking Washington doesn’t work. After seeing the Baltic States you realize how diverse a country of our size is. We started out with 13 colonies within a stone’s throw of DC. We are now 52 and span thousands of miles. We all have different priorities and we have proven we can’t figure that out. One size does not fit all. State and regional governments have to step forward and take care of themselves. On a purely philosophical side we can’t expect the federal government and eventually the state to do everything for us.

Honestly speaking we are the world’s largest superpower. Just like the Yankees or the current NCAA winner everyone wants to bump us off our pedestal. We should be proud of who we are but not haughty. We should not have to put out every fire. We should not have to solve every problem. Diplomacy and arm twisting seem a lot better than swagger every time.

Most of all honestly speaking we have to embrace change. As I study the Renaissance it was a celebration of man’s spirit. A combination of ingenuity and creativity created a whole new era. We are that time line on steroids. The world is moving so fast it would be easy to just say let’s sit this one out. As we travel the interconnectivity of the world is startling. Ports and airfields with shipping and airline companies you have never heard of. The trick is to make it work for us and not be sucked in by the monster.

Most of all the world needs visionaries who are leaders. Corporations and universities should be the breeding grounds but the intense spotlight and meager rewards of public life rob us of some very dynamic minds. We are left with party hacks and lifetime politicians. Just like career bureaucrats they know how to work the system. We wind up losing.

Well, I have now lost 10  pounds with all this thinking while pedaling. (I wish) I know it is a little far afield but I feel like I want to reinvent TTG for the 439th time. Not throwing out all the old pieces but giving them some help with fresh ideas and a new perspective or coat of paint as it were. If you are happy with things as they are I applaud you. Me? The next fun and challenging thing is right around the corner. Gotta look for it.Going my way?

As always,
Ted The Great.

Factoids:
In Sweden the bus driver has to blow into a receptacle to make sure he hasn’t been drinking or doing drugs before the coach will start.

Contrary to current lore the Vikings did not have horns on their helmets. This would have been far too cumbersome in battle. This horn business was dreamed up one time by some idiot Minnesota fan. Actually he was pretty smart because he has made a lot of money. Remember that change and creativity thing.

In Finland it is considered very rude to be late. Considering the normal weather pattern if you are tardy your friend has to freeze their you know what off waiting for you.

We have drunk vodka shots in a bar made completely of ice in Stockholm. We had some local moonshine with an RAF pilot in Lithuania. We were sung to by a choir of old people who survived the gulag in Siberia for 20 years after being ripped from their parents at the age of anywhere from three to five. Life is good. Live it.

Salutations  from  St. Petersburg ,Russia. It is the land of Peter the Great and Catherine the Great so by sheer osmosis it feels very much like home to Ted The Great. There is more gold leaf in the palaces than there is in Fort Knox. It is fascinating that both here and in Copenhagen a palace can be nothing more than a big building downtown.Just something some duke or duchess just had to have. In fact yesterday we passed the biggest of them all, KGB headquarters where I am sure the court is replete with minstrels and clowns including the Major Domo. (I better wait until we are out of Russian waters to post)

As a rule you hear very little of Putin. The locals probably still worry about who is listening. The guides we have had are very pleasant but conspicuously restrained when it comes to talking about anything other than the script. By contrast in Estonia the two young people were quite engaging and downright proud. The young girl who took us on a cross country bike trip relished the fact she had participated in the human chain in the late eighties. She said thousands held hands over many hundreds of miles and won their independence without any violence or their countrymen and women being killed. There is something exciting about that freedom thing.

When you study the history of the region you pick up a lot more of the subtleties or maybe I was just asleep during those lectures too many moons ago. War is a part of the culture not only for Russia but also Denmark, Norway, Germany and one of the biggest thugs later in the millennium was good old Sweden. I thought they just skied and knit sweaters there. There are fortresses and turrets of old in every hamlet and quiet harbor. The paintings depict this battle or that. Countries are played like pawns on a regional chess board. Finland Knight four to Russia Castle five.

The intrigue is that over thousands of years, countries and shires were formed by tribes migrating from Mongolia et al. Some stayed in one spot and others moved on. The language took hold in one place and then was adapted in another. All was well until one particular tribe wanted to grow and needed more space. What else would one do but send over some Goths or Vikings or whatever and rape and pillage all in the name of the Motherland? And all this has continued relatively unabated for millennia .

Russians have borne a lot of the brunt. They have been laid siege by the French under Napoleon and the Germans under Hitler even they thought they had non aggression pacts with each. The abhorrence of Mein Feuhr is pretty evident in any presentation. Here in St Petersburg they were bombarded for 900 days straight during WWII. The various churches, museums and government offices were numbered one through ten on the Luftwaffe hit parade. The Hermitage was number nine.

I questioned why Russians always look so dour, sad or even angry? They say it is cultural but I think the right term might be environmental. Since the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 to the dissolution of the USSR in 1991 the state was in control of everything from media to your home life. You were afraid to say anything of a personal nature for fear you would be reported, questioned and very possibly sent to Siberia.These were not idle threats. If you thought Lenin and Trotsky were bad you would not believe the cruelty and savagery of Joe Stalin’s boys. It is always ironic for me to see Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin yucking it up in Yalta as they divvied up the spoils of war.

Imagine your country has been blown apart by warring factions over many centuries. The weather is bad and only gets worse with mind numbing cold and snow in the winter. I think I would be a bit paranoid about both my allies and my enemies and from the weather point of view wondering why I would want to live here? Look at the tenor of the writings of Dostoyevsky or the music of Tchaikovsky. They reflect the times and you can hear it. I did ask one guide what the difference was between Pre 1991 and after? She said the jury was still out. There was freedom to make as much money as you want but at the same time there was risk. There were positive things in the security of the state. Very interesting.

As for our view of the metropolis Kathy and I found it depressing in many ways. The city has a grimy facade that is rusted and crumbling in many spots. Most of the buildings are monochromatic grey and have the feeling of the old Cabrini Greens or lower East Side projects. Contrast that with the Hermitage and Winter Castle with over a thousand rooms you really wonder if things have just been replaced by a new aristocracy. The truly odd part is that while BMW’s, Range Rovers, Audis and Mercedes are in ample supply, the inhabitants don’t seem particularly well dressed. Maybe it is all part of the enigma that is Russia today. .

Overall you get the impression that once again the country is spending its resources on building up industry and by extension its military. Corruption is still rampant which is on display for a stadium being built for the World Soccer Cup. It was started in 2004 and scheduled for completion in 2007. It still looks only halfway finished and is the laughing stock of the denizens for its snail’s pace and the lining of several bureaucrats’ pockets.

There is no doubt the Palaces, gardens, fountains and Hermitage are spectacular. You hear about Sotheby’s auctioning off a Picasso for umpteen zillion and yet in the above there is a room with twelve of them. Cezanne, Monet, Rembrandt ? How many do you want? But beneath the surface as with any good patina it’s where the rubber meets the road. You have to look at the bones of the structure. From this man’s vantage point it feels old and tired. That’s it for now.

As always
Ted The Great.

Factoids:
Josef Stalin took power in the twenties right through to his death in 1993. It is estimated that during his rule from executions, starvation and war dead the number rises to almost 43 million lives lost.

There is a hotel in St Petersburg where Hitler planned to have his party celebrating the conquest of Russia. He had invitations printed with both the time and the place.

St Petersburg is actually a series of islands that hold some 5 million people. During the war there were 1500,000 shells lobbed at it during the siege. They removed all the paintings, furniture and chandeliers from museums and palaces and transported  them inland. Hitler’s troops tried to destroy any vestige of the Russian culture.

It is interesting to note that a large portion of the art we viewed here and around Europe has a religious theme. Huge cathedrals have been built and everything from tapestries to paintings to sculptures reflect interpretations of the bible. Yet not many people go to church anymore. Hmm.