Link for proposition 317. Add your support and signature so that St. Patrick’s Day can be made an official holiday. Cheers!

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 Because there’s no better day to be at the bar.

So here’s the new 2009 link for the new Proposition 317 petition. 

We tried last year, let’s make it happen. We’re due for such a sensible holiday. Have a Guinness filled St. Patrick’s Day!

CHEERS!

*Also, I’m moving my blog, slightly, to HERE*

New Suspense Thriller, first in a trilogy, USA Best Books 2008 Best New Fiction Category award winner, San Francisco Chronicle rave review from November 2008, new events, book signings

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Black Market Truth: The Aristotle Quest, Book 1

I think this is incredible.

http://news.ufl.edu/2008/06/26/energy-consortium/

“Remember how long you’ve been putting this off, how many extensions the gods gave you, and you didn’t use them.  At some point you have to recognize what world it is that you belong to; what power rules it and from what source you spring; that there is a limit to the time assigned you, and if you don’t use it to free yourself it will be gone and will never return.”

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

I am presently surprisingly bored, unfortunately broke, and deliriously tired.  Believe it or not, but Vegas becomes stale quite quickly.

On a better note…

I re-read You Can’t Go Home Again  by Thomas Wolfe this weekend.

“Some things will never change.  Some things will always be the same.  Lean down your ear upon the earth, and listen.” 

I have for many years been in awe of Wolfe and his epic-time-description.  And to put my sentiments quaintly… nothing changes.  His words impress more deeply upon me each time I lift his pages.  With each passing moment of my life, his literal life seems to become a greater mirror of mine.  Even if you have never missed and longed for someplace so violently that even in your unconscious dreams it brings a blunt and wakeful pain to your heart… his words are worth your while. 

“You found the earth too great for your one life… But it has been this way with all men… You have faltered, you have missed the way… And now, because you have known madness and despair… We who have stormed the ramparts of the furious earth and been hurled back, we who have been maddened by the unknowable and bitter mystery of love, we who have hungered after fame and savored all of life, the tumult, pain, and frenzy, and now sit quietly by our windows watching all that henceforth never more shall touch us—we call upon you to take heart, for we can swear to you that these things pass.”

The man knew how to pull a pen across a page- and make it last, make it momentous.  It is all very real, very true.  He does not mimic… for there are mortal recollections and emotions more memorable than pure sadness that only those who have left their true and beloved home—left it against their better judgement—have felt.  It is a unique pain, a different yearning.  A desperation unknown before that first foolish, weary step.

“…it was silly, anyhow, to feel as he did about the place. 

But why had he always felt so strongly the magnetic pull of home, why had he thought so much about it and remembered it with such blazing accuracy, if it did not matter, and if this little town, and the immortal hills around it, was not the only home he had on earth?”

It’s not depressing; though I know it may seem tiresome.  It is rather, a companion to lonesome wanderers.  A textual beacon from the past that has ceased to fade.  Will never fade so long as there are restless fools such as myself who act with stubborn insistence upon a sporadic and momentary urge to move.  A mistaken epiphany leads dreamers and wanderers much further into solitude with such unceremonious brevity that it is years before one can even begin to notice they are no longer home; that they have left, and kept moving.  It is quite a time before one realizes that the faces surrounding are not the same, the streets have changed their course, the music sings of foreign loves; Time has passed, the past is now your future. 

“…and he had an instant sense of something re-found that he had always known—something far, near, strange, and so familiar—and it seemed to him that he had never left the hills, and all that had passed in the years between was like a dream.”

Ironically, the restless wanderer has kept stagnant while the immovable past has fled.  As long as there are those who once believed that love was something that one could do without, as long as we— the simply ridiculous and clearly delusional—continue to flee, his Homeric lamp will burn.

“…Must the beggar on horseback forever reel?”

“All he knew was that the years flow by like water, and that one day men come home again.”

 

*

 

 

 

Havisu Falls

I feel the urge to share this hidden spot.  Because it may just be the place you’re looking for but have never known. 

For those of you who hike, backpack, camp or just genuinly like to get away… Go Here.  It’s majestic, secluded, dramatic and beyond breathtaking.

This is Havisu Falls.

It is NOT Lake Havisu.

It’s this unbelievable phenomenon in the middle of the desert.  Located in the Havisuapai Indian Reservation, in North Western Arizona.

This is the bottom West end of the Grand Canyon.  And that above is a waterfall in the desolate South West desert. There are two; below is the big one, Mooney Falls. 

* You can climb down a “ladder” to get to the shore of this one.*

This is real.  Real in every way.  

There is no electricity.  There is no connection.

The Supai residents here still have thier mail delivered by donkey. 

At night it is only you, the sand and the sound of flowing water.

It is a 10 mile hike down into the canyon to get to the village.  Leave early and it’s a truly pleasent adventure.  If you don’t, well, literally you will be hiking through the desert in the middle of the day. 

We all know how smart that is. 

Along the way, you’ll come across some pretty amazing sights.  And you may even see some wild horses.

From there it’s about another mile or so to get to the waterfalls and the camping areas.  But when you see that carribean blue water pouring out of sunburnt canyon walls, you’ll forget that you just trecked through overheating desert.

* The intense Green-Blue of these waters is caused by Travertine.  Surreal.*

Camp sites are located along the gently flowing streams that flow down from the falls.  There are beaches to relax on by the falls, and infinate pools to wade around in.

NOTES:

• It’s the DESERT.  Don’t forget that.
• The TEMPERATURE rises quickly as you descend.  By a lot.
• In the desert you need WATER, yes, but you also need sugars and salts.  This is important, make sure you have GATORADE or something like it along with your water supply.
• The HEAT does not go away at night.  Be prepared for this.
• Those holes in the sand, are SNAKE holes.  Try not to pick the campsite that is in abundance of them.
• The water is COLD.
• You and all your belongings WILL be covered in orange sand when you leave.  Don’t try and fight it.
• Start out EARLY.  DO NOT attempt to hike down after Noon.  And 4p.m. heat is worse than you imagine.
• There is a helicopter available for a very low price.
• You can also arrange to ride a horse down.
• Or you can have your belongings brought down by horse and make the hike on foot. After hiking down with my backpack, personally, this would be my preferred method next time.
• Remember that 10 miles down the Canyon is not the same as 10 miles up the Canyon.  Double your liquid.
• Reserve a campsite BEFORE you go.  It’s quite inexpensive.
• A raft is a nice thing to have to float around on.  Find a light one you can blow up when you get there.
• Don’t forget your swim suit!
  
  

 Because there’s no better day to be at the bar.

OK So here’s the new 2009 link for the new Proposition 317 petition. 

CHEERS!

 Random thought of the early morning

I have never loaned a book that I ever got back. 

Handing one over is basically writing a check to the other person for the amount of the book.

Why?

Does this happen to everyone, or do I just happen to have one-way book karma?