more old

It is beginning to occur to me that my youth was anything but normal. I believe my independence, though embraced, was thrust upon me as a result of our Nomadic lifestyle. Every time we moved I needed to establish new friendships and abandon old. Scouting neighborhoods became second nature. If my mother had limited my explorations, I would not be who I am today. 

Until I get my eye controlled computer, I will have to resort to Cliff's Notes versions of story. I hope to soon flesh over the skeletal structures, providing written sinew and muscled content once I can exceed my present rate of a herky/jerky five words a minute.

In Diamond Bar..........

I caught a tarantula in the hills, tied a thread around its body/thorax? and walked around   the neighborhood with it leashed to a button on my shirt- until it bit a kid and made him sick. I fed it beetles and provided water. Forgot the water once?, it dried out, kept its carcass in my underwear drawer, its legs  fell off, my mom found the remains, it met  the Tidy Bowl Man.

I fashioned a non motorized go cart by reversing a tricycle, removing the big wheel, reversing the handle bars, bending a nail around the rear axle and attaching it to a piece of plywood and attaching bicycle wheels to the other end of the plywood. I could sit and steer with my hands or lie down and steer with my feet. Fast and deadly. Fred Flintstone brakes.

I had just bought a chocolate shake and was one handing my bike down a residential hill when some kid tossed a broom through the front spokes. I went up, over and down, turning myself into an abrasion poster child. Through it all, I didn't lose a drop of the shake.

Me and Kelly found several large fish fossils unearthed as a freeway was cut through the hills nearby. His parents had one mounted as art in their living room.    

I placed second in the Castle Rock Grade School Junior Olympics qualifier  as a high jumper, competed in the Junior Olympics at Mt. Baldy, finishing in first place since the other kid was jumping off both feet- illegal.

Had a birthday party in my garage, 12th? where I got two CCR- Down on the Corner albums and two Three Dog Night- Live at the Forum albums, we played "Spin the Bottle" and I got to kiss my new girlfriend, Becky Ogle. Hi, Becky!

Unknowingly made Molotov cocktails by mixing gas and other fluids in glass bottles to simulate lava lamps. I kept  one in my bedroom.

Played with Tom's toys- a 50cal shell- chromed, and a 30 cal shell, live. 

More later