Sometimes it takes Jimmy Buffett to get things done

SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - Writing inspiration for me comes from lots of different places. And for most of my adult life, I have been what pros in the writing bizz call a 'facile' writer.

The short definition is, if I want to write, I generally just starting banging away on the keyboard.

Just like this.

Generally.

But this fall, the writing hasn't been coming just like this much of the time.  In fact, for the last two months, I thought I was afflicted by the dreaded writer's block, a syndrome most professional writers will tell you is, well, total crap. They also are the same writers who have never faced it.

Even though for months I have been outraged at the lunacy of ideologues like Glenn Beck, the lack of caring (and arrogance) of the people entrusted with running the two public university systems in California, and the seeming inability of Americans to have rational discourse, writing about these issues (and corollary matters) has seemed, well, sooooo daunting.

Daunting and frankly just plain old depressing.

Enter Jimmy Buffett.


Jimmy Buffett on stage

It wasn't actually Jimmy Buffett himself who got mixed up in my writing, it was a book by Buffett, A Salty Piece of Land,  mailed to me by my nephew Tony Fitzgerald.

Tony had read the book, and while he admitted the prose wasn't exactly 'Homer,' he said it had certain style to it and that he thought I would enjoy it.

If it had been Homer, I doubt it would have been as effective.

The tale is about a cowboy/sailor from Wyoming who ends up in the tropics tending to the rebuilding of a lighthouse. That's about all I'll reveal today, because I am about halfway through reading the book and suspect that I will be recommending it later on in a longer review.

But even if I didn't read another page, A Salty Piece of Land, has helped me crack the formation of a writer's block.

While reading about the odyssey of Tully Mars (the main character), I suddenly envisioned myself writing about (and living in) sub-tropical Mexico - the very place Admiral Fox and I will be as soon as the fall semester at the university ends. And the thought of that writing - as opposed to spilling words about the idiocies of a Glenn Beck, for example - made my fingers positively twitch to get to a keyboard.

Is the writer's block gone? Will I never write again about loons like Glenn Beck or the trustees of the California State University system?

No to the first, and probably no to the second, too.

But thanks to Jimmy Buffett and Tully Mars, I think I understand what was blocking the words, and keeping the blood pressure up.

Get the lighthouse back on line Tully, please. I have things to write.


A Salty Piece of Land

Watching the swine flu circus from Mexico

ARROYO SECO, Jalisco, Mexico - The day the story broke about the outbreak of swine flu in Mexico City, news media immediately began using the word 'pandemic.'

It is a powerful word, laden with frightening implications, especially as it is usually pronounced in television broadcasts with the same gravity as saying 'nuclear war.' In this case, certainly four days ago, it was also a wild overstatement. I trust it is still an overstatement as you read this. But it did keep people glued to television sets - and advertisers smiling.

Here on the west coast of Mexico, in the very southern portion of the subtropical state of Jalisco, children are out of school and playing in the streets (part of the nationwide alert and school closures). People who have coughs are seeking doctors, when they might not have otherwise. Pigs are eyed somewhat suspiciously, though not avoided. But because there are very few televisions in the village, life simply continues without CNN's Wolf Blitzer's bulletins reporting, well, not that much.


I'm innocent, I tell you! I'm innocent!

This is not to diminish the genuine concerns people have about their health, and the health of their families and friends. But the hammering away on 24-hour news channels by hyperventilating newscasters (with non-news flu updates) isn't helping.

Washing your hands more often might, especially after handling money.

The swine flu presents a health threat, certainly. So do a plethora of other communicable diseases all over the globe, currently dormant. Read Richard Preston's book The Hot Zone for a terrifying look at how close the world came to have a major outbreak of ebola nearly 30 years ago. (You can watch the movie based on his book titled Outbreak, though the film is not as compelling.)

The Hot Zone excerpt

But there is another threat to be aware of in all this, the threat posed by fearful people. How many cases of swine flu will it take before some zealots carrying highpowered rifles on the U.S. Mexico border decide that anyone trying to cross in the U.S. poses a clear and present danger to them - and their families?

In Sacramento, Calif., three school-aged children have been diagnosed with the flu, though their cases appear to be, well, simply a flu and not in any way life threatening. But there is likely a lot of free-floating anxiety around St. Mel's school and it's hard to say whether the first child diagnosed will become a pariah to his classmates when he recovers and school reopens.

Let's hope not.

Let's also hope that this swine flu burns itself out quickly - as many viruses do - and that we don't have hear the word pandemic mispronounced again for a long time.

Now please go wash you hands. Who knows who might have been using your computer keyboard?

Crash with a wild pig nets motorcyclist $8.6 million

MONTEREY, Calif., USA - This story is one of those that late night comedians will likely have some fun with, for some time.

Wild pig crash

But it isn't really funny, for any of the injured parties. (The motorcyclist, the wild pig and the taxpayers of the State of California.)

I have a great deal of sympathy for the motorcyclist who was hurt in the crash. He is in a wheelchair and is unlikely to walk again.

But how the state of California came to be found responsible for the accident is beyond me.


Wild pig, acting pretty tame

It's true, state highway officials were (and are) aware that wild pigs - as well as other creatures like humans, pheasants, rabbits, raccoons, snakes and the occasional coastal deer - sometimes wander across that stretch of state Highway 1.

They still do. (The animals, not the state officials, though they are free to do so...)

But what exactly should state officials do to ensure the safety of people riding motorcycles at night along dark stretches of rural highways? Close highways after dark? Shepherd all wild animals to special animal crossings with guards wearing bright yellow uniforms to hold up traffic?

A few years ago, a good friend of mine had to swerve to miss a deer on a highway in Northern California. In the process of dumping his bike on the road, he racked his ankle sufficiently to put him in a wheelchair for months, then more months on crutches and finally some physical therapy. He also has several metal pins holding his ankle together.

He didn't file a lawsuit against the deer - or the state of California for not issuing enough hunting licenses to keep those dangerous does off the highways. He spent a lot of time recovering, paid his medical bills (with the limited assistance of his insurance company) and rode on, making him luckier than the motorcyclist who hit the wild pig.

Perhaps I need to read the transcripts of the trial to see how the jury came to its conclusion in awarding the $8.6 million in this cyclist vs. pig case.

Might make fascinating - and/or disturbing - reading.

NY Times puts Mexico's troubles into perspective

Just a few days ago, I wrote about CSU, Sacramento and UC Davis telling students to avoid Mexico for spring break, out of fear that the violence in some border towns somehow threatened their vacations in places a thousand miles south of the border.

A New York Times article published Monday, puts much of hysteria about Mexico and safety into perspective.

I won't repeat it here, but it well worth reading to get some balance to the hyperbole being pumped out by media outlets - and apparently even California universities who should know better.

Here is the link:

NY Times on Mexico

Puzzling out how dangerous Mexico travel might be

SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - I wondered how long it would be before fears about safety in Mexico would reach Central California.

Sacramento is almost always somewhat behind the curve on this stuff.

But in response to some U.S. State Department travel advisories about dangers in border towns, CSU Sacramento and UC Davis have jumped on the fear bandwagon, urging students to skip spring break in Mexico because of the situation in some of the border towns.

The border towns.

One more time?

The border towns.


Downtown Nogales border fence

Now I don't mean to suggest that these students - or me either - should go hang out on a street corner in Ciudad Juarez or Nogales, or even Tijuana. Maybe especially Tijuana.

I would also advise these same students to stay out of parts of Oakland, Calif. at any time of day, thank you very much. Ditto for New York, Boston, Washington D.C. and most other U.S. metropolitan cities, all with their own safety issues - at least at certain times of the night.

But, please! Mexico is a huge nation, full of interesting places to visit. Many safe places, I might add. I've been to many and expect to go to many more.

In the meantime, in addition to Sacramento-area colleges urging students to avoid heading south, one area church was highlighted in a Sacramento Bee article published today. Its leaders are pulling the plug on a 13-year-old help project for a Mexican city in which about 700 young people - young people who annually have helped build houses and do various good-will projects in Guadalupe Victoria, Mexico. Instead, a contingent will travel to Fresno to help the needy there.

Good for them for donating their spring break time to do good works.

But, as they say in Mexico: Cuidado! (Watch out!)

There are parts of Fresno that might have their own drug cartels and wars going on.


Downtown Fresno by day

The song, 'What About Now?' and retirement

SACRAMENTO, Calif. - The most frequently asked question (FAQ) about our impending retirement (19 days from today) is "How did you know it was time?"

Indeed...

Well, some people go to retirement planners - but I have never been that organized.

But what I did do about two years ago was create a file (on the computer and on paper) which we named Project Escape Velocity. PEV (not the best acronym, but what-the-hell...) consisted of retirement benefits projections, records of long term (and short term) debts, and potential post-university income.

Not being a graph or spreadsheet guy, I used my calculator every few months and looked at the debts, watched the potential retirement income go up, landed a few more writing contracts and finally in March we fed all the data into an analysis system I learned when I was a newspaper editor called SWAG

Sophisticated-Wild-Ass-Guess.

SWAG said: You have escape velocity.


Retirement liftoff

But besides all the $$$$ issues, there's lot of questions about leaving careers, even though we will be doing guest cameo teaching every fall here.

Which brings us to the headline: What About Now?

I've always been looking at the horizon and wondering what's beyond it. In 1970, I packed up a VW van and headed west from upstate New York. I would have done so on a motorcycle, but with a wife, a three-month-old baby and a cat, balancing would have been a helluva trick. I guess I could have considered a sidecar, but that would have seemed so, well, dorky.

And, of course, all the boats! I had thought when we sailed off to Mexico on Sabbatical in 2002 we were very close to escape velocity. But close is just that.

So in addition to making a file Project Escape Velocity, I started collecting music, much of which I put together on a CD for my amigos Ric Brown and Rosemary Papa, who, like us, are escaping Sacramento and headed for great new opportunities. The CD is called "Catch Us If You Can," with the first song an updated version of the Dave Clark Five song by the same name from the 60s.

But another tune that has been ringing through my brain for weeks (on and off, though mostly on) is by Lonestar called "What About Now?"


Lonestar - country singers without cowboy hats

The pulsing music of that song is almost enough to give you escape velocity:

What About Now

The sign in the window said for sale or trade
On the last remaining dinosaur Detroit made
Seven hundred dollars was a heck of a deal
For a four hundred horsepower jukebox on wheels

And that road rolls out like a welcome mat
I don't know where it goes but it beats where we're at
We always said someday, somehow
We were gonna get away, gonna blow this town

What about now, how 'bout tonight
Baby for once let's don't think twice
Let's take that spin that never ends
That we've been talking about
What about now, why should we wait
We can chase these dreams down the interstate
And be long gone 'fore the world moves on and makes another round
What about now

So, with the rockets roaring in the the background and the music on the CD, it's 19 days to retirement and Mexico. Fittingly, on our first day of official retirement, we will be flying to Puerto Vallarta where I hope by lunchtime to be toasting el futuro at the Cafe Tacuba with its owner Victor who serves tequila shots with every order he serves.

Followed by a siesta, of course.