Shoot-out right now at Temple University over Drug Operation

The hummingbird came by dozens of times but my camera is too slow to get a picture.

Ya know what? It's worth buying a newer one.

Do you think these are real?

I graduated from Temple University in my early 20s. Excellent school.

Let's see what our live cameras say about the latest gun and drug battle.

My 18 readers from all over the country are waiting for my report.







Here's anudder update. Click here.

Good reporting on the last link.

Here in Willow Grove it's thundering and lightening.

My living room was a terrible mess and I asked Scott to help me fix it. I bought these gorgeous greeting cards at B & N, which he returned to their original boxes.

I'd like to write a true story tonight called MY DAY WITH EILEEN.

Always more food at Gram's, right Sarah?

 Up Byberry Road I bounced along - what great foods would I find there? The road was milled. When Dan was little, he loved seeing the construction men working, my little 43-yo boy.

Sarah taught again at Arcadia, this time from 9 until 4 pm. Quite exhausting and she still has jetlag from being in the UK.

They met in a classroom, about 25 students. Sarah gave them writing exercises - what's the best and the worst thing that's ever happened to you. 

The worst thing that ever happened to Sarah was getting lost in China. Ticket selling windows, huge line, tremendous anxiety waiting in a huge line. Then they got on a bus where Sarah's intellectual acumen figured out what the characters meant.  Higher and lower pitches mean different things.

 The birthday girl has all her marbles at age 97.

 We had salmon, salad, cauliflower, and dessert.

Blackberry swirl ice cream by Turkey Hill and tiny cloud mounds called "mochi."

I am stuffed. Scott came over to visit.

Sarah reads from her book GRAVITY at Arcadia College

Having just returned from the UK, Sarah drinks sweetened tea.

The room was filled and all were impressed by the ornate Grey Towers.

She arrived at the behest of Josh Izzard, who not only organized the program but has many other programs in place.

He's an academic.

I arrived in style via Uber.

An assortment of delicious appetizers were served.

I ate as if I were Gretel starving in a forest.

Sarah shared the stage with PE Garcia, a most unusual poet.

He's an editor for Rumpus magazine.

He's also written for Prairie Schooner.

I've never gotten my poetry into either lit journal.

Other photos please:

Winding staircase at Arcadia.

Schmoozing afterward. We were urged to take the food home with us.

I had Sarah's black coffee waiting for her when she woke up.

Last night she ordered Chinese food thru UBER EATS and we ate it in the morning.

Today she's back at Arcadia to teach Fiction Writers. She starts them off with some exercises.

Here's one of my favorite fiction stories that was published in Quail Bell Review. It's called MY JENNY. 

Goodbye Dr Ray - Welcome home Sarah Lynn - Alzheimer's Poem "The Room"

Obit of Dr Ray Schweibert courtesy of Central Jersey Obits.

RAYMOND H. SCHWEIBERT, JR., M.D. – On April 22, Dr. Raymond H. Schweibert Jr. died peacefully in Bucks County, Pa. after a prolonged illness. He was 87.

Dr. Schweibert is survived by his beloved wife of 42 years, Eleanor; his son Raymond C. and daughter Donna M.; his sister Patricia (William) Calhoun; grandchildren Sam Dudick, Joseph Riker and Marli Dudick; and several nieces and nephews.Dr. Schweibert grew up in Passaic County, N.J., and graduated from Clifton High School. He received his bachelor's degree from Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pa. and his medical doctorate from Temple University in Philadelphia, Pa. He is predeceased by his first wife and mother of their two children, Marie J. Mignogna, M.D., whom he met in medical school. He is also predeceased by his parents Raymond H. and Mary (nee DiChristofaro) Schweibert. Dr. Schweibert was highly respected physician for more than 50 years before retiring.

After 12 years in family medicine, Dr. Schweibert entered a residency for child psychiatry at Albert Einstein Healthcare Network, followed by a fellowship at Hahnemann University Hospital. He practiced as a board-certified child psychiatrist, largely in the Princeton and Trenton areas, for more than 40 years. Dr. Schweibert was an avid reader, a history aficionado, and an outdoorsman whose interests included sailing, skiing, tennis, hiking and fishing. He was a charter member of the Brant Beach Yacht Club on Long Beach Island, and served as a lifeguard on LBI for several summers in his younger years.

During the late 1970s and early '80s he, his son and daughter made several week-long hiking treks on the Long Trail in Vermont. His love for music ranged from opera to contemporary, and he saw singer/songwriter Randy Newman in concert several times with his son. Dr. Schweibert penned two memoirs of his historic travels, the first entitled “In Nimitz's Wake” that followed a 1998 trip he took to Guadalcanal, and served as a tribute to U.S. Navy Admiral Chester Nimitz, the Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet during World War II. The second he called “Cuba: A Personal Odyssey” that chronicled a July 2000 group trip he took to Havana.

A private ceremony is planned. Donation's to the Alzheimer's Association can be made by calling 1-800-272-3900 or going to Act.Alz.org/donate.

*

Today at Second Home for the Elderly I casually mentioned to Nurse Kim if there was any news about Ray Schweibert.

Oh, she said, he died in April.

In moments where I'm alone, I grapple with this news. 

Just woke up - it's around 4 am - and printed out the obit.

Ray was my favorite person at the day care. I did meet a couple of times his b'ful wife Ellie.

Hadn't realized they put up photos of when you were in your prime.

Here I am.

Sarah's in town for a reading at Arcadia College.

Went very well. I took loads of photos. Not surprisingly I can't figure out how to download them.

*

THE ROOM

A sci-fi version of Alzheimer's disease

Like bats, they ping off one another
arms outstretched, some hear music
or a baseball game, is that Igor
Stravinsky and his Pulcinella? 

Feet shuffling across the room, 
barefoot no more, wearing bibs at table 
where thick gruel is spooned down your throat

The moon, parting through the clouds
reminds him of something he can't
quite remember, can't quite remember,
can't quite...

Get me out of the house pronto! - Poem: Strolling around the grocery store

Mom's party is scheduled for around 2 pm.

W/o eating I drove over to Giant to buy my h'ors d'oevres.

First, tho, Ms Kathy prepared a nice cuppa coffee for me, hot, which I sipped on while getting my groceries.

When I was all done I asked her for a refill of black coffee. Here it is, sitting on my TV Table as I tap away.

I delete all emails about the suicide of that Epstein guy.

Betty who works at the deli counter told me how to prepare an appetizer plate.

Before I do dat,



If we've got any poets out there - Hello Emily, Walt, Linda B, Marf - lemme write a quick one.

STROLLING AROUND THE GROCERY STORE

Pushing my cart as if it was a baby stroller, I sipped on the dark sweet cafe au lait Ms Kathy
prepared for me.
All were "at ease" in the store awaiting the morning rush.
The store is as bright as the moon and everyone looks familiar:
the tattooed, the many bangled women and men, too,
I must do this more often, I thought, nothing like fresh-roasted
Starbucks in the morning.

Mom's 97th birthday - Some Leftover Poems 4 You & other splendid writings

GARBAGE NIGHT

Are the stars out tonight?
Too cloudy. I've put out
Scott's valentine plant
giving it just the right
spritz of rain this evening.

Saddened, I must tell you
that Sandy Wood the voice
of what to look for in the
sky, has retired. A quirk in
that musical lilting voice
of hers mandated the change.

I'd imagined, when she spoke,
her lounging about in yellow
silk pyjamas, drinking green tea
from a demi-tasse.

As I drove home from Giant
I passed houses on my street
whose recyclables were loaded
with empty cartons.

Quickly I put my own items
away, including a Starbucks
cuppa java, and raced back out.

Rainlets dropped as I loped
down the street. Who cares
if I gets wet. I'm not gonna
melt and my purple hair has
already lost its lustre.

What do they eat in their
homes with young children.
Raisin Bran pokes out, bold
as a gondolier in Venice.

Gallon jugs of milk. Ah,
I remember milk for my then
little darlings, were they
Sarah and Dan?

And the adults? Boxes of pizza
whose smell lingers and beer
of all sorts fit to burst
your belly.

Scott Kelly the astronaut
is on TV upstairs. Jovial,
tossing off difficult things
as not a big deal, I shall
take my Raisin Bran - if only
I had some, upstairs to watch.

*
Ellen was kind enuf to pick me up to whoosh me through the secret roads to get me to her house off Byberry Road.

There was Mom, Mommy, Ma - as I usually call her - sitting at the head of the kitchen table. Guess who visited? Tyler, an Orthodox Jew for several years, his son David, four, who didn't attack me when I walked in. His mom is teaching chess at home in New Jersey.

I know how to play, said David. Want me to teach you?

Not today, I blubbered.

We ate loads of cheese n crackers. Can there be anything better?

The cheese is from SHEEP.  No wonder my belly kept bah-ing.

Mom got many cards, including mine. I'd given it two days to arrive.

Her friend Lenore called from Aurora Ohio.

You mean she hasn't died yet? I thought.

Don't laff. Her husband changed seemingly overnight.

Dementia.

Got a wonderful grant in the mail.

Altho I was exhausted, I ate breakfast, read and slept a little and then wrote what I considered a splendid thank-you letter for the five grand.

Sent the check to my bank. Was gonna drive to the PO but then Dante showed up, so I gave them to him, not mentioning what they were.

WAKING UP AFTER MY 97th YEAR

I pinch myself when I awake
Still here. Is this who I am now?
Legs that hurt when I move.
Belly that loves to eat. Best years
back in Camp Lejeune where Ruthie
was born and Harold got pneumonia
who believed he was rowing toward home.

What shall I bake today? Chocolate
brownies, walnut sticks, gefilte kraut?
Or meatloaf with Hunt's tomato sauce.

The days of the Now and Then Shop
have passed, merchants like so many
Jews when they first came over.

But the nuts stick in your teeth so I
won't eat any, or not too many,
and Nikki drives a long way to see
GG, as she calls me.

Lucky! So lucky. What's 97?
The best day of my life.

The mail must go through

I had two important items to mail, so I headed out to the Hatboro PO.

One was 2 copies of the Yes I Can book I mailed to our new preacher. Two weeks ago, I re-read online WISE BLOOD by Flannery O'Connor, a devout Catholic, about a gang of misfits led by a preacher, none of which I can remember. I first read Flannery when I lived and worked in San Francisco. At lunch hour I would read her books in the mild weather in a huge park.



I could not remember for the life of me how to get to the post office or its zip code. 19040.

Stopped into the Giant where Donna was behind the pharm counter.

The Willow Grove PO, she assured me, was nearby, and told me how to get there. York Road.

Mailed both parcels.

Checked my PO Box 181 and found a grant in there.

Wha?

True.

Stopped at the Hatboro Market and Deli and got this. "Under new management" beamed a sign, for, perhaps five yrs now.

Hoagie with Tavern ham, fab! And potato salad.

Made myself a cold drink of cold water and lime.

Scuse me a moment while I quaff,

The potato salad is only fair, but some paprika, black pepper and celery seed will fix it, plus some fresh peppermint in the front yard, from Robin F at the Giant.

Kaaa! Oops the mint got caught in my throat.

While I was coming home from the post office it was so hot, I thought I might pass out.

I envisioned stepping out of my car and lying in the middle of the road so someone could help me.

Instead, I closed my windows and turned up the AC.

Am reading THE VAGABONDS by Jeff Guinn, a road trip taken by newly good friends, Henry Ford and Thomas Edison.

Many promises were made - and broken - by the new friends, but it didn't matter. They liked and respected one another. Their wives were proper ladies, with their tops buttoned all the way up and got along well.

Why did I publish the photo below? I couldn't find one with high buttons. Please don't think I entertain prurient interests.




Neither man had many friends but it didn't bother them.

I thought of a friend of mine and thought maybe I'll write a short story about him. A man of the cloth. Not YOU, new preacher.

And now I'll go upstairs. plop in bed and read.

Marlon Brando's famous "I coulda been a contenda" speech is such a warhorse by now that a lot of people probably feel they've seen this picture already, even if they haven't. And many of those who have seen it may have forgotten how flat-out thrilling it is. For all its great dramatic and cinematic qualities, and its fiery social criticism, Elia Kazan's On the Waterfront is also one of the most gripping melodramas of political corruption and individual heroism ever made in the United States, a five-star gut-grabber. Shot on location around the docks of Hoboken, New Jersey, in the mid-1950s, it tells the fact-based story of a longshoreman (Brando's Terry Malloy) who is blackballed and savagely beaten for informing against the mobsters who have taken over his union and sold it out to the bosses.

SCOTT and I watched the film thother night.

What a sensitive actor he is. 

WHEN I AWOKE, my thumb had a terrible cramp.

Is that all you do is complain?

Oh, my new book was ready for me at the library even though it was about to pour.

Hurry Ruthie Hurry!

 Double click to enlarge.

National Hotel of Cuba.

As I told Nicolas at the Upper Moreland Library, my dad was stationed in Cuba during World War II.