November 12, 2004
Looks like we'll get more rain tonight. Quite wet out, the air that is (5:27 P.M.). Worked all morning on Johnny-Behind-the-Deuce copy. Shamie, from Ireland, and the foremost card expert I know (his cards have been featured in numerous Westerns, including Deadwood) came in to visit Mike Melrose and I took the opportunity to ask him how Mr. Deuce got his name. Later, he phoned me with this answer: "Because of his habit of betting heavily when he held no more than a deuce as a hole-card, he earned his everlasting pseudonym Johnny-Behind-the-Deuce." Makes sense, eh?

Got a call from Grant of Optimo Hats down in Bisbee and he told me all about a Steven King novel, or story they are filming down there. Evidently, they"re using sepia toned 16 mm film and making it stutter to give the flashback sequences an oldtime effect. I swore I"d remember the name of the movie but I've already forgotten it. I'm not worried, Emma will tell me.

Minnesota Mike and I went up to Carefree at lunch time to see Brian Label's and Bill Welch's new store Cowboy Legacy Gallery. Wow! It really has some cool stuff. Saddles, big artwork by the likes of John Moyers (Cowboy Artist), Donna Sickle Howells and oldtime Western posters (at $4,500 a pop!), spurs, guns, sculpture, and some pretty cool old photos including a series of Buffalo Bill crossing with a Mormon wagon train at Lee's Ferry. Begged Bill to allow us to scan them for a future True West article and he brought them down and Robert scanned them. One of them has a great 1950s style cowpunchers style hat, and this is in 1890 (I want it for my "Confessions of a hat Nazi" piece next summer).

Did a portrait of Buckskin Frank Leslie in full scout regalia for my new book, then whipped out a pretty neat little image of a rifle toting Frank McLaury. Not bad. Copped it from a Jeremy Rowe photograph, or I should say, one from his stunning collection.

Had lunch at the Bad Donkey (A cob snob salad and an iced tea, $10.80 cash, I thought Melrose would buy but he's so damned cheap).

Kathy seemed quite nice this morning, and I guess I should count my blessings. And one of my blessings is I'm thankful she doesn't read this blog.

"If a man says something in the woods and there are no women there, is he still wrong?"
—Old Guy Saying