This? Or this? You decide.   steve @_livingdog - Instagram

Patrick McGoohan, American born Irish actor.  Below is a clip from Braveheart, proving that age did not blunt this actor's ability to convey intelligence and ruthlessness: https://youtu.be/4S7QARslq74       I am a huge fan of McGoohan, primarily because of the series "The Prisoner".  That was hands down the most intelligent thing ever put on the small screen.  He wrote and produced the show.  Telling the story of a British agent who quits the service, it is a tangle of paranoia and sci/fi special effects that holds up superbly to this day.  I think he is the most intense actor I have ever seen.  He was a boxer while young, the only thing we have in common. The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh, Disney. John Drake, Danger Man. Danger Man.      I have not yet seen one episode of this, but that is going to change.  I like McGoohan because of the Prisoner, which I saw when it first aired ...

Less than an hour ago I was in my lawn chair out front practicing guitar and drinking a beer.  I heard the fluffle of a large bird landing in the palm tree I am sitting under, not unusual, and I hear something hit the ground right in front of me.  That sounds like a snake, thinks I, and sure enough, there was two foot of snake all coiled up and giving me the stink-eye.  It was a diamond back water snake, harmless but extremely aggressive.  This explains why he was acting like he was going to bite.  He was trying to crawl up the palm tree but kept sliding off.  Well.  One lucky snake.  I mean this motherfucker fell less than 8 feet away.  I was playing and singing along with I Shall Not Be Moved, an old Charlie Patton number that only requires three frets.  But moved I was!  The sun was just going down.  I poked at him until he got under a brush pile.  Best of luck to you, flying snake, keep going p...

November 20, 1943.  17 aircraft carriers, 12 battleships, 8 heavy cruisers, 4 light cruisers and 66 destroyers bombard Tarawa atoll for 3 hours.  At the lifting of the fire, the Marines are sent in.  Expecting 5 feet of water over the coral, the Higgens boats grounded in 3 feet of water.  A New Zealand expert was ignored when he told them of the neap tides and exactly what would happen.  The island had 500 pillboxes and most had survived.  When Tarawa was secured on the 23rd, all but 1 Japanese officer and 16 men were taken alive.  The Second Marine Division lost over 900 dead, with a total of 3166 casualties out of 12,000 men, 25 %.  Other than the Japs, our leaders were the worst enemy out there.  The Marine Commander, Holland Smith, blamed the Navy, but Smith was a paranoid and a liar who ruined Army-Corps relations for decades.  But the Navy did fuck up, and badly.  The bombardment should have gone on for three days, and ...

This is a shell that some craftsman ground down on a wheel to look like a fish.  He glued a bit of shell for the fin, and I will glue something where the eye was, perhaps a bright blue glass bead or something.  So much work, and it was 50 cents.  Not usually my thing, but I respect the amount of trouble people put into the things they make.  It has a wall hanging attachment on the back, and I think it is very lovely. Miniature hand carved Noh mask, 2 dollars.  At first I thought this was Tlingit or some such, but a stroll through the web and I changed my mind.   Two sided Flip Wilson doll, marked Operation Bootstrap, 1970.  The small rip on the left shin is where I cut the tag off and touched the doll with the scissors.  Fuck.  The other side is, of course,  Geraldine.  This has a pull cord record in it, that certainly used to shriek, "The Devil made me do it"! ...

So tonight my brother and I are watching Susan Cabot in "The Wasp Woman", a movie I had for years and never saw.  It was her last film role.  I think this is Roger Corman at his best.  The above is her and Charles Bronson in "Machine Gun Kelly". Susan Cabot in "Tomahawk". She was very pretty. But something went horribly wrong.  She became a recluse in her palatial, filthy house, with only her son and four dogs as company. Her dwarf son beat her to death with a barbell.  They both seemed to be unstable, and it sounds like she treated the boy badly.  Since the dead cannot speak for themselves, I shall leave it at that. This is worth reading: https://www.criminalelement.com/blogs/2015/11/the-wasp-woman-murder-the-death-of-susan-cabot-by-james-marrison-true-crime-hollywood Roger Corman is something else. Sometimes I forget celebrities have problems also. https://youtu.be/9PFtCthVnVs No...

I found this today for 60 cents.  Cheap newsprint, the only flaw is where I turned the first page and ripped it a tad.  Conkey and Co. 1903.  The red binding tape is original.  Superb condition, excellent artwork which appears to have been cribbed from Dore.  1903.  The only one I could find for sale was about 18 bucks, more than I expected. Cartoon pig with wheelbarrow, Shawnee Pottery.  Shawnee bought the American Encaustic Tile Company, founded 1875, in Zanesville, Ohio, in 1936,  They produced ceramics until 1961.  There a number of ceramics companies in that area of Ohio.  This guy is flawless. Carnival glass bowl.  Orange with iridescent layer.  I have no idea about when this stuff was made, only that what was once cheap is now overpriced. Porcelain slip cougar, exquisite modeling.  Marked Aldon Accessories LTC, 1973,  N Y C.  These are fairly commo...