Watching Hurricane Sandy In Real Time

Where I live, we were warned about a week in advance that Hurricane Sandy might make a left turn from the course it was on, going up the Atlantic.  The new projected path would send it directly into the Jersey Shore.  And since this was combining with a nor’easter into a super storm, the entire heavily populated Northeast Corridor could be at risk.  By Friday afternoon, there was no longer any question about it. It was definitely going to make that left turn and come right at us.  As I watched the news on the networks and the Weather Channel, it only got worse.  Soon, Mayor Nutter of Philadelphia was on, as well as Governors Christie of New Jersey and Corbett of Pennsylvania.   Everyone was warning that this storm would be dangerous and lives and property were definitely at stake.

It seemed like a lot of hype, especially considering the last big storm that came through about 14 months ago.  Hurricane Irene was felt in our area, but didn’t produce the devastation that forecasters predicted it could bring.  This sentiment was expressed especially along the coast, where people heeded the government warnings to evacuate the shore towns, especially the barrier islands, most of which were no more than a few blocks wide, with the ocean on one side, and the bay on the other.  The storm did indeed bring plenty with it.  However, it seemed the damage was minimal for all the warnings that were issued.  Now these same warnings were issued, and now they were more urgent than they were for last year’s big storm.  The eye of the hurricane would make landfall in either Delaware or New Jersey, and would arrive as a category 1 hurricane.  Coastal flooding was a very real possibility from the Carolinas to New England.  Everyone in the path of the storm had been hearing all of this all weekend.  But, of course, they heard those same warnings last year and were skeptical.  A storm was coming, of course, but they had been through all kinds of storms before, and felt they had seen everything.  It may have been rough at times, but everything always stayed intact.  This sentiment is typified by a woman from one of the shore towns being interviewed for a local news program.  She had lived on the Jersey Shore a good part of her life, and had been through everything.  Last year, she heeded the evacuation orders for Hurricane Irene and moved inland to stay with friends.  It turned out that her friends lost their power, but nothing happened to her home on the shore.

However, this time everything seemed to be happening exactly as the meteorologists were predicting.  Even as this was going on, the “here we go again” attitude was prevailing in some shore residents, like the woman referenced above.  They watched as the wind picked up and the rains began to fall.  They watched as the warnings and pleas to get off the barrier islands grew stronger and more urgent.  Governor Christie, who is not known for mincing words, could not convince them either.  So they waited and watched as the rain and winds grew heavier and stronger, even as the ocean began to crash through the sand dunes and turn the streets into rivers.  They walked around with their cameras and documented this as it was happening, and soon their pictures began appearing all over the social media outlets.  But many of these diehards eventually had all they could handle, and those who could do so found their way to the designated evacuation points or made last ditch 911 calls.  But a few were determined to go down with the ship if they should have to.

The storm apparently weakened somewhat once it made landfall, although it was still strong enough to cause plenty of damage when it reached my town, about 60 miles inland.  Fortunately, the town I live in sits on a hill and there is not much worry about flooding.  There are plenty of valleys around our town that are prone to flooding, but we’re fairly safe.  But no one is safe from the wind and pounding rain.  The wind howled throughout Monday into the small hours of Tuesday.  I remember going to sleep at 10 to the sound of the perpetually roaring winds, and then waking up around 2am to relative quiet.  The winds had died down.  The next day, just about everything was closed or shut down, so I was able to take a walk around to visually assess the damage Sandy had caused.  There were plenty of downed trees and generators humming.

Now, as I finish writing this, it is over a week later, and things are back to normal here in Bucks County.  The Jersey Shore, of course, is a different story.  The cleanup will be going on there for a while, and hopefully it will be ready to receive its tourists by the time summer arrives.  Although these were the two areas I was watching most closely during the storm, there were plenty of other areas of the Northeast hard hit by this storm, including West Virginia, which received a lot of snow.  But it appears the coastal areas were the hardest hit, and which have the most to lose from all the damage.

Remembering a Landmark and a Blown Chance Encounter

Sometime around 5 to 10 years ago, I was riding the train home on a Sunday afternoon with a few of my friends.  I usually have a good memory about these things, but my recollection of that day is fuzzy.  I don’t remember exactly what we were discussing, but I think our conversation centered on my hometown of Langhorne.  An elderly gentleman was sitting nearby as we talked.  As the train was nearing Langhorne station, he was one of the people who got up to exit the train.  He had overheard our conversation earlier and knew what we were talking about, and he introduced himself by showing a tag on his suitcase.  The image on his tag was a landmark in my area for several decades.  It was the old Constellation airplane that was mounted and propped up by three large columns on top of a restaurant in Penndel, owned by a man named Jim Flannery. When the plane stood, it was visible from the station we were arriving at, although the view was partially obstructed. The man identified himself as Flannery. I was speaking with none other than Jim Flannery.  He ran that restaurant for years before he bought the plane, which was then carefully disassembled and shipped north from Dover, Delaware.  It was then carefully reassembled and fastened to the roof of the restaurant, and used as a cocktail lounge.  A spiral staircase was constructed leading up from the ground level to the airplane/cocktail lounge.

Growing up in Langhorne, that was a part of my childhood.  An old airplane resting on top of a building is not something you see every day, but in my case, it was.  We passed by it every Sunday on our way to church, and throughout elementary and middle school, my bus would drive past it.  It was there until the late 1990s, when, after having gone through several post-Flannery ownerships, the restaurant finally closed for good.  The property was sold, and the plane was disassembled and dismounted from the main restaurant building, which was razed to make way for an Amoco station and mini-market.  I remember seeing the huge dismantled relic lying on the ground, until it was finally taken away to a museum.

But after I got past the initial surprise that I was speaking with Jim Flannery, my curiosity led me to ask a question about the opening ceremony for the airplane/cocktail lounge in 1968.  It was publicized by sending a hot air balloon off from the parking lot.  But it all went wrong right after takeoff when the wind sent the balloon into power wires, electrocuting both riders and sending them falling to their deaths.  Without thinking, I asked him about what went wrong that day.   He gave a quick muttered response that I didn’t understand.  I then came to my senses and realized that was not a good question to ask.  I wish I would have thought of something wiser and more pleasant to say, since this was no doubt a bad memory for him, and presumably something he has had to answer to many times in the past.

I had mostly forgotten that chance meeting with Flannery until recently, when I passed by the BP station that now sits on Flannery’s old site.  In a friendly gesture, the owners of the station commemorated the landmark that once stood there by attaching a replica to the top of their neon sign.   I pass by this station often, and sometimes fuel up there, but I didn’t think much of the miniature Connie.  This time, however, I decided to do some internet research on the restaurant and airplane.  In doing so, I also came across Flannery’s obituary.  He passed away last June, after living most of his life in Penndel, near his business, and the landmark that will forever be associated with his name.

The Return of Gino's

I was driving along Street Road in Bensalem, PA a few weeks ago when I saw something I hadn’t seen since I was in high school, at least.  It was a Gino’s restaurant.  Gino’s was a fast food chain started by legendary Baltimore Colts running back Gino Marchetti, and their restaurants were a fixture in my area during my childhood.  It seemed to me that around here Gino’s was third to McDonald’s and Burger King in the fast food market.  They also worked out a joint deal with the Colonel that paired Gino’s with Kentucky Fried Chicken, and the only place to buy KFC food was at a Gino’s.  The signs outside the stores placed the KFC bucket logo above the big red Gino’s Hamburgers sign.  But as far as I know, Gino’s was never a national chain and never expanded beyond the northeastern United States.  It came to an end in 1982, when the chain was brought out and the Gino’s name was retired.  All existing Gino’s locations were converted to Roy Rogers, and for the most of the next thirty years, Gino’s was a memory.

It was not a total surprise to see a Gino’s restaurant.  I heard a few years ago that a return was planned. They had a website going, with a list of targeted locations, but I don’t remember seeing the Bensalem spot on the list.  I was actually looking forward to seeing Gino’s restaurants again.  Part of it was out of nostalgia, but part of it was also because I liked their food, although I generally try to avoid fast food nowadays.  I think I remember reading that there already was a Gino’s open in King of Prussia, PA, which is on the opposite side of the Philadelphia metropolitan area from where I live.  But once I saw the Gino’s on Street Road, I had visible proof that they were back.

There are a few Gino’s restaurants that stand out to me in particular.  The one we frequented most was in Fairless Hills, PA, which I think was the closest Gino’s to where we live.  It stood at an ideal location, on the corner of a busy intersection.  I grew up in a fairly large family, one of five kids, and my mother was a nurse who didn’t work, choosing to stay home and take care of us while my father supported us.  I think that is why whenever we ate out, it was usually McDonalds or Gino’s.  I don’t remember going to fancy restaurants much.  My parents just tried to treat us as much as they could on the budget they lived on, and looking back I was happy with it.

We ate at that Gino’s in Fairless Hills regularly when I was little, but there was one afternoon that I won’t forget, even though my memory is vague.  I think I was only about six or seven at the time.  We were eating at Gino’s during a windy day, and there was a shopping center under construction nearby.  A few minutes of particularly strong gusts created a makeshift dust storm coming from the construction site, and I saw the dirt flying all over.  For those few minutes, the visibility was very poor.  It had blown past by the time we left, and although I don’t remember it, our car was probably covered in dirt, as were all the others.  Decades later when we drove by that location, which is now occupied by an Amoco/McDonald’s joint store, my father still recalled that day.

Every summer our vacation routine was to spend two nights in Atlantic City during the middle of a week in late July or early August.  My parents liked going there, as they had since childhood.  And they probably found that plan cheaper than spending a week at one of the Jersey Shore resort towns that stretched from Long Branch to Cape May.  Going to Atlantic City was all I knew for vacation, and looking back I was fine with that as well.  As kids, one thing we really liked about Atlantic City was the famous Boardwalk.  And among the hundreds of shops and attractions on the Boardwalk there was a Gino’s, which I think we went to at least once almost every year we went there.  I have a vague memory of sitting at the Gino’s while looking out over the ocean and watching the waves crash into the jetty. 

During my childhood, our family would travel monthly to Jim Thorpe to visit relatives.  Our normal route was to take the Pennsylvania Turnpike to get there, but there was also a back way my parents liked to go.  That route took us through Bucks County, where we would ride the back roads until we got on the turnpike at the Quakertown exit.  More often, we would get off the turnpike there on the way back, and take the back roads through Bucks County the opposite way back home.  Along the way in Quakertown, there was a huge shopping center with a Gino’s, where we would often stop for lunch before continuing back home.

At one time Gino’s commercials were seemingly on all the time.  During the Phillies telecasts they were, since Gino’s was a sponsor, along with other local institutions such as Schmidt’s beer and Tasty Kake.  These ads stand out to me, I guess, because they ran repeatedly during Phillies telecasts, and I watched plenty of Phillies games.  Following the trend of Ronald McDonald and the magic Burger King, Gino’s also had their own mascot, the Gino Giant.  I don’t remember much about the Gino Giant except his telling kids to rub their bellies and make a wish.  I think after that, they were magically transported to the nearest Gino’s.  Later, in 1977, after the first Rocky movie created a sensation all over the country, Gino’s found a way to work the spirit of Rocky into their ads.  I always remembered a series of those ads, which would end with the main character of the commercial doing a victory dance similar to the one performed by Rocky when he finally made it to the top of the Art Museum steps.  In the background, there was music and a chorus of singers singing “feeling good at Gino’s”.  One day a few years ago, I searched YouTube to see if one of those old commercials was posted, and indeed I found one.  That is what led me to find out Gino’s was making a comeback.  My curiosity led me to look up Gino’s on Wikipedia to find out what actually happened to the chain.  I learned that they were bought out by Marriott and converted to Roy Rogers’s restaurants, but I also learned that there were plans in place to revive the Gino’s brand in the next few years.  That put me on the lookout, occasionally checking the sites, but I missed the news that they had bought property in Bensalem, and also was unaware when it opened. 

According to their website, Ginos now has four locations, with a fifth site opening soon.  Two are in Pennsylvania, and two are in Maryland, soon to be three.  I don’t know if they will regain the presence they had in the 70s.  There is no joint deal with KFC this time, and Gino’s is cooking their own brand of chicken.  I’m glad to see they’re back, although I don’t plan on going there much.  I would like to go there just once, probably when I’m on the run sometime.

Super Bowl Memories

Now that another Super Bowl Sunday has passed, and the game itself is now nearing the half-century mark, I am thinking back to some of the title games that stood out to me over the years.  The Super Bowl itself goes back to January of 1967, just after the merger had been signed in which the former American Football League would be incorporated into the NFL.  The AFL was previously an upstart rival league which had managed to not only survive, but thrive alongside the NFL, and apparently Rozelle and the rest of the NFL brass figured that they couldn’t beat the AFL, so they might as well join them.  Or, more accurately, they worked out a deal to absorb the AFL into their league. The merger would not take full effect until 1970, but an AFL-NFL championship game would be played between the two league champions starting in 1967. That game would soon come to be known as the Super Bowl.  I have watched many of them over the years.  In America, that’s what most people do on that day.  But some stand out to me more than others, and here I’ll describe the ones that I remember most.

Going way back to my youth, I remember Super Bowl XV, because of the excitement of the Eagles finally getting to the Super Bowl.  I also remember the frustration I felt as they proved to be no match for the Oakland Raiders, despite being heavily favored to win.  NFL Films nicknamed it “The Cinderella Super Bowl” but I didn’t think that title was a good fit.  Neither of these teams had just emerged out of nowhere.  The Eagles and Raiders had both been in contention for several years, with the Raiders being a playoff fixture for a decade.  They already had one Vince Lombardi Trophy under previous coach and future color commentator John Madden.  Sometime in the four years between those Super Bowl games, Madden retired and was replaced by Tom Flores.  Longtime Raiders quarterback Ken Stabler, who also wore a ring from the 1977 Super Bowl, was gone by then as well.  Which brings me to what I think is the reason this particular game got the Cinderella nickname, which I thought better described the next Super Bowl pitting the 49ers against the Cincinnati Bengals.  Both of those teams were relative newcomers, and it proved to be the first of several championships that made Joe Montana into a legend.  However, that subtitle was given to Super Bowl XV, and it probably had something to do with Raiders quarterback Jim Plunkett.  Plunkett was a Bay Area native and Stanford grad who had been in the NFL for close to a decade.  He was originally drafted by the New England Patriots and started for them for several years, and if I remember right, lead them to several playoff appearances.  Sometime around 1976 or 1977, Steve Grogan took over and Plunkett was traded to the 49ers, then to the Raiders.  I have to admit, I don’t know his story very well, but I guess it was enough of a rags-to-riches tale for NFL Films to give this Super Bowl that nickname.

I also remember the 1986 Super Bowl very well, as it capped off a near-perfect 18-1 season for the Chicago Bears.  They seemed unstoppable, except for one loss to the Dolphins.  It also seemed to me that a rematch between the Bears and the only team to beat them during the regular season would have made a perfect Super Bowl, but the Patriots pulled off an upset of the Dolphins in the AFC Championship Game and so earned the right to play for the trophy in New Orleans.  But, like every opponent the Bears faced that year (except the Dolphins), the Patriots were no match and a very predictable one-sided blowout by the Bears materialized.  Bears defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan was hailed as a genius for his 46 defense, and caught the attention of new Eagles Owner Norman Braman.  He was soon offered the head coaching job with the Eagles, and was out the door. Ryan may have been missed by the Bears fans and players, but Head Coach Mike Ditka, who couldn’t stand Ryan, was only too happy to see him go. Today, they have apparently put their differences aside, and have recently appeared at some functions together, including a much belated White House reception for the 1985 Bears.  This game was also the beginning of a trend.  For the next decade, the NFC team would win every Super Bowl, usually by a wide margin.  Only two games were close.  The next year, the Giants replaced the Bears as the juggernaut, and steamrolled over the Broncos in Super Bowl XXI.  In the coming years, the 49ers and Cowboys would also build near-perfect teams that squashed whatever AFC opponent stood between them and the Vince Lombardi Trophy.

The next game that stood out to me was the 1990 Super Bowl between the 49ers and the Broncos.  It was a fitting way to close the decade, as it epitomized the state of the NFC and AFC in the Super Bowl.  The 49ers epitomized the NFC, and the Broncos the AFC.  Predictably, it was a blowout, with the 49ers winning by a final score of 49-10. It was a summary of the decade in football, or at least the second half of it, and it just wouldn’t have seemed right if it went any other way.  It was the fourth Super Bowl victory for the 49ers, and the fourth loss by the Broncos, who up until then lost all their Super Bowls by a wide margin.  The first Super Bowl lost by the Broncos was actually in 1978, by an entirely different team, so that loss could be isolated from the John Elway era Broncos.  But the 1990 Super Bowl was still the third one lost by the Broncos in five years.

The next year, what stood out to me about the Super Bowl game between the Giants and the Bills, was of course the fact that it came down to a last second field goal attempt by the Bills. Kicker Scott Norwood missed wide right, and the Giants won 20-19.  As in many such cases, that play effectively ended Norwood’s career, although not immediately as he played with the Bills for one more season.  It was also one of the few competitive Super Bowls during that decade of NFC dominance.  The Bills would make it back to represent the AFC in the next three Super Bowls, but would not find themselves coming anywhere near that close to a victory.  They lost those three games by a combined score of 119-54, to the Redskins in 1992, then twice in a row to the Cowboys. They took over the Broncos role of super blowout victims.

After the mid-90’s, I don’t remember following the NFL too closely.  I know that after that time, the NFC dominance ended, as well as the Cowboys and 49ers dynasties that did most of the dominating.  I honestly can’t name who won most of the Super Bowls after that, although I am on the computer and could easily cheat on this.  I remember sometime in the late 90’s, the Packers won the title for the first time since Vince Lombardi was coach.  The balance of power eventually shifted to the AFC, with dynasties in Indianapolis with Peyton Manning, and in New England with Bill Belichick and Tom Brady.  I remember the near perfect season the Patriots put together, only to have their hopes crushed by the Giants in the final seconds.  If only they held on for that last minute, they would have topped the 1972 Dolphins.  They were also one of those truly dominant teams like those 1972 Dolphins, as well as the 1985 Bears, the 1986 Giants, 1992 Cowboys, and probably a few other teams I missed. 

Over the years, Super Bowl Sunday grew into an unofficial national holiday, and having Super Bowl parties became common in households all over the country.  Eventually, the commercials became a part of the show that people had to see.  Halftime entertainment also became a ritual, featuring mostly music legends.  It has become the grand finale for the season.  Now the season’s over, and it’s time to focus on basketball and hockey, and anticipate baseball in the spring.  The next big event is the March Madness week leading up to the NCAA Division I men’s basketball championship.  Maybe that will become the next unofficial holiday.  But for football, there is only the NFL network to hold people over until the end of summer.

Green Gold?

I’ve been reading a lot about this subject lately, as it is easy to find by just typing in the keywords on a search engine. But the main reason I keep doing searches on the shale boom is because I’m always looking for good economic news, and the shale boom offers at least some faint hope for the fragile economy.  Not only can this boom produce sorely needed jobs, but also has already made significant headway in decreasing our dependence on foreign energy.   All I have to do is mention two words: “North Dakota”.  North Dakota, of course, is the epicenter of the energy boom here, and is a flourishing oasis in a job market that still resembles the Sahara Desert.  The boom there has been compared to the California gold rush of the mid nineteenth century, and what were once small, lonely prairie towns are growing into small cities centered on this energy revival.  If all goes well, North Dakota is a symbol of hope and the future of our country as a whole.  And there are other areas that are rich in shale oil and gas waiting to be fully tapped, although the jury is still out on the effect of the drilling processes on the environment.

All this news is bringing on a flashback to four years ago.  I have to admit that in early 2008, I was still clueless as to what was about to happen to the economy.  However, I drove about 20 miles each way to and from my job, so there was no way I could not notice the rapid spike in gas prices.  I also remember having seen an ad for a CNN special titled “Out of Gas: We Were Warned”.   I didn’t think much about it, to be honest, but the soaring gas prices were constantly reminding me of it.  I didn’t have a lot of worries at first, since I was in a position where I could absorb that price increase.  But I couldn’t help wondering when it was going to stop, and if this was just the beginning of something.   A few years before that, I overheard some friends talking about the world’s oil supply running out in the next 30 years.  Again, I was not overly worried, since my assumption was that hydrogen would replace gasoline as the main source of vehicle fuel long before oil supplies got short.   But I was fully aware that I was not any kind of scientist, and I was only basing that assumption on what little I knew and had heard.  Meanwhile, the price of gasoline continued to rise rapidly through the winter and into spring, so I decided to research this subject a little more on the internet.

I soon became familiar with the term “peak oil”.  I was shocked by what I found, even though I realized that everything I found on the internet needed to be taken with a grain of salt.  I started to wonder if my faith in science and hydrogen technology was misplaced.  There were several sites warning of what was waiting ahead, their conclusion being that sometime around 2005-06, the world’s oil production hit its peak, and from there on was in terminal decline.  There was no real solution, not hydrogen or anything else.  The time to prepare the infrastructure of the United States for a post-peak oil world had passed, and we were now stuck with the consequences.  The impact of peak oil would hit suddenly, and without warning gas prices would skyrocket out of control, and driving a car would become unaffordable to the average person.  I was just looking into one side of the story, but it seemed to confirm my suspicion that some kind of a structural shift had occurred, and that there was more than just worldwide demand, but also diminishing supply behind the unprecedented spike in gas prices.

I learned something else while I was researching peak oil.  I found that there was a vast reserve of shale oil right under the United States.   The possibility of tapping into this oil was dismissed by most peak oil doomers.  They pointed to a concept I learned called EROEI (Energy Returned On Energy Invested).  According to what I read, getting the oil from the ground would actually use more energy than what could be produced from the oil being extracted.  However, I don’t remember any mention being made of the process known as “fracking”.  If I remember right, most of the peak oil articles I read were from around 2005-06, right around the time of the technological breakthrough called hydraulic fracturing, for which fracking is a shorthand name.  So I wasn’t aware that even as I was reading those articles on peak oil, the Bakken shale boom in North Dakota may well have already been underway.

I have never been anywhere near North Dakota, so I can’t in any way speak about it from experience.  And I still don’t have a thorough knowledge of the Bakken shale boom, other than the news clippings I’ve seen.  But one thing I do know is that North Dakota has jobs in abundance where they are scarce just about everywhere else.  Some of the numbers I have read are unbelievable, including fast food workers making $20 an hour.  The major disadvantage of course is that North Dakota is hardly the most desirable place to live.  Subzero midday temperatures are not uncommon during this time of year, and the vast monotonous terrain is also likely to be unappealing to most people.   Added to all this is the lack of adequate housing to handle the huge influx of job seekers.  There are small dwelling units going up rapidly, but those who can’t find housing either have to risk their lives by sleeping in their cars in polar conditions or stay in the extremely expensive hotels and motels.  There doesn’t seem to be much there for anyone looking for excitement.  Since Williston seems to be the largest boom town, I decided to do a simple scan on Google Maps and on Flickr.  It looks like just a small town in the middle of a vast, endless prairie.  There may be something of water sports enthusiasts, since it lies near the Missouri River. The Rocky Mountains may also be within a few hours drive.  North Dakota is obviously thousands of miles away from either coast, and the nearest large body of water is the Great Lakes. 

With all that is going on in North Dakota, I am wondering about what will happen where I live, in Pennsylvania.  I live in the Philadelphia area, which does not lie above the Marcellus shale deposits in the Central and Western parts of the state, but of course is much closer to those regions than to North Dakota, and maybe the Marcellus shale boom will rub off on our area.  I don’t know how economically tied in we are with other regions of the state, but I think we could benefit in some way.  There has been much speculation and hope, but now, in just the last few days, I have been hearing news that the boom may not be as big as expected.  There are reports that the number of actual jobs created was exaggerated, and also that Chesapeake, one of the largest companies, is shifting its investment away from the “dry” gas areas such as Central Pennsylvania, and toward the liquid gases that lie more to the western part of the state and in Eastern Ohio.  The hydraulic fracturing practices have apparently produced a glut of dry natural gas, which will likely remain cheap for years.  Now, the operations have shifted to the more profitable liquid gas to the west.

I didn’t watch the annual State of the Union address last night.  For things like that, I prefer to get a recap on the internet or in the newspaper.  But President Obama made sure to tout the energy boom, and the impact it is having.  It is giving me some hope.  Maybe this is the light at the end of the tunnel.  Maybe it can be exported and go a long way to erase the huge trade deficits we have been facing.  Maybe it can take a huge bite out of the high unemployment in this country.  It has already greatly reduced our dependence on foreign energy.  All I can do is hope that time will prove these hopes to be justified.

First Year of the Cat

Back in the summer of 2004, my brother Mark moved back in the house temporarily.  He was in transition, since he was looking to buy a house and planning to get married the next year.  I don’t remember him taking a lot of stuff in with him, but one thing he brought with him would need special attention: his cat Buddy.  I also understood that the cat would probably stay with us once Mark found a house and moved out.  His fiancée already had two cats, and adding one more was a little too much.  Since I loved cats I didn’t mind keeping Buddy once Mark was settled in his new place.  It had been a while since we had any pets, so it took a while to get used to having a cat around the house again.

I also realized that because of Mark’s job and the fact that he was looking for a house and planning to get married, he was not going to be around a whole lot.  It was understandable given his situation.  My father sometimes said that he hardly noticed Mark had moved in with us.  When he said that, I had to say that one thing for sure was that his cat had moved in with us.  He was also a little hesitant to take Buddy in, even though he too liked cats.  But he knew that I had a way with cats and would want to take care of Buddy if Mark couldn’t, so he didn’t object to keeping him.  We got to know the cat and he got used to us while Mark was by necessity absent most of the time. 

The first problem that arose was my father’s choice of cat food.  He was not a grandfather yet, but he spoiled the cat in a grandfatherly way.  Mark had Buddy on a strict diet and made it clear to us that we were to give him only one scoop of diet cat food a day, and nothing else.  I didn’t want to go against Mark’s wishes, but my father felt it was a good thing to give him something different for a treat, which happened to be cans of Fancy Feast moist food.  My gut feeling was confirmed soon, because once we gave Buddy the Fancy Feast, he didn’t want anything else.  He would still eat some of the IAMS diet food, but only when there was no Fancy Feast for a while. He had previously been quiet and keeping to himself, but now he was constantly meowing for the moist food, especially early in the morning.  We got used to not being able to do anything in the morning before giving Buddy his Fancy Feast.

At first, we would hide the cans from Mark, and clean out the food dishes before he came home, but he eventually found out.  I tried to let him know that I didn’t approve of the Fancy Feast, but my father insisted on giving it to him.  Of course Mark didn’t like it, but by then it was too late.  Once cats have the moist food, they don’t want anything else.  In Mark’s words, Fancy Feast is like crack to cats, and from what I saw, that description is fairly accurate. 

After about six months of living with us, Mark brought his new house and moved out.  Buddy stayed behind with us as expected, and he was our cat now.  It took a while, but by that time Buddy was used to his new surroundings, and began to warm up to us.  Since I was now the human father figure in his life and had a way with cats, he developed a liking to me.  I realized it shortly after Mark moved out. Buddy liked sleeping in different spots around the house, and he also liked laying in my laundry basket whenever it had freshly cleaned clothes in it.  I remember one time as I was lying in my bed, he was making his way into the room and about to jump into the basket and get his hair all over my clean clothes.  I saw him and said hi, and after looking at me for a second, he jumped up into the bed with me and slept there.  At that time, I knew I had won his trust and was now his best friend.

My father started to notice that too.  He also noticed something I wasn’t totally aware of, and that was that Buddy was going everywhere I went.  After coming home from work and feeding Buddy, I would sometimes take a nap, and I came to expect him to make his way back up to my room and sleep with me there.  I just got used to having a cat sleeping with me, and got used to sleeping on one side of the bed.  But he was going other places I went inside the house, too.  When I was downstairs on the computer in the front room, he would find a spot nearby and sleep there.  When I got home from work, he would either be waiting for me, or would show up soon after I arrived.  Not all cats are like that with all people, but again, since I had a way with cats and some dogs, and since I was his main caretaker, he was now around me most of the time.  It has been several years now, and Buddy is still here, although he is older and slower that he was before.

The Wrestling Revolution that was Televised

A revolution occurred on January 23, 1984.  It happened in Madison Square Garden when 10 year ring veteran Hulk Hogan won the WWF title for the first time, although for the time being that revolution was contained to the world of professional wrestling.  And even within wrestling, it was still limited mostly to the Northeastern United States, although WWF President Vince McMahon had nationwide and global plans underway.  Exactly six months later, on July 23, another event took place that, as far as I know, was the first practical attempt by McMahon to cross professional wrestling over into popular culture.  It was actually via a women’s title match featuring the longtime champion known as the Fabulous Moolah and her challenger, a young Texan named Wendi Richter, who Moolah had earlier trained for the business.  The match was broadcast on MTV and established what was known as the Rock and Wrestling Connection, a phenomena that was short lived but served its purpose in setting the WWF on its way to becoming the world’s largest and ultimately only major league wrestling promotion.

At the time, professional wrestling was still masquerading as a sport, but this would soon change.  Once McMahon took over the WWF from his father, he made clear his intention to monopolize the wrestling industry.  In his quest to do so, he would soon drop all pretenses of marketing his product as a legitimate sport, and instead offer his package under the heading of “sports entertainment”.  It seemed MTV was the perfect vehicle to do so, since his aim was to turn his major players into rock star-like figures.  MTV would also give his show a national audience, primarily among young teens, and therefore open a nationwide market for him.  It was clear after this that he wanted to change the landscape of professional wrestling.  Until then, wrestling was regionalized, with the promoters all respecting each other’s territorial boundaries.  McMahon was about to dismantle that honor system among promoters and expand beyond his territory, which was the Northeastern United States.  He had already begun to make the moves toward that goal before Hogan won the title.  Although the Northeast was a lucrative market, he had bigger plans.

The story leading up match itself began on a flight to Puerto Rico.  Cyndi Lauper was an up and coming singer and wrestling fan who met WWF manager Lou Albano on that flight.  The meeting resulted in Albano being asked to appear in the video for her single “Girls Just Want to Have Fun”, which soon topped the Billboard Hot 100.  Albano would appear in several more of her videos, producing a string of hits that brought Lauper her fleeting superstardom.  Perhaps to return the favor, she was written into one of the WWF story lines.

Rowdy Roddy Piper, a future wrestling legend, began the buildup by promising for several weeks to have Lauper on his Piper’s Pit interview segment.  First Albano appeared claiming to be her manager and responsible for her success.  Next, David Wolff, her actual manager (and boyfriend at the time) denied Albano’s claim.  Finally Cyndi herself came on as promised, and when the manager subject was brought up, she made clear that it was Wolff and not Albano.  Then Captain Lou, being Captain Lou, walked on, insisted that Lauper credit him with all her success, and added in some derogatory comments about women in general.  An altercation ensued, and soon after that, Lauper issued a challenge to Albano.  They would each pick a female wrestler to manage, with Albano picking Moolah, and Lauper choosing Richter.  Richter defeated Moolah and became champion.  Shortly after this, Albano publicly apologized and began working with Lauper to raise money for MS research.  By the end of the year, he had made a “face turn”.

Before long, however, the whole Rock and Wrestling Connection became a distant memory.   The term itself would be forgotten, although celebrities would continue to be featured at major WWF events.  Most of its key players faded from view not long after.  Cyndi Lauper soon moved on and left wrestling behind.  Wendi Richter dropped the title back to Moolah a year later, and left the WWF shortly after that, angry over the way it was done.  Albano retired from the WWF two years later.  But the juggernaut that was set in motion rolled on.  WrestleMania and several annual pay-per-view events quickly became the norm.  As the show evolved, the wrestling action itself often took a back seat to the shtick, as McMahon began to attach cartoonish gimmicks to his stars.  That brief moment in time in 1984 didn’t last long, but the transition of wrestling from a cult niche market to pop culture phenomenon had begun.  And although it took a lot longer, McMahon was eventually able to absorb his major competition and make the WWE, as it is now called, the only major wrestling promotion in America, with the smaller operations now serving as a kind of farm system.