Got up at 5:30 and worked on a couple projects then went to yoga at eight. Just me and three other "girls" (women in their late sixties). All three were bunched up on their mats at the north end of the room and I walked down and took the south end of the room in the corner. Debbie, our teacher, looked over and said, "Bob, why are you way down there?" And I said, "Wild Bill Hickok." None of them got the reference, but I think everyone here will.
Finished the "Legends of The Road" treatment at 11:45 with an assist from Ken A. and sent it off for proofing. Went home for lunch and had the leftover mole negro from Otro and went out to the studio to relax. Whipped out a little study that was about half done and sitting there waiting for me.
Daily Whipout, "Storm Over Kayenta"I've been on a Kayenta jag lately since I've been studying George Herriman, Maynard Dixon and Gunnar Winforss. Also, I've been reading the new John Wayne book by Scott Eyman and really enjoying it. And, of course, John Wayne and John Ford both have a little history in Kayenta, since it's just south of Monument Valley. I'm at the point in the book (page 495) where Ford is dying of cancer. They have a big ceremony at the American Film Institute to honor him with a Life Achievement Award. At the ceremony, The Duke seemed tongue-tied. If he had a speech he didn't give it. He simply said:
"I love him; I could say more."
—John Wayne
That, my friend says it all. In fact, one of the amazing things about the book is how eloquent Wayne was. Kind of shocking really.
"It takes 15 years of kissing somebody's backside for a professor to get a chair somewhere and then he's a big shot in a little world, passing his point of view on a lot of impressionable kids. He's never really had to tough it out in this world of ours, so he has a completely theoretical view of how it should be run and what we should do for our fellow man."
—John Wayne, referring to Paul Hutton's world
