Calling All Patriots! A Salute To Memorial Day.

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• I drink. I enjoy it.

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJ1aPaP1_Ew

• No good deed goes unpunished.

• I recall when an AA relative brought a young new AA guy to our Thanksgiving. It was awkward at best. We felt obligated to not serve wine...which we normally did. Plus, we didn't really know the guy at all.

• Life can be tough enough without an addiction like that.

• I worked the Memorial Day weekend in 1974 at KDFL/Sumner. A very drunk salesman came in and handed me an album of military marching tunes. Bob said he had sold thirty minutes to a local business and to let the album track through. Then, he sat down in the corner of the control room and cried as the music played. I have no idea if he was simply patriotic or had a military background. Nice guy, the spitting image of Walter Cronkite, and a great story-teller. He wrote for Field & Stream, bringing a few of his articles for me to read. When the Christmas holiday rolled around and I realized Bob lived alone and would be spending the holiday in his trailer with only his friend Jack Daniels. I thought it would be a nice gesture to invite him to dinner instead. When I picked him up, I knew immediately that he had been drinking again. Just how that would play for this occasion I had no idea. I introduced him to my parents and my wife. He regaled us all with stories of his outdoor adventures. Bob was quite the sportsman. At one point, I turned to my mother who was in shock, and I saw that our guest was eating peas from the serving bowl. The evening only got worse. I suspect he had a bottle in the sport jacket he wore. After dinner, I helped our sloppy drunk guest to the car and dropped him off at his home. My parents never said a word about what had happened. I had been married only a few months at this point. That was the last time we had our parents over for dinner.