May 29, 2007
Here's more photos from my Winterset Sojourn last weekend. Many celebs were in town for the big unveiling, including U.S. Senator Sam Brownback, 51, who is running for president (below, right). As I waited to go on Saturday, Brownback and his wife Mary (center, back to us) came through and introduced themselves. The Brownbacks are talking to Ethan Wayne (left) who was on hand to uveil the statue of his dad and destroy the last wall of the gas station which was standing in the way of the new museum.



Unfortunately, some things sound good in meetings ("And then we'll have Ethan put on a hard hat run to the Hogster and push over the entire wall and the crowd will go wild!"). What actually happened is that Ethan, in a hard hat, ran to the heavy equipment, brought the claw down and a tiny piece of the corner of the last remaining wall came down. He got out and shrugged. That's it. This passes for bigtime entertainment in Winterset, Iowa. Ha.



"Grandpa, were you there when they brought down three of the shake shingles off the roof of the old Sinclair Gas Station?" "Yes, my grandson, I was on my father's shoulder, looking at one of the speakers hyperventilating. Then I remember a loud pop and I looked up and three whole shingles just flew through the air and I thought, 'I've never seen something this wild in ma life,' and then I went back to the house and my dad shucked a bushel of hard corn right in front of me. Most exciting day of ma life."

Before and after the speech, crowds lined up in the rain outside the birth home (at left) and the museum gift shop (right) and they brought in more on school buses (extreme left):



According to a financial column I read on the plane, we are suffering from “feature creep.” I know I am. Basically what it is, is when we look at a new product in a store we think that the more features there are, the better. Unfortunately, product returns cost a hundred billion dollars a year because we can’t figure out how to use the damn things. The puncline: “even when you give consumer what they want they can still end up hating you for it.”

Dire Prediction #3,469
By 2010 a typical life will fit on a cell phone. Lifeblogging is on the rise and one of the first to do it is Gordon Bell (no relation) who is archiving his entire life online, including wearomg a head camera to record and post people he meets walking down the street.
The interior stories we tell about ourselves rarely agree with the truth.

Invariably, when we talk about the past we lie with every breath we draw.

What greater paradox of history: a war that must be won, and the victory
results in consuming misery and instability, leading to more wars.

“The only thing worse than a great defeat, is a great victory.”
—Duke of Wellington

“Just tell the truth.”
—Chang Chong-chen, a student at the Brussels Academy of Fine Arts

Gas in Arizona is closing in on $3.25, but in London it’s $6.65 and Hong Kong is’s $6.30 and Tokyo it’s $4.49. Meanwhile, in Baghdad it’s $1.19 and in Riyadh it’s 49 cents a gallon (the price it was in Kingman in 1965!).
—Wired magazine

Also from the pages of Wired: How profane was HBO's Deadwood? “Think Cormac McCarthy
with Tourette’s syndrome.”

Live And Let Dad Die
"Thought this might interest you...Calculate your life expectancy based upon your habits and medical and family history. The quiz takes about 7 minutes and is pretty cool! I am going to live until I am 77 (YIKES) so I need to make some major changes... anyone else with me?!?
—Deena Bell

http://www.livingto100.com

"I took the test and unfortunately, I died last year."
—Dad