Good evening, 919 Gang. Last night I reported a bunch of photos and wondered if I could get them all into the report. Well, I couldn't. So tonight I will lead with Jerry Rife's post, held from last night, and warn others that I may fail to get yours in tonight, but they will be held for tomorrow.
JERRY RIFE writes:
Jan and I just returned to San Diego after a couple of months at our home in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. I've added a number of pictures from SMA to my photo blog. Here is a brief sample that I hope will whet 919ers' appetites for more which they can see on my photo blog at www.rifepics.blogspot.com/
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REBER: Last night Preston Gomez checked in after his main heart valve was replaced by a mechanical one at VA Hospital La Jolla.
ROY SCHNEIDER writes:
Glad Preston is on the mend. I'm keeping him in prayer....and looking forward to the memoir.
JANET LOWE writes:
Thanks for the health report Preston, and evidence that the government can indeed provide good health care. Best wishes for a long, fun life.
JAY LEVIN writes:
Shocked to read about my old friend and nanny Preston Turegano's surgery, but thrilled to hear all went well. Recover quickly, Preston. The world is a far better and more interesting place with you in it.
RICK SMITH writes:
Welcome back, Sarge. And to Ellie Irwin: I think some of One-Eyed Jacks with Marlon Brando was filmed around Guadalupe, hard by Highway 1.
CHET BARFIELD writes:
Good to have ya still with us, Preston, and glad the ticker's gotten an upgrade. I too recently signed up with the VA (because cost of city COBRA is so high, although I'm still paying it). I've found the VA system to have its flaws -- young docs, long waits for some specialties -- but overall it's quite good. Rx's are cheaper than Sharp Healthcare mail-order pharmacy, and everyone who's seen me seems competent and kind. Hopefully it'll be a while before I sample any inpatient services, but glad you are getting back to your memoirs, Mr. Turegano. Hope I'm in 'em.
KATHY VALENTINE writes:
It was great to read Preston's positive comments about the VA Hospital in La Jolla (good to hear you are doing well). I can support that with my 91-year-old WWII vet father's experience. For years as a former teacher and coach, he went to his supposedly superior private practice doctors. Urged to at least utilize the VA for lower-cost prescriptions in his early 80's, a blocked tube to his kidney sent him to the hospital. Not detected before the VA did their workup, the private doctor thought he was "too old" and it was "too risky" for him to have a procedure that the VA eventually did -- and he was kept off dialysis for several years. Now he gets VIP treatment from their very caring doctors and nurses. With a recent surgery, the surgeon went down an impressive "pre-flight" checklist with his team of about 10 people huddled around Dad. I know he wouldn't be here today without the VA's care these past 10 years.
MICHAEL SCOTT-BLAIR writes:
To Preston Turegano....Welcome to the zippered chest club. Had the aortic valve replaced Aug. 2007. I got a cow valve -- I moo when driving through the countryside. With the animal valve I am supposed to be able to get off the coumadin at some time but that has not happened yet. There are a bazillion side effects to coumadin but I am sure you have checked them on Google, and getting the blood thickness checked every three to four weeks can be a pain. But be on the lookout for a new procedure we just learned about. It appears there is a process that uses a pin prick on the finger instead of having to go and get blood drawn each time. We use Kaiser, and they have been using this new method in Northern California for about a year, but it appears that it has not trickled down here yet.
I had a triple bypass while they were in there and as far as I am concerned, my heart is now in great shape. Just one small problem -- I also have idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. Idiopathic is a fancy medical term that means they don't know how I got it but I got it, and it is the pulmonary fibrosis which means my lungs are filling up with fibrous tissues which will suffocate me if my wonderfully improved heart doesn't quit under the extra work load first.
Just occurred to me that if you had bypass surgery some time ago, this was a revisit to the zipper club for you. And did you see the television program last week of an 87-year-old woman who refused the open heart procedure so they went in through the leg vein and threaded the new valve in place. Heaven only knows how they got the old one out!! She was out of the hospital in two days and is going back to Jazzercise ---- good for her.
LISA PETRILLO writes:
Oh Preston, as always, a beautifully written story. Thank you and I am so glad you are on the mend.
THANE McINTOSH writes:
I had the same valve replacement surgery as Preston Turegano in 2002. I had Aortic Stenosis (calcification of the aortic valve) and would have died very soon without it. I also got the mechanical valve and have put up with a daily Warfarin pill instead of facing open heart surgery again. I have had no side-effects of the valve at all over the years, except for a very, soft and reassuring heartbeat click if I sleep on my left.
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REBER: Happy Birthday (April 28) to Chuck Boyd, a long-time friend and frequent contributor. I was introduced to Chuck about 1961 when he was at USD. Bob King said he wanted me to meet Chuck, who was in a darkroom at USD. King said you had to be sure to knock on the darkroom door before entering because Chuck might be entertaining a lady. He wasn't.
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JIMMY THORNTON writes:
Special note to Padres scout emeritus Jerry Schultz, but first, this just in…..
When I arrived in San Diego in the chill spring of 1969, I thought the names here were a bit off: places such as El Cajon (huh?) and La Jolla? Of course, we had towns with strange names in Texas, and my favorite was Cut and Shoot, a city in eastern Montgomery County, about 6 miles east of Conroe and 40 miles north of Houston where I worked on The Houston Chronicle with the late Richard Brumley. If I recall correctly some really tough boxer with dents in his face came from Cut and Shoot, Texas, and that fact alone provided a lot of copy for sports writers. One town that played a big role in my upbringing was Leakey, Texas, in the Frio Canyon. It was near the church encampment where the parents sent me to learn God. You could get in a fight in Leakey by pronouncing it Leeeky. No kidding, the locals insist it’s pronounced LAKE-eee. Well, there is a river flowing through it. Sort of. As Frank Saldana can assure you, Frio means cold and the river there was Frio, frio, frio. But there was a pretty little waitress in town who was very warm in greeting us strangers from the big city. She had the sweetest little “ya’ll.”
Jerry faithfully follows my coot reports from location on Mission Bay. Early in April I noticed the male coots had this silly grin on their beaks. And by mid-April, the coot herd had flown north to the Pacific Northwest breeding grounds. They’ll return next fall, I hope. Meanwhile, I’ll miss their coot poop. They must eat tar for the heck of it. I thought they had a carefree life vacationing in San Diego. Then I saw an Edgar Allen Poe raven dining on the remains of a coot it had just swept upon and killed on the beach. And that coot was never more. That’s like killing a mockingbird, right?
This is how I remember the Frio Rio near Leakey, Texas. A friend and I rode a makeshift raft down river. The water was so clear you could see fish at the bottom 30 feet down. It was frigid.
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PAT ROGALLA writes:
Now that things are "Royal" here is mine. Back in the 1990's visiting England....I ran into the Queen Mum. No, really. My husband, Ed, and I were riding on a red open-top bus when we saw ahead two splendid horses prance out a gate on a side road. We made a quick decision to find out why, pulled the cord and got off. Behind the horses was a Rolls-Royce which came to a stop before entering traffic. I ran to the curb for a better look, and as "saints would have it"....in the back seat between two stiff looking elderly gentlemen was the Queen Mother! She was about two feet from me, and I was flabbergasted! She was wearing her usual light blue coat and matching hat with the long blue feather. Perfect! I was overjoyed! (Here I was in England and seeing the Queen!!) I really lost it. I started jumping up and down and I shouted, "Hello your Queen-ness! How nice to see you. How is the Palace?" (What else can you say when you are not prepared to chat with the Queen of England?) At my first scream the Queen Mum leaned way forward in her seat with a non porker face of -(Geesh, one of those aborigines from the colonies!) but she managed a tight slit smile and waved a Queenly two finger salute at me. Wow! That really sent up my jumping along with waving both my hands. Then her Rolls roared into traffic. BUT, she looked back! I'll never forget. Of course Ed said, "You just made a total idiot of yourself." So? I came to England and saw the Queen. How many....?
BONNIE ROGERS writes:
I don't do tea parties. I made that clear to my college sorority sisters, Hugh Thompson when he was my boss in the Women's Department at The San Diego Union and everybody who knew me socially. But in 1983 I made an exception.
At that time I was public relations director for the City of Hope, a cancer hospital and research center in Duarte. Every other year we held a convention for supporters and fundraisers from all over the United States at the Beverly Hills Hotel to keep them up to date on the wonderful work being done and to exhort them to further fundraising efforts. During the months before the convention PR would solicit statements of support from politicians, government leaders, movie stars, etc. These remarks would be printed in an inspirational booklet and passed out to conventioneers.
This particular year I suggested we hire free-lance film crews and tape the messages from personages visiting Los Angeles to show the convention crowd. Good idea, said the top brass, but you will need to get budget authorization for each celebrity. Fine, says I. A short time later I learned that Prince Charles was going to be in Lancaster for the World Wildlife Fund. How about Charles, I memoed? No dice, said the top brass. Number two guy on the T.O. thought it was a good idea, however, and took it to the President of the Board of Directors. The two of them, with a British citizen who had made a bloody fortune in freezers and refrigeration, went to the British Consul in Los Angeles to check feasibility.
Can't do Prince Charles, they were told, but we are planning a visit up the California coast in February for Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II. Perhaps we can work something out for her. This inspired our fundraisers to hit up the refrigeration king for a big donation for the British Pediatric Research Center at the City of Hope which the Queen could then dedicate on her trip to California. PR was not involved. That is, until I learned that Scotland Yard was touring the medical center to check security issues and that they had okayed the dedication of a plaque above a laboratory door in the upstairs hallway of the pediatric building.
"You mean you're going to drag that poor old lady eight thousand miles just to shove her into an upstairs hallway? Don't you understand her job is public relations? We need to do this out in the open where everybody can see her. We need to accommodate the press," says I. CoH leaders asked Scotland Yard if we could have the event outdoors. No, you don't have a security plan, they were told.
"I have a security plan," I said. I got a schematic drawing of the City of Hope's 94 acres, penciled in a 10-foot-high chain link fence all around the perimeter, showed machine gun placements in the underground corridors which linked the buildings, sharpshooters on the roofs, National Guard troops at the main gate, etc. The plan was submitted to CIA, FBI, Scotland Yard and Buckingham Palace. They all agreed it was a good plan.
I went right to work. I had the maintenance department build a pedestal for the plaque out of Formica (which looked like marble) and sunk it in the pansy bed in front of the main entrance. I ordered bleachers be set up for photogs and film crews so that when they shot the Queen at the plaque, the City of Hope's symbolic Spirit of Life fountain and the words "City of Hope" on the building behind would form the background for every shot. I had the roadway tented over and chairs set up for all the City of Hope dignitaries and big donors whom I invited to the dedication and to have tea with the Queen. I hired two film crews and several still photographers to take visuals of the Queen with City of Hope leaders. I arranged coverage with 13 TV outlets, two radio networks and countless print press.
Then I got an hysterical call from the director of the medical center. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" he screamed. "Chain link fence? Machine guns? Snipers? Not as long as I am alive!" "Calm down," I soothed. "The powers-that-be said we had to have a security plan. We have a security plan. Nobody said we had to implement the plan. There will be no fence, no snipers, no machine guns. Just pray for two things-enough rain to keep the crowd down and that the Irish don't come."
February 28 dawned wet and rainy, and Her Majesty arrived on time in her limo escorted by the City of Hope president who held an umbrella for two. She dedicated the plaque, walked across the street to the pediatric hospital where she shook hands with a line-up of City of Hope leaders, toured the actual research lab upstairs and was presented flowers by several pediatric patients in the children's playground. The" Tea On The Green with the Queen" which we had planned across from the playground, had been moved into the adjacent auditorium because of the weather. Her Majesty stepped into her limo and waved graciously at guests as they took shelter in the auditorium for finger sandwiches, Earle Grey and fresh strawberries. To this day, all attending consider they had tea with the Queen of England.
Then City of Hope CEO shakes hands with Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II at the entrance to the medical center's pediatric hospital. He died just a few months ago and this was the photo picked to run in his on-line obit.
The real kicker to the tea is, because I knew the constraints on Her Majesty's time, I didn't even invite her.
REBER: A terrific story.
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DON BARTLETTI writes:
Speaking of small towns that are worth a visit, I love to follow the 2-pt. lines on a AAA map and occasionally stop at the little black dots. I've become a U-turn champ over the past four decades of toting cameras around the Southland on my motorcycle or -- in the case of Trona, Calif., -- while on assignment in my company car. I bring up Trona after laughing at Tom Cushman's recent post about it being a place he'd list as one of those California towns NOT worth a visit. Well, in late September 2009, I made a U-turn on the Trona Cutoff road, and an audio-slide show to boot. Trona is hot, stinky, dusty, and mineral-rich, but it's lesser known for having the only high school dirt football field left in the U.S. The Trona Tornadoes proudly call their turf-less home dirt, "The Pit". Have a look and listen:
BOB LAURENCE writes:
I'd intended to tell you about our visit to Rhyolite as my favorite small town in California, but after Googling it, I see it's actually across the line in Nevada.
Anyway, it's still one of my favorite little-known places, in the hills just east of Death Valley.
Rhyolite is a ghost town, but more fascinating than most because it doesn't fit the usual ghost town image of a few near-collapsing wood-frame saloons and homes scattered along a dusty dirt road.
At the beginning of the 20th Century, Rhyolite (according the Wikipedia entry) wasn't just a one-horse frontier town but a real city of 3,500 to 5,000, with multi-story concrete buildings, streetcars, electric lights, an opera house, a stock exchange, telephones, a hospital and a school. There's still a substantial-looking railroad depot there, but it's fenced-off and the train doesn't stop there anymore.
Rhyolite collapsed after the gold ran out, and by 1920 had been abandoned. The process of decay was accelerated by people who ransacked the place over the years, cannibalizing the buildings as a source of free building supplies.
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KATHY VALENTINE writes:
I was going to write after your comment about the Ramona Sentinel blurb about WWII vets dying off about 1,000 per day and being able to talk to them at the Ramona airplane exhibit. That gave me a great laugh! But seriously, veterans should have an oral history recorded as part of the Veteran's History Project that feeds into the Library of Congress. We only paid a small charge for our own copy of a recorded DVD interview. As a former glider pilot, Dad (pictured below) enjoyed a weekend jaunt to the charming Palm Springs Air Museum -- while I believe the local San Diego Aerospace Museum and even the USS Midway are in on this project.
Don't wait any longer if you have a WWII vet in your family...we hit 90 and decided it was time!
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DON BRAUNAGEL writes:
The humorous column about the woman shaving her hoohah while driving (I had read about it before, but this report was more fun) reminded me of a view that I thought was as far as anyone could go. Wife Yolanda and I were heading north on I-5 near Old Town and looked over to see a woman driving while shaving her underarm -- with a blade and shave cream. Good thing both of us saw it, or one of us would've doubted the reporter.
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JERRY SCHULTZ writes:
To Kelly Murphy. Do you know how Jim Applegate may be contacted? He was one of the really good guys at the UT and was royally given the shaft by community relations management. Also, a note to Preston. Your fans may be stunned or PO'd, but not amazed. I doubt any ever doubted you have a heart. I'll keep you in my prayers for a speedy recovery.
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REBER: Last night we printed a link to a report that the last manufacturer of typewriters had ended production.
BOB ELLEDGE writes:
And just like that like that, NBC retracted its report of the last typewriter factory closing, saying Tuesday night that it had found at least one other factory still manufacturing typewriters...
JAMIE RENO writes:
Hi Jack, with respect to Bob Elledge’s post on the demise of the typewriter, as I noted Tuesday on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/jamie.reno2, reports of the “last typewriter factory in the world” closing are inaccurate. The typewriter’s days are certainly numbered, but it is "far from dead," Ed Michael, GM of sales at Moonachie, NJ-based Swintec, tells Gawker http://gawker.com/#!5795649/relax-theyre-still-making-typewriters. "We have manufacturers making typewriters for us in China, Japan, Indonesia," Michael says. "We have contracts with correctional facilities in 43 states to supply clear typewriters for inmates so they can't hide contraband inside them.”
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TIM WILSON forwards:
Think you know cars from the 50’s?
Scroll down and keep clicking “Next” until you get to the end, which will reveal your score.
BOB ELLEDGE writes:
Talented bartender...a newspaperman's dream...
TIM WILSON forwards:
Great look-a-likes highlight “Everybody, Everybody in the House of Love”:
P.O. Box 2239
Ramona, CA 92065
U.S.A.
