Old News 2020 Seems just like last year...

Don't forget to visit Jack And Misty's Important Links!

(Go on... you know you want to...)

Our CD catalog:www.elvinsystems.com/jm/catalog.htm
YOUTUBE:www.youtube.com/jackandmisty
FACEBOOK:www.facebook.com/jackblanchard.mistymorgan





Misty welcoming friends to our motorhome.
NEW JACK AND MISTY LOGO UPDATE! Thanks to Ann Collins for smoothing the edges! :) --Jack and Misty. (P.S.: Click on logo to see it at full size! -- Jerry.)

December 19th, 2020...

Thousands of readers around the world.

NOTHING IS OVER LIKE CHRISTMAS. Nothing is over like Christmas. Months of anticipation, and then it's gone. Try to hold on to it and it slides away like this morning's dream. People who tell us that it's a pagan holiday, just because it's near the winter solstice, may not realize what an intrusion that is upon our enjoyment. We can each bring our own thoughts to the season, and make it our personal non-pagan celebration. It's in the spirit of the beholder. It's hard to work up the spirit here in Florida, but we give it a shot every year. Misty decorates a tree, and puts Christmas stuff all over the place. We listen to Christmas music with the air conditioning on and with palm trees lurking in the yard. Television doesn't help, with reports of all night sales, talking heads urging us to be good consumers, stranded travelers sleeping in airports, and carolers singing "Happy Honda Days". I toss up futile prayers for snow here in the subtropics, but this is the time of year when we just get a cheap imitation of early autumn. A couple of trees around here get a touch of red, and I go look at them. I get sentimental about Christmas, probably because I had real Christmasy holidays years ago, with folks who are no longer with us, and my childish subconscious thinks it will happen again. I think next year I'll write a letter to Santa, and ask him for one more snowfall in Buffalo, where the night is silent, the homes are warm, and Christmas is strong in the air. Copyright © Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


December 12th, 2020...

Thousands of readers around the world.

MERRY CHRISTMAS ANYWAY. Merry Christmas all you Christians, Jews, Muslims, atheists, rich, poor, and let's not leave out the fringe weirdos. Merry Christmas I say, to all humans, dogs, cats, and miscellaneous living items. Christmas has been my favorite holiday my whole life, and I want to share it with you. You don't have to buy me anything. Join me in toasting old Saint Nicholas, if he will fit in our toaster. (Haha. I get jolly at Christmas.) Cry with me at the ending of "It's a Wonderful Life". Let's boo and hiss together at Old Mr. Potter. We'll get sentimental listening to the Christmas carols at Walmart. What time is Charlie Brown on? Let's all pray for snow even if we're in Florida. Enjoy new times with old friends. If we don't have any friends, let's make some. Find somebody who looks down in the dumps, give them a big smile, and toss them a "Merry Christmas". If they just look at you funny and walk away, so what? There are other people waiting to be annoyed with our Christmas glee. Think about your home town, and try to recall the good times. I think about Buffalo this time of year. Not necessarily the real Buffalo, but the one that only I remember. That's where I got all my Christmas spirit to begin with, shopping downtown... a lost art, and trimming the scotch pine with people we loved more than we knew at the time. I laugh and cry a lot as Christmas approaches. I even cry at commercials. I laugh easily at funny remarks, especially mine. It's embarrassing but I don't much care. Ten minutes after the joke has slipped into the past, I think about it and start laughing again. Everybody tries not to notice, and the more I try to stifle it, the more I laugh. Tears come out of my eyes. Christmas makes me weak. So, whatever your religion or non-religion is, Merry Dang Christmas! You don't have to go to church if you don't want to. I probably won't, but I might watch Midnight Mass on television, and I'm not even Catholic. It's all part of the pageantry that is my holiday, and I plan to eat too much, mellow out, and enjoy the feeling. Call me on your holiday and I'll join you, but listen... What I'm saying to you right now is this: "Merry Christmas to all good people." Copyright © 2007 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


December 5th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

CHRISTMAS ENOUGH. ‘Twas the night before Christmas and all through the park, One trailer was leaky, and covered with tarp. On the wall were two cards, where you taped them up. By the light of a candle, I poured us a cup. Our tree on the table, was scrawny and thin… A foot and three quarters of plastic and tin. The carolers sang on our clock radio, It’s the thought, after all, that counts, as you know. The snow on the window, the smell of the pine, Were sprayed from a can, but we didn’t mind. No money, no shopping, no last minute rush. Christmas with love is Christmas Enough. * * * * OLD SONGS AT CHRISTMAS. Some of my friends don't like Christmas music. I love it. I can understand how Christmas songs seem corny to some people, but they have melody, harmony, and words, which is more than a lot of today's music. Anyway, I love Christmas music for completely different reasons. This is the most emotional season of the year, and those songs bring back powerful memories, both happy and unhappy, but packed with emotion. The ghosts of past Christmases often blur my vision in December. My family was a partying bunch... each holiday an excuse for all the relatives to get together and have a special time. Even my grandparents would dress in outrageous Halloween costumes, and on July 4th's we would drive the neighbors nuts with fireworks. New Years Eve meant champagne and "blind robins". .. and on and on. Later in my life I experienced some very rough Christmases, some even tragic, and also some wonderful times with Misty and the small family we had left. Every experience at this time of year is magnified and extreme in my memory. Hearing the old songs at Christmas makes me happily sad. They evoke feelings I don't even understand, and yet it's my favorite time of the year. My steady guy cracks right down the middle, and my sentimental guy takes over. "It's a Wonderful Life" was on TV the other night. We watched something else because we've seen it so many times. The show we were watching ended early and Jimmy Stewart was still on, so we decided to see the last hour of it. We both sat there like idiots with lumps in our throats and tears in our eyes as George Bailey got his life back. Christmas makes me weak, I guess. A good kind of weakness. Copyright © December 5, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


November 29th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE SUNSET TRAIN. He headed for the cashier's counter, hoping that the curtain rods he was carrying were the ones she wanted, when he saw the painting for the first time. He'd been in this store dozens of times but he'd never noticed those pictures before. He wasn't an art critic, but he knew he'd never seen anything like that train picture. The surface of the picture was textured to look like a genuine oil painting, and somehow that scene looked more real than life! The silver steam from the old engine glowing in the sunset, billowing against the yellow-blue-orange-pink sky, the brightly colored, but weather worn railroad cars, and the red caboose, so real you could almost step right into it. Each piece of gravel along the track, each clump of vegetation on the prairie was clearly defined, and cast a long late afternoon shadow. The mountains were a blue haze against the distant horizon. It was a painting you could stare at for a long time, finding details previously overlooked. A bell rang. The store was closing. On impulse he hurried to the customer service desk and put the picture on layaway, with five dollars that should have gone to overdue bills. He didn't know when he'd be able to manage the eleven-ninety-five balance. He paid for the curtain rods and went home, feeling a little guilty. * * * She stood back and looked critically at the curtains she'd hung. He told her that they made a big difference in the little apartment. She smiled and said that the curtains looked better than the trash cans in the alley. He held her and said he wished he could provide her with a better home, and she said that they weren't doing too badly for newlyweds, and that she believed in him. He didn't mention the money he'd foolishly spent on a picture of a train. Payday again, and another losing battle with arithmetic. If only a tree or a patch of grass could be seen from their window, it might raise their spirits. It would interrupt the drabness. He felt sorry for her, being stuck there all day. At least taking the bus to the factory everyday gave him a change of scene. These were his thoughts as he paid the cashier and waited for the large picture to be wrapped. He centered it carefully on the wall over the chair with the broken spring, and called her to come in from the kitchenette and take a look at the surprise. Wiping her hands on her apron, she glanced around the room until her eyes stopped at the explosion of color. She almost cried! It was like having a window to a valley locked in sunset. They held hands and stared at the painting until dinner almost burned. Years struggled by, and the broken spring chair was replaced by a new living room suite, complete with payment book. They moved several times in the course of their lives, first to a couple of larger apartments, then to a house in a suburban development, and finally back to another cheap apartment, where they were to spend their final years. The infirmities of old age often require a tightening of purse strings, but they weren't complaining. They'd been through rough times before. Through the years they'd managed to hang on to two treasures: the Sunset Train painting and their love for each other. It hit him hard when she passed away. Somehow, he'd always imagined he'd be the first to go. He wasn't prepared for the emptiness. Nobody ever is. He took the habit of talking to her, even though she was gone. He'd stare at the painting and go over old times. Sometimes he'd sit for hours in front of the television, but his eyes would wander back to the Sunset Train. He'd imagine that they were together in that valley, or riding on the train. The neighbors often dropped in to check on him. Conversations always gravitated to the painting. Several days passed before they noticed the mail and newspapers outside his door. Fearing the old man had died, and after getting no answer to their knocking and calling, the neighbors set their shoulders to the door and the old wood gave way. Finding no one in the apartment, clothes intact in the closets, and the TV left on, the neighbors notified the police of his disappearance. While the premises were being inspected, an officer commented to a neighbor, "Unusual painting in there! Realistic, I mean!" "Yeah," replied the other, "everybody remarks about that train picture." "No," said the policeman, "I'm talkin' about that picture of the valley and the sunset. There's a track runnin' through it, but no train." And he was right. The train was gone. Copyright © 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


November 21st, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

IN ONE YEAR AND OUT THE OTHER. Another year is quickly losing steam, because like toilet paper, life goes faster near the end of the roll. Even though we don't take autumn in Florida, the northerner inside me struggles through the annual November self inventory. I've been busier this year, but less creative. I've become our agent, manager, and promotion department, which doesn't leave time for writing songs or playing music... the things that I think are the essential me. I didn't know I was going to write that, but now that I've brought it to my attention, I plan to drag out the old keyboard and guitar and get back to basics. As soon as I finish this mastering project promised to a client. I'm going to write a song even if it's bad. I need the writing part. I need the music. I've been worrying about losing those ten pounds all year. Worrying has kept from gaining more than a couple of pounds. We don't know of any good bands playing around here, and we don't like those cheesy new movie theaters, so we went to the grocery store and back, and pigged out on Italian food and ice cream. The life of the recording artist is pure excitement. I've learned a few small things this year: 1. You can't own a computer. It owns you. 2. There seem to be a lot more people younger than I am, and less people older. 3. You can get immune to political news. I'm relieved...that the worst of the hot weather is behind us, and thankful...for no hurricanes at our house this year. I'm blessed... to have Misty as a life partner, and hopeful... that we make our music together for some more years. I'm lucky...to have so many helpful friends, many of whom I've never met face to face. 2020 may or may not be the best year of my life, but I'm glad to be in it. Copyright © November 21, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


November 14th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE CHRISTMAS TOWN. It was the day before Christmas. We were road tired and traveling westward through Illinois or Iowa... on our way to another show somewhere. We tried to cheer each other up, and said we'd celebrate our Christmas at a later date. The countryside looked like a Christmas card through the windshield of our motor home. Fine dusty snow was starting to whirl around. and the Interstate Highway was just about deserted. It began snowing harder. We needed a place to pull in for the night, but we hadn't seen anything open for miles. We started to get worried. It was getting dark, and the wind was blowing the snow into drifts. We pulled off at the next exit, but there was no sign of life except for an old barn. There was a wooden sign over the door, and Christmas lights were on inside. It turned out to be a little store with a few groceries, and some antiques for sale in the back. The owner took us to a little room where they kept boots and snow shovels. That's where we plugged in our electric line. Misty made a good deal... One night, two dollars. I dragged our small artificial Christmas tree out of the trunk. She had it trimmed and lit in about ten minutes. We'd been on a long hard tour and we didn't have any presents for each other, so we looked around at the antiques and things in the store. We picked out a few gifts, but we didn't have any way to gift wrap them. Two or three at a time people from the town came into the store, stomping the snow off their shoes and saying "Merry Christmas" to each other. They were smiling and friendly and offered to take our gifts back to their homes and wrap them for us. When they came back a while later our presents looked beautiful. They brought along some cookies and eggnog, and we had a little party with these unusual strangers. We wanted to cancel all our future bookings and live here. In the morning we woke up to snow covered cornfields and a sparkling forest of winter trees. An old rusty plow and a wagon were half buried in the snow outside our window.. It was a perfect Christmas. We don't even know the name of the town, or which state it's in. And we haven't been able to find it on any map. We just think of it as our Christmas Town. Maybe it's in the twilight zone. Copyright © November 6, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


November 6th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE WEIRD GIG. I was part of a teenage musical trio. Ronny Loft played upright bass. His brother Jerry played rhythm guitar. They both sang better than I did, but I played better. I was the piano guy. We were all acoustic. We could play in a blackout. The Loft brothers were Mohawk Indians. Their extended family mostly lived on what was then called The Six Nations Reserve, in Canada. I spent some time with them on the reservation. We leaned toward Western campfire music, pop, and boogie. We often played for free, because we were learning, and loved to play. When the brothers sang together it reminded me of the Mills Brothers. Being the dark ages, our only sources of music were AM radio and records. I'm glad we didn't have karaoke tapes and echo effects, because we responded to each other. We interacted. That's missing when you use artificial music. The tape doesn't change. It's the same every time, and it's somebody else's music. Our music was rudimentary, but pretty good, and it was our own. One year I went to stay on the reservation with them for the Fourth of July horse races, a big event up there. I never asked why Canadian Indians would celebrate our Independence Day. Jerry and Ronny's relatives ran the General Store, the Post Office, and the funeral parlor, all in one big rambling house. We all had trouble sleeping because we were excited. We were young and on an adventure, especially me. In the middle of the night, the guys tiptoed into my room and said to come with them. They wanted to show me something. We sneaked down the creaky stairs, not wanting to wake up the whole house. With a flashlight, they led me to a strange old musical instrument: an ornate wooden pump organ. They showed me how you pump the air with foot pedals and played the keyboard with your hands. I started playing a boogie, very softly. I looked up and the guys were gone! In a few minutes they returned with their instruments and we started jamming. I looked up again a few minutes later and there were enough Indians in the room to make a John Wayne movie. They were all smiling, clapping, and tapping their feet to the beat. We played for over an hour. The lights had not been turned on, just a couple of candles somebody had lit. We ended to a big round of applause, and somebody hit a light switch. I blinked at the brightness, and when my vision cleared I looked around. This is what I saw: We had been jamming in the funeral home, and there were two dead bodies in there! I'd been jamming on the funeral organ! That's just one of the weird gigs I've played. Copyright © November 6, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


October 31st, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

A 1971 VISIT TO DISNEY WORLD. (From my newspaper column, 1971. Note: 1971 was Walt Disney World's first year.) Saturday afternoon, through no fault of my own, I found myself being patted on the butt by the Disney turnstile. I had already been forced to memorize "Goofy 746-118B" under threat of never seeing my car again. I tried to get back out through the turnstile, but Misty and our guest took me by the ears, and dragged me, sobbing, through the archway to The Magic Kingdom. The music of a 200 piece rock band was being magically forced through a 3-inch loudspeaker. At a lunch counter we stood in line for a while, and we were abruptly awakened by a teenage counter girl. She glared at us silently, waiting for our order. They must have been out of Mouseburgers, because all she gave us was a small cardboard box containing three small cardboard hamburgers. "The one on top is 'without sauce'", she said. That was true. None of them had sauce. I was startled to find she could talk. At the first big show, there were several hundred of us waiting in the theater lobby We were jockeying for position. A young hostess with the microphone had been waiting for this. 'LAY-DEEZ AND GEN-TUL-MEN", she screamed into the P.A. system, which was set at number ten. A lady in front of me rolled her eyes and collapsed to the floor. To my left, a businessman clutched his chest and flung himself over the railing. A child's voice cried, "I didn't know the Lord was a lady!" "YOU ARE NOT GOING ANYWHERE WITHOUT ME, so you might just as well stand there and listen to what I have to say!" The meek dropped like flies all around us. "When I see fit to open the doors you will quickly move into the theater and hurry to the opposite end of the room, dragging your dead and wounded! There will be no eating, drinking, smoking... no talking, no flash cameras, no holding hands, and no giggling! All right! You may now march into the auditorium in a quiet orderly manner. We hope you enjoy our presentation." Inside, another starlet took over. She was good, but she couldn't top her ugly sister out front. She sort of sang her speech: "Immediately upon the conclusion of our presentation you will exit swiftly to the left of the herd. Do not touch or lean on the railings! They were only constructed to maintain dicipline... blah blah blah oral hygiene and regular dental care." After the show I said: "How 'bout a nice relaxing boat ride back to the parking lot? Fun's fun, but I'm worn out!" The ferry captain waited till we were away from shore to do his number on us. He never once stopped mumbling over the mike, which sounded like a giant toilet paper tube. Not one word was in any known language. It sounded like a Winston Churchill speech played backwards. His volume was a couple of decibels above the point of pain, and passengers were leaping ecstatically overboard. At the main exit we were divided into squares, and loaded onto people movers. The conductress of the tram was armed with a microphone. "IF THERE ARE MORE THAN FIVE OF YOU IN A SEAT, WE ARE NOT GOING TO MOVE!' A man behind me said: "We just got here and they're threatening us already!" I said; "Yes. Isn't it great?" "IF THAT CHILD IS MORE THAN THREE YEARS OLD, HE WILL HAVE TO GET OFF YOUR LAP!" I got off Misty's lap. "If you drop a package, a baby, or if your hat blows off we are NOT allowed to stop!" The tram began to move. "We will pass throught the Happy, Dopey, Grumpy, and Freaky sections of the parking area! We have twelve thousand cars parked here, and if you miss your section we can NOT take you back! So, Lots o' luck. Ha ha." "This is our first stop. Grumpy people exit quickly to the driver's right! Goofy people exit to the left!" We exited to the right. We were grumpy people. Copyright © 1971, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


October 25th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

A LETTER FROM AN OLD FRIEND. I get mail from amateur songwriters, many of them past acquaintances who feel something is due them for associating with me before I was of any practical use. I got one like this a while back. Notes in parentheses are mine. "Hi, Jack! Sorry about taking so long to answer your letter (Note -- Eight Years), but we've had company from out of town. We were just talking about you the other day after we noticed your albums in the stores up here. You look great, even with the long hair and strange clothes. Have you put on weight? (Note - He just killed any chance of a favor.) "Do you remember the cold winter night I gave you a lift down to the gas station to get kerosene for your heater after the gas and electric companies had shut you off? And I'd have run you all the way back home through the blizzard, except for the smell of the kerosene. You know I would have. "Well, you finally made it, didn't you? Everybody up here always knew you would. We were just kidding when we used to call you a no-good bum. HA -- HA. We were just trying to put some spunk into you, and you'll have to admit -- IT WORKED! "Since you are an old friend I am giving you first crack at the enclosed original song. If you don't record it I'll have to send it to Johnny Cash, so let me know right away, and don't worry, it's copyrighted. "Your old kerosene buddy, Robert." The following is the hit song he enclosed: "WHEN I'M GONE (or THE GOODBYE SONG) "When I'm gone - you'll find that I won't be here anymore When I go - I'll say goodbye and walk out thru the door Then you'll see it won't be me that's with you as before When I'm gone - you'll find that I won't be here anymore. "When I'm gone - if you're alone, you'll know that I'm not here When I go - if I am far away, you'll know I won't be near Then you'll see it won't be me that's with you as before When I'm gone - you'll find that I won't be here anymore. (CHORUS) "Goodbye - Goodbye - I think you ought to know It doesn't mean I'm going to stay It means I'm going to go Goodbye - Goodbye - The sun comes up at dawn You'll find I won't be here no more, Honey, when I'm gone." Here's the answer I wrote to my dear old friend: "Dear Robert, "In unbiased critical appraisal I must admit that your lyric has a certain steadfastness, not leaving the slightest worry in the listener's mind as to the protagonist's departure. "It drives home the point and makes its title known with a repetitiveness highly valued in the commercial field. Its simplicity is to be complimented as well as its portrayal of a situation in which each of us has found himself at one time or another. "The first-person style and identifiability of the characters only strengthen the argument that you have invested the total of your talent in this one grand effort. "In consideration of the above, and in sincere gratitude for the kerosene you took me to get, I cannot, in good conscience, stand in the way of you and Johnny Cash. Please send it to him and take all the credit for yourself. Don't mention me at all. Heaven knows you deserve it. "Your old friend, Mr. Blanchard" Copyright © October 25, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


October 18th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

To our readers at home and around the world: As you are, we're busy trying to cope with this pandemic, so we're sending you a few column reruns, the cheerier ones. Love, Jack & Misty. THE WORLD NEEDS A LAUGH. My father said, "I'd like to purchase a chicken." The farmer said, "Want a pullet?" Dad said, "No. Just put it in a bag. I'll carry it." "Bewitch me, darling." "I'll bewitch you in a minute. I'm busy." They can keep me in prison but they can't keep my face from breaking out. Back when we had the million-seller Tennessee Birdwalk there were only a million people in the world. In an old theater that had mice, Misty said, "Down-on-their-luck show mice." SONG. "They tried to sell us egg foo young." COUNTRY SONG. "Cranky, I'm Cranky for feeling so lonely." WARNING: Bears can go 35 mph... Faster if they're in a car. There's a fly in here! I thought this was a No Fly Zone! It's sunny, beautiful. and in the 50s here in Florida. Makes me feel almost alive! Our car only makes left turns. I'm never gone long. HEARD ON THE ARK: "All hens on deck!" EXCITEMENT IN A SENIOR COMMUNITY... The unexpected pregnancy. MY NEW INVENTION... The Suppository Gun. MY SELF-HELP BOOKS... "The Power of Positive Whining. "Build a Mechanical Squirrel in Your Garage." THE LIMO. Misty and I once bought a raggedy old limousine for $90. We needed transportation and would rather look eccentric than poor. To add to the effect, we colored it powder blue with house paint and a brush. At a gas station two tough guys said they knew the car and we owed them big money. We'd never been there before in our life! I floored it and sped away at four miles an hour. TO A HECKLER: "Why don't you get a toupee with a brain in it? A friend said, "I bet you never have a dull moment at your house." I said, "I'm having one right now." At Christmas our phone never stops ringing! It's those four calling birds! My dad had a mole on his nose. He had it tattooed to look like a fly. I'm getting my elbows pierced so I can wear cuff links with a short sleeved shirt. Aunt Bess could jump 3 feet straight up without bending her knees. My dad talked to himself a lot. Nobody knew it because he was a ventriloquist. A cashier demanded that I prove I'm NOT eligible for a senior discount. On Thanksgiving I enjoy catching squirrels and dressing them up as Pilgrims. No more chicken for me. The feet get caught in my throat. Misty said, "My hair looks like a drowned rat." I said, "No. It looks like a nice rat." She laughed. I'm heading for the roundhouse. They can't corner me there. Copyright © October 11, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


October 11th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

NEVER A DULL MOMENT. When I was about 21 I got a job in a big truck terminal. My job was to stand behind a long counter, take the truckers' paperwork, and search through thousands of pages of huge black books to find the tariffs for every state and county they went through, and charge them the taxes. I couldn't ever find them all so I started making up the numbers. Nobody ever said anything. THE DOG TELEGRAM... The dog said he wanted to send a telegram. The guy behind the counter pushed a form over to him, and the dog filled it out very carefully: "Bow wow wow. Bow wow. Bow wow wow.", and slid it back to the attendant who read it and said, "You are allowed 10 words for the same price. Would you like to add another 'Bow wow'?" The dog said, "Well, I could, but wouldn't it sound a little ridiculous?" Oboe players are crazy. That's a legend, or possibly a truth in the music field. They say it's because the constant buzz against the teeth vibrates the brain. I don't know how accurate this is because I've spent my whole life with musicians on all instruments, and about half of them are crazy. Who decides what is a weed and what is acceptable vegetation? I happen to like dandelions, hollyhocks, and other so-called weeds. I'm glad they don't do that with people. I'd probably be a weed. One night Misty and I checked into a lodge atop of a high mountain at Lake Arrowhead. We got up the next morning, pulled the cord on the drapes that covered a whole wall, and they opened onto a wall-sized picture window. Outside, the mountain forest was covered with two feet of new snow, without a sign of life, except for some rabbit tracks. The pine cones were as big as footstools. A real-life Christmas card... In California… in June. I was taking a milk bath. The cow slipped on the soap and broke my leg. THE LIMO... Misty and I once bought a raggedy old limousine for $90. We needed transportation and would rather look eccentric than poor. To add to the effect, we colored it powder blue with house paint and a brush. At a gas station two tough guys said they knew the car and we owed big money there. We'd never been there before in our life! I floored it and sped away at four miles an hour. I was a smart kid. I said, "I'm not getting in the van until I see the candy!" A little UFO landed on our birdhouse, scaring the crap out of a bird sleeping inside. Tiny green aliens climbed out and began speaking in earnest to the bird, who didn’t look happy. The aliens weren’t happy either, getting no response from the bird. They argued among themselves for several minutes, and then took off over the water tower. The lady said, "You know an animal was murdered to make that leather jacket!" I said, "I didn't know there were any witnesses. Now I have to kill you." The lady said, "I'll bet you never have a dull moment." I said, "I'm having one right now!" Thanks for the the positive responses to my humor. I'm touched. I always have been. Copyright © October 11, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


October 4th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

OCTOBER POETRY. "THE VOICE" We saw a candle in the window of the chapel in the graveyard, And it flickered as it slowly moved away. Was that the wind in the pipes of the old dusty organ, Or just howling down the hill among the graves? Then lightning struck the steeple and it rang the chapel bell That's been rusted into silence many years. Then the thunder rolled away and the organ starts to play, And we heard a voice that filled our hearts with fear. Then the voice called through the night so loud and clear, "Is there anything at all you'd like to hear? Though my bones are old and moldy I just love to pick them oldies. Is there anything at all you'd like to hear?" So we dug up some requests for him to try. We shouted, "How 'bout 'Speckled Bird' or 'Jambalay'?" He said "Maybe I'll ad lib a chorus on my ribs." Then the voice sang all the songs that made us cry. Well, the three of us, we sang the whole night long. He kept pickin' funky organ until dawn... Till the morning mist was rising on the lawn... When the sun came up, we knew that he was gone. Now the first red rays of sun begin to creep, And the shadows of the graves are long and deep. We smile and wonder when we'll hear that voice again... Then we close the lid and sing ourselves to sleep. Then we close the lid and sing ourselves to sleep. * * * HALLOWEEN SONG: "If I knew you were comin' I'd have baked a cat." Copyright © October 4, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. "The Voice" lyrics and music by Jack Blanchard. Copyright © and published by Jack Blanchard Songs (BMI). All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


September 27th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

To our readers at home and around the world: As you are, we're busy trying to cope with this pandemic, so we're sending you a few column reruns, the cheerier ones. Love, Jack & Misty. HOT LONG FOOT DOGS. Almost every morning when we wake up, I say something like this to Misty: "Do you come here often?" Today she said... "Not if I don't have to." She had some Strauss waltzes playing on a CD. I didn't comment. I like that music once in a while. After about ten minutes of Strauss' three-quarter time, she got up and changed the CD, saying... "I want some music where I don't have to count!" Anyway... A lot of people make me laugh: Stephen Wright, Bob Newhart, Mark Twain, Homer Simpson...The list is endless. But the one who makes me laugh most often lives right here. At first I thought it was a tendency toward spoonerisms, years ago, when Misty read a roadside sign to me as : "Hot long foot dogs", and "Look at the Clydes up in the skow!" (Clouds up in the sky.) After a while I began to notice the little smile she had when saying one of these things. She knows she's funny, but she doesn't care if people think she's mixed up. Mixed up like a fox! Over the years I wrote most of them down for posterity on the inside covers of legal pads. I now have hundreds of these which I plan to go through someday, to put her sayings into a book. In the meantime, here are a few I can remember: "He's watching me like I'm a hawk." "Bleeding like a stuffed pig". "Life is a three-way street." "Let the guy without sin pass the first stone." I said "Who's that singing?" She said "The Elderly Brothers." She once said to me: "You could charm the women right out of the trees." "Running around like a chicken with its hat off." We were mixing down a recording session and she picked out a little flaw. The engineer told her she could really hear well,and she said this: "Like a mink". Copyright © September 27, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


September 20th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE NEWS. Disease of the heart, Prices get higher, Porno called art, and your Ford is on fire. Sniffing of glue, And food that is bad for you, Chickens with flu, And cows that are mad for you. Heating oil, Global warming, Depleted soil, And tropical storming. Acid rain, Crashing planes, Crack cocaine, And shooting pains New commies and predators Tsunamis and senators Bombs that are nuclear, How high the gas is, Bombs that are nucular, Destruction of masses. Air pollution, prostitution, And how to interpret the Constitution Kids grades, Terrorist raids, and AIDS The hopeless and the hopers. The homeless and the dopers Take some pills, Learn new skills, Pay your bills, And write your wills. No wonder we've got the blues. It's THE NEWS! (Written in 2005.) Copyright © September 20, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


September 13th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

A WINTER MORNING. By the time you read this it will not be current, but I'm writing at the kitchen table on Christmas morning. It's chilly and the steam is swirling up from my coffee cup. Carolers are singing softly and there are church bells. I haven't opened the curtains yet but judging by the grayish light seeping through, it's a winter day. I haven't heard any snow shovels, but it's still early. I think I'll plug in the tree lights. Even through the closed curtains snow is visible in the corners of the windows. Holly and candles add color to the room and the silhouette of a Christmas wreath can be seen at the front window. As little as a couple of inches of overnight snowfall can blow into deep white drifts, so I feel around under the bed for my high top boots. The ones with the knife pocket. And I'd better get out my blue flannel shirt. The checkered one. That always feels good and warm on a winter's morning when the snow is squeaky cold. We'd better hurry. We're due at Alan and Vivian's house for Christmas dinner. Funny, I can't seem to find my high-tops,or the flannel shirt, or even my sheepskin mittens and earmuffs. Grandma probably put them away somewhere. I'll ask her. No, that's right, I can't ask her. She's been gone for a long time. Sometimes I forget that. I wonder what ever happened to those old winter clothes of mine. Seems like I had 'em just the other day. Or was it many years ago? Got to go now, we're late for dinner. Don't forget to turn off the tree lights and the air conditioner. And, oh yes, the stereo Christmas music. As I step out the door, presents under each arm, the white glare makes my eyes water. It could be snow. It really could! But I feel the coral rock under my feet as I step down from our motor home and I hear the waves slapping against the shore a few feet to my left. I wonder if they're having snow up home. Copyright © September 13, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


September 11th, 2020... 19 years ago today. Never forget, folks...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

AMERICA, SEPTEMBER 11TH, 2001. (Written on that day.) We're all zombies here today. We somehow find our way to the grocery store or post office like sleepwalkers. We stare blankly at the television in disbelief. People leaping from firey windows over a hundred floors up. A couple jumping hand in hand to their death. We've been getting messages of sympathy from friends around the world. Thank you. We're glad you're there, and we're glad you care. This is obviously a dark time for the American people. Our thoughts are with the victims and the people who love them. The airports are all closed. Folks who ordinarily rant and rave if their flight is delayed, seem to be taking it without protest, quietly seeking another way to get home. Too quietly. Like zombies. We worry about friends up north. We'll try to call tomorrow. Today is not a good time to overload the phone lines. In some different way, all of us are victims. At our house things are not normal. We are in a state of confusion, disbelief, sadness, and anger. Maybe we're in shock. I try to make my wife smile with the occasional light remark, but her regular smile is not working today. All our projects, so important yesterday, seem trivial. They're on the back burner for now. It's inspiring to see how people in New York and Washington risked their own lives to help each other. I'm proud of Americans tonight, and it's been a while since I've felt that way. Firefighters, police, and emergency workers are heroes. We saw Republicans and Democrats singing a spontaneous God Bless America...together. Touching. I hope they remember the feeling. It's the way it should be. Misty said she saw the young workers bagging groceries at the supermarket almost in tears. We, even as Democrats, are discussing hopefully that President George W. Bush might have the potential to be a Harry Truman. Right now we need somebody to "give 'em hell". This is not a day for political differences. We hope he kicks terrorist butts. The maniacs that committed these atrocities represent to me what evil is. I'm glad I'm not president. I'd probably bomb all the suspects and ask questions later. I know that's wrong, but we're mad as hell over here. At least I am. We've seen the pictures on TV all day, over and over, but the reality is still hard to grasp. We'll watch them over and over again... even after the television is turned off. Our country is strong. Our people are tough. I almost forgot that. We'll get through this, and even be stronger. In time things will be more like normal, but never quite the same. I never thought of myself as a super patriot, but tomorrow I think I'll go out and buy a flag. Jack Blanchard Copyright © September 11, 2001 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


September 6th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

NOT A LIVING SOUL. The back country road led to Cassadaga, the Spiritualist center. We turned right at the old hotel and threaded through the little lane that winds past the church and around Spirit Lake. Not a living soul was out in the afternoon heat. I'd been here before to do a series of articles, and was well past the stage of being spooked. But I was nervous today. I was here for my first "reading" with a medium. It wasn't ghost fear I had, but fear of letdown. I had tried to be open-minded. I just didn't believe in talking spirits. As our tires brushed to a stop against the high curb under the Spanish moss, I was preparing myself for disillusionment. I looked at the small countrified house and was already pre-hearing the vague, but tricky generalizations that fortunetellers are known for. I was going to have none of it! No table thumping either. First of all, I thought, if the medium does actually contact dead people, my dad, John, and my grandparents, Clair and Ethel, would surely try to reach me. I tried not to look suspicious as Mae Graves Ward led me into her pleasant little reading room, and invited me to sit in the old rocker in front of her desk. Before I sat down she said this: "John is here" "I know it's a common name", she apologized, "but there's a man named John here. Do you know him?" John then proceeded to recap our lives together, making comments on things I'd done since his departure. He joked around a little, in his way, and sent greetings to my mother, although he knew she wouldn't believe it. The sun came through the white lacy curtains as Mrs. Ward continued to doodle with a pencil on scrap paper, and cheerfully relay messages from the other side. "Did your father have a younger sister who passed away very young", she asked? I said no, a little embarrassed at her mistake. "Well", she smiled, "We can't win 'em all. This young girl is here anyway. She seems to be eleven or twelve years old, and her name starts with an 'Ro'. Maybe Roberta". "I don't know who she is", I said. She came a little too close for comfort with my grandparents. Right on the money. And she introduced a lot of other people. Most I recognized, a few I didn't. I left the five-dollar donation, said goodbye, and returned to the car in a daze. Misty asked how it went. I said, "I can't talk about it just yet. I have to try and digest all that just happened." The sun was setting and the fishing boats were coming in as we crossed the St. Johns River bridge, and I began to talk. And I went over it again later for my mother's benefit, as we sat around the dining room table. "But the medium missed a couple of things", I said. "For instance, she asked if Dad had a sister named Roberta who died young." "Her name was Rosie", my mother told me. "She died at twelve years old." Copyright © September 6, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission of the author.


August 30th, 2020... Hey, we started off the month with Christmas, why not end it with Halloween? :-) Here's Jack...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

To our readers at home and around the world: As you are, we're busy trying to cope with this pandemic, so we're sending you a few column reruns, the cheerier ones. Love, Jack & Misty. OUR HALLOWEEN ADVENTURE. It was Miami,1963, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, the closest the world had ever come to global nuclear war. Fidel Castro was a real threat, it was the night before Halloween, and Misty and I were young and foolish. The costume shop guy said this Halloween would be loaded with Castros, in fact he was completely sold out of Castro masks and trick cigars. I had already bought army fatigues and cap, black boots, and a realistic toy M1 rifle. Lack of a mask was not going to stop me. My early theater training went not for naught. (Not for naught?) I sought out a store selling stage makeup, (I sought not for naught.), and bought nose putty, black crepe hair, spirit gum, and tan pancake makeup. An hour later I looked exactly like Castro. I knew it was good when Misty didn't laugh. She just said "You ARE Castro!” Meanwhile, she had become a cowgirl. That was the point where we went nuts. I thought I WAS Fidel! I chewed my fifteen inch cigar and swaggered like a man in command. Tonight was just supposed to be a trial run, but it was too good to waste. We hit the Miami streets not knowing what havoc would be wrought (We wrought not for naught.). On that Halloween Eve, the world wasn't ready for a couple of premature screwballs. We burst through the door of a prominent nightspot and stopped the show. The emcee called me on-stage for an interview. I told them, with a thick accent, "I just came over to get my welfare check.", which may be the most conservative thing I've ever said. It was so much fun that we started making the rounds, winding up in North Miami Beach at 4 AM, bugging anybody we could find. I got out and hitchhiked, and cars made U-turns and went the other way. I lurked outside diners until somebody spotted me, then I'd disappear and let them try to tell the rest of the crowd. At one diner, four cops were sitting in a booth when I stood in front of the window. The other customers saw me and were laughing. When the police finally spotted me they went for their guns, and everybody laughed harder. I melted into the shadows. At 5 AM, exhausted, laughed out, and hungry, we went into an all night restaurant and waited for a waitress that never came. We eventually gave up and walked out, and were met at the door by a mob of police in uniform and plain clothes. Patrol cars with flashing lights were all over the place. I stuck my giant cigar in my mouth, hiked up my toy rifle, and we walked straight to our car. They watched us, unsure what to do. A detective tapped on the car window and I rolled it down. "I feel a little foolish", he said, "but please say something in English." I said, "Happy Halloween." He said, "We've had a lot of calls from citizens who swear they saw Castro." The next day the Miami Herald headlines read: “FIDEL STALKS MIAMI NIGHT!" I did TV interviews in full makeup, and they also interviewed the detective. He said we were nuts. But we weren't nuts for naught. Happy Halloween. Copyright © August 23, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission of the author.


August 23rd, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE TEAR. There's something about a photograph. Many people believe that having your picture taken steals some of your soul. I look at pictures of friends and relatives who have died, and I can see that soul, especially in the eyes, the expression, and even the body language. I have a picture of my mother taken at a holiday gathering during her later years. She was smiling, and seemed to be in the Christmas spirit. I've looked at that picture many times, but a few weeks ago, I enlarged it, and thought I saw something. I hit the 200% button, made it really big, and zoomed in on her face. The smile was still there, but in her eye I saw something unexpected: A tear. I sat back in shock and took a deep breath. What could she have been thinking? Was it a tear of joy or sadness? Did she know that it may be one of her last family moments? I asked her that question aloud, but the photograph didn't answer. I'm sure we were all enjoying the moment together, but at the same time, taking it for granted. You always think there will be many more. Now I realize my mother was not taking that moment for granted. I keep going back to look at the photo, even though it's burned into my mind, and my heart. When I discovered the tear behind her smile, I had tears to match hers. We spoke to each other beyond the limits of time and space. There is soul in a photograph. Copyright © August 23, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission of the author.


August 17th, 2020... Hey, folks! Just when you think something's over... it isn't. I'm referring to Jack's interview with Kliph Nesteroff, which I thought was done last week. Well... it wasn't! Kliph just posted Part Four yesterday. Click HERE to catch up!
August 16th, 2020....

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE AKRON MICE. Before we ever had any Jack Blanchard and Misty Morgan recordings, we were working hotels and lounges over the eastern states, booked by the ABC agency. The four week gig at Nick Yanko’s Greek restaurant in Akron was one of the worst. Nick loved the belly dancer, but treated our trio with no respect at all. He didn’t like us or our music because we were different… too original. At first we tried to please, but after a while we didn’t care, and stopped taking crap from Yanko and his headwaiter. It was a rough month. On the winter day we arrived in Akron, as always, we looked for a place to live. We finally rented a flat in an old two story house. Not a nice place. To get it we had lie to the landlady, saying that we would be there for a long time. When you’re in deep trouble there is no friend like a good lie. Our dog Brubeck was with us on the road. He was a sweetheart, and we trusted him alone while we were at work. Brubeck is one of the main animals in this story. Back at the club, the belly dancer would dance over to my drums, and play the bongos with her chest. Misty hated it, and got into a row with the owner, who told her she was just a peon and the dancer was the star. We had driven hundreds of miles to get there and couldn’t quit because we had very little money and a guitar player to pay. The next job in Albany, New York, was four weeks away. We just sucked it up and played our sets. The one friend we made in Akron on that trip was a tall dignified man who could have played a movie senator. He thought our music was great, and showed us all around town. He was a bookie. To add to the fun, I had to have two molars extracted by a dentist played by Boris Karloff. It turned into a nightmare he called “dry sockets”, and I overdosed on pain medication. Misty had to walk me around in the snow for hours that night to keep me from passing out, and maybe dying. When things are really bad, a little light entertainment can mean a lot. The house had registers in the floors for the furnace to send up warmth, and one night we noticed Brubeck staring intently down into a register, like the RCA dog looking into the Victrola horn. On closer inspection we heard little peeping sounds from down in the pipe system. Mice. The next day, Misty opened a kitchen drawer of pots and pans we didn’t use, and saw two little rear ends scurrying to hide… a skinny one and a fat one. The fat one was running behind, slipping around, not used to the exercise. We decided that we liked them. After all, we didn’t have a lot of friends in Akron. Misty started putting out a little dish of ice cream for them at night. It was always gone in the morning. A dog and some mice can get you through a bad time. Copyright © August 16, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


August 9th, 2020... Something New Department: The third and final part of Kliph Nesteroff's Illustrated Interview with Jack has just come online, and like the first two parts, it's a must read! You can find it here. (And scroll down this page if you missed the first two parts!)
Meanwhile...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

GHOST TOWN. Somehow we had missed the turnoff to the southern Ohio town. We went back to where the highway ought to be and found a narrow old road, with grass growing up through the cracks in the pavement. Could this be the main road to town that I remembered from my childhood? The sign said it was. The small city, after slumbering quietly for generations, had become a boomtown with the coming of a large chemical company. For a while the population grew with the influx of labor. The little corner taverns where old cronies had once exchanged worldly wisdom became juke joints as the town opened up. Housing became scarce, money became plentiful, and the townsfolk began a new habit... locking their doors. That was the last time I'd seen the place, and the only memory I had to go by. I was surprised at the desolate weeded over road that had once been a main artery. We turned off the superhighway and followed the rustic lane toward the town, trying to spot familiar landmarks. There were new shabby buildings, some vacant and boarded up. There were new gas stations looking aged and toothless with their pumps gone. I thought I recognized an old building... a certain curve in the road... but the clutter made it impossible to get my bearings. Drifting into town, I was relieved to see the railroad station and its surrounding park untouched by time. I had often told Misty about the good times at Aunt Bess' house, where I had spent a lot of my childhood. Now I was about to show her the actual place where it all happened, but at first I couldn't find it. It used to be right there on the corner of Fourth and Maple. Now there was just a rundown Frankenstein house hiding in the weeds. We parked while I stared at it for a long time. I had somehow forgotten... They're all gone. The whole smiling, partying family had died off one by one since I'd been gone. I knew it, I'm sure, but I’d blocked it out. The small grocery store across the street had a new name but looked the same. I went in and asked, but they didn't remember who had lived in that corner house. They didn't recognize my desperately mentioned names, and they were busy. Asking around. we learned that the chemical plant had laid off thousands of workers, and the government had built a superhighway that bypassed the town, so it went quietly back to sleep, somewhat the worse for wear. We searched the town all day, and it was sunset before we found anyone we knew. They were all together, as always. The squeak of the rusty wrought iron gate pierced the evening stillness, as we entered the old cemetery, and began brushing away weeds and dust, to peer at names on tombstones... names that clicked on familiar faces in my mind. We drove out of town and didn't talk for a while. Nobody said goodbye. If this was a ghost town these new people didn't know it. We were the ghosts. Copyright © August 9, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


August 7th, 2020... THE ILLUSTRATED INTERVIEW, PART 2. It's amazing, the research author Kliph Nesteroff has done. I'm reading about things in our life that I've tried for years to forget. :-D -- Jack (& Misty). Click here to catch up!
August 5th, 2020... A verbal and visual bio of Jack & Misty, by author Kliph Nesteroff. This is just PART ONE! I'm amazed and want you all to see it. There are things in it that were almost lost in time. Part Two will be published Friday. Click here to enjoy it! -- Jack.
August 2nd, 2020... Christmas in August? Why not? Here's Jack...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

To our readers at home and around the world: As you are, we're busy trying to cope with this pandemic, so we're sending you a few column reruns, the cheerier ones. Love, Jack & Misty. MERRY CHRISTMAS ANYWAY. Merry Christmas all you Christians, Jews, Muslims, atheists, rich, poor, and let's not leave out the fringe weirdos. Merry Christmas I say, to all humans, dogs, cats, and miscellaneous living items. Christmas has been my favorite holiday my whole life, and I want to share it with you. You don't have to buy me anything. Join me in toasting old Saint Nicholas, if he will fit in our toaster. (Haha. I get jolly at Christmas.) Cry with me at the ending of "It's a Wonderful Life". Let's boo and hiss together at Old Mr. Potter. We'll get sentimental listening to the Christmas carols at Walmart. What time is Charlie Brown on? Let's all pray for snow even if we're in Florida. Enjoy new times with old friends. If we don't have any friends, let's make some. Find somebody who looks down in the dumps, give them a big smile, and toss them a "Merry Christmas". If they just look at you funny and walk away, so what? There are other people waiting to be annoyed with our Christmas glee. Think about your home town, and try to recall the good times. I think about Buffalo this time of year. Not necessarily the real Buffalo, but the one that only I remember. That's where I got all my Christmas spirit to begin with, shopping downtown... a lost art, and trimming the scotch pine with people we loved more than we knew at the time. I laugh and cry a lot as Christmas approaches. I even cry at commercials. I laugh easily at funny remarks, especially mine. It's embarrassing but I don't much care. Ten minutes after the joke has slipped into the past I think about it and start laughing again. Everybody tries not to notice, and the more I try to stifle it, the more I laugh. Tears come out of my eyes. Christmas makes me weak. So, whatever your religion or non-religion is, Merry Dang Christmas! You don't have to go to church if you don't want to. I probably won't, but I might watch Midnight Mass on television, and I'm not even Catholic. It's all part of the pageantry that is my holiday, and I plan to eat too much, mellow out, and enjoy the feeling. Call me on your holiday and I'll join you, but listen... What I'm saying to you right now is this: "Merry Christmas to all good people." Copyright © 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


July 25th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

JACK'S SUNDAY FUNNIES. On my answering machine I say, "I'm sorry I'm not here right now. I'll try again later." Misty was sniffling. She said, "I'm all stuffed up!" I said, "By Elvis Presley." SONG TITLE: "If You Won't Leave Me I'll Find Somebody Who Will" My new book: "I WAS A COUNTRY SINGER FOR THE FBI." There's a bug flying around my face. I hate facebugs! My jokes are too old fashioned for our young hip friends. I've got to stop using references like "zoot suit", "Hubba hubba", "saddle shoes", "23 skidoo", and "Boop boopa doop". A side effect of my new medicine is Involuntary tap dancing. I had a dislocated shoulder, but later I located it. I can't wait to be a hundred and four. No peer pressure. A lady said, "Didn't you used to be somebody famous?" I said, "No, I used to be Jack Blanchard." THE CAR WON'T START. The good news: We'll always know where it is. Some people were looking at Misty. She said, "They're watching me like I'm a hawk." Misty says, "You're growing old with grace and Grace is getting sick of it." We couldn't afford to get the brakes fixed, so we had the horn made louder. We live on a one-way dead end street. I hate furbishers! You always have to get it redone. Strangers have the best candy. GOOD MORNING! GOOD MORNING! IT'S SUCH A BEAUTIFUL DAY! I leap out of bed, crack my toe on a chair, do a two minute pain dance, and pass out. I said. "I have hip pain." The doctor said, "Cool!" Misty said, "What do you want to do on your birthday?" I said, "Sit up." I didn't know Misty was outside when I locked the door. She knocked. I looked through the window at her and said, "Who is it?" WHAT I WANT SOMEBODY TO SAY AT MY FUNERAL... "I thought I saw him move." Copyright © July 25, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


July 19th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

GEORGE. The first time you meet George and spend a few minutes with him, you come away with conflicting impressions. He's brilliant. He's almost got sincerity down pat. He talks big money, but he has scotch tape holding his glasses together, and has to push his car to start it. He knows a lot about everything. He has some good sounding ideas. He can create excitement and mistrust at the same time, and the oddest part is this: You kinda like him. His idea the day we met him was a chain of restaurants called "Misty and Jack's Family Picnic". We had the name value at that time, and had been looking around for a way to exploit it. Of course George had that all figured out ahead of time. He knew what buttons to push. The decor would have white trellises, with artificial climbing vines, picket fences, flowers, etc.. He told us the seats should just be comfortable enough, but not so comfortable that people would sit around all day taking up tables. He had invented a way to make pizza in a microwave and have it come out just like oven baked. Naturally I came up with my usual type of suggestions, like a chicken place called "Chicken In A Casket". We could serve them on their backs in black cardboard caskets with a red lining. We could have plastic toothpicks made in the shape of little white crosses, and stick them in the top of the chicken for decoration. Unlike most mental cases, George had a sense of humor. He got the jokes. He had us set up a dinner party at our house to meet a potential investor, who just by accident was a psychiatrist. A high profile local shrink. The psychiatrist was nuts, too. All through dinner he psychoanalyzed me in front of everybody. He told me everything he thought I did wrong in my life, and why. He ruined the party showing off his shrink ability at my expense. I kept my cool for the sake of everybody else, but as the guests were filing out the door, I said to him: "I bet you don't get invited back to many parties". He was shocked, and asked me why I would say something like that. I told him how he had behaved, and he said a real shrink thing to me. He said: "You handle your hostilities well". I felt like pulling his lower lip up over his head. George was a loud talker. He'd be sitting with us at a restaurant table, conversing at a level that could reach everybody in the room... an actor playing to the back row. He used a lot of phrases like: My people... My people are loyal... We've leased the entire top floor for our offices, etc.. His office was a twenty year old Chevy. There was a recently divorced waitress working in our club, who talked a lot about marrying a rich guy. She was going to find one, you just watch. Goldie was money hungry a little more than most of us. She could hear George talking about his people and his big deals all the time. A month later they were married and moved into the most expensive penthouse in town. The marriage lasted about a month, until Goldie and the landlord realized that the rent check was going to bounce. George could discuss any subject like an expert. I'm sure his IQ was off the chart, but his IQ wasn't running the show. I wanted brochures: He knew the name of every fancy type font. He sent what he called a rough contract to me in Nashville. I took it to a friend, who was a law professor at Vanderbilt. He said the contract was excellent legal work. We didn't see George for a few years and then one night he was on the Channel 9 News. They interviewed him as a scientist who had invented a coffee substitute. I said to Misty, "I think that's Postum". Another year or two, and there he was, being interviewed on Channel 9 again. He was wearing a white lab coat, and was introduced as a local scientist who had discovered a particle smaller than an atom! They asked him how he had done it when nobody else could, and he said something so stupid I thought a hook would come out and pull him off. He said: "Nobody else was looking for anything that small." The reporter said, "That's amazing!" I ran into that psychiatrist a while later and asked if he knew what George was up to lately, and he said: "He's a pathological liar". Yeah, but we liked the liar better than the doctor. Copyright © July 12, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


July 12th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE LAST DAY. Simon Lescart woke up on his last day, plugged in the coffee maker, and sat down at the computer to check his email. There was the usual spam and forwarded jokes, which he deleted without reading. The sixth message subject line read "Final Notice", and the sender was an acronym, "T.P.T.B." He started to dump it as spam, but, for some reason he clicked it open. The message was this: "NOTICE OF EXPIRATION. "Dear Mr. Lescart, "This is an automatic reminder that your life expires at midnight tonight. Please do not try to reply to this email. Have a nice day. Very truly yours, The Powers That Be." Simon tried to reply anyway, but his email bounced back from the "unknown recipient". He knew it was most likely a stupid joke, but he couldn't stop thinking about it as he fought the city traffic on his way to work. What if this really was his last day? He'd often heard the old saying, You should live every day as if it were your last. What should a person do on his last day, anyway? Get drunk? Smell some flowers? Confess his sins? What? He didn't have much of a family to visit, just a brother up in Akron, and an ex-wife in Atlanta. They hadn't spoken in years. He couldn't think of any old sins offhand. Maybe he should commit some? He knew that the weird email was a fraud, but he decided not to go to work today, just in case. He pulled off at an exit and got back on the expressway going the other way, toward the ocean. This is nuts, he thought. He couldn't think of anything really important to do, befitting a persons last day on the planet, so he just sat on the beach for most of the day, and drank a few beers. He felt a little nervous, like a high school truant, but he also felt something else he couldn't define. Was it freedom? He had some guilt too for wasting the day looking at the ocean. Someone whose approach he hadn't noticed sat down beside him. The man was obviously homeless, in his ragged black suit and dirty torn sneakers. The man said, "Are you okay, friend? You look kinda lost." Simon said, "That's an odd word... 'Friend'. Now that you mention it, I guess I don't have any of those. Just a bunch of acquaintances." "Maybe you never really tried", said the man. "I've been pretty busy", said Simon. "You must have accomplished a lot of great things, being so busy", the man said. "No great things. Just keeping even. Paying the bills", said Simon. "Do you think you have any great things in you", asked the man? Simon said, "Maybe. I've been doing a lot of thinking. If I had the time I'd do things differently." That's when the chest pain struck and the world faded to black. He vaguely heard voices. "What Happened?" "Get back!" He was being carried. Then a blinding light above. People working over him. "We're losing him!" "Clear!" Then a huge shock and the world was gone again. The smiling nurse said, "Welcome back. You've had quite a day." "What time is it", he asked? "Almost midnight", she said. "I have to call my brother", he insisted. "We'll contact him for you. You can talk to him in a few days." "I wish I HAD a few days", he said! A cell phone rang. "That sounds like mine", he said. "Where is it?" "It's beside your bed, but you need to rest." He tried to reach for it, but she stopped him. "I'll answer it for you", she said. "Lie back down!" She said, "It's just a text message." "What does it say", he groaned? The letters on the cell phone screen said this: "EXTENSION GRANTED." Copyright © July 12, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


July 5th, 2020... A friend just found this and sent it to us. Happy memories. Jack & Misty To our readers at home and around the world: As you are, we're busy trying to cope with this pandemic, so we're sending you a few column reruns, the cheerier ones. Love, Jack & Misty.

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

A STRANGE NIGHT ON INTERSTATE NINETY. It had been a sunny winter day, about 34 degrees in the Dakotas. Snow from the night before had partially melted, wetting the road surface of Interstate Ninety. It was late afternoon and we were behind a tractor-trailer. Then the sun dropped below the horizon and the temperature fell, turning the asphalt into an ice-skating rink. All traffic on the road lost traction and slowed to three miles per hour, trying to maintain control. The roadway was crowned and vehicles were sliding slowly off the shoulder into the deep ditch and settling on their side, where the passengers could freeze to death during the night. Somehow I kept our motor home on the road, but I could feel the pull toward the ditch. Then the eighteen-wheeler ahead of us began a 180 degree turn, like a slow-motion ballet, until the truck driver was looking directly at me from his windshield, about ten feet away. Then the big rig coasted sleepily off the shoulder and settled into the snowy ravine, facing backward. I was amazingly alert at that point, hands tightly on the wheel and foot carefully off the brake. Misty shouted, "There's an exit and a KOA sign! Try to get off!" I said, "All the campgrounds are closed up here in the winter." She said, "At least we'll off this nightmare." With some careful sliding around and correcting, I managed the exit ramp and found the RV park. I couldn't believe it! They were open! I had never found a northern campground open this time of year, because the water freezes up. We went inside the lighted building, and they told us that they had ice-breakers on their water lines on each site. The ice-breaker looked like a pump handle. You lift it up and force it down and it cracks the underground ice, and the water comes out. We hooked up our water and electricity, and Misty had a good idea. She wrapped an electric blanket around our water hose and plugged it in. It kept the hose from freezing up during the night. We could see the flashing lights out on the Interstate, where rescuers were getting people out of their cars and trucks, and taking them to shelter, some to the heated KOA building, where they were given hot drinks and food. There wasn't enough traction to pull the vehicles out of the ditch, so they were saving the people, and would get the cars and trucks the next day, if the ice melted. Misty and I had everything we needed in the motor home, but we went inside to be with the rescued people, and talk about the ordeal we'd just been through. The television news reported that hundreds of travelers were being rescued from their stranded vehicles. Inside the campground building it was an impromptu winter party, with strangers in the fellowship of being unexpectedly alive. Copyright © July 5, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


July 3rd/4th, 2020... "Hey, baby, it's the 4th of July..." - Dave Alvin. 4th of July, Buffalo, 1950's. Have a safe one, folks! - Jerry.
June 28th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

CECIL. Back in the Dark Ages we bought a Basset Hound puppy. and named him Cecil. He was the cutest dog we'd ever seen and could have had his own TV show. He would climb up on a table to look out the window, knocking over a lamp and a vase. If one of us would try to get him down from the table he'd bite. He bit the kids and he bit Misty. Misty said, "You don't bite the hand that feeds you!" When we moved from Miami to Key West, Cecil went with us. He wasn't satisfied with the accommodations and tried to destroy the trailer one bite at a time, so when we went to work each night we tried putting him in the bathroom with food, water, and toys. Cecil didn't like toys and never played. He also didn't like the bathroom and systematically took it apart. First he chewed up the bottom of the door, but the hole wasn't big enough so he climbed up on the sink and turned the water on. He thought the mirror was a window. He pooped in the sink, walked around in it and used it to decorate the mirror. When we got home he looked at us with disdain and started coughing just to punish us. The next day we took him to a vet. He told us the coughing was from howling all night while we were gone. An employee at the club where we were playing said that she knew the mayor and that he would take the dog. She came and got Cecil the next day. He walked away with her and never looked back. She later said that the mayor had to let the dog sleep with him to stop the howling. So Cecil slept with the mayor and took a social step up. I think that all the time he lived with us he wondered who we were. Copyright © June 28, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


To our readers at home and around the world: As you are, we're busy trying to cope with this pandemic, so we're sending you a few column reruns, the cheerier ones. Love, Jack & Misty.

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

HOW I INVENTED THE CHEESEBURGER. In the late 1950s, before I met Misty, I was part of a teenage Pop vocal quartet called The Dawn Breakers. We were on Coral Records, a subsidiary of Decca. Our biggest record was a song I wrote titled: "Boy with the Bebop Glasses". The B-side was "The Things I Love". As a result of the airplay, an agent in Buffalo named Harry Ricci booked us on a Canadian tour, up around the Northern Ontario mining country. I remember two of the towns were Sudbury and Timmons. They were the biggest places. It's probably completely modern now, but at that time it looked more like the nineteenth century. It was an adventure. It seemed that every town had a theater, and that's where we put on our show. One was a long- closed movie house, and for some reason the stage was unusable. We had to do our show from the orchestra pit. At rehearsal the first day I plugged in my guitar and amp and got semi-electrocuted. The orchestra pit was the lowest point in the building and all the dampness gathered in that part of the cement floor. Plugging in my guitar was like using a toaster in the bathtub. Somebody brought a cardboard box for me to stand on to break the ground. It worked, and we went ahead with the rehearsal. After the first song the theater manager walked up to me and said, "Sounds great, Jack", and put his hand on my arm, and we both got zapped. We were a wholesome quartet, appealing to teens. but for some reason the agent booked a stripper to open for us. She went as far as topless and was all set for more when a lot of cops stormed the stage, wrapped her in a blanket and got her off stage. We didn't see her after that, much to our disappointment. At another theater, for the price of admission you got our show and a Jerry Lewis movie. There were no dressing rooms, so they hung a light bulb behind the movie screen and we changed there. We could see the movie in reverse on the back of the screen. We heard the crowd laugh at Jerry Lewis, but whenever the screen dimmed down the laughter took on a different tone. With the light bulb shining on us, they could see us right through the screen running around in our underwear. After the first matinee we went out to get something to eat at a little diner around the corner. I'd been on a cheeseburger kick for several months and that's all I wanted. The waitress said, "I don't think we have that". I asked if they had hamburgers. She nodded, and I said, "Just melt some cheese on top of it." She looked nervous and said she'd have to go ask the owner. She came back and said, "He's afraid you won't like it." I said, "I'll love it! Please! Just give it a try." And I did love it, even though it was served on toast. The owner, an elderly Chinese man, came out from the kitchen to ask me if it was okay. I told him it was the best I ever had. After the evening show we headed for the same diner. As we approached it we saw a large sign in the window. The sign said this: "CHEESEBURGERS". Copyright © 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


June 7th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

REPORT FROM AN OLD HURRICANE. August, 2004. It has been a pretty tense 24 hours here in Central Florida. Charley was a category 4 hurricane and had its eye on us, so we threw each other into garbage bags, along with our most prized trash, and checked into the Bates Motel around the corner. We watched the storm reports and ate junk food right up until it was getting ready to hit us. Then the power went off, along with the TV, A/C, and our sense of decorum. The wind was howling, and electrical transformers exploded all around. We had bought a little battery-operated television, but we couldn't get any batteries, so we stared at the portable radio, by candlelight. The room temperature was rising fast. On the radio they said that Charley was tearing up our town. We didn't look out the window. Things were banging on it. We later found out they were shingles and parts of trees. About an hour later the worst was over, and we tried to call our neighbors, but the motel phones weren't working, and our cell phone battery was low. We wondered if we had a home to go back to. We stood in the open motel room door with our arms around each other and watched the last feeder bands blow things around. The frogs had started saying Budweiser which Misty says is a sign that the storm is over. I acted as if I believed her. Finally we locked the door to keep out the bad guys, and tried to get some sleep. The motel windows don't open. The first things we noticed were: It was hot... The air was still and it was too quiet, except for the obligatory motel neighbor that likes to slam doors all night. We turned the radio on, and after searching through a lot of hip hop and perky DJ's, we found the hurricane reports again. They helped us sleep a little. Today we came home and our place looks like a spilled ashtray. The good news is: Our power is on, and we can live here with tarps over the roof until help comes. There is also some other damage, but we're alive and in air conditioning. Thanks to all who called to see how we're doing. Guess what... I just heard thunder. Copyright © 2004 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


May 31st, 2020....

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

GOING HOME. In the mid-1970s we took a trip back to our home town, Buffalo, New York. Somebody had been rearranging the scenery. First, I missed the arching elm trees that were wiped out by Dutch Elm Disease. Those DAMN Dutch! Buffalo without the majestic elms was like seeing your grandmother in her underwear. There were little new trees being held up by sticks and wire. I hoped I would live long enough to see them full grown. We were driving our motor home and stayed at a KOA on Grand Island, a big chunk of land in the Niagara River that was rural in my childhood, but was now looking suburban. The temperature was in the low 40's, and the wind across the island was fierce. Accompanied by my old buddy Bob Egan and his girlfriend Mary Lou, we made the rounds of the nightspots and dayspots. I noticed that people had an obsession with "improving" pianos. Most of the grand old upright pianos had been cut down in an attempt to make them into spinets. It didn't work. The shape always came out sort of hunchbacked. They stuck to it, though, painting them with pink or white enamel, and putting mirrors over the keys. I could never play a piano with mirrors over the keys. I can't stop watching the hands in the mirror. It's like trying to talk with an echo on the telephone line. Each night we started out at a Grand Island tavern built into the downstairs floor of an old house. The large screened porch covering the front of the building had storm windows up. It was late autumn, and no place for sissies. The Roast Beef sandwiches on Weck, a Buffalo specialty, were perfect. That's about all I ate while in town. The tavern had an old upright piano, that was a bit out of tune and was missing some ivories. It looked as though it needed some Ragtime, so we played some every night. We also went to Dinty Moore's Restaurant at Elmwood and Kenmore Avenues, where they had a piano bar and a dance floor. Misty danced with Bob, who looked funny in my huge brimmed cowboy hat. That's the first time we've been bar hopping in a 38 foot motorhome. In the daylight, we took in Delaware Park, the zoo, the houses where we used to live, some old landmarks All things wood must be covered with Formica, and a big picture window must be gouged out of every house front. Crinkly shingles of various colors were tacked on to houses I used to like. The solid wood counter on the upstairs porch was now wrought iron railing. Satellite TV dishes pop out of the wall like giant toadstools, and our wonderful sunporch was replaced by the mandatory picture window. Before we said goodby, we had a couple of get-togethers in a North Tonawanda tavern, played music, and had fun. Most of those friends and relatives are gone now, but we still see them in our memories of that visit, and in the fading snapshots that were taken. I learned something... It's not so much the the way it looks, or the economic situation, or even the great food It's the feeling... the aura, that makes Buffalo unique. The soul, the energy, and the personality are still there. LATER: In 2010 We visited Buffalo again and found it better than ever. Many of our old haunts had ignored time and were the same, but with new people. There were new improvements and the city looked great. Buffalo has its unique energy and personality. We'd love to visit again sometime, but we don't live there anymore. Copyright © May 31, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


April 5, 2020... To our readers at home and around the world: As you are, we're busy trying to cope with this pandemic, so we're sending you a few column reruns, the cheerier ones. Love, Jack & Misty.
May 24th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

CHEERING US ALL UP. HOW I BECAME A MUSICIAN. God looked down and said, "I think you need some help getting girls." My first instrument was the bassinet. GOOD MORNING: I leapt out of bed, banged my toe on a chair, did a two minute pain dance, and passed out. A goldfish has a memory of three seconds, or was it..., no. I forget. "And those seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music." Nietzsche The old guy said, "How 'bout a date, baby?" She said, "Get lost." He said, "I AM lost!" Everybody has his own idea of a good time. A moth likes to bang his head on a porch light. I like Karaoke Bars. I could eat one right now. My Little Golden Book: "Strangers Have the Best Candy." I said, "The world is getting overpopulated." Misty said, "I wonder what's causing it?" I said to the lady at the bookstore, "Can you direct me to the self-help section?" She said, "Wouldn't that sorta defeat the purpose?" "IRRITABLE VOWEL SYNDROME": A Fear of the alphabet. HEADLINE: "China may be using the sea to hide their submarines!" Misty just said, "There are two mockingbirds out there mocking each other." If you swim in the sea and a fish bites your knee THAT'S A MORAY. I didn't know Misty was outside when I locked the door. She knocked. I looked through the window at her and said, "Who is it?" They say all life is precious. I wouldn't give you two cents for a fruit fly. After all these years I'm still thinking about the sexy girls in my high school. After all these years those girls are thinking about Bingo. Misty said, "What do you want to do on your birthday?" I said, "Sit up." My Aunt Bess once posed nude for a famous photographer. He never looked up from his newspaper, and she was barred for life from the lobby of the Biltmore Hotel. Misty was sniffling. She said, "I'm all stuffed up!" I said, "By Elvis Presley." I said, "CAN I HAVE A BURGER AND FRIES?" The lady said, "This is a library." I whispered, "can i have a burger and fries?" I just bought a camouflage cap and I can't find it. A side effect of my new medicine is Involuntary tap dancing. I said to the pilot, "Did we land or were we shot down?" We watched Star Trek tonight. The Enterprise was attacked by Kardashians. One night we checked into a lodge on top of a mountain at Lake Arrowhead, California. We got up the next morning, pulled the cord on the drapes that covered a whole wall, and they opened onto a wall-sized picture window. Outside, the mountain forest was covered with two feet of new snow, without a sign of life, except for some rabbit tracks. The pine cones were as big as footstools. A real-life Christmas card... In California… in June. Copyright © May 24, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


May 17th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

SEASONAL THOUGHTS. Autumn is my favorite time of year… a season of moods. The first chill after summer has worn out its welcome... That’s when I start to feel the holidays coming on. Not that we do any big celebrating these days… but it’s the remembering of celebrations past, and those who were with us during good times. The empty places at our table. I write more songs during the remnants of the year… when emotions are nearer to the surface, the past is just over our shoulder, and old voices whisper in our ear. ONE WINTER, when it was minus 35 degrees and windy in Minnesota, Misty and I stayed in a cement floor cabin on a lake shore. I heard what sounded like whale sounds. It was the frozen lake groaning as it expanded. We had recently had such bad times that we were thankful to be there with friends close by at Christmas. We didn't mind the cold. When we played Walt Disney World Roy Clark and Hank Williams, Jr. were at the ends of the park, and we were at the center stage. We were assigned a guide for the day. He looked 12 years old. Misty thought he was a boy and called him honey and sweetie, and he liked it. Turns out he was a Disney Vice President. He must have started out as a duck and worked his way up. After the week's shows Boots Randolph threw a party for the artists. Later in the party, there was some excitement going on at the ballroom door when some medics rushed in with a stretcher. Roy Clark grinned, raised his glass, and said goodbye to everybody. Then he made himself comfortable on the stretcher, and was carried out to the ambulance. He was late and had a plane to catch. FOLLOW THE BOUNCIN' BALL. Got no reason, Got no rhyme. Kickin' a can down the road o' time. Follow the Bouncin' Ball, Sing an old song. I don't mind if you tag along. Saturday matinee, give away a funny book, free of charge. Also a CrackerJack. Read "Red Ryder", "Little Beaver". Trade it for a Dizzy Dean baseball card. Down to the roundhouse, Look at the trains. Up on the rooftop, spottin' airplanes. Follow the Bouncin' Ball, Sing and old song. I don't mind if you tag along. (Words & music by Jack Blanchard.) CHRISTMAS ENOUGH. 'Twas the night before Christmas and all through the park, One trailer was leaky and covered with tarp. On the wall were two cards where you taped them up. By the light of a candle I poured us a cup. Our tree on the table was scrawny and thin... A foot and three quarters of plastic and tin. The carolers sang on our clock radio, It's the thought, after all, that counts, as you know. The snow on the window, the smell of the pine, Were sprayed from a can, but we didn't mind. No money, no shopping, no last minute rush. Christmas with love is Christmas Enough. Copyright © May 17, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. "Follow The Bouncin' Ball" and "Christmas Enough" lyrics by Jack Blanchard. © Jack Blanchard Songs (BMI). All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


May 10th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

CHANGING MY NAME. (This happened in 2010.) Life is getting weirder. Last week I went to renew my driver's license. For some reason they now require the following: Your birth certificate; Your old driver's license; Two proofs of residence; Your Social Security card; A marriage license, whether or not you've ever been married; Medical records with your name and birth date; A pint of blood; And other proofs that you exist. Misty went with me to renew hers. Our birthdays are close together. She had to prove that her last name was now Blanchard. This is true: An 84 year old friend of mine was recently required to provide an affidavit swearing that he and his elderly wife were actually married, and not living in sin. It was to prove that her last name was legally the same as his. We're all under suspicion. Anyway... They noticed that my driver's license and Social Security card said "Jack Blanchard", but my birth certificate said "John Blanchard". This made me a suspect and they wouldn't renew my license. They told me to go to the Social Security office 25 miles across the city, and get them to change my S.S. card to "John". Misty was sent on a similar mission. The next day was 85 degrees in the shade here in Florida, and about double that in our car because the A/C Freon was low. We drove an hour and waited on a steel bench for two hours. We couldn't share our anger with any of the crowd, because they were as mad as we were.. Misty got a friendly clerk and zipped right through. The woman asked her "Are you really Misty Morgan?". She was a fan. I got a sleepy-eyed clerk who had her young son with her, and they were ready to go home. We were not happy to see each other. She looked at her computer, which was out of my line of sight, and said this: "We have you as 'Jack' for your whole life." I said, “Me too.” She asked if I could name any companies I'd worked for. I named about six Buffalo factories where I'd labored away my youth. She studied the computer screen and said nothing. By now she knew who I was, but wouldn't admit it. I had two large manila envelopes packed with what I thought were important papers. She shoved them back at me and said, "You need two pieces of ID that say "John". I said "I know. That's why they sent me here... to have you change my S.S. card to "John", and then I'll have to live as John for life." She said "You will have to change all your legal things to John... titles to your home and vehicles, your credit, your will, your bills, and your underwear." She was getting tired of me. She told me it would be easier to legally change my first name to "Jack". I've been Jack all my life and didn't know it was a crime. I stomped out the door as everybody else was doing. So I called our lawyer and said this: "Hi. This is Jack. I need to change my name to Jack." We went to court a couple of weeks later. After being strip searched on the way in, the case went well. Even the judge laughed. I said “Haha.” After endless driving in traffic and arguing with morons, it cost us over $1,100. But, now I’m legally “Jack”. Copyright © May 10, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


May 3rd, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

LITTLE THINGS. I was in a dark mood, sitting on a bench at Publix, waiting for Misty and watching people check out. A little girl 5 or 6 years old said, "I'm going to sit by you." She sat and talked with me for about 5 minutes. She held a small black purse with two straps, and she didn't deal in affectations or childish cuteness, but looked directly into my eyes and conversed person-to-person. She said, "Is your mommy here?" I said "Yes." She said, 'What's her name?" I said "Misty." She pointed to her mother and told me her name. She turned and took a closer look and asked "Do you have make-up on?" I said no and she said, "A beard." I said "Yep" and she said, "Why?" I said, "Style, I guess." She accepted that, and pointed at my longish hair. I said, "I've got to cut that hair.", and she said "No! Long hair is nice!", running her fingers through her blond hair to illustrate. A lady shopper stopped and told her, "You're so pretty!" The little girl just smiled her thanks. Misty appeared with her shopping cart. She smiled and said, "I see you have a friend." The little girl said, "Go!" to me, as if people should go when their parents are waiting. I said I'd probably stay seated there. (I was having a bad hip day. An old Disco injury.) She asked, "Why?" I told her I liked to watch the people, and she thought that over. Then her mother came by and they walked away. She turned and waved and called ""Bye". She made me happy! I won't forget her. Copyright © May 3, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


April 26th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE STORY OF SAM FROM CASABLANCA. Sam played "As Time Goes By" in a bar in Casablanca. Ten years later, in the fifties, he had learned a second song. He tried to keep up with the musical trends. In the sixties he bought a reverb unit, a sitar, and took guitar lessons. In the seventies he got a fuzz box and a drum machine, and began singing "As Time Goes By" like Neil Diamond. All the musicians in town were playing guitar, singing like Neil Diamond, and wearing black vests. To break the monotony, the musicians started trading jobs without telling the bar owners. Nobody noticed because they all sounded the same, looked the same, did the same songs, and went with the same waitress. Bars were disappearing, so gigs were getting scarce. Every fifteen minutes a stern voice on TV said: "DON'T DRINK AND DRIVE". Less people were going out. They were drunk at home with the kids. Sam had been replaced by a karaoke machine. Sam sat in the park, trying to figure it all out. Even with all his equipment he couldn't get a job. The public mind was headed for prohibition, against drinking, against smoking, against guns. Sam was so mad he felt like getting an abortion. As far as he knew, drinking and staggering was acceptable, so that's what he did. He staggered between a fat lady and her bald dog, tripped over the leash, and arced gracefully into the path of an oncoming piano truck. He settled out of court for enough to buy his own club, and more equipment. He even put in a giant screen TV. He was so proud of it he left it on even while he was playing. One night he was playing his digital keyboard and singing "As Time Goes By" like Taylor Swift, when he looked up and saw that his customers had grown thick hair all over their faces! The shock gave him a heart attack. After all he was a hundred and fourteen. Nobody noticed as he grabbed the money from his tip glass, slid off the bench and died. The crowd was facing the other way, watching Casablanca on the giant TV. They didn't recognize Sam in the movie, singing in his own style and playing a regular piano. At "The End", the bartender turned off the sound and they heard the funny noise: Sam was lying dead on his new bass pedals. The bartender said: "Here's looking at you, kid", and bought the house a drink on Sam. He put about half the cash from the till in his pocket, poured one for himself, and closed early. Copyright © April 26, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


April 19th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE LAST DAY. Simon Lescart woke up on his last day, plugged in the coffee maker, and sat down at the computer to check his email. There was the usual spam and forwarded jokes, which he deleted without reading. The sixth message subject line read "Final Notice", and the sender was an acronym, "T.P.T.B." He started to dump it as spam, but for some reason he clicked it open. The message was this: "NOTICE OF EXPIRATION. "Dear Mr. Lescart, "This is an automatic reminder that your life expires at midnight tonight. Please do not try to reply to this email. Have a nice day. Very truly yours, The Powers That Be." Simon tried to reply anyway, but his email bounced back from the "unknown recipient". He knew it must be a stupid joke, but he couldn't stop thinking about it as he fought the city traffic on his way to work. What if this really was his last day? He'd often heard the old saying, "You should live every day as if it were your last." What should a person do on his last day, anyway? Get drunk? Smell some flowers? Confess his sins? What? He didn't have much of a family to visit, just a brother up in Akron and an ex-wife in Atlanta. They hadn't spoken in years. He couldn't think of any old sins offhand. Maybe he should commit some? He knew that the weird email was a fraud, but he decided not to go to work today, just in case. He pulled off at an exit and got back on the expressway, going the other way, toward the ocean. This is nuts, he thought. He couldn't think of anything really important to do, befitting a persons last day on the planet, so he just sat on the beach for most of the day and drank a few beers. He felt a little nervous, like a high school truant, but he also felt something else he couldn't define. Was it freedom? He had some guilt too, for wasting the day looking at the ocean. Someone sat down beside him. The man was obviously homeless, in his ragged black suit and dirty torn sneakers. The man said, "Are you okay, friend? You look kinda lost." Simon said, "That's an odd word... 'Friend'. Now that you mention it, I guess I don't have any of those. Just a bunch of acquaintances." "Maybe you never really tried", said the man. "I've been pretty busy", said Simon. "You must have accomplished great things, being so busy", the man said. "No great things. Just keeping even. Paying the bills", said Simon. "Do you think you have any great things in you", asked the man? Simon said, "Maybe. I've been doing a lot of thinking. If I had the time I'd do things differently." That's when the chest pain struck and the world faded to black. He heard voices. "What Happened?" "Get back!" He was being carried. Then a blinding light above. People working over him. "We're losing him! CLEAR!" Then a huge shock and the world was gone again. The smiling nurse said, "Welcome back. You've had quite a day." "What time is it", he asked? "Almost midnight", she said. "I have to call my brother", he insisted. "We'll contact him for you. You can talk to him in a few days." "I wish I HAD a few days", he said! A cell phone rang. "That sounds like mine", he said. "Where is it?" "It's beside your bed, but you need to rest." He reached for it, but she stopped him. "I'll answer it for you", she said. "Lie back down!" She said, "It's just a text message." "What does it say?", he groaned. The letters on the cell phone screen said this: "EXTENSION GRANTED." Copyright © April 19, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


April 13th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

RAILROAD DAYS. A long time ago we were on our way to do a national television show from the PBS main studio in Pittsburgh, and then to a Nashville recording session. Tennessee Birdwalk had become a surprise hit. Sometimes life can be good. The porter showed us to our compartment and stowed our luggage. Orlando was sliding away past our windows, so we settled down, propped our feet on our suitcases, and waited for snow. An official voice over the PA system: "You're invited to the dining car for the hospitality hour", Free coffee and orange juice". Misty said, "Let's live a little", and we staggered forward with the sway of the train. Passing through the club car, the train rounded a curve, and Misty sat on an elderly man's lap. His wife said, "Well, I never" and glared out the window at nothing. She failed to see the humor in it. The best part of the dining car is watching the scenery fly by in sunset colors. Telephone poles tick away the time, and up ahead the train whistle adds to the adventure. At every road and city street, cars are lined up waiting for us to pass by. Make way for the train, the biggest thing that moves on land! We stayed awake most of that night wiping our breath steam from the train window, and watching the sparkling towns and moonlit woodlands fall away behind us. Washington DC was having a brisk morning as we left our luxury train and boarded a coach bound for Pittsburgh, which wove slowly through the gray land Appalachia. There were untidy traces of leftover winter, dingy crusts of snow and slush. Smoky air had left its film on town and country alike, dulling the colors. Trees, houses, factories, cars, dogs, cats, grass, and people all blend to a drab tannish gray. Men in work clothes stand in the cold rain waiting for the train to take them home after another hard day. A pregnant woman struggles to get a baby carriage over the curbside slush pile without dropping her bag of groceries. Clothes are functional. No time for style. A gang of workmen lined up in the aisle waiting to get off, whisper and snicker at our haircut and clothes. We must seem outlandish to them. Misty and I smile at each other, taking no offense. The train stops and they file off, lunch boxes under their arms, heads bowed against the gray rain, each seeking out the dreary street that leads home. The train was owned by The Baltimore and Ohio/Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad, and the train staff was proud of it: R.G. Whitling, Conductor; L. Boone, Flagman, and E.A. Popp, Baggageman. Their hospitality brought color back to this leg of the journey. Nature soon followed suit, producing a beautiful rocky river that wandered for miles through scenic hill country. Journeys can remain after destinations fade from memory. Copyright © April 13, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


April 5th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

A LITTLE MIRACLE IN ASHFORD, ALABAMA. When you're hitch-hiking cross country you usually wind up taking circuitous routes, getting stranded in places you never knew existed, and meeting people who are surprised that you exist. We were once detained as suspected chain gang escapees, which is where this story will eventually arrive. You may be trying to go north, but find yourself heading east or west, and happy to get a ride, to get off the side of a long and often creepy road. When hitching you see the roads differently. You notice the gum wrappers, cracks, puddles, weeds and insects on the shoulders. You get to know them well, sometimes being there for many hours. A bend in the highway that cars disappear around in seconds, is a mystery to you. Maybe there's a town up there, or an old gas station where you might get water, or a lucky ride, or more endless miles of nothing, Hitch-hiking to a place a thousand miles from where you start can easily cover almost double the AAA route, moving laterally as often as forward. And you can plan on a number of extra days in the burning sun or cold rain. This isn't all bad. Looking back on it It's an adventure. At the time it seemed like punishment. Bob Egan and I were trying to get back to Buffalo from Florida, and got dropped off at nightfall in a tiny southern town by a bakery truck driver going in for the night. The two-lane county road traffic amounted to a vehicle an hour, it was dark and getting chilly, we hadn't eaten, and were practically broke. We were in Ashford, Alabama, at the intersection of US84 (now called Old US 84), and the road going northward was the narrow County Road 55. There was a streetlight on the corner, so we stood under it, trying to look wholesome and non-threatening. Kids from the town came around to watch us stand there. We were the biggest thing going on in town. They were just a few feet from us, but we couldn't understand a single word they said. We were from another planet. After an hour or maybe three, a dump truck rumbled toward us from the wrong direction. Shovels were hanging on its sides and clanging. It stopped and large elderly man in a plaid shirt got out. He was the sheriff or maybe the constable. The big man was friendly, but said he had to take us in because we fitted the description of two chain gang escapees... two young Yankee fellas, one dark-haired and one blond. We tried to tell him how innocent and nice we were, but the report said that they were smooth talkers, and not to believe anything they said. We climbed up into the truck cab and he drove us about two blocks to the police station, where we sat and were given coffee and a sandwich, while the sheriff made some phone calls. The police station was on Main, which in my memory was an unpaved dirt street. After a while he said "We don't have a regular jail here, but we've got a place for you to stay until court in the morning." Then he drove us to a big wooden house of indeterminate color, and introduced us to a matronly lady... the proprietor of this rooming house. She was as friendly as he was, but we were surely headed for life on the chain gang, and that took a little edge off the fun. We did get some needed sleep and some breakfast in the morning. The rugged old cop picked us up and said we had been cleared of all suspicions. He drove us to the county line. Like an idiot I said "Good luck catching those guys." He waved out the truck window and headed back to town. It only took a few decades for me to figure out what really happened. He knew we would be stuck all night on that corner. He could see that we were tired and probably hungry, and he made the phone call to the boarding house lady to put us up for the night. There were no escaped convicts. Just two young strangers who needed some help. I have a warm spot in my heart for Ashford, Alabama, and those good people. Copyright © April 5, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


March 29th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

MORE LAUGHS TO CHEER YOU UP. Misty said, "You're growing old with grace, and Grace is getting sick of it." Something dropped in the kitchen. I said, "What are we having?" Misty said, "Floor pie." The husband said, "Well, I only have 24 hours to live. Let's take a ride through the park, eat at the best restaurant, and make love all night." She said, "Easy for you to say. You don't have to get up in the morning." A trainload of thesauruses jumped the track. Witnesses were startled, aghast, amazed, appalled, astonished, astounded, and dismayed. The light in our refrigerator goes off when you open the door. THE BABY SWALLOWED A BULLET. The doctor said, "Give him a laxative but don't aim him at anybody." The cowboy said: "That's the ugliest, stupidest looking beast I've ever seen." The buffalo said: "I think I just heard a discouraging word." On Thanksgiving I enjoy catching squirrels and dressing them up as Pilgrims. DUMB JOKE.... A dyslexic guy walks into a bra. I said to the pirate, "How did you get the eye patch?" He said, "It was my first day with the hook." I was walking down the street wearing my glasses and the prescription ran out. At Publix a guy said to Misty, "I saw you giving the bananas a dirty look." She said, "They started it." I said, "You're really ugly!" The bartender said, "You're no open casket case yourself." Misty said, "Leave the door open. The flies haven't been out all day." The teacher said, "What is it with you? Is it ignorance or apathy?" I said, "I don't know and I don't care!" Prozac killed my blues career. Since I learned Morse Code tap dancing drives me crazy! I was playing the piano and some guy yelled. "Go, Man!" So I left. They say all life is valuable. I wouldn't give you two cents for a fruit fly. Aunt Bess got a hamster fur coat. We couldn't keep her off the Ferris wheel. I asked the mechanic about our car. He said, "You're not getting enough steam." They can keep me in prison, but they can't keep my face from breaking out. I caught a loudmouth bass. He wouldn't shut up so I threw him back in. The other fish threw him back in the boat. My dad said, "I'd like to purchase a chicken." The farmer said, "Wanta pullet?" Dad said, "No. Just put it in a bag. I'll carry it." I'm getting my elbows pierced so I can wear cuff links with a short sleeved shirt. Bird watching is a popular pastime. The birds call it "stalking". "Bewitch me, darling." "I'll bewitch you in a minute. I'm busy." My first instrument was the bassinet. Dr. Phil has a TV show, while I just sit on a bench and yell advice at squirrels. Where am I going, and what am I doing in this hand basket? Copyright © March 29, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


March 23rd, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

A FEW LAUGHS TO CHEER YOU UP. I'm getting crows feet, but somehow my shoes still fit. When I was a young brat a lot of the kids in our neighborhood were getting their adenoids taken out. It was a war to eliminate adenoids from the Earth. I don't think anybody knew what they were, but they wanted them gone. THE LIMO. Misty and I once bought a raggedy old limousine for $90. We needed transportation and would rather look eccentric than poor. To add to the effect, we colored it powder blue with house paint and a brush. At a gas station two tough guys said they knew the car and we owed money there. We'd never been there before in our life! I floored it and sped away at four miles an hour. Asthma only bothers me around cigars or dogs. The worst is a dog smoking a cigar. Misty said, "My hair looks like a drowned rat." I said, "No. It looks like a nice rat." Every Thanksgiving I enjoy catching squirrels and dressing them up as Pilgrims. Chickens can't fly backwards except when they sneeze. They sent my uncle down in the mine to make sure it was safe for the canary. EXCITEMENT IN A SENIOR COMMUNITY... The unexpected pregnancy. I've been sitting on the porch staring at the birds. They're starting to stare back. Oh, to be young again and full of false hope. I was fired from the orange-juice factory because I couldn't concentrate. "Bewitch me, darling, Bewitch me." "I'll bewitch you in a minute. I'm busy." At my colonoscopy they found my car keys, a pair of dice, and a harmonica. I was taking a milk bath. The cow slipped on the soap and broke my leg. I wonder why my eyes burn after sex. Maybe it's the pepper spray. I asked the bank teller to check my balance. She leaned over and pushed me. We have enough money to last for the rest of our life, unless we buy something. Copyright © March 22, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


March 16th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

STRANGE TIMES. There may be an overdose of panic due to the virus, but it's not a hoax, and nobody knows how bad it may get. The influenza pandemic a hundred years ago killed more people than a war. We went out yesterday, buying what supplies we can afford, out of what the stores have left. It's so strange out there. Misty's worn out. All I do is take her places and wait in the car. If we were young we wouldn't let it bother us, but we're in the first-to-croak age group. That's a medical term. We live out in the country but just inside the city limits. Not the best place if everything gets locked down. In answer to a few inquiries, I've had asthma for 5 or 6 years, and I'm having trouble walking. It could be an old sports injury. I got a lot of them. Otherwise I seem strangely healthy. We got a dehumidifier to ease my asthma. It seems to help. I don't change much in appearance and I can't get pain pills because they don't believe my age, but I'm enjoying hemp gummy bears. Misty says the people working in the stores are very nice, and try to help. A retail store worker sent me this note: "We're like the band on the Titanic who kept playing while the ship was sinking." "Make the days a little longer. I don't know where the time has flown. Lord, I'm having such a good time, I don't want to go home." (From one of our songs.) We hope you stay well. Copyright © March 15, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


March 8th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

RUSTY DIAMOND: A TRUE STORY. 1960s. Rusty Diamond was a Country recording artist, with releases on Starday and Stop records, but his main talent was getting money from rich girls. One of these angels, a very sweet and buxom blonde from Chicago, bought into Rusty's career to the tune of $48,000 in one week, probably more than double that as this is written. He hired me as his producer and we flew to Nashville to record some hits. Rusty passed out $50 tips to waitresses, porters, and anyone who had his hand out. To Rusty the important thing was the public gesture. In Nashville, he called up one of the finest men's stores and had them bring a truckload of assorted clothes to our motel. We selected a few thousand dollars worth, and he paid the driver in cash. Returning to Miami, a crowd awaited us at the airport. Women stood in line to kiss Rusty while photographers flashed pictures. Police directed traffic as we pulled away in a new rented Lincoln limo. I found out later that Rusty had hired the whole crowd, photographers, cops and all. Rusty moved into an oceanfront suite and hired a valet/bodyguard, for about two grand a week... a tough guy about six foot eight. The blonde's father heard about her business venture and hopped a plane for Miami, hopping mad. He threatened everybody in sight with jail sentences, if he couldn't arrange for the guillotine. Rusty not only calmed the old man, but hit him for another forty grand. The last I heard of Rusty he was broke and running from his bodyguard, whom he had neglected to pay. When Rusty Diamond had a buck he made Howard Hughes look like a bum. He never realized that being himself would have been enough. Once, when we were alone, I saw him in tears, saying that nobody really cared for him. But he had set it up that way by acting the bigshot, and trying to buy admiration and loyalty, but we'd like to see him again, even if he's broke. EPILOGUE. Since this was written we have found Rusty's obituary in a Salt Lake City newspaper. Copyright © March 8, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


March 5th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

TRYING TOO HARD. Recently I pulled out of a streak of depression that I think was due to lack of creative ideas and financial pressure. I kept forcing myself to go to the piano or guitar and forcing myself to try to write a song. I felt guilty when it didn't work. I'm supposed to be a writer. Isn't that who I am? Have I lost it? I even took the recommended therapeutic walks, but it seemed as if I was trying too hard to enjoy it, consciously looking at trees, sky, etc.. "Great sky. Nice tree. Is this working?" Again... forcing it. It was my businesslike left brain fully in charge and beating the hell out of me. One morning I got up and told Misty this: "I've had it! I'm going to stop torturing myself." I stayed away from the music room and just did whatever I felt like doing. I actually got happy! A night or two later I got a surprise urge to play the keyboard, and did it without trying to produce a masterpiece. With no self-pressure and no guilt it was more like fun. A couple of ideas came to me out of the blue. I wrote them down for later. Today I feel okay. I may play a little music tonight. You never know what might happen when you're not trying to make it happen. Copyright © March 1, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.



Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

February 23rd, 2020... A LETTER FROM AN OLD FRIEND. I get mail from amateur songwriters, many of them past acquaintances who feel something is due them for associating with me before I was of any practical use. I got one like this a while back. Notes in parentheses are mine. "Hi, Jack! Sorry about taking so long to answer your letter, (Note -- Eight Years), but we've had company from out of town. We were just talking about you the other day after we noticed your albums in the stores up here. You look great, even with the long hair and strange clothes. Have you put on weight? (Note - He just killed any chance of a favor.) "Do you remember the cold winter night I gave you a lift down to the gas station to get kerosene for your heater, after the gas and electric companies had shut you off? And I'd have run you all the way back home through the blizzard, except for the smell of the kerosene. You know I would have. "Well, you finally made it, didn't you? Everybody up here always knew you would. We were just kidding when we used to call you a no-good bum. HA -- HA. We were just trying to put some spunk into you, and you'll have to admit -- IT WORKED! "Since you are an old friend I am giving you first crack at the enclosed original song. If you don't record it I'll have to send it to Johnny Cash, so let me know right away, and don't worry, it's copyrighted. "Your old kerosene buddy, Robert." The following is the hit song he enclosed: "WHEN I'M GONE (or THE GOODBYE SONG) "When I'm gone - you'll find that I won't be here anymore When I go - I'll say goodbye and walk out thru the door Then you'll see it won't be me that's with you as before When I'm gone - you'll find that I won't be here anymore. "When I'm gone - if you're alone, you'll know that I'm not here When I go - if I am far away, you'll know I won't be near Then you'll see it won't be me that's with you as before When I'm gone - you'll find that I won't be here anymore. (CHORUS) "Goodbye - Goodbye - I think you ought to know It doesn't mean I'm going to stay, It means I'm going to go Goodbye - Goodbye - The sun comes up at dawn You'll find I won't be here no more, Honey, when I'm gone." Here's the answer I wrote to my dear old friend: "Dear Robert, In unbiased critical appraisal I must admit that your lyric has a certain steadfastness, not leaving the slightest worry in the listener's mind as to the protagonist's departure. "It drives home the point and makes its title known with a repetitiveness highly valued in the commercial field. Its simplicity is to be complimented as well as its portrayal of a situation in which each of us has found himself at one time or another. "The first-person style and identifiability of the characters only strengthen the argument that you have invested the total of your talent in this one grand effort. "In consideration of the above, and in sincere gratitude for the kerosene you took me to get, I cannot, in good conscience, stand in the way of you and Johnny Cash. Please send it to him and take all the credit for yourself. Don't mention me at all. Heaven knows you deserve it. "Your old friend, Mr. Blanchard" Copyright © February 23, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


February 18th, 2020... Our song* is NUMBER ONE TODAY on the Soundclick charts, Feb. 18, 2020. YAY!!! - Jack. *The song in question, by the way, is Michael Warner's collaboration with Jack, "OLD SONGS". You can listen to it HERE! Well done, both of you! - Jerry.
February 17th, 2020... HOLD THE BUS! This is BIG!... (drum roll, please...) From our friend Frans Martiz at Airplay Express: A Multi Platinum Disc is awarded to "Jack Blanchard & Misty Morgan" for landing the Number One slot on the AirplayExpress Country Top 40 Chart for two weeks in a row with their latest 2019 Remix of their worldwide Billboard hit, "Tennessee Birdwalk"! Radio Stations and DJ's can download this new remix on this link: https://www.airplayexpress.com/airplay-express-apx55/ Well done, Jack & Misty! And thanks again to Airplay Express! - Jerry.
February 16th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

GHOST TOWN. Somehow we had missed the turnoff to the southern Ohio town. We went back to where the highway ought to be and found a narrow old road, with grass growing up through the cracks in the pavement. Could this be the main road to town that I remembered from my childhood? The sign said it was. The small city, after slumbering quietly for generations, had become a boomtown with the coming of a large chemical company. For a while the population grew with the influx of labor. The little corner taverns where old cronies had once exchanged worldly wisdom became juke joints as the town opened up. Housing became scarce, money became plentiful, and the townsfolk began a new habit... locking their doors. The picturesque, American town of stories was the only memory I had to go by. I was surprised at the desolate weeded over road that had once been a main artery. We turned off the superhighway and followed the rustic lane toward the town, trying to spot familiar landmarks. There were new shabby buildings, some vacant and boarded up. There were new gas stations, looking aged and toothless with their pumps gone. I thought I recognized an old building... a certain curve in the road... but the clutter made it impossible to get my bearings. Drifting into town, I was relieved to see the railroad station and its surrounding park untouched by time. I had often told Misty about the good times at Aunt Bess' house, where I had spent a lot of my childhood. Now I was about to show her the actual place where it all happened, but at first I couldn't find it. It used to be right there on the corner of Fourth and Maple. Now there was just a rundown Frankenstein house hiding in the weeds. We parked while I stared at it for a long time. I had somehow forgotten... They're all gone. The whole smiling, partying family had died off one by one since I'd been gone. I knew it, I'm sure, but I’d blocked it out. The small grocery store across the street had a new name but looked the same. I went in and asked, but they didn't remember who had lived in that corner house. They didn't recognize my desperately mentioned names, and they were busy. Asking around we learned that the chemical plant had laid off thousands of workers, and the government had built a superhighway that bypassed the town, so it went quietly back to sleep, somewhat the worse for wear. We searched the town all day, and it was sunset before we found anyone we knew. They were all together, as always. The squeak of the rusty wrought iron gate pierced the evening stillness, as we entered the old cemetery, and began brushing away weeds and dust, to peer at names on tombstones... names that clicked on familiar faces in my mind. We drove out of town and didn't talk for a while. Nobody said goodbye. If this was a ghost town these new people didn't know it. We were the ghosts. Copyright © February 16, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


February 9th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

LUCKY EDDY AND THE SWAMP CHICKENS. Lucky Eddy was an over-the-road car hauler. He had a full load of new Ford Fiasco’s on the trailer... and he was headed down the Turnpike toward Miami. Naturally, It was a dark and stormy night. By pure coincidence, Harlan Crapper happened to be driving a truckload of schizophrenic chickens northward to Yeehaw Junction, where he planned to sell them as Grade A to his cousin Ranier. He was pleased with his own business acuity. Harlan liked to brag that he was a direct descendant of Sir John Crapper, who had changed the world with his plumbing marvel. It was a lie, but Harlan had told it for so long he considered it to be as good as true. Meanwhile, Lucky Eddy thought he was either going blind or his headlights were growing dim. In the middle of nowhere, his headlights went completely out. At the Exit sign he thought it said Holopaw and Yeehaw Junction, but he didn’t see any town. He coasted down the ramp, and onto a two lane side road, where he eased onto the shoulder, and stopped to think. They don’t give these trucks to chimps. The idea hit him like a crazed mink. He climbed up to the new Fords, went to the front car, and turned its headlights on. Back in the cab, he found that he could see okay with the car headlights. He was pretty proud of himself as he headed on down the road looking for signs of life. Unfortunately, the only life forms headed his way were Harlan P. Crapper and his crazy chickens. Harlan was listening to his favorite radio talk show about Bigfoot, crop circles, and UFO’s. He was rattling toward Lucky Eddy at his usual 70 mph, deep in thoughts of alien abductions, when he thought he saw a plane coming in. The only trouble was, there was no airport. As the flying object drew closer he saw that it had two bright lights aimed right at him, it looked to be about twenty feet off the ground, and it was coming for him fast. “Whoa!” he hollered, and thought “This is it!” He prayed that the aliens wouldn’t probe any sensitive areas. When the thing was right on top of him, Harlan yanked the wheel all the way to right, and sailed off into the nice safe swamp. Lucky Eddy couldn’t believe his eyes! He stopped and walked back to where the chicken truck had flown off. He shone his big flashlight into the swamp water, and saw Harlan treading water, and a bunch of funny acting chickens trying to fly. There is no moral to this story, and nobody learned anything from it. Copyright © February 9, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


February 2nd, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE ROOM IN THE MIRROR. (2020 rewrite.) Hank Wallace leaned up against the big mirror in the corner of the bedroom, studying his receding hairline at close range, and trying to tune out Elsa's nagging voice. She stood almost behind him now, a little to his right, and addressed herself to his reflection in the mirror. "Henry! Why are you gaping at yourself? Your boss and his wife will be here any minute and you haven't even started to get dressed! No wonder they all get ahead of you at the office. I hope you haven't been into that wine again. I can check the bottle, you know." He stared at her over the shoulder of his mirror image, and said nothing. "Well?" she demanded. He looked into his own eyes and remained silent. "This is your last chance to show Ed Herman that you're not an idiot! I'm the one who had to bow and scrape to set this evening up! I'm going to go check that wine bottle, and when I come back you'd better be dressed." He noticed that the closer you get your face to the mirror, the more you can see of the room inside it. The mirror room, of course, was identical to his own, only backwards. But the lighting in there seemed a little different,... cozier. He found that he could look in and around the corner of the frame when he pressed his nose against the nose of his image. He was straining to see if he could look around the inner frame and see the flowers on the mirror room wallpaper. That's when his head went through. He was aware of the warm glow the second he stepped into the mirror room. There was a peaceful atmosphere the other one never had. The other Hank Wallace smiled and motioned him to sit down. Hank observed that his new friend's clothes buttoned on the wrong side and his hair was parted on the right. He also noticed that his image looked somehow younger than before. There was motion on the other side of the mirror. Elsa marched into the bedroom with the wine bottle in her hand. She looked around the room. She stormed to the closet and threw open the door. She stood hand on hip, in puzzlement. She got down on her hands and knees and looked under the bed. She was on all fours in front of the big mirror when she glanced in at the two Henry Wallaces. Her face erupted into a silent scream. Sound didn't come through the mirror. Hank wondered what next. There was an outside exit door in the mirror room just like in the other. He wondered what kind of a world was out there. Elsa reappeared in the frame, pointing hysterically, with the Hermans behind her, staring through the mirror. All three were gesturing and silently shouting at the two Hanks. He felt a little sorry for Elsa. Hank Wallace stood up, shook hands with himself, walked to the doorway, stepped out into the reverse world, and lived happily ever backwards. Copyright © February 2, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


January 26th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE WORLD NEEDS A LAUGH. My father said, "I'd like to purchase a chicken." The farmer said, "Want a pullet?" Dad said, "No. Just put it in a bag. I'll carry it." "Bewitch me, darling." "I'll bewitch you in a minute. I'm busy." They can keep me in prison but they can't keep my face from breaking out. Back when we had the million-seller Tennessee Birdwalk there were only a million people in the world. In an old theater that had mice, Misty said, "Down-on-their-luck show mice." SONG. "They tried to sell us egg foo young." COUNTRY SONG. "Cranky, I'm Cranky for feeling so lonely." WARNING: Bears can go 35 mph... Faster if they're in a car. There's a fly in here! I thought this was a No Fly Zone! It's sunny, beautiful. and in the 50s here in Florida. Makes me feel almost alive! Our car only makes left turns. I'm never gone long. HEARD ON THE ARK: "All hens on deck!" EXCITEMENT IN A SENIOR COMMUNITY... The unexpected pregnancy. MY NEW INVENTION... The Suppository Gun. MY SELF-HELP BOOKS... "The Power of Positive Whining. "Build a Mechanical Squirrel in Your Garage." THE LIMO. Misty and I once bought a raggedy old limousine for $90. We needed transportation and would rather look eccentric than poor. To add to the effect, we colored it powder blue with house paint and a brush. At a gas station two tough guys said they knew the car and we owed them big money. We'd never been there before in our life! I floored it and sped away at four miles an hour. TO A HECKLER: "Why don't you get a toupee with a brain in it? A friend said, "I bet you never have a dull moment at your house." I said, "I'm having one right now." At Christmas our phone never stops ringing! It's those four calling birds! My dad had a mole on his nose. He had it tattooed to look like a fly. I'm getting my elbows pierced so I can wear cuff links with a short sleeved shirt. Aunt Bess could jump 3 feet straight up without bending her knees. My dad talked to himself a lot. Nobody knew it because he was a ventriloquist. A cashier demanded that I prove I'm NOT eligible for a senior discount. On Thanksgiving I enjoy catching squirrels and dressing them up as Pilgrims. No more chicken for me. The feet get caught in my throat. Misty said, "My hair looks like a drowned rat." I said, "No. It looks like a nice rat." She laughed. I'm heading for the roundhouse. They can't corner me there. Copyright © January 26, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


January 19th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

TRANSITIONS. (This was written when we first moved to our new home in 2014.) It's a cool gray rainy day here, a transitional day, with the remnants of Winter and early signs of Spring. Standing under the edge of our carport I can see almost a mile of tan fields and lines of trees, until the landscape gets lost in the mist. The trees and Spanish moss are moving with the breeze, as are the flags on our street. These are mostly World War Two people and that kind of patriotism doesn't go away, even though the nation has changed over their lifetime. I didn't like Florida for a long time after I landed here. The palms annoyed me. They were foreign and reminded me that I wasn't home; that this was all temporary and I didn't belong here. I could go to almost anywhere up north and not feel like an outsider, but Florida felt unreal... like a movie. As I stood just out of the rain today and took in the palms, the giant oaks in rainy-day colors, and the Spanish Moss like graceful fringe on a gown, it occurred to me that I like it. When did that happen? I still love Buffalo with it's four seasons and the energy in the air, but it's mostly the Buffalo in my memory. The last time we visited there, I enjoyed it, but I had a sense of being outside looking in. The world has changed so much that maybe we all feel a little like strangers at times, but this subtropical place has sneaked up on me and it's started to look right. Maybe I'm home... or as close as I'll ever get. Copyright © January 19, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


January 12th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

OUR ADVENTURE. In early March, 1970, the phone rang. It was Little Richie Johnson at Wayside Records. He said, "You better get packed. We're selling 50,000 a day!" A month later, on April 4th, our "Tennessee Bird Walk" became the Number One Country record in the world and our life changed completely. A week later on April 11th, it was Number One again, and we were doing a show with Jerry Lee Lewis and Waylon Jennings. Waylon joked, "Please get off Number One. You're killing my record. " Now a look back at Miami in the Early 1960s. Misty and I had been struggling, mostly broke, and even homeless on the street for a few days. In the mid-1960s we had a trio on the road playing small clubs all over the East and Midwest. Our old car and homemade trailer kept breaking down and taking all the money. Misty was "Mary" then. Then we got lucky and landed a steady job at a Miami supper club, where we met Richard Nixon and other famous people. Things were getting better. We started singing duets, Mary Blanchard became Misty Morgan, and we got a one month booking at a lounge in Key West. Two guys came in and signed us to a four song contract. and we went to Nashville to record. There were no hits, but our song "Bethlehem Steel" made the Billboard Chart, and Wayside Records signed us. In December, 1969, Misty and I were entertaining crowds at Orlando's Everglades lounge and commuting to Nashville to record. We had had another Billboard charted single, "Big Black Bird". We had a steady job, a nice home, and bought a new Corvette. After struggling for years on the road playing low-pay gigs. the stress was off and we were reasonably happy without any big hits. Our song "Big Black Bird" had gotten a Pop Pick in Billboard, along with Aretha Franklin and others the same week, although we considered it Country. Wayside Records got excited and negotiated with Mercury Records for our distribution. Mercury was ready to go with the record, but the master sent to them by Wayside was faulty. They had to call Wayside and wait for another master. Radio stations were ready to play it but had no copies, and the record died. But now we were on Mercury, a major label. With three hit records, 1970 was the wildest year ever. We were doing major network TV shows, state fairs and festivals, recording "Humphrey the Camel", "You've Got Your Troubles, I've Got MIne", and others, and dealing with big time agents and managers. We were disoriented, facing new problems, and on the road all the time. We were often exhausted, and didn't know where we were. The money went through our hands to agents, managers, musicians, roadies, travel expenses, and wardrobe for TV and live shows. Our happiest times were in the studios, recording with great musicians. It was a wonderful year, an exciting year, and a grueling year. Then a bunch of IRS guys showed up at our house. The hard times and the good times made it an adventure. Copyright © January 12, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


January 5th, 2020...

Thousands of intelligent good-looking readers.

THE LAST DAY. Simon Lescart woke up on his last day, plugged in the coffee maker, and sat down at the computer to check his email. There was the usual spam and forwarded jokes, which he deleted without reading. The sixth message subject line read "Final Notice", and the sender was an acronym, "T.P.T.B." He started to dump it as spam, but for some reason he clicked it open. The message was this: "NOTICE OF EXPIRATION. "Dear Mr. Lescart, "This is an automatic reminder that your life expires at midnight tonight. Please do not try to reply to this email. Have a nice day. Very truly yours, The Powers That Be." Simon tried to reply anyway, but his email bounced back from the "unknown recipient". He knew it must be a stupid joke, but he couldn't stop thinking about it as he fought the city traffic on his way to work. What if this really was his last day? He'd often heard the old saying, "You should live every day as if it were your last." What should a person do on his last day, anyway? Get drunk? Smell some flowers? Confess his sins? What? He didn't have much of a family to visit, just a brother up in Akron and an ex-wife in Atlanta. They hadn't spoken in years. He couldn't think of any old sins offhand. Maybe he should commit some? He knew that the weird email was a fraud, but he decided not to go to work today, just in case. He pulled off at an exit and got back on the expressway, going the other way, toward the ocean. This is nuts, he thought. He couldn't think of anything really important to do, befitting a persons last day on the planet, so he just sat on the beach for most of the day and drank a few beers. He felt a little nervous, like a high school truant, but he also felt something else he couldn't define. Was it freedom? He had some guilt too, for wasting the day looking at the ocean. Someone sat down beside him. The man was obviously homeless, in his ragged black suit and dirty torn sneakers. The man said, "Are you okay, friend? You look kinda lost." Simon said, "That's an odd word... 'Friend'. Now that you mention it, I guess I don't have any of those. Just a bunch of acquaintances." "Maybe you never really tried", said the man. "I've been pretty busy", said Simon. "You must have accomplished great things, being so busy", the man said. "No great things. Just keeping even. Paying the bills", said Simon. "Do you think you have any great things in you", asked the man? Simon said, "Maybe. I've been doing a lot of thinking. If I had the time I'd do things differently." That's when the chest pain struck and the world faded to black. He heard voices. "What Happened?" "Get back!" He was being carried. Then a blinding light above. People working over him. "We're losing him! CLEAR!" Then a huge shock and the world was gone again. The smiling nurse said, "Welcome back. You've had quite a day." "What time is it", he asked? "Almost midnight", she said. "I have to call my brother", he insisted. "We'll contact him for you. You can talk to him in a few days." "I wish I HAD a few days", he said! A cell phone rang. "That sounds like mine", he said. "Where is it?" "It's beside your bed, but you need to rest." He reached for it, but she stopped him. "I'll answer it for you", she said. "Lie back down!" She said, "It's just a text message." "What does it say?", he groaned. The letters on the cell phone screen said this: "EXTENSION GRANTED." Copyright © January 5, 2020 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved. Reprinted by kind permission of the author.


January 1st, 2020... And now... a holiday greeting from our sponsor:
It's that time of year again, folks. A lot has happened in the last 12 months, like it seems to do every darn year, and in the spirit of old adages like "a new broom never boils" and "a watched pot sweeps clean" (or some such stuff... forgive me, I'm old...) it's time to put this past year's news page out to pasture. But don't worry if you missed anything -- it hasn't gone far. You can now find every little belligerently centered* bit of it HERE! (And shortly on the Old News page, as usual.) So on behalf of myself, Lee, and Jack and Misty, let me wish you all a safe, sane and happy 2020! Happy New Year, everybody! Jerry D. Withers, Your Friendly Neighborhood Webmeister™ *P.S.: Still can't fix the code, so it looks like 2020 is gonna be belligerently centered as well.
MKOC Web Site Ring! Join the Real Country Music
Ring!The My Kind Of Country SiteRing

This site owned by
Jerry D. Withers
View the Previous SiteSee ALL the sites belonging to the MKOC Web RingView Sites
RandomlyJoin the MKOC Web Ring!View the Next Site

SiteRing by Bravenet.com

Home Add Me!

 

Sign the Guestbook

©2020 www.jackandmisty.net. all rights reserved