Roger O Green

Raoul Vezina, Part 1

Raoul Vezina was born in January 1948, I believe, in Troy, NY. As far as I can tell, he was always been a very generous and very talented soul.

Here’s a picture that he drew back when he was in high school, which he gave to his friend, Jim Strickland dated 12/13/65.

He was also a musician, playing keyboards and harmonica; these are photos of RV from 69/70 around Lemoyne College, also provided by Jim.

Eventually, he found his way to New Paltz, NY, a small college town about halfway between Albany and New York City. Michael T. Gilbert recalled that he played some kind of “electronic piano gizmo with a band that gigged at St. Blaise bar/restaurant” in town.

Michael and Raoul often collaborated on stories. Here are a couple of nice pieces that appeared in 1973 in the first issue of Michael’s New Paltz Comix underground.

Michael noted that he and Raoul “either met at the local drugstore (fighting over the latest comics!) or at the school newspaper office, where we both contributed cartoons. We hit it off and decided to collaborate on a page for the first issue of New Paltz Comix, which was originally to be published by the school paper. When they dropped the ball, I took over and printed it myself. I later published three more issues, and Raoul and I collaborated on a neat sci-fi story, “Rubber Soul”, for the second issue. Raoul’s work appeared in all four issues, and he was my favorite contributor to those comics.”

I first met Raoul in 1973 or 1974. When I first started collecting comics a couple of years earlier, my friend Mark and I used to have to hop into his car and drive five miles to a newsstand trying to find a copy of our letter four-color fix that wasn’t totally wrinkled from being jammed into the spinner rack. Then a guy named Peter Maresca opened a comic book store right in downtown New Paltz called the Crystal Cave. Oddly, Peter wasn’t all that interested in comic books. He was much more interested in comic strips and would diligently clip strips from the Sunday paper and put in protective coverings. This is, by the way, the same Peter Maresca who’s involved in publishing Little Nemo in Slumberland and other comic strip books.

So it fell to the guy running the front of the store, Raoul Vezina, to create an atmosphere of welcoming and information about the comic book scene. And he did. As a customer, I always felt welcomed and understood at the Crystal Cave, and that was largely Raoul’s doing.

And when I left New Paltz for the Capital District, I would find myself again in the Raoul’s orbit.

ROG

P is for Popular Mechanics

I suppose I could have done a piece on politics or Presidents. I’m still processing (a good P word) on that concept of President-elect Obama, which makes this only the second time I’ve voted for a Presidential candidate who actually won. Maybe next time through the alphabet I’ll expound on that.

Meanwhile, there was this list in Popular Mechanics magazine back in September about 100 Skills Every Man Should Know: 2008’s Ultimate DIY List, which noted that “Brains and charm are fine, but a real guy needs to know how to do real stuff.”

There were lots of comments about should and should not have been on the list, but I won’t go there except that it tended to be carrist, i.e., automobile-oriented. This quiz does push some buttons for me, though, in that I am not what people would consider “handy”. What they used to call Shop in 7th and 8th grades, dealing with wood and ceramics was a disaster for me.

Automotive

1. Handle a blowout – I suppose no
2. Drive in snow – no
3. Check trouble codes – what does this mean? Look at the gauges? That I can do.
4. Replace fan belt – no
5. Wax a car – this I’ve done, but not in a long time
6. Conquer an off-road obstacle – I don’t even know what that means, but I’ll say no
7. Use a stick welder – if I knew what a stick welder was, that would help
8. Hitch up a trailer – have done, though not lately
9. Jump start a car – have done this, but not lately

Handling Emergencies

10. Perform the Heimlich – I’ve actually successfully done this
11. Reverse hypothermia – I could do that
12. Perform hands-only CPR – I’ve actually trained to do that
13. Escape a sinking car – I had a recurring dream as a child about a sinking car; I think I could

Home
14. Carve a turkey – have done it
15. Use a sewing machine – not well
16. Put out a fire – yes, actually
17. Home brew beer – disinclined
18. Remove bloodstains from fabric – seems as though I’ve done this
19. Move heavy stuff – I’ve helped on over 100 moves, including a piano
20. Grow food – done this a few years ago
21. Read an electric meter – actually one thing I used to do all the time as a kid

22. Shovel the right way – I don’t know what that means. But I do have an ergonomically correct shovel, so I’ll say yes.
23. Solder wire – have done it
24. Tape drywall – have done it, did not enjoy
25. Split firewood – have done a while back
26. Replace a faucet washer – did this a while ago
27. Mix concrete – for some reason, did this, though not lately
28. Paint a straight line – not really, unless I’m using a straight edge
29. Use a French knife – don’t know
30. Prune bushes and small trees – actually think I’m good at this; did it this summer
31. Iron a shirt – I can, but I don’t enjoy it; that’s why God created permanent press
32. Fix a toilet tank flapper – one of those things I was curious about as a kid and actually figured out
33. Change a single-pole switch – no
34. Fell a tree – never have even tried
35. Replace a broken windowpane – never tried
36. Set up a ladder, safely – I assume so
37. Fix a faucet cartridge – I’ll say no
38. Sweat copper tubing – have done
39. Change a diaper – this I absolutely have accomplished
40. Grill with charcoal -yeah, but not lately
41. Sew a button on a shirt – I’ll say no. I’ve actually done it, but it always takes me so long doing and redoing that I feel peevish.
42. Fold a flag – I’d need the manual, but I used to do it in Cub Scouts

Medical Myths

43. Treat frostbite – yes
44. Treat a burn -yes
45. Help a seizure victim – yes, on a city bus in Albany
46. Treat a snakebite – I’ve read how
47. Remove a tick – yes

Military Know-How
48. Shine shoes – I was actually good at this at one point
49. Make a drum-tight bed – absolutely not
50. Drop and give the perfect pushup – define “perfect”

Outdoors
51. Run rapids in a canoe – no
52. Hang food in the wild – ? let’s just say no
53. Skipper a boat – no
54. Shoot straight – no
55. Tackle steep drops on a mountain bike – no thank you
56. Escape a rip current – I did this once, but I don’t know how

Primitive Skills
57. Build a fire in the wilderness – probably not
58. Build a shelter – maybe
59. Find potable water – possibly

Surviving Extremes

60. Floods – haven’t yet
61. Tornadoes – ditto
62. Cold – yes
63. Heat – yes
64. Lightning – hasn’t been an issue

Teach Your Kids

65. Cast a line – no
66. Lend a hand – I try
67. Change a tire – she’s not even five
68. Throw a spiral – ditto
69. Fly a stunt kite – what’s “stunt kite”?
70. Drive a stick shift – no way
71. Parallel park – no
72. Tie a bowline – ?
73. Tie a necktie – maybe someday
74. Whittle – I don’t whittle
75. Ride a bike – eventually; she has a trike

Technology
76. Install a graphics card – I don’t do
77. Take the perfect portrait – trial and error
78. Calibrate HDTV settings – not yet applicable
79. Shoot a home movie – no
80. Ditch your hard drive – no

Master Key Workshop Tools
81. Drill driver – no
82. Grease gun – no
83. Coolant hydrometer – ? no
84. Socket wrench – possibly
85. Test light – ?
86. Brick trowel – no
87. Framing hammer – ?
88. Wood chisel – we have one
89. Spade bit – ?
90. Circular saw – we don’t have one
91. Sledge hammer – have used one
92. Hacksaw – had one
93. Torque wrench – have used
94. Air wrench – ?
95. Infrared thermometer – no
96. Sand blaster – no
97. Crosscut saw – have used one
98. Hand plane – used one and ruined perfectly good items in shop
99. Multimeter – ?
100. Feeler gauges ?

Obviously, my very manhood is threatened.
ROG

Finally!

So here’s the plan for the day: Get up at 5:45, throw on some clothes, walk the 5 blocks to my new polling place – my old one was less than 2 blocks away, but that library’s being renovated.

Vote. This undercuts the need for anyone (this means YOU, Working Families Party) to have to CALL me to REMIND me to vote. I ALWAYS VOTE. (Can we get early voting someday, New York? Oh, you’re arcane and backwards? I take that as a “no”.) Also, I’ll beat the crowds AND I’ll have a fallback position to come after work, should the machines not be working.

Since my wife has the day off, she’ll take the child to day care, so I can just go to play racquetball, then go to work. Try to ignore all polling news; I just don’t care anymore.

Go home, eat dinner, do the evening routine with the child. Turn on TV at 9 pm EST and watch the voting results until shortly after the California polls close, then go to bed for a few hours, getting up early to see what was unresolved tonight.

I must say that Charlie Gibson of ABC News seemed a bit apoplectic last week about the early voting that’s taking place, saying in essence, shouldn’t all the voters have exactly the same opportunity to get as much information before pulling the lever, or whatever it is one does on an electronic machine? I think Evanier said it as well as anyone: “Seriously, a lot of us just want it over. How long has it been since you heard anything from either candidate that might have changed your mind?” Everything I hear now is preaching to the converted. Here’s MY contribution to that effort:

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Local (Albany County) advice.
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My Personal ‘Faith Priorities’ for this Election by Jim Wallis of Sojourner Magazine
***
“The other day, a guy who played a game of basketball against Barack Obama said that Obama spent the whole game ‘trash talking.’ He also said Obama’s trash-talking is
eloquent, high-minded and inspirational.”
— Conan O’Brien

ROG

The SKA questions

A friend of mine e-mailed this to me:

1. What time did you wake up this morning? 5:30 AM. this is actual;ly an improvement.
2. Diamonds or pearls? In order to do what?
3. What was the last movie you saw? Vicki Crisina Barcelona. I was going to go see Frozen River this past weekemnd, but the prospect of taking two buses each way simply didn’t appeal to me.
4. What is your favorite TV show? Current: The Office; true for at least three years. All0-time, Dick van Dyke Show.
5. What do you have for breakfast? Spoon-Size Shredded Wheat mixed with Cheerios, the usual one weekdays; on weekends, it’s oatmeal
6. What is your middle name? Owen. There was a period in junior high when my friends and I would address each other by our middle names.
7. What is your favorite CD at the moment? I have about nine CDs in rotation, including Brian Wilson, REM and Elvis Costello
8. What kind of car do you drive? I don’t drive it, but we have – what is that Bryan Ferry song? – Avalon
9. What’s your favorite sandwich? egg salad on wheat
10.What characteristic do you despise? injustice
11. Favorite item of clothing? slippers
12. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go? San Francisco
13. Favorite brand of clothing? L.L. Bean
14. Where would you retire to? Qu’est-ce-que ce ‘retire’?
15. What was your most recent memorable birthday? My 16th. My parents rented a place and I invited all my friends.
17. Furthest place you are sending this? So, I went to SiteMeter, and the farthest country appearing there was Thailand
18. Person you expect to send it back first? n/a
19. When is your birthday? March
20. Are you a morning person or a night person? Middle of the night
21. What is your shoe size? 10
22. Pets? none
23. Any new and exciting news you’d like to share with us? we went to the open house for UAlbany’s College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering. I now know more about a buckyball than I ever wanted to
24. What did you want to be when you were little? A minister, then a lawyer
25. How are you today! reflective
26. What is your favorite candy? cherry Hershey kisses
27. What is your favorite flower? mums
28. What is a day on the calendar you are looking forward to? tomorrow
29. What is your full name? Roger Owen Green
30. What are you listening to right now? Tom Petty box set
31. What was the last thing you ate? dinner last night: chicken, corn, potatoes
32. Do you wish on stars? hard to see the stars in the city, but I never did anyway
33. If you were a crayon, what color would you be? green, of course
34. Last person you spoke to on the phone? probably one of my sisters
35. Favorite restaurant? Justin’s, where I proposed to Carol
36. Real hair color? WYSIWYG. Gray.
37. What was your favorite toy as a child? teddy bear
38. Summer or winter: summer
39. Hugs or kisses? hugs, unless they are romantic kisses…
40. Chocolate or Vanilla? vanilla. Did I ever tell this story? I was in 6th grade, and we were selecting ice cream for a party. I was out of the room, but came back and was asked when I returned. I was the ONLY one to pick vanilla.
41. Coffee or tea? tea, I suppose, in that I don’t drink coffee, to some people’s chagrin
42. Do you want your friends to e-mail you back? I love comments
43. When was the last time you cried? there’s always something
44. What is under your bed? books, slippers, the bathroom scale
45. What did you do last night? after dinner, did the child’s bedtime routine, then bed
46. What are you most afraid of? boredom
47. Salt or sweet? sweet
48. How many keys on your key ring? 4
49. How many years at your current job? 16 last month
50. Favorite day of the week? Sunday
51. Do you make friends easily? depends on what you call friends
52. How many people will you send this to? billions and billions
53. How many will respond? millions and millions

3ROG

Web changes

Someone asked on a listserv, “Does anyone know of a service for tracking not just website changes, but exactly what content on the webpage changed?” As a result of the question, I joined ChangeDetect, a free web page monitoring system. It’s my intention to add all of the web sites and blogs which I follow that do not offer an RSS feed, but I’ve only gotten around to tracking the website of my ol’ friend Fred Hembeck thus far.

So how does it work? So far, fine, though the e-mail notification takes about a day from the actual site change. Still, when I actually get around to using it more frequently, it’ll beats going to the page and seeing the same old stuff.
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Blogger has this feature where it’ll let you know when an RSS-equipped blog on the sidebar was last updated. I discovered, however, that if the blog poster says the post was entered two days ago, it’ll note on my blog that the blog was posted two days ago.
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I used to have something called Jigli on my side panel, a service that was creating a word cloud of my blog, which I liked. Unfortunately, it was creating an unintended consequence. It seemed to create what appeared to be hyperlinks on words that weren’t actually hyperlinks. I thought it was just my computer, but when a good friend of mine saw the same thing, I deleted the Jigli and the problem went away.
***
I was on a listserv when someone provided info about a conference in Italy. One reader took great exception to this and said, “I saw the announcement for a conference that cost $15 to attend within driving range for most of New York State.
One does not need to spend hours on an international flight plus all of the money for staying in a hotel in order to present at a conference or to attend a conference.” Others responded with comments such as “funding issues notwithstanding, some people may be interested in knowing this is happening. Why the need for the nasty responses?” ou’d be surprised how heated librarians can get.
Finally, I wrote: “To quote Sylvester Stewart: ‘Different strokes for different folks And so on, and so on and scooby-dooby-doo.'” That generated a “Roger: Best. Post. Ever.” and another positive comments. That made me feel really good!
***
I’ve got nothing pithy to say about the passing of Studs Terkel. I’ve read only one of his books – Working – though I did enjoy seeing him express his views in various venues. But here’s a nice piece:
Studs Terkel: The Power of His Prose By Dennis Kucinich, October 31, 2008

Studs Terkel knew the real America. The America of grit and gumption, heart and soul, passion and nerve. He chronicled five generations of American history with a compassionate and deep understanding of the American character.

He was the quintessential American writer. He was our Boswell, our Whitman, our Sandburg. He was able to get people to open up and share their innermost thoughts and their deepest dreams. In the words of Kipling ‘he walked with kings and never lost the common touch.’

Infused in each word he wrote and in his spoken word, he was a master story-teller and could regale groups for literally hours with his deep understanding of human nature its possibilities and its foibles. He was a person of great appetites and his greatest appetite was for the truth. America has lost a tribune of the people. But the power of his prose lives on.

Studs was a dear friend. My wife, Elizabeth, and I have enjoyed many visits in Studs’s home. His good humor was a constant even during a visit a couple of years ago when he was recovering from heart surgery.

I was touched by the forward he wrote to my book, A Prayer for America. I’ll never forget the encouragement he gave me to run for president in 2004.

ROG