Timmy, me boy

The Alberton Papers, Vol VI, #XII
By Dick Darne 6-30-08
This week I would like to pay tribute to one of the finest musicians I ever played with, both on stage or just jamming. Twenty nine years ago I arrived in Alberton on the forth of July weekend. Someone took me over to the Lumberjack, where I observed a young man playing the dobro with the band. Since I came from the heartland of bluegrass music, I did know how it was supposed to sound and sound like it, it did. A short time later, when I had the Petty Creek Band and played a few years in Chet’s on Friday nights, I was introduced to Tim Ishler, the dobro player. Whenever we were lucky enough to get a paying job, we would try to get Tim to play with us, although he was in such demand, it wasn’t always possible. He not only was a master on the dobro, but he became master of all the stringed instruments. He could sing any part and knew his way around the stage and sound system. In short, he was one of the best.
Tim’s talents didn’t stop there, he served our town in the fire department, rising to Chief. He studied and trained and became an EMT. He was truly talented, but used his talents to help people enjoy a better world rather than pursue the almighty dollar. For a couple of years he would hitch a ride from Missoula to Alberton with me, where I found him to be quite capable of properly thinking as we discussed multiple topics on the long ride home. We never got to play much as the years went on, life’s many demands weighing in on both of us, but I’ll surely miss him. I will never forget the mournful, bluesy sound he would coax from the "old hound dog" or the "bells in his banjo" as only a gifted few could do. The only stringed instrument I never heard him play was the harp. Do you suppose?
Timmy, me boy, you picked and sang more than most. It still wasn’t enough. You were a part of Alberton and Alberton will be a lesser place without you. dd

frank flushum, space plumber

The Alberton Papers, Vol. VI, #XI
By Dick Darne 6-17-08
After browsing through the news reports for the last few weeks, I have decided to write another story telling the truth behind the headlines. The story they don’t want you to know but must be told. Of course there will always be a mother out there who will forbid her children from reading these stories, claiming that I am filling their little heads with nonsense. Or someone somewhere who will have his breakfast ruined, but this is a small price to pay. And yes, I’ll protect my sources, so if anyone needs help in getting the truth out, you can come to me.
Remember a couple weeks ago, when there was a plumbing problem on the space station and a courageous space plumber saved the day? Well it was not the first time. We will now tell of the first plumber in space, Frank Flushum.
Back in the early days of space travel, we were going to send a ship out to explore the solar system. This was in the days when Pluto was still a planet, and they figured that the ten years in space was too dangerous for humans, so they trained a monkey to fly the ship. At the last minute, just before blast-off, the business manager for the local having jurisdiction got a court order, citing the need for a man aboard a manned craft and since plumbers have been protecting the health of our nation for many years, a plumber must be on board.
"Scrub the launch and find us a plumber!" said Mission Control.
A notice was posted, but only our hero, Frank Flushum stepped forward.
"Here’s your space bibs and krapoline alloy pipe wrenches, all you have to do is ride along and fix anything that breaks. The monkey has been trained to fly the ship. Bon voyage!" they instructed as the countdown resumed.
"5,4,3,2,1, we have a liftoff!" cried Houston, as the mighty ship with brave Frank rose above the earth, into orbit and then onward to the outer reaches of our solar system, boldly going where no plumber had ever gone before.
After a few weeks in space, poor Frank was lamenting the fact that not only nothing had broken, but the monkey appeared quite confident in his abilities to command the ship, even fixing all the meals. Frank thought more and more about less and less, which is not always a good thing.
"Jeez, when we get back, old Bozo here will get a tickertape parade down Madison Avenue and I’ll just be the dumb old plumber. I can fly the ship. The monkey’s got a manual, tells him just what to do, I can read." thought Frank. "I think I’ll just kill him and shoot him out the tube. I’ve got almost ten years to think up a good story."
So he does. He adjusts the command chair, opens the book, checks all the controls and away he goes.
"Nothing to it, piece of cake." Frank mused aloud. Then he read the last page.
"DON’T FORGET TO FEED THE PLUMBER THREE TIMES A DAY!" In big bold print.
With apologies to all my brothers, dd

smell the roses

The Alberton Papers Vol. VI, #X
By Dick Darne 6-10-08
Smell The Roses
Now for some musings from beautiful downtown Alberton. Too wet to plow. Too cold, wet and windy to cycle. Grass can be heard growing. Spring cleaning is too much work. River too muddy to fish. So it’s time to fill my faithful readers’ heads with nonsense.
Let’s start with: "the Gazebo, the real story, uncensored." Unknown to most people, the almost completed gazebo is the realization of a lifelong dream of Mayor Joe Hanson. I sent one of my investigative reporters back to his hometown to dig up the real story, right out of his childhood dirt pile, where he spent his happy childhood building little gazebos out of sticks and rocks and stubbornly rebuilding them when the other kids would stomp them into the dirt, calling him "gazebo head" in the process. Poor little Joe would scream at them: "Some day I’ll have the bestest gazebo in the whole world and you can’t stop me!" Well it took many years, life’s other demands using all his time, until recently he was able to wrest a pile of materials from Mother Nature’s reclamation process and ramrod a crew into hard labor, bringing to fruition his dream. While not completed yet, it stands as inspiration to all with dreams of the bestest, right here in beautiful downtown Alberton.
Dreams of Americans instead of The American Dream.
While resting my eyes, relaxing on a park bench in Portland I was alerted to the presence of others by Nellie the Wonder Dog. A couple of old geezers with well worn bikes had sat down on the adjacent bench. They introduced themselves.
"Lester Miles is my name and this here’s Roosevelt Smelmore. Just call me Les."
"And just call me Rosie. " said the huge man, who looked like he could play front four for the Packers. "We were just noticing your seat and handlebars, just about like ours."
"Well, I did figure out a while back that the butt gives up first." I replied
"And the next is the elbows and shoulders, it’s hard to enjoy a ride with hands and arms numb." said Les.
"Yeah, we’ve been riding many years now and it used to be a test of pain to take a long ride but we finally noticed what we weren’t noticing." added Rosie.
"What’s that?" I asked
"The roses. Take time to smell the roses." one of them said and then they were gone.
It does make sense. Ride less miles and smell more roses.
One last muse: I miss my buddy Tom.
Take the time! dd