outdoors fun and adventure, writing, photography, collectables and antiques, helping to raise my Grandnephew Daniel, attractive women wearing sensible shoes, setting people straight on the true facts about my life, trying my best to survive, that's right--I said attractive women wearing sensible shoes--they just gotta be wearing them sensible shoes
Music
Basically I'm a Rolling Stones fan who admits that the Beatles were better. I have every tune the Beatles released. I posses about 750 vinyl albums worth of recorded music--on vinyl LPs, cassettes, videos, CDs, and DVDs. My music library is built on Rock n' Roll, structurally supported by old and new Blues, shored up by great old Rhythm n' Blues, tied together with a bit of acoustic Folk Music, decorated with some comedy recordings, and screwed down tight by some recorded interviews of my favorite artists. I'm an original fan of The Cream, The Doors, Country Joe and the Fish, The Mothers of Invention, Jimi Hendrix, The Jefferson Airplane, The Grateful Dead, The Faces, The Yardbirds, John Mayall's Bluebreakers, Janis Joplin, Them (featuring Van Morrison), The Animals, etc., and I have all kinds of later 20th century and newer 21st century hard rockin' and blues recordings too. I listen to whole albums, not just the few hit songs that radio stations divvy out to us between commercials.
Movies
To Kill A Mockingbird, Grapes of Wrath, Monterey Pop Festival (Janis Joplin's set always tingles me all over), Woodstock, Wild America, Wild Angels, Patriot, Paths Of Glory, Saving Private Ryan, Pork Chop Hill, Catch 22, Dr. Srangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, Apocalypse Now, Platoon, Good Morning Vietnam, Cider House Rules, Mel Brooks' History Of The World-Part One, The Big Lebowski, Thunder Road, White Lightning, On Any Sunday, The Hustler, Head Of Arturo, The Man From Snowy River, Last Of The Mohicans, Apache, The Gun Fighter, The Cheyenne Social Club, Little Big Man, Geronimo: An American Legend, Westerns of all kinds and qualities, most of the Marx Brothers and W.C Fields stuff, Antz + Flubber + Shrek 2 and other good movies I watch with my great-nephew.
Television
PBS always comes first, Last of the Summer Wine--the writing is done at genius level and the photography is superb, Masterpiece Theater, Austin City Limits, Soundstage, Antiques Road Show, P.O.V., Outdoors Maryland, Motor Week, NOVA, Indepedent Lens, The Red Green Show, Benny Hill, The Office and My Name Is Earl are the only sitcoms I always watch, Vegas, Numbers, The Unit, Northern Exposure, The Jay Leno Show.
Books
To Kill A Mockingbird, Pearl, Adventures of Huckleberry Fin, The Tragedy of Puddn'head Wilson, Davy Crocket's autobiography, Little Big Man, The Hite Report (munch-munch-yum-yum-yeah!), Pleasure Man by Mae West, The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway, Stillmeadow by Gladys Tabor, Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee, Our Nig, Riding The Rails by Michael Mathers, Nam by Mark Baker, The Good War by Studs Terkel, The Naked And The Dead, Catch 22, Seeds Of Man by Woodie Guthrie, and biographies or autobiographies of my favorite Rock n' Roll and Blues musicians.
Heroes
One of my heroes is an older black woman who used to ride in a friend of mine's taxicab in West Chester Pa., during the 1980s. My friend was local starving artist Kevin (or was it Kevon?) Snyder. Once, when discussing the tipping habits of taxicab passengers, Kevin told me that he had no problem with the fact that a certain single mother, who scrubbed floors for a living to raise her children right, could not even afford to give cab drivers a twenty five-cent tip; and he understood that perfectly. She rode cabs regularly, and if she had tipped the drivers twenty-five cents every time that she rode in a cab then at the end of the week she and her kids would need that money to survive on worse than Kevin did. That woman, who steadily worked hard at a low paying job, raised her children right, and never had a fair chance at anything better, because she was not white, who Kevin had said was very enjoyable to converse with, is my all-time number one hero. I've been holding onto that for over 20 years waiting for an opportunity to tell that to somebody.
About me: I'm a 59 year old man who has lived and worked all up and down the East Coast of the USA, from Patten, Maine down to Key West, Florida. I have lived way out in the woods, in small towns, big cities, resort beach towns, but here I am back where I grew up at in Dundalk, Maryland again. I was a U.S. Army Photographer in 1969-71, stationed on Okinawa. I was a bear hunting guide in Maine, a blast furnace laborer for Bethlehem Steel, an office furniture delivery truck driver, a Book Mobile driver, Ferris Wheel Operator Extraordinaire, I drove a cab (sporadically because my back kept getting worse), I was a security guard in several places--including Key West Ocean Side Marina. I am saddled and bridled by a bad back and a good dose of depression, but I ain't dead yet. I survive on a small, monthly, non-service connected Veterans Administration disability check, and this freakin' poverty has just about worn me out. I need a modern computer, an editor for my writing, a financial backer for my photography efforts, and a sweet, young, 40 something year old woman to love and admire and have and hold and enjoy great times with while living out the rest of our lives to the fullest.
Who I'd like to meet: Not too picky right now, I'm damn near a hermit.
GREAT pic's of Patten!! Arnold Ballard is my cousin (my Dad's 1st cousin) and it was nice to see those ones! Sorry I can't help with names! I went up there last weekend and I couldn't believe the SNOW! The snow banks are at least 4-5ft. tall!!! It truly is amazing, I love the snow but I can say that I'm done with it, I'm glad I'm not up there! LOL! Take care and keep posting pic's! :-)
hey dave, if you change your myspace password the false comments/bulletins will stop... this happens all the time on myspace... someone gets into your account and once you change the password they can't get in :)
Hey Dave, Thanks for the invite...enjoyed the pictures, especially some of the B & W Maine shots from back in the day. Great to see someone taking the time and care to document Dundalk as well. Keep up the good work...
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