UJT Update for 05/30/2019, Under the Jacaranda Tree

May 30th, 2019

“Goeije morn!” “Good Morning !!!” to you all in West Flemish, a Germanic language spoken in West Flanders in Belgium, in Zeelandic Flanders in the Netherlands, and in the French département of Nord.

I have been in webpage maintenance hell all week. I have been recreating my summary pages one link at a time. I have been trying to make the “Visual” Editor work. Both hosting and tool support folks have been gently trying to tell me that in essence that BoldGrid Tool can help to a point but no one can maintain their site without messing with the code at some point. So welcome to my UDT maintenance world:

At any rate, I believe the vast majority of the summary pages have been updated now to current status and will be maintainable from this point forward. I did notice that in the process of “improving” BGs product, they also managed to break our ability to play one UJT Radio after another without having to start each one. I will work on that too. After it is all said and done, I think using the images as links for the various recipe pages is better than the stuffy old buttons that I had before. What do you think?

This week I learned some stuff:
• Today is NATIONAL CREATIVITY DAY!!!! Unleash your imagination! Whether you are an artist, writer, musician, filmmaker, blogger, photographer, graphic artist, cook or any of 1000 other creative personalities, the world is going to celebrate you!

Website Update:
• Week Two for our New Vocabulary Quiz!
• A New UJT Music Trivia Quiz, Again !!!!
• No new recipes this week but I did realize that I hadn’t uploaded my recipe for Slow Cooker Ropa Vieja. It is pretty easy and delivers a wonderful dish treasured by me and all the Cuban kids I grew up with. It was also my wife’s birthday dinner request.

Writing, Ceramics and Painting Update:
• I started on a new panting of one of Chris Spain’s wonderful photographs.
• Grandpa Stories is still not re-published.

Weird-Stuff-O-Meter:
• Its hard to believe how much I have aged with out maturing much. I am kind of proud of that actually. If I would change any of my behaviors, I think I might target those few things considered, “normal” that I still can be observed doing. Looking back, I can see many opportunities for misbehavior that I just missed out on. But all in all, I have had just a fine time getting this far.

Music Update:

I hope you all enjoy this week’s musical selections. I still haven’t relearn my digital turntable and associate software. But even without the new stuff, I think this week’ selection is worthy of your time.

Go to this week’s UJT Radio program.

• The Beatles — When I’m Sixty-Four — This week we celebrated Tippy’s 64th. I remember listening to Sgt. Peppers and hearing this song and kind of laughing (we were laughing a lot back then!). I think that was the only times I ever even considered getting this old and I thought it was funny. Oh and the answer is yes, I will still need you and feed you now that you are sixty-four.
• Jackson Browne — Walls and Doors — This is another thought provoking song by our old dear friend Jackson Browne. Tis one comes from his latest endeavor, “Standing in the Breach” released in 2014.
• Les Paul & Friends — Good Luck You’re Having — This one comes from his last recorded effort in 2014. It doesn’t say but I am positive that Joe Bonamassa is singing lead and playing. It just a great ass shaking song.
• Lynyrd Skynyrd — That Smell — I remember hearing this the first time I had a friend almost OD on heroin just before I joined the Navy. This is from their 1977 release, “Street Survivors”. I always loved the guitar work on this one.
• Steely Dan — Rose Darling — One of my favorite songs from one of my favorite albums, “Katy Lied” released in 1975.
• Lady Antebellium — I Run to You — A pretty song that I got to hear because I bought the “Songs for Japan” album in in 2011. Beautiful harmonies!
• U2 –Vertigo – What can I say! There is just something about U2 that takes me by my brainstem and takes me to what they want me to see. I have really tried to figure out how they do it and the best guess I have is that their music is so completely sincere and vulnerable…at least to me. In any case, it makes me smile, cry and ponder the imponderables.

That’s it… Do the best you can; Laugh every chance you get; And always remember … The best is yet to come!

As always, thank you for being my friend!