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Sunday, June 07, 2015

"Goonies never say die!"


The Goonies, without a doubt one of the most defining movies of the Eighties generation, was released thirty years ago today on June 7th, 1985.

Here's Chunk doing the "Truffle Shuffle" in wild celebration!


Inquisitr.com has a neat list of 15 things about this movie that you may not have known.  F'rinstance, the pirate ship was kept a secret from the cast until they were ready to film the scenes there, so as to more authentically capture their surprise.

Saturday, June 06, 2015

Check out this poster for THE PEANUTS MOVIE

Love the appearance of the CGI here. It's a spot-on merging of modern animation style with Charles Schulz's classic look.

But the highlight of course is the characters.  Looks like most of the Peanuts gang all in one shot, including Snoopy's siblings (even Olaf made the cut!).  And ya gotta appreciate the Little Red Haired Girl's face hidden behind the bag of popcorn...


The Peanuts Movie arrives on November 6th.

Wednesday, June 03, 2015

Bitter Blood: Thirty years later

Law enforcement officials at the scene of the explosion, June 3rd 1985

Within minutes the skies turned a roiling black.  Rain, and then a vicious hail poured out like wrath across the fields.  Law enforcement and emergency personnel ran for cover.  Stones of ice pelted the vehicle, and those who had been within it.  Steam arose from the asphalt of the highway… but it did little to dissipate the acrid aroma of high explosives and smoking metal.

Years later, one of the detectives who had come from Kentucky remembered the storm.  It was as if God Himself “was pissed”.

As well He might.  Looking down from on high at this culmination of madness fueled by pride and jealousy.  If God could be moved at all to anger, surely it must be here.

And there in the midst of it all, wrapped inside the crumpled wreckage: the bodies of two little boys.

Jim and John were already dead when the vehicle exploded.  Autopsies revealed that each had been given a lethal amount of cyanide.  But that must not have been enough, because both were also found to have been shot in the head.

June 3rd, 1985.  The day that one of the most horrifying and bizarre tales in the annals of American crime came to an end.

It had begun a year earlier, with the murders of a widow and her daughter in Kentucky.  And then the brutal deaths of a prominent Winston-Salem executive, his wife and his mother.

The insanity would finally draw to a close on this rural stretch of North Carolina highway, at the climax of a guns-blazing car chase straight out of Hollywood.  Years later, Hollywood did come knocking… but entertainment executives refused to believe that such a twisted tragedy could be wholly nonfiction.

Here at the end of it all, an SUV blasted to smithereens.  Two children who looked sweetly asleep in the back of the vehicle.

And blown apart from the wreckage their dead mother, her body shredded from the waist down: the result of having been sitting atop the bomb.  Nearby, gurgling to death in a ditch, was her cousin… and her lover.  The scions of one of the most notable lineages in North Carolina.  Drawn together in a shared and spiraling madness.

A madness that in the end would leave nine people dead.  Two families nearly wiped out completely.  And to this day, it remains a crime spree that remains no more understandable than it was fully three decades ago.



It began, as so many stories of this kind do, with a fairytale romance.  The princess in question being one Susie Sharp Newsom.

Susie was the daughter of tobacco executive Robert Newsom and Florence Sharp Newsom.  And growing up, Susie seemingly had it all.  She was beautiful.  She had smarts.  She had no end of admirers and then, suitors.  Above all else, at least to her, she was an heiress to one of the most respected names in the state: the Sharps.  Most prominent of whom was the aunt she was so close to: Judge Susan M. Sharp, who had become the first woman in the country to be elected the head of a state supreme court and who was widely recognized as one of the most respected women in America.

In every possible way, Susie Newsom was blessed.  But there was a darker side.  Susie harbored fantasies of being royalty.  She was considered spoiled by many, no doubt because of how she insisted that everything be done her way.  So fierce were the ensuing temper tantrums during childhood that her mother often doused Susie with cold water to calm her down.

When it came time to further her life, Susie chose to attend Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem.  And it was there where she met Tom Lynch.  Two years her junior, Tom hailed from a prosperous family near Louisville, Kentucky.

It seemed like it could have been a happily-ever-after story.  But there were signs from the start.  That Tom’s mother Delores and Susie came to despise each other was the most obvious.  Delores did not want Susie in the family and perhaps Susie did not appreciate her own family being disregarded by her mother-in-law to be.  Photos of Tom and Susie’s wedding portray the two women with very strained smiles for the camera.  What the photos do not show was the heated argument between Delores and Susan, who among other things found fault in the dress worn by bridesmaid Janie Lynch: Tom’s sister.

Susie, John and Jim
circa 1980
But there was a marriage.  And Susie followed Tom back to Kentucky where he was in dental school.  Though between his own studies and her career, there was little time for each other.  Neither was there time to be found with Delores, less than two hours away.  When Susie gave birth in 1974 to her son John, Delores - who had come to Beaufort, South Carolina to see her first grandchild - was told to wait for an appointment to see the baby.  It was much the same with Susie and Tom’s second child James, born in 1975.

And then Tom decided to move the family to Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Susie hated it.  It was a place beneath her position, she thought.  The way Susie raved about the Sharp family back in North Carolina, one would have thought that they were running the place.  Albuquerque lacked culture and dignity.  It refused to treat her with the royal due she had been given throughout her life.

Tom and Susie began to have it out with each other.  With tensions growing, the animosity between the two began to envelop sons John and Jim.  Apparently it even spilled over to the point that Susie lashed out at Jim, who required hospitalization for two days.  No charges were ever filed.

In the summer of 1979, Susie flew back to North Carolina, claiming that she wanted to spend time with her grandfather who was in failing health.

It was very soon after that Susie Lynch told Tom that neither she or their sons would be returning to Albuquerque.

Thousands of miles away, with little more than the reputation of a new dental practitioner set against one of the most politically connected families in the southeast, Tom signed an agreement to give Susie custody of their sons, now ages 4 and 3.

Susie had tired of Albuquerque.  Strangely, with Tom out of the picture even a return to familiar surroundings had given Susie a wanderlust.  For whatever reason (she said she wanted to go be an English teacher) Susie left for China, taking John and Jim with her.  They departed with little more than the shirts on their backs and a bag of Star Wars toys.

She was there for six months before returning home, dirty and malnourished and disillusioned with living in what she had come to believe was a filthy and unhealthy environment.

Susie’s condition shocked her mother, Florence.  But it so happened that there was a doctor in the family.  Susie’s uncle, Dr. Fred Klenner.  Yes, Dr. Klenner would make everything all right…



Even at the height of demand, you could have driven past and not know it was there unless you were consciously looking for it.  The narrow front entrance is today situated between the doors of a beauty shop and a low-power television station.  Looking at it from across the street, it seems like nothing more than another empty office along Main Street, Anytown, U.S.A.

Until perhaps the past decade or, the front door looking out onto Gilmer Street in Reidsville, North Carolina was still announcing, in fading script, that this was the practice of Dr. Frederick Klenner.  And depending on who you chose to believe, Dr. Klenner was either one of the most cutting-edge physicians in the field or a quack of enormous proportions.

Physician or fraud?
Dr. Fred Klenner
There is no doubting of Dr. Klenner’s medical knowledge and expertise, especially in the area of what would today be considered neonatology.  When one looks around Reidsville, there are still today quite a number of people who will profess… and even with some amount of pride… at having been delivered by Dr. Klenner.  When a local farmer’s wife gave birth to quadruplets, it was Fred Klenner who assisted and then supervised their nourishment to good health.  It was a feat that propelled Dr. Klenner to nationwide prominence

A product of the medical school at Duke University, Fred Klenner certainly had the right credentials.  It also seemed that controversy would forever surround him.  His marriage to Annie Sharp was practically a family scandal: she was Protestant, he was old German Catholic of strictest caliber.  But that would only preface the peculiarities… and dark pall… of the life and career of Dr. Frederick Klenner.

It was in the 1940s that Dr. Klenner began experimenting with ascorbic acid - better known as vitamin C - as a possible treatment for a wide variety of maladies.  In time Klenner would be using vitamin C on everything from polio to multiple sclerosis to a toothache.  His work would not go unnoticed: no less an authority than Nobel winner Dr. Linus Pauling gave Klenner his highest praise.  Within a few short years, Dr. Klenner had become world-renowned for his treatments.  And indeed, it was to his secluded office on Gilmer Street that patients came from across the country, hoping to be another miracle of Dr. Klenner’s approach to medicine.

Yes, Dr. Klenner certainly was making a name for himself.  He also earned his detractors.  His over-reliance on vitamin C and other substances to the detriment of traditional medicine gained him a bevy of physicians who deemed Klenner’s remedies to be reckless, even irresponsible.  “Fraud” was commonly said behind his back.

Anyone who came into his Reidsville office could almost certainly expect to be given a shot of vitamin C courtesy of Dr. Fred Klenner.  Visitors to his office could expect other things too.  A segregated waiting room, for one thing.  Up until his death in 1984, Klenner kept white and black patients separated while they waited to see him.  Some have ascribed this to racism on the part of Dr. Klenner, though others have noted that he was simply a product of his times and was reluctant to change according to modern sensibilities.  Indeed, many of his most faithful patients were black.  And when Dr. Klenner passed away, the only fellow physician who came to the service was a black woman.

There were other odd things about Dr. Klenner.  Among the most cringe-inducing is that Dr. Klenner was still using a needle sterilizer, in a time when AIDS and other diseases were grabbing the headlines.  It was very likely that a needle used in Dr. Klenner’s office would be used a dozen times, on as many patients, before finally being discarded.

And then there was Dr. Klenner’s theology and politics.  His belief that the apocalypse was nigh.  That communism was on the march and would swallow the earth whole.  On at least one occasion Klenner claimed to know the exact date that the world would end.

This was Susie Lynch’s uncle, to whom she turned for medical care.

It was at the elder Klenner’s office that Susie would become reacquainted with her cousin Fritz.



To this day, my aunt remembers Fritz Klenner making the rounds at Annie Penn Hospital in Reidsville.  That Fritz would come in wearing his white doctor’s coat, smiling, sometimes accompanied by his father.  Going room to room to see patients and speak with them.  Sometimes Dr. Klenner would take blood samples and give them to Fritz.  Because Fritz was studying medicine at his father’s alma mater Duke University, and his work related to blood research.

Fritz Klenner:
His father's son
That is the Frederick “Fritz” Klenner Jr. that so many people were familiar with.  The up-and-coming young protégé of his illustrious father, who would go on to make his own name in the annals of medicine.

And it was all a show.

Maybe there were indications early on about Fritz.  Some of his high school classmates later recalled how fixated Fritz was about Adolf Hitler.  Fritz also shared his father’s hatred of communism, albeit to perhaps a far deeper degree.  Also inherited was Fred Klenner’s intense end-times fatalism, and a belief in being prepared for the apocalypse at all costs.

Fritz adored his father.  He would do anything to please Dr. Klenner.  The thing he feared most was to be rejected and abandoned by his father.  And he was determined to do anything to keep that from happening.  Fred Klenner’s love was generous… but his punishments could be most severe.

Who can tell when the madness began in earnest?

Was Fritz Klenner pure evil, or - as a very few have suggested - was he the product of mental illness?

I’ve never doubted: Fritz was the way he was, because he chose to be.  It was all a game to him.  Right up to the very end, when he claimed to have been involved in covert operations.

What we do know for certain is that after graduating from a private high school in Georgia (Dr. Klennner refused to have his son graduate from Reidsville High School, so outraged was he over the school's new desegregation policy), Fritz Klenner studied at the University of Mississippi.  But he never graduated.

He told his family that he had.  The first significant lie in a web he would weave of them.  Fritz told his father that “enemies” in the school’s German department conspired to keep him from finishing his degree.  Dr. Klenner bought into it.

Then Fritz told his father that after getting it “straightened out” with Ole Miss, that he was going to enroll at Duke University’s medical school.  And for many years, that is what the community around Fritz Klenner believed: that he was studying to be a doctor.

Fritz… who was affectionately known as “Young Dr. Klenner” by many, could be seen working constantly with his father.  Just as ubiquitous was the black doctor’s bag he carried with him, containing a wild assortment of pills and injections, especially his father’s vitamin C.  Drugs which Fritz was generous in dispensing to any he deemed was in need of them.

It was only when Judge Susan Sharp inquired with her good friend Terry Sanford, then president of Duke University, that it came to be discovered that the only Frederick Klenner who had ever been enrolled at Duke had graduated in the 1940s.

And in time, other stories that Fritz had told would come to light…

Fritz was a Green Beret in Vietnam.  Fritz had fought against the communists.  Fritz had performed extraordinary measures to save the lives of his father and others.  Fritz had connections.  Fritz had done undercover work.  Fritz was an asset of the CIA.

Fritz Klenner was a fixture at gun shops throughout the area.  He made a lot of acquaintances, who became enamored with Fritz’s spell-binding tales of heroic feats.

Only years later was it realized that he had been building up an arsenal of weaponry with which to ride out the end of the world: dozens of guns.  Thousands of rounds of ammunition.  Survivalist literature of the most radical sort.  Vitamins and stimulants and anything else of medical value that could be swallowed or shot up.  Combat knives.  Camouflage clothing.  A Blazer kitted-out to be a rolling fortress.  And explosives.



It wasn’t long after Susie went to see Dr. Klenner that family realized something was very wrong between her and Fritz, though it was never spoken aloud.

But in time, it became obvious to all: Susie and Fritz, first cousins, had become lovers.

Maybe it was a delusion on the part of Susie.  That she and Fritz and the two boys were now all a family.  After all, didn’t the royal families of Europe practice incest so as to keep the bloodline pure?

That is what Fritz had become.  A prince to her princess.

The family was aghast.  If for no other reason than because of the environment that Susie was providing for John and Jim.

Susie was convinced, courtesy of no small amount of paranoia from Fritz, that Tom Lynch was going to take her sons away from her.  Her reaction was to limit Tom’s contact with John and Jim even further than there already had been.  Phone calls were kept brief.  Letters and packages from the boys’ father and grandmother were thrown into the trash.

John and Jim with Susie's aunt Judge Susie M. Sharp, at the dedication of her portrait
The legal hurdles Susie had put in place for Tom to meet with his children perhaps speaks volumes about her desire to control their interactions.  Some have suggested that Susie’s aunt, Judge Susan Sharp, had much to do with that.  However it may be, the requirements were enormous and exacting on Tom Lynch.  He even had to provide for air transportation for his ex-wife when she accompanied John and Jim to Albuquerque on their rare visits to their father.  Tom wanted to see his sons more often, but under the agreement he had signed he could only see them on holidays and several weeks each summer.

Oh hell, I’ll go ahead and say it if no one else will: Susie Sharp Newsom Lynch had all the legal marbles in her corner.  And there wasn’t anything that Tom Lynch could have realistically done about it.

May she burn forever.



Tom Lynch,
wife Kathy and
John and Jim
Tom and his new wife  Kathy got to see John and Jim when they arrived in Albuquerque.  They were utterly astounded at how bad the boys looked: underweight, dirty hair, unkempt nails.  They did not look at all like two healthy young boys.  Neither did Tom and Kathy care for the plastic bags of “vitamins” that Fritz had sent along with them.

Things had gone on long enough, Tom had decided.  He was going to press his case for more visitation rights with John and Jim.

Meanwhile, in May of 1984, Dr. Fred Klenner was in the emergency room at Morehead Hospital in Eden, about twenty minutes from Reidsville.  Dr. Klenner refused to be taken to Annie Penn - only a few streets away from his home - because of a longtime dispute about doctors privileges.

A few days later, Frederick Klenner Sr. was buried.

It was wondered by many what would Fritz do without his father’s overarching presence.



The closest thing that authorities found in the way of a witness was a bicyclist who later reported hearing something not unlike gunshots.

It had been a friend of Delores Lynch who made the discovery, on June 24th 1984.  Law enforcement descended on the scene.  It was a gruesome one: Delores, shot in the back and then in the head at close range.  Her body had been there for at least a day, cooking in the Kentucky heat on the driveway approach to the garage of her house in Prospect.

A trail of blood nearby.  Investigators followed it into the house.

There was Janie, Delores’ daughter.  39 years old, but looking much younger.  She was graduating dental school.  And for the first time in her life, she was truly deeply in love.

Like her mother, she had also been shot in the head and the back.  Also at close range.

Delores Lynch and her daughter Janie

As night descended, more personnel arrived on the scene.  One of the detectives took a single look and told the others “this was a hit.  A pro took these people out.”

The murders of Delores and Janie Lynch rocked the community and completely baffled detectives.  Who could have done this?  Why would they have done this?

“There’s a dark cloud in that family,” a retired officer told Lieutenant Dan Davidson, who was in charge of the investigation.  Find that cloud, he was told, and he would find the killer.

But as weeks turned to months, the mystery of what happened in the house on Covered Bridge Road would only increasingly confound the detectives.  Almost as if to punctuate the enigma, during one visit to the house investigators found several palm leaves arranged in crosses spread across the floor.

They were never explained.  Neither, it seemed, would be what happened to Delores and Janie Lynch.



Gentle souls:
Bob and Florence Newsom
John and Jim had been with their father in Albuquerque when the news arrived about the deaths of Tom’s mother and sister.  Tom wanted to spend more time with his sons so that they could grieve together.

Susie would have none of that, and demanded that John and Jim come home immediately.

In the aftermath of the murders of Delores and Janie, Tom received condolences from an unexpected quarter: Florence Newsom, Susie’s mother.  Florence expressed significant grief to Tom, and Tom was appreciative of that.

But Tom also took the opportunity to express his frustrations about the situation with Florence.  And that what he wanted most was as normal a relationships with his children as any father should be allowed to have.

“I believe that in order for children of divorce to come out of the experience as as well as possible, it is vital for them to have a strong relationship with their father as well as their mother,” Tom wrote.

Florence acknowledged that belief.  “We agree it is very important that the boys have a strong and good relation with their father.  We hope you and Susie can have good communication so the boys will not play one parent against the other.”

So began a rather deep relationship between Tom and his former in-laws, built upon care and consideration for the best interests of John and Jim.

And in the months to come, Florence Newsom and her husband Bob would agree to testify  in court on Tom’s behalf that Susie must be obligated to give him more visitation rights and access to John and Jim.

Susie was incensed.  John and Jim had to stay with her, she claimed.  Because Tom was involved with the mob and that’s why his mother and sister had been taken out in a gangland hit.  She knew that was so because Fritz told her, and because Fritz was CIA.

The hearing was scheduled from the week of May 26th, 1985.


May 19th.

There were Bob and his 84-year old mother Hattie.  They had been shot.  But the perpetrator had shown far greater hatred toward Florence: shot, stabbed and her neck slit.  She was discovered in a prayerful position, posed by the assailant.  Their bodies in Hattie’s house in northwestern Winston-Salem.  Bob and Florence had moved in with Hattie so that they could take care of her in her old age.

Three people who were thought by those who knew them best to be among the gentlest of folk, butchered in the middle of the night.

Next-door neighbor Maya Angelou echoed the disbelief of everyone: why would anyone do this to the Newsoms?

Had there been any other history of violence in the family?, detectives asked Bob and Florence’s son Robert.

As a matter of fact, there had been.  A year earlier, in Kentucky.



Investigators from two states suddenly became very interested in the life of Susie Lynch.  And very quickly her cousin and lover Fritz Klenner aroused their curiosity also.

The question must have been in their minds: would a woman dare murder her parents over a custody battle with her ex-husband?

In a sane world, such a thing didn’t seem possible.

But the world of Susie Lynch was not a sane one.

During the course of the investigation, detectives came across Ian Perkins: a friend of Fritz’s who also lived in Reidsville.  Perkins, 21 and a student at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia, was questioned by Winston-Salem detectives.  And from him, through prodding by the detectives from Kentucky, eventually came a remarkable recounting of the night of May 18th.

Fritz Klenner had long already “confided” with Perkins, with whom he shared an interest in anti-communism and firearms, that he worked with the CIA.  Well, Fritz now needed Perkins to help him.  They had been given an assignment to wipe out a communist cell.  The communists were smuggling weapons to South America and trading them for drugs, which would then be sold to profit the communist cause.  All of this was under the control of the KGB.  So Fritz was going to perform a “touch”, as he explained was CIA terminology for assassination.

If Perkins helped Klenner on this covert operation, it would no doubt look well on his record when he was officially recruited by the CIA.

Fritz planned for he and Perkins to have a three-day weekend, ostensibly camping in the Blue Ridge Mountains.  That would be their “cover”, as he put it.  Cover while they were away on the real mission: taking out the foreign drug traffickers aiding the communists.

The date for the mission was May 17th throug the 19th.

At 11 on Saturday night, Ian Perkins drove Fritz Klenner to the Old Town neighborhood of Winston-Salem,  and dropped him off just half a mile from where Bob, Florence and Hattie were enjoying their evening.

An hour later, Perkins picked Klenner up, the “mission” an apparent success.

Only now, with the detectives present, did Ian Perkins learn that Fritz Klenner had never been a doctor.  Had never been an operative of the Central Intelligence Agency.  But in all likelihood was a multiple murderer who had used Perkins as a gullible alibi.



That was on May 30th.  The next day, Ian Perkins met with Fritz Klenner.  Perhaps out of a need to atone for the role he inadvertently had played, Perkins agreed to wear a hidden microphone.

Perkins and Klenner met the following day also.  On each occasion, Perkins told Fritz that the police had been asking about the Newsoms.  About if he knew anything about it.  Fritz insisted that he was working with the CIA.  He gave Perkins some pills from his black bag, claiming they would help him keep his nerve during interrogation.

On June 3rd, Perkins met with Klenner a third time, in the parking lot of what was at the time the Zayre department store on Cone Boulevard in Greensboro.  Perkins wore the wire again, terrified that Klenner would see it.  Klenner swore that he hadn’t actually killed anyone.  Then he said that he would write a statement for Perkins, indicating that he was on a secret mission for the government.

Then Fritz Klenner said his final words to Ian Perkins: “I’ve got things to do.  I won’t see you again.”

It was the closest thing to a confession that Fritz Klenner would ever give.

Fritz drove off in his Blazer.  Several unmarked police cars were following.

It was about 1:30.  Personnel from five law enforcement agencies, including the detectives from Kentucky and the State Bureau of Investigation, were scrambling.



Fritz arrived at Susie’s apartment off of Friendly Avenue in Greensboro, not far from the Guilford College campus.  Detectives had already staked out the apartment.

They saw Fritz and Susie furiously running back and forth from her apartment, loading supplies into the Blazer.

And then the detectives were shocked to see John and Jim, dressed in camouflage fatigues, exiting the apartment and being made to get into the back of the Blazer.

No one had thought about the children.  It had just been assumed that they were in school for the day.

The Blazer took off.  And the law officers went into pursuit.  It was at the intersection of Friendly and New Garden roads that a Greensboro detective and an SBI agent attempted to make Klenner stop.  Fritz spun the Blazer around the car and headed east.

Police officer Tommy Dennis, who had taken the call to be on hand to arrest Klenner, was coming from the west.  Seeing the Blazer, he attempted a U-turn.  Two other vehicles in the pursuit did likewise and followed behind Dennis.  One car raced past Dennis to get to Fritz.  Dennis swerved and crashed into the Blazer’s driver’s side door.

The next thing he knew, Dennis was looking down the barrel of a 9mm  Uzi submachine gun and behind its trigger the maniacal grin of evil incarnate.

Fritz fired.  Five bullets hit the car.  Two hit Dennis.  He survived, no doubt because of the bulletproof vest his wife made him always wear.  With a chest wound and his shoulder bleeding, Dennis was out of the game.

And Fritz was smiling the entire time.

Friendly Avenue had become a scene straight out of a Mad Max movie.  As the carnage rolled on, Fritz Klenner continued to fire the Uzi as he directed the Blazer toward New Garden road.  One bullet hit Lennie Nobles: a fresh-faced detective from Kentucky just a few weeks on the job before the Lynch murders took place.  Nobles received minor wounds.  Glass from the bullets also hit detective Sherman Childers, also from Kentucky.  The two were undeterred in their pursuit of who by now was almost certainly the killer of Delores and Janie.

The chase reached Battleground Avenue.  Fritz stopped several times to open fire on the officers.  At one point Fritz stepped out of the Blazer to stand in the road and open fire with the Uzi.  Civilians ducked for cover.

The chase exited Greensboro proper.  Fritz continued north, as Battleground Avenue gave way to US 220.  There was no doubt where was his destination: the “farm” he and his father had near Eden.  It was a place he had allegedly kept well stocked with weapons, ammunition and explosives.

The farm was where Fritz was going to wait out the end of the world.  And that is what was happening to him and Susie.

The caravan arrived at the intersection of US 220 and N.C. 150.  The Blazer made a right turn, east.

More machine gun fire.  Residents were bewildered as to what was going on.  The officers remained in close pursuit.

Then, at Bronco Lane, the Blazer’s brake lights came on.

Those nearby later said that they saw some commotion, or struggling, in the cab of the vehicle.

Two shots.  Like pistol fire.

And then the Blazer blew up.

So powerful was the blast, that the Blazer was lifted off the ground as high as the telephone poles before slamming back down.

The time had been 3:07 p.m.  June 3rd, 1985.



Susie’s head and torso barely remained.  It was obvious that she had been sitting on the bomb that Fritz had installed.  There was nothing to be gained from her.

Fritz, also thrown out of the vehicle, survived for a few seconds more.  Dan Davidson, the lead detective from Kentucky, came across Fritz and tried to get a deathbed confession from him.  All that could be heard were the sounds of bones scraping together and a bloody gurgle of desperation.

Then he died.

It was what was found in the back of what had been the SUV that broke the hearts of all who came to the scene.  John and Jim, dead.  Each shot in the head.

It was later determined that they had been given cyanide.

It was also later determined that it was their mother, Susie Lynch, who had shot them.

And then the sky turned black.  And the thunder rolled.



The explosion was so loud, that my father working on his dairy farm heard it from ten miles away.

There is a very strong possibility that had Fritz Klenner gotten much further, that he would have met Mom on her way back home from work that day.  If he was going to his farm near Eden, Klenner would almost certainly have turned north onto Church Street, then followed it north into Rockingham County and onto Woolen Store Road.  That would be the most direct route to the farm from where he turned the Blazer onto Battleground Avenue.

Actually, come to think of it, my sister and I could have probably seen him, too.



Tommy Dennis and Lennie Nobles made full recoveries.  Dennis soon afterward left law enforcement, at the behest of his family.

Ian Perkins served four months in prison for the part he unwittingly played in the Newsom murders.

Within hours of the chase and its fiery end, law enforcement descended on Susie's apartment and Fritz's mother's house.  Dozens of guns were found, with accompanying ammo.

Officials also entered the former office of Dr. Fred Klenner.  There were so many vitamins and other medications on the premises that it took three dump trucks to haul them away to be destroyed.

Detective Davidson later found evidence of Susie Lynch’s participation in the murders of Delores and Janie Lynch.

In the wake of the tragedy, the cooperation of the various law enforcement agencies involved fell under considerable scrutiny.  It remains an open question as to whether anything could have been done in the way of sharing information, that could have stopped Fritz Klenner before he had a chance to make his escape.

Tom Lynch refused to have John and Jim buried in North Carolina.  His sons were laid to rest in New Mexico.  In the last place where they were truly happy.


Thirty years ago today.

I was eleven years old.  Just a little older than John and Jim.  And even then, all I could think about was how could a mommy do that to her two boys.

A lot of things happened that summer.  One friend was left paralyzed for life from a car accident.  Another was killed on our farm in a freak mishap.  And then not long after, Dad almost lost his right hand in a way that to this day still makes me want to throw up.

But the Fritz Klenner murders, and how they ended on that road near my home, haunted me especially.

They have haunted countless others, and no doubt still will decades from now.  They will haunt, no matter how much our senses wrestle with comprehending that such a thing happened.  Jerry Bledsoe wrote as much when he authored Bitter Blood: his massive tome about the murders and the madness that coalesced between Fritz and Susie.  Twenty-seven years later, Bitter Blood remains the definitive authority of what has so often been called the most bizarre crime in American history.

There is so much to be haunted by this story.

But most of all, I'm haunted by John and Jim, though I never met them.

They would have been my age now.  They could have had wonderful lives, each of them.  They could have gone on to college.  Fallen in love.  Gotten married.  Had children of their own.

Their mommy took it away from them.

I just can't understand that.  I couldn't understand it then.

I can't understand it now.

And I don't doubt that until my dying day, I'll never understand.

Nine people.  Across four generations.  Destroyed by unbridled jealousy and unfettered fantasies.

Thirty years ago today.

Doesn't seem like it.

A lot of my childhood innocence died that day.

It did, for many other young people around here.

 And I'll never come close to figuring out why.


Photos are attributed to the News & Record, which has made many other photos about the Klenner-Lynch murders available.  For more coverage of the thirtieth anniversary of the murders, including links to the original article series written by Jerry Bledsoe, click here.

Thursday, May 28, 2015

Book: Breakthrough

Let's recap, shall we?

Dad's passing in November threw everything out of kilter, particularly writing the book.  Not just out of being in grief and recovering from losing my last remaining parent, but also because of everything that comes with a death in regard to paperwork, his estate, and so forth.  So the project I've been working on since last May, my book about having bipolar disorder, had to be put on the back burner.

In January I felt okay enough to continue working on it.  And I did.  At least for a little while.  A few more chapters were completed.

Then in February, everything slammed to a halt.

I had reached a place in conveying the narrative where my mind could not, would not, proceed any further.  It had hit a solid wall and nothing I did could break it down.  It was my memories, very painful memories, that I could not approach much less attack.

It was all of the memories of the very worst kind of person that mental illness made of me.  For twenty-some chapters it had been building to this wretched culmination, and I lacked any heart to take one step further.

The core of it was a considerable amount of material, correspondence really, from the past several years.  You could call it a kind of file.  And I couldn't open that file, though I needed contents of it to go forward with my writing.  It was a crucial amount of raw source material about myself.  I needed it for my research.  But I also see now that I needed it for my own personal understanding.

Last month helped immensely.  First the trip I made to visit family in Florida.  And then the week which my dear friend Melody spent here.  It had been Melody's idea in March that I really could go into "the file"... but also that I shouldn't be alone when I did so.  Her presence here bolstered my resolve open "the file" and see what was inside of it.  Nothing that I hadn't seen before, but it was just as painful now as it was during the time that the correspondences were accumulating.

I couldn't have done that research without a good friend being nearby who could give me encouragement and support when I needed it.

That was the end of April.  The trip to Florida renewed my cheerful spirit.  Melody's visit gave me strength to barrel through that blockade in my mind.  But something was still missing and I couldn't figure out what.  So it was that I've gone all of this month without writing anything for the book.

My narrative was still ground to a halt and I didn't know how to make it move.

Until late last night.

I finally cracked it.  The critical next chapter.  It came in a moment, the breakthrough that I had been looking for.

I spent the next few hours writing.  In the wee hours of the morning, the first draft had been completed.  And then I hurtled on to the beginning of the next chapter.

It was like a wave had been building up all of these months, finally come crashing ashore.  And when it receded, there it was: the vision of how to keep going.  How to move forward.  Three months, my efforts and frustrations were leading to this.  There were times when I genuinely wondered if I should give up this project.

Maybe it was God whispering something to me last night.  I want to think it's like that.

Writing the book is back on track.  I've broken through the wall, have overcome that torment and fear.  Doing that changed me, maybe made me a better person.  Made me stronger.

I know what to do now.

Wednesday, May 27, 2015

Chronicle of a manic-depressive episode

I'm a writer.  It's incumbent to my nature to put down my thoughts and observations, either for personal review later on or for appreciation by others so that they may come away from the time they have just spent with a little understanding and enlightenment.  At least, that is what I try to gain from anything from others that I take the time to read.  Writing is how I contribute to the larger world, and I have to be honest about what it is that I am writing about.  Regardless of how it reflects on me.

So I have no real problem with documenting my more severe bipolar episodes.  Friends on Facebook know, perhaps too well, how my writing there reflects the state of my moods.  A little over a year ago however I began to more clinically... or at least as is possible to do with such things... document my manic-depressive episodes for friends and family there to read.

There have been a lot of reasons for me doing that.  For one thing, I'm writing a whole book about having bipolar disorder, so I'm not sharing anything that won't be public knowledge anyway (at least, I hope that it will be public knowledge in the form of a published book!).  Related to that, writing on Facebook about my episodes allow me to "beta test" the tone of my writing for the book: sorta see how well it flies with others.  So far, everyone seems pretty taken in by it.  Writing about this as it happens affords a peek into something that they otherwise might never have any understanding of.  And one of the long-term benefits to me is that these "entries" do serve as a real-time journal of this condition that has wrought so much damage to my life.  Maybe there is some value in that, which I can someday look back over and draw some crucial clue from.

For the past several days, actually going back over a week and a half, I have been dealing with one such manic-depressive episode.  It had especially climbed in intensity in the last two or three days until this morning, when it finally lapsed and began to recede.

I made three entries on Facebook about it.  So I thought that I'd share those here, for anyone interested in this kind of thing.

Tuesday, May 26th, 1:28 a.m. -
Extreme depression for the past several days. From the start of the weekend on the intensity has been exceptionally severe. Depression with mixed-state of mania characterized by thoughts about death and dying, whether I have a soul or not, doubts about God really hearing me, all beyond my control absent medication... and even those aren't helping much.
There are reasons why too many bipolars commit suicide. I can barely convey the full effect of this one. Unable to live but don't know how to die. Wondering if my mind is too broken for God to care. The ghosts of so many relationships gone, because of this thing that I'll spend the rest of my life reining in.
There's a line. Most people don't know its there. You find it when you want to die. You finally cross it when the desire to no longer be here pushes you over from longed-for absence into active ideations. I have not had the ideations this time... but once more I have approached too close to the line than most people would ever want to.
"Just a little less pain, God. Just a little assurance that You are listening..."
I keep crying out to Him, desperate for Him to show me that He hears me through the madness and the despair. For God to show me that I'm not a reject, that I'm not someone He's abandoned. Because that's what I feel like, abandoned by God. And that's a worse thing than the manic-depression ever could be.
Yes, I'm on the medication. They are working. God only knows what I would be like without them.
Maybe this episode will end soon.

Tuesday, May 26th, 10:12 p.m. -
Depression/manic episode has retreated, for the most part. Still many lingering thoughts about death and questions of the soul and whether God is hearing me, however. Those were the topic of much conversation during my weekly therapy session this morning ("we covered a lot of heavy ground" in her words). Thankfully I happened to have that appointment today, when I was in dire need of it. Also discussed was the feelings of wanting to be dead, and that "line" which I explained in the previous status. Not for the first time, not for the last, I went closer to the line than in peaceful periods I would want to. She asked, again (because she had to) if I would seek help if I crossed that line into serious thoughts of killing myself. I can do that. I *have* done that and I like to think that I'll do it again when... not if, when... things come to that.
I wrote that status was to give you all some insight into what it is to be bipolar, during a particularly intensive episode. There are some reasons why I did that. One of them is because I'm writing about this in my book anyway, I thought it would be a neat idea to run this kind of material by others. Another reason is because posting these "reports" here documents something that DOES impact others.
When I've done these, I haven't asked for prayers. However, I do greatly appreciate them. And I need to express my gratitude to everyone who has lifted me up during this most recent bout with this condition.
Thank you :-)

Wednesday, May 27th, 4:57 p.m. -
Manic-depressive episode has receded. Since waking up I've had no oppressive thoughts about death or whether or not I have a soul. My frustrations with God however are seemingly never going to go away. I would still give anything for as much as a whisper from Him, that He really is listening to me. SOME indication that my mind isn't so broken that He can't hear me...
It would be nice to know if I could still have some semblance of a normal life. Maybe even a family. That's what I've asked Him most of all for.
I've tried "replicating" the episode, in my head. Tried to voluntarily bring about the feelings and thoughts that had overtaken me these past several days. I can't do it. I don't think its because of exhaustion either (mental and physical). It's because this is a disease that is so capricious. It comes and goes at its own whims. It is a separate entity from my "real" mind. I can no more "will" a bipolar episode to occur than I can command my foot to have an ingrown toenail. It's impossible to make such an intense manic-depressive episode come about. I can certainly encourage the conditions for one, by abstaining from the medications. But the arrival of the episodes themselves are completely beyond my control.
There is some strange comfort in that. Almost an affirmation that this isn't "just in my head", if you catch my meaning. That there truly is a physiological basis for this condition.
Even so, it does seem too unfair. To have a disease that sends my mood so completely out of whack and robs me of clear thinking. I *do* demand God to tell me how could He let such a thing happen, to anyone. What if mental illness keeps someone from knowing about Him at all? Is that person eternally damned because of bipolar or schizophrenia? Am I damned for wondering such things?
Is that why it's as if God doesn't hear my cries to Him? Because I don't have enough faith in Him for giving me such a damnable disease.
Theological musings aside, the episode is fast fading in the rear view mirror. So for now, I will be content with that much.

Sunday, May 24, 2015

Rest in peace John Nash

Very sad news today about John Forbes Nash, Jr. and his wife Alicia, who perished in an automobile accident last night in New Jersey.



I read A Beautiful Mind several years ago, and then again during research while writing my own book (even though Nash suffered from schizophrenia and not bipolar disorder).  However it was that the movie portrayed the hell that he went through, his real-life ordeal was much, much worse.  But he endured, and triumphed wildly.  His work in game theory - even as a graduate student - revolutionized economics and ultimately led to his being awarded the Nobel Prize in 1994.  I wish I had even a fraction of the mind to really appreciate the work that Nash pulled off throughout his long and brilliant career.

Thoughts and prayers going out to their family.

Thursday, May 21, 2015

Look! Lindsey Stirling and Josh Groban perform "Pure Imagination"... with the Muppets!

You know you've hit the big time when you land a gig with the Muppets.  So it has now happened with violinist/dancer/artistic force of nature Lindsey Stirling.


Check out Stirling performing a rendition of "Pure Imagination" in this video mounted by Kermit and the gang (and oh yeah, vocals by this Josh Groban guy too):

Monday, May 18, 2015

Here it comes: The Knight Shift SWIMSUIT EDITION!

You couldn't resist, could you?  You were duly warned.  You were told that there was nothing that I could do.  And yet some of you couldn't keep yourselves from asking me about her.  SOME of you even went so far as to offer money for her Facebook page.  And I can't do that either.

But never let it be said that this blog doesn't try to deliver.

So it is that today, I bring to you the first ever...

The Knight Shift
SWIMSUIT EDITION

Featuring my beautiful cousin Rachael as she models a variety of cutting-edge swim attire.  As well as more about her, in her own words.


"I'm local in Miami but plan to travel internationally this summer. I'm happily single and plan on that for awhile lol"

  
"I eat honey every day. And I love God and life!"


"I hope to stay in the light and be a light no matter the darkness I've faced or will ever face ahead."


"It's all about perspective and keeping our minds stayed on peace is key to getting through anything crazy that life brings."



"I'm hard on myself and def not anywhere close to perfect but pray for me that I will stay strong!"


"Life is tough, but God is more powerful than all that."

(Editor's note: the one below is my personal favorite of the suits that Rachael is modeling.  I've never seen a piece of fabric engineering like that.  A real work of art!)


Yes, she's beautiful no matter what she's wearing.  But Rachael also has an amazingly beautiful heart.  She is a remarkably sweet young lady and her devotion to God has inspired me to seek Him first also as I embark upon my own endeavors.  I am very blessed and honored to call her my cousin.

I've learned something from these photos, something I never understood before.  I have not ever been a real fan of "swimsuit issues" of magazines or television specials or what have you.  Yes, I'm as red-blooded a guy as you can get, but that sort of thing has never been what I go for in terms of lovely attire on a female.  What I mean is: girls in swimsuits have never "turned me on".  But in looking at these photos I've realized something: that the purpose of swimsuit photos is NOT so much the woman and how "appealing" she is, but it really is a showcase of fashion design and creativity.  A beautiful woman in a well-conceived and realized swimsuit is a magnificent work of art, to be enjoyed and appreciated as a single entity.

Well, that's what I took away from it, anyway.

And so concludes the first (only?) The Knight Shift Swimsuit Edition.  Lord only knows if there will be another :-P

Too many candidates? How to remedy the presidential debates

In the past few days I've seen a lot of commotion about the first Republican presidential "debate", set for a few months from now.  The biggest deal is about the number of candidates who may appear on the stage: some are counting as many as 19.  And there's the mess going on right now with George Stephanopoulos: the ABC whateverhedoes and how he donated $75,000 to the Clintons: common sense would be that no "journalist" that blatantly compromised would serve as moderator for any debate, much less a Republican one.

Then again, I haven't been impressed by any moderator of presidential politics in recent years.  Don't even get me started on the Fox News guy who blatantly asked Ron Paul during one of the early debates if he seriously thought he was a presidential contender.  If that wasn't biased journalism, then I don't know what is.

Back to the amount of candidates.  Actually, we can address the moderator issue as well.  There is a very simple solution.  Of course this being about the politics and power of high office, don't expect it to be adopted:

All 19 candidates in a row on stage.  The moderator asks one question to all of the candidates.  Then in random order each candidate gives his response, with a minute of time allotted for his or her answer.  No rebuttals.

It's not a "debate" in the fullest sense of the term.  More of a candidates forum.  And it's worked before.

When I ran for board of education some years ago, there were 16 candidates running for five seats.  There were two forums for candidates to express their views.  There was a televised forum, which due to studio space constraints had us going in front of the camera three at a time, and there was a public forum at one of the county's elementary schools.  Fifteen candidates total took to the stage (another candidate refused to come and tried to make a ridiculous spectacle of it later on).  I think we got in 5 or 6 questions total.  It ran quick and smooth, and everyone came away from it informed about the candidates.

It also served to engender no animosity among the candidates or toward the moderator.  When everyone is getting asked the same question, without room for obvious bias on the part of the alleged journalist doing the moderating, well... it makes for a debate that is more even-keel for all involved.

Fifteen candidates doing a debate.  That was completely fair and unbiased in regard to anyone.

Don't tell me it can't be done.  It can.  I should know.  I was there.  I was one of the candidates.

But I'm not expecting my recommendations to meet with any approval from either the Republican or Democrat parties, or the media giants who perpetuate the weary drama between them.  My suggestions are meant for a better sort of citizenry.  Maybe someday, in the not-too-distant future, those people will rise to the task and take charge of this country away from the corrupt and the power-mongers.

TWIN PEAKS is back on and David Lynch is directing!

I said a few posts down that I spent the weekend away from the Internet, so I could re-focus my thoughts, especially toward writing the book.  However this bit of news almost yanked me away and had me rejoicing on this blog.

So in case you missed it: David Lynch is returning to helm the Twin Peaks revival!  And not only that  but apparently there will be more than the nine-episode order we had already been told was coming.

Apparently the heart of the disagreement that had earlier threatened production is that Lynch wanted more resources to tell the story the way he felt it needed to be told.  Which is totally understandable.  Twin Peaks is his baby, always had been.  Nobody else could pull off the mystery, the tension, the flat-out weirdness that has made this show so consistently beloved and admired over the past two decades.  Twin Peaks never got the full resolution it deserved.  But next year, thanks to Showtime, we'll be getting that.

The show is still on for the summer of 2016.  It will air exactly one-quarter of a century after the final episode of its broadcast run in 1991.  Right on time for, as dream-Laura told Dale:


Speaking of 25 years, how has the cast fared all of this time?  Based on this video that Madchen Amick (who played Shelly Johnson) posted... they look downright great!  I think this is everyone except Kyle MacLachlan and Ray Wise (we know MacLachlan will be back as Dale Cooper, and Ray Wise's character is dead), Jack Nance died under mysterious circumstances (no joke) so Pete can't return, and Frank Sylva (Killer BOB) passed away from illness.  Otherwise it looks like the whole gang did this clip:

This is looking better than I originally imagined. Wonder if the cherry pie is as good as ever...

So... is Princess Leia now a Disney Princess or what?

Two days after the Disney acquisition of Lucasfilm two and a half years ago, a friend from high school told me over Facebook that her daughter was wondering about something.  It was a good question then and it's just as good if not more so now:

"Is Princess Leia from Star Wars now a Disney Princess?"

 Okay, so Leia is now under the Disney umbrella.  Admittedly, that means very little in the grander scheme of things.  I'm not seeing anyone equating Han Solo with Prince Charming after all.

But Leia is a bona-fide princess.  In fact, she's on a whole 'nother level from the Disney Princesses.  She's the adopted daughter of Bail Organa of the Royal House of Alderaan.  That's a much bigger deal than Aurora's kingdom or Ariel's realm under the sea.  Snow White had the witch trying to destroy her... but Leia had the forces of Emperor Palpatine hunting her down, led by no less a dark knight than Darth Vader himself.  Tiana is a product of the French Quarter of New Orleans.  Well, Leia comes from an even sleazier background: senate politics!  And don't even get me started on how Leia does things with her hair that Rapunzel can only dream about.

And yet the question persists: does Leia belong among the ranks of the Disney leading ladies?

Well, I have an answer, and it's kinda as official a statement as we're apt to get for the time being.

A few weeks ago I was out of town and came across a Disney Store.  I went into check out the Star Wars stuff, and once more found myself contemplating the Leia/Princesses conundrum.  Just out of curiosity I asked one of the associates, and I was expecting something of a humorous answer.  However when she called the store manager to come over, I knew that something more was afoot.  The manager told me that I was far from the only one who's asked them about that.  Indeed, so many have asked Disney Store employees across the country that question that there is now a semi-official response from Disney...

Here it is: Princess Leia is not a Disney Princess.  To be counted among their ranks, a proposed heroine must be inducted at a special ceremony at one of the Disney parks, and that hasn't happened yet for Leia.  However, that's not to say that it won't happen at all.  There is some speculation that Disney will have her coronation sometime fairly soon, possibly even in time for Episode VII: The Force Awakens this coming December.

There is a very significant amount of support for her to be made a bona fide Disney Princess.  The leadership of Disney is well aware of this.  And as Star Wars continues to grow under the Disney aegis, expect that support to increase further.

So there we have it: Leia isn't a Disney Princess yet.  But the odds to seem to be in her favor that she will be one, and sooner than later.

I know: it's not the kind of earth-stopping thing that's utterly critical.  But in this crazy world that is going more insane seemingly by the hour, I thought it was something worth chuckling about :-)

Sunday, May 17, 2015

Coming tomorrow...

The post that could finally break The Knight Shift.

Maybe the post that finally sends me to prison.  Or at least will have people wanting me to get incarcerated.

This blog's most outrageous post to date.

There will be some more posts coming tomorrow (I spent most of the weekend away from the Internet completely, so I could clear my head and cut through the fog keeping me from writing for the book.  It worked, incidentally: this afternoon I finished the first new chapter since late February.)

So those posts will get done.  And then, probably late tomorrow afternoon or early evening, will come nothing less than the boldest post in this blog's history.

But I also like to think that on some level, it will be pretty funny.

What is it?  Stay tuned!

Friday, May 15, 2015

How about something beautiful for a change?

This is my cousin, Rachael:


No, guys: you may not ask me for her phone number.

Thursday, May 14, 2015

Out of the Maw

Exhausted.  Worn down and running on bare metal.  Whether the drugs are helping or dragging down on mere being is something no longer discernible.  My mind is a chemical kalediscope of up and down and in and out, like one of those movies from the Sixties but without the funky soundtrack.  Trying to keep it together, without being subsumed or consumed by madness on all fronts.

These past few days, thoughts of wanting to be dead haven't stopped.  Thoughts of active ideations of suicide are not there but I'm fighting to stay away from that edge.  Something I've already come too close to.

Not the first time.  Not the last.

I didn't want to look into the abyss.  I was forced to gaze into it.

Take the meds.  Slow it down.  Up the intake.  Breathe in this lithium night.  Take the edge off.  Forget how much you lose as a writer and a thinker.  Be living, not alive.  Mere existence is a crawl.  Life to the fullest accompanied by near-psychosis, or breathing day to day without fulfillment of purpose.

Damn the disease.  Damn the drugs far more so.

I take the meds.  And I will live and be haunted for one more night.
I have no tears and I must cry.

The drugs took the tears all away.

I miss being able to cry.

Sunday, May 10, 2015

From the estate of Robert Knight...

This past day was a bittersweet one.

My sister and Dad's sister and her husband and I set to work on cleaning out the basement of my parents' house.  Just something that has to be done, sooner than later.  The entire house is being cleaned out, top to bottom.  Because in a few months the house that my family has called home for all these decades will be ours no more.

On a more personal note, I will be looking for an apartment soon, depending on where the Lord leads me.  Which, could be literally anywhere.  For the first time in my life I am truly on my own.  I did everything that I could for Mom and Dad.  Now is time at last to see what's out there.  I can go anywhere, do anything.  It's a very thrilling time in my life... and I'm feeling younger than I have felt in years.  Maybe I'll stay around here.  Or relocate to Florida.  Lately the notion of doing some overseas missionary work has crept into mind.  So many places where I could probably be happy.  Maybe at last the little bit of happiness that I've always wanted, even.

This is what Dad, and Mom, would have wanted of me, no matter where it is that I go.  And that could be any number of places.  There are only two absolutes: Tammy the Pup will be accompanying me (that little girl and I are attached at the hip) and there must be real bona-fide broadband Internet.  All this time I've been using a satellite connection and there's not only a monthly data quota, but also HORRIBLE latency.  Wherever the new digs are will certainly be a place where I can do online gaming with "Weird" Ed and all our other wacky pals.  Not to mention getting to use a Roku.

But that's yet to come.  Right now, there is the very difficult business of settling Dad's estate.  Something that I had no idea was so wrought with intricacies and hurdles.

So we spent most of the day cleaning the basement.  Going through everything.  So much of Mom and Dad's belongings and darn nearly all of it triggering memories for me.  I was literally telling Anita and my aunt and uncle the year and day that we got this item and that.  Such as the VCR that Dad bought three weeks before Christmas in 1984.  And the stereo that was a present to Mom in 1979, when I was almost six years old.  And "newer" things like the first satellite receiver, from 1997 when it was still Primestar.

All of those were so shiny and new once upon a time.  Now useless and collecting dust and forgotten about, as will be with most of the possessions around us eventually.

"Life is a vapor".  The materials which we accumulate, much more so.

So much of what we found brought back many, many cherished memories for all of us.  When we came across Dad's cap collection, that hit me hard.  He collected so many caps over the years.  We didn't know what to do except to put it with everything else going into the dumpster we've rented.  And for a while, doing that walloped me hard.  But there are other caps of his that I can hold onto, and so I can still honor his memory that way.

Some of what we've found will be sold at an estate auction later.  The rest is consigned to that dumpster.  And soon that will be the end of that.

Well, there is one other thing worth mentioning.  At long last I am looking at selling off most of my Star Wars collection.  First I have to get it cataloged... which could take weeks.  Then I have to figure out how exactly to sell it: eBay or Craigslist or somesuch.  It all needs to go to good homes.  But I'm going to keep the pieces that have especially great importance to me.  I'm still debating the Slave Leia cardboard stand-up that my sister gave me for Christmas when I was in college: she said that putting it in my apartment would make sure that I woke up to a woman every morning (her words).

It's finally sinking in.  This home will soon no longer be "home".

But I think that things will work out fine.  God has taken care of me this far along.  Maybe He will bring me a little further.

There is one thing from the estate of Robert Knight that I'm not sure how we are going to dispose of.  It's a cache of items which I discovered this afternoon, on a high shelf - untouched for decades - in the basement.  As I was pulling out dust-covered jars and bottles, some dating to the Fifties, my hand touched something round and metal.  And when I saw what it was, I could scarcely believe it.

Look!  Billy Beer!


Dad had told me years ago that he had some of this stuff, but until this past afternoon I had never laid eyes on it.  And next to the Billy Beer cans (which were still filled with beer) there were a few cans of J.R. Ewing's Private Stock, which I assume was from around 1980 and the "Who Shot J.R.?" hype.

Billy Beer.  Somehow, that made all the work and yes, heartbreak that we went through this past day worth it.  It's the kind of thing that Dad would have bought, as a novelty if nothing else.  I don't know what I'm going to do with those cans.  Maybe donate them to some strange museum for this kind of thing?

Hey, Billy Beer can't be all bad, can it?

"MMMMMMM... We elected the wrong Carter."

Thursday, May 07, 2015

The shortest scientific journal paper published... ever

"The Unsuccessful Self-Treatment of a Case of 'Writer's Block'" is the title of one Dennis Upper's article, published in Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis in the fall of 1974.  In terms of structure and syntax it is in every way a well-researched, thoroughly annotated and concisely presented scientific paper.

It is also the shortest such paper ever published by a journal.

I don't dare excerpt it here.  You'll have to visit the article that Science Alert has about it.  Much thanks to great friend of this blog Dewana Hemric for passing it along!

EDIT:  Real Clear Science has compiled a few other brilliantly terse published science articles.  I like this one especially, a fairly recent article investigating neutrinos traveling faster than light...