Skip to main content

EJ impersonator visits winery

Good Superbowl, yeah?  I was rooting for the Cardinals, of course, but it was a great game, down to the last seconds.

Last Friday, a man came into the winery looking very much like Elton John.  It wasn't, of course.  If anyone would know the real Elton, it would be me.  A few of the customers did double takes and we heard them whispering, "Is it really him?"  Personally, I figured the guy for a flaming, overzealous fan.  He had the orange-tinged helmet hair, jewelry, earring (although in the opposite ear worn by the real EJ) and even a slight gap between his front teeth, but no English accent and the wrong voice altogether.  Turns out he's worked as a body double for Elton for 17 years.  At least, that's what he claimed.  His stage name, as he referred to it, was Eldon John and he had a few autographed photos of himself to share.  I have an autograph from the real Elton, so some chicken scratches from an impostor did not interest me much.  My co-workers dug it, though.  One lady in the gift shop even took a picture of him holding her baby.  He was a nice enough fellow and I had a good time chatting with him.  One of his companions was a spacey, middle-aged blonde who didn't seem to grasp much of what was going on.
"Don't mind her," he said.  "She used to be friends with Jerry Garcia."  'Nough said, though it probably wasn't true.
Anyway, Eldon, a.k.a. Richard something-or-other, hails from Ferndale, California, in Humboldt County, which could also explain his friend.

One of the regular tour guides who brings vans to our winery vowed yesterday, "I'll never complain about the rain again."  It was pouring.  She takes visitors on bike rides in Volcanoes National Park and the air has been awful these past weeks.  Now, the trades are back and it's raining, but getting wet is apparently better than sucking sulphur dioxide fumes.  So when those are your only two choices, you learn to embrace the rain.

Little minnie Winnie is sitting in my lap right now.  She loves me.  Her big, fat brother, Mr. Sox, is on the couch at my side, snoozing.  He's still none too happy about sharing his digs with these upstarts.  

Hoppsy goes in for surgery tomorrow to remove a weird growth on her eyelid that the vet thought looked suspicious.  

Speaking of dogs, the state of Hawaii is considering a ban on Pit Bulls.  From what I've observed, that would wipe out about half the dog population here.  People are protesting, of course.  To me, it sounds like just another law they won't be able to enforce.  Does the state really have the manpower to go door to door to see if a pit bull lives there?  And if they find one, are they really going to make those residents euthanize the family pet?  Heck.  I would bet that half the cops on this island own pit bulls, along with their cousins, brothers, uncles and aunties.  Please.  Of course, a bill to hold pet owners responsible for their dog's actions died last year in committee.  Got forbid we should actually blame the responsible party here.  Let's just punish all the dogs for the irresponsible actions of a few bad humans.  

Who elected these people, anyway?   Shoots.  Maybe I did.  I don't remember anyone running on a 'No More Pit Bulls" platform.  Or a 'Let's pay the legislature a lot more money' platform either.  They recently voted themselves a 34% pay raise in the middle of a recession.  Time to kick their okoles out to the breadlines with the rest of us.

A hui hou.  Aloha!



 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Mom

This is my beautiful mom. She died last Sunday. For those who knew her, my heart breaks with you. For those who did not, here's an introduction to the best confidante, role model and mother a girl could hope for in life. This is the obituary I'd planned to submit to the local paper, but have opted instead to publish here. Obituary: Beverly Todd Bev -- my mom -- was a longtime caregiver, advocate, and dear friend to countless elderly in South Salem. Hers was a kind and generous spirit. She devoted much of her life to the welfare of others, giving wholly of herself and doing so always with great affection and humor. She was born Beverly Marie Steinberger in Silverton, July 23, 1938, the first child and only daughter of Art and Marie Steinberger. Her brothers called her Bevvy Buns, a nickname she grew fond of and wore proudly within the family circle as an adult. Bev attended St. Paul’s Elementary School in Silverton, Silverton High School and Marylhurst Co...
2 comments
Read more

Back at it

It's been some time since I've written. My mom died in February, and I haven't had the gumption to write much, other than a couple of feature stories for the paper and the occasional pithy email to a friend. Tonight, sitting in my favorite burger joint with a pile of fries in front of me, I dunk them into a deep pool of ketchup mixed with a hot sauce. That's how Mom liked 'em. My burger? The Spicy Hawaiian, a nod to my 808 connections. It's a brilliant combination of peppers and pineapple, a favorite on the Power Stop menu. I'm sure she'd have loved it, too. There's a bubbly beer with a lime in it. That's not a homage to anything. I just like beer. These past months, I've done little but work, search and apply for jobs. Two rejection letters have landed in my email this week. Search-and-apply has become a futile obsession. It's time for a break, at least until I hear back from all those applications still floating around out there. I am...
Post a Comment
Read more

Goodbye Dan Fogelberg

Saturday started out as just another day to clean the house. Within a short time, however, I found myself on a mission; a mission of arachnid eradication. The spiders, for all their great bug-eating prowess, have a tendency to get a bit out of control in a place where there's no real winter. They're not only everywhere outside, but inside, too. I found webs with giant eight-leggers in corners, on the ceiling, hiding under window shades....everywhere! They were in places I vacuumed just two days before. Since the invasion of the beetles, the spiders have grown enormously fat and happy. So I sucked 'em all up. EEEEEEEEWWWWWW! I was none too keen on removing the vacuum bag. In addition to spider sucking, there was fun with fungi. What did the girl mushroom say to the boy mushroom? Gee your a fun-gi! Unfortunately, the prevailing fungus amongus was not shitakes or portabellos, but mold and mildew. Again.... eeeeeeeeewwwwww! I cleaned the top of the fridge, which was home to a n...
4 comments
Read more