Back from Santa Fe. Marveled at the scenery along I-40, especially since I just finished reading "The Last Camel Charge" and the entire route follows Captain Beale's Camel Corp Expedition almost to the T. This was of course Route 66, which we followed religiously every summer from Kingman to Iowa from 1946 to 1966. I love that country from Gallup to Flagstaff. Many memories. Did a painting of this as a possible centennial image called "Old Trails."
Got up this morning and whipped out a painting I call "Pipeline Rider":
This was inspired by a film I saw recently of surfers riding through pipeline waves and coming out after seemingly swallowed up by water. Seemed like a perfect thing for a hellbent cowboy to be doing as well.
We've got more packrats in the garage and they have taken to rearranging my boxes of photos. Found two historic photos on the floor by the garbage cans. The first is of Andy Solt and Malcolm Leo, at the time, 1981, two of the hottest producers in Hollywood. They had just produced "The History of Rock 'n' Roll" for ABC and were slated to produce a major documentary "This Is Elvis" for theatrical release.
Through my agent at William Morris, they signed on to produce my comic book character Honkytonk Sue and actually sold the project to Columbia Pictures who slotted Goldie Hawn to play the Queen of Country Swing. This photo was taken in 1981, in the aftermath of "Urban Cowboy", which created a semi-big wave of new Westerns. Goldie, of course, had just done "Private Benjamin" which was a major hit and she had a five picture deal and Honkytonk Sue was supposed to be one of them, but although Larry McMurtry co-wrote three scripts for the project it never even made it to production.
The other photo the garage packrats brought to my attention is this one of a certain radio celebrity who worked with me on KSLX. I would come in every morning with horror stories about the behavior of my teenage kids and she was quite often very unsympathetic, telling me flatly she wouldn't put up with such nonsense. Last Thursday I got a very sweet email from her. She has a teenage daughter and she told me how sorry she was. Didn't gloat at all. I have nothing but sympathy for anyone who has to raise a teenager.
This photo was taken in 1988, which is slightly before my kids became teenagers from hell. Ha. This is when The Jones, Boze & Jeanne Show aired on KSLX. Fun times.
"We probably wouldn't worry about what people think of us if we could know how seldom they do."
—Olin Miller
