May 4, 2005
As of seven this morning I took my last dose of coumadin. Based on my latest catscan the clot is gone. However, the report noted “chronic thrombosis” which basically means it could return at any time. My doctor said it's hard to tell with all of the scarring how much damage is there. And she wished me luck.

After reading the obits for the past week (every day there seems to be a guy my age, or younger, who has done thrombo-mosied over to the other side), so I'm just real happy to be here, and if you're close to my age you know exactly what I mean.

The comments on the Religion cover and story continue to come in. Just got this one from San Francisco:
“Let me just say again how much I loved the Clint Eastwood Jesus. but you've
gotta give the devil his due. After all, it's the role Lee Van Cleef was made to play.”
—Damian (a minister and artist)

And here’s a report on End of Trail which moved out of Southern California this year and into the backwoods of New Mexico. I have been concerned that they might lose their substantial attendance. Here's a report by our piano-playing neighbor at Festival of the West:

"I just got back from the SASS event near Albuquerque...as this was my first time at this event I don't have any comparison to the past in Calif. but in my humble opinion and perspective as just the piano player..it went exceptionally well. The playing from 8 to midnight at the "Belle Union Saloon"..three nights...was an ideal fit for me and I guess it all went OK cause nobody shot me. Elevation was something like over 7000 feet, mountains,cedar trees, big valley...no modern stuff stuck around to be seen so it will be a neat place for their plans to build a western town which they have already started. Nearest town with a lot of motels and some stores..Moriarty..about 20 minutes. Albuquerque & WalMart.. about 45 minutes. The event was sold out. It drew a lot of new attendees from the mid to upper Rockies states as it was closer than Calif. Some from England, Europe, Australia. The people were a class act and made it good for us. The weather turned unusually cold and windy and it even snowed but Sat & Sun were fine."
—Dwain Bond, frontier piano player extraordinaire

I was contacted last week by the editor of Route 66 Magazine, Bob Moore, who said he is downsizing his life and going on the road with a trailer to pursue novel writing. Bob also told me he has a full set of Razz Revue magazines and would I like them. They came in today and Gus and Mike Melrose have been ogling them ever since. The Razz was a humor magazine that Daniel Harshberger and I published from 1972 to 1976 (16 issues). Many painful and great memories. In 1974 we ran Wonderful Russ for governor of Arizona (no joke!) and Daniel took Russ down to the State Capital and posed him out front. The subsequent political poster (free inside every magazine!) had a headline that read: "He Knows What Arizona Needs" and in Russ's hand is an enema bag. Russ came in third (I want to say he got 276 votes) and because of the equal time rule, Russ got on all the tv stations (4) and told about how he was going to blast California off into the ocean so we could have ocean front property and how he would free all the prisoners and let real criminals run the government. Oh, and don't forget “free drugs and free food.” Needless to say, the people who ran Arizona at that time were not amused, but several of us were, and damned proud too.

"Yesterday is but today's memory, and tomorrow is today's dream."
— Kahlil Gibran