Jubea

I don't give a lot of thought to living a long time. Frankly, I am amazed that I have made it this long. I have several older friends who have recently had serious medical calamities of some sort, so the end ain't ever exactly pretty, unless of course, everything stays hunky dory and you manage to go in your sleep.

In any case, I do have at least one reason for wanting to extend my lifespan, my jubea chilensis.

The jubea, or Chilean Wine Palm, is in my opinion, the prettiest palm in the world. It certainly has the widest trunk of any palm in the world. A massive palm.

It is a notorious slow grower. 

Mine is about fifteen years old now.  

These are the cold hardiest palms in the world, they grow in the snow in their native land.

Many have been killed by those tapping them for the sap in their trunk which is fermented for palm wine.

I estimate mine has about four foot of trunk right now and a trunk diameter of about 42". 

Very stout.

They get wide before they get tall.

It is about 16' to the top of its highest frond.

It's growing but just not fast enough for me. 

Although it looks great now, it will look totally amazing once mature in my garden.

Something I will most likely never see.

You can see its dark green foliage behind the other plants in this picture, to the right of the cactus spires.

Has a very deep color, which is nicely accented by the brahea armata or Mexican blue in the front right of it.

Another slow grower.

I want to see the jubea in its regal magnificence, like the jubeas in Mission Bay near the Bahia, or in front of the DeYoung Museum or the Santa Barbara Courthouse.

If only I should live that long.

Tommy Emmanuel and Nora Germain

December 29, 2025

My father, Amos Sommers, would have been ninety nine today. He died in April of 2015 after a long bout with Alzheimers. He was a very successful man and a very tough man. "How the hell can you make a living selling art and antiques?" he would ask me.

Great question, pops. Like anything else, you survive as best as you can. It's up and down.

Here is a snapshot of my dad in the Alzheimer's home in Clovis, a tender moment kissing his sweet wife Shela's hand.

He became more tender as he aged.

They had a wonderful marriage.

I miss him. He was absent near the beginning but always there for me in the end.

Happy birthday, dad.

*

Leslie and I decided to blow off the traditional thanksgiving and have dim sum instead.

Like an early Christmas.

We went down to Jasmine. It was very good, shumai and duck and shrimp and scallops and all sorts of good things.

She said no pictures so you get this.

To the left was a wonderful pork belly with a crispy chicharrone type top.

I put some of the leftover pork in my scrambled eggs this morning. Delicious.

Tonight we make the traditional bird and stuffing, still thankful.

Speed of the Sound of Loneliness

More this and that

 

This is one of our native scrub jays. Such a boring name for such a lovely bird. Much like the house finch, it suffers from an unduly modest sobriquet. If you were a traveler from a distant land and came up on its gorgeous plumage for the first time you would think to call it a blue paragon of gorgeousness or something similarly suitable. 

But no, it was destined for ignominy by some forgotten taxonomist with zero vision and/or literary skill. 

We (mostly Leslie) feed them peanuts in the morning. We have quite a scrub jay troupe around here.

*

A CIA linked Afghani refugee shot two people back east, a tragedy. I would like to mention that this wretch was one guy. I have known quite a few afghans in my time, many of them translators for our troops overseas and the great majority I have met are wonderful people.

They helped us do whatever the hell we were doing over there, much like the Montagnards did in Vietnam. It is senseless to send them back over one misguided man's actions. These people helped us immensely and would be sitting ducks back with the Taliban.

A deluded Christian named Scott Roeder murdered the abortion doctor George Tiller. Eric Rudolph, responsible for several bombings, was an anti abortion Catholic. Are we going to blame the whole religion for the horrible behavior of a few? Where shall we deport them?

*

I got a call from my cousin Linda Forman's sister Francey (also a cousin) that Linda had passed. She loved the blog, was a frequent commenter,  the eighty year old went by the name honky tonk angel. More about her here.

Linda lived in Western Massachusetts, started out in my family's stateside birthplace, Providence. 

Here is a picture of her, she is on the left, Francey on the right.

Both look a lot like my mother, their first cousin. But nicer.

Here is a picture she sent of a building that once held the Roberts Paper Box Company, our longtime family business.

Linda and I were two peas in a pod. 

She loved Dylan and Nanci Griffith, Zevon, Guy Clark. Libby Cotton. John Hartford. Was longtime friends with Sam Bush. 

All that weird music I like, she liked it too. Must be genetic. 

We had similar artistic tastes too, she owned a Werner Drewes and a Lozowick  and a Peggy Bacon.

She was married to a pretty famous bluegrass musician once upon a time and sent me all her old Sing Out magazines last year.

She filled in a lot of family history for me. I did what I could in return.

We also had near identical political leanings.

She liked to piss off the people in her gym, wearing shirts like this:

She was a liberal beatnik and owned an original Woodstock poster.

She would occasionally quote Ram Dass.

It was such a pleasure making friends with each other so late in our respective lives and I will miss her letters and support dearly.

Never met her in the flesh but it doesn't really matter. We were family through and through.

Sitting In Limbo

Mose Allison

Van Rat

I am back from a very successful trip to Santa Barbara. Pretty beat, everything hurts. I sold well, in many different areas, but the booth basically continued the Texas, southwest theme because I still had a lot of that material in the van.

We had a lot of rain in the days before I left. My roof at my store is pretty patched together and I worry about its integrity, especially near the skylights.

I bit the bullet and hired a crew to go back up and patch and seal before the big rain. Spent some money. Glad I did.

Let's see, what do I remember?  

A two day pack in, lights and paper up the first day, all the material brought into the booth. 

Laid it out in my brain and got a wall or two set up.

The show opened Friday, quite brisk sales, will definitely miss some of my prized material. 

I brought this double sided Dean Cornwell illustration, didn't sell it but I like it a lot.

Another big booth.

Anyway the setup looked something like this.

I bought from two estates when I was up there, purchased these great Albert Paley Millennium candlesticks from 1998 and this Tiffany bronze harp lamp base.

Now I just have to find a shade.

Had one really nice dinner with Alyssa and James and friends of theirs at Lure.

Basically ate at my old haunts. Garrets for breakfast, Presto Pasta, Chucks, Esaus...

Sold well but turned down a lot of offers that were almost, we will ultimately see if that was wise or not.

My van ran well but it smelled a little mousey the whole time.

I had the feeling that something was living in it.

One morning I opened my door and there was a ball of lint on the door sill. 

I picked it up and it turned out to be two baby mice.

I deposited them in a shrub but have to wonder where mom is and what is still inhabiting my van?

Rather than coming home exhausted Sunday night I stayed over. Had a brutal interaction with a hotel clerk.

I helped a client hang a painting Monday and saw my friend Carol and picked up some beautiful Mucha prints. Drove home yesterday, leg and foot on fire. I unloaded 90% of the van today, will continue Thursday and try to have a mellow day tomorrow and rest a bit if I remember how?

Good to be home.

*

Two of my favorite musical artists have passed, Jimmy Cliff and Donna Jean Godchaux. Jimmy Cliff was a wonderful performer and a lyricist on a very exalted perch, on the level of Prine, Dylan and Hunter.

 I got to meet Jimmy once and will tell you a little story about the encounter.

I had a childhood friend who was a film and movie carpenter from New York, Greg Criscuola. Greg had a friend who was a major television lead, Debra somebody or other and he flew out to Los Angeles and invited me to a filming. 

He was staying at the Sunset Marquis. This is back in 1978.

We were in the hot tub at the Marquis smoking a joint when these two rasta guys showed up and jumped in. We had a puff with them and they were in Cliff's band.  They liked psychedelics and we may have shared some with them.

They invited us to a show at the Roxy that night. It was an amazing performance, Reebop from Traffic was the percussionist. we were invited to a party after the show in their room.

We walk down there and there is a cop at the door. "Shit," we thought. "They are getting busted." We walk up to the cop and he says, "Get in their sons, they are smoking some gnarly reefer."

We walked in to the coolest party. I thought I was a stoner, these jamaicans were smoking foot long corn husk spliffs and left me in the dust like a baby. Smoked me under the table. White dudes in hawaiian shirts were singing scat and doing free verse while other people were jamming in their respective corners with guitars.

Greg ends up playing guitar with Jimmy Cliff. It was just the most righteous, fun, incredible party, will never forget it as long as I live. Neither will Greg, I am sure.

*

Donna and Phil at the Cow Palace, my first show
after moving back to California in 74.

Donna Jean was the dead's female vocalist. She and her husband Keith were the only two members of the band I actually never talked to. But I loved them both, think she added something very special to the gestalt. Yes, she screamed a bit and was out of tune frequently but not Yoko awful and the good far outweighed the bad. 

Her time with the band was the best they ever played in my opinion and piano playing husband was an incredible and very natural musician. 

Far better than what came next, which was often unlistenable to me. 

I think it was nice to have a female voice in the mix and she was a major component of some of the greatest shows I ever saw in my life, 1976 through 78.

So thank you Jimmy and Donna, bless you both.

Grant Geissman

Rockin' crossword

I created another rock and roll crossword puzzle. I don't think many of you, if any, can solve this one. Surprise me.

Santa Barbara Antique Show

 

Reeling in the years

We met our friends Fay and Kevin at La Especial Norte in Encinitas yesterday for soup. 

It is an old standby.

The chicken soup is still outstanding but the large bowls have shrunk considerably. 

Way of the world I guess. 

You get about twice as much soup here in Fallbrook at Rosas.

Afterwards we drove down the coast towards the Belly Up to see Steely Jazz.

When my wife says no pictures, she means no pictures.

There were two shows, a five o'clock show for the Can't buy a thrill through Royal Scam period and then an eight o' clock set for Gaucho and Aja. Definitely wanted to do the early show, the latter a bit too overproduced and blah for me, can hardly listen to it anymore.

The band is pretty cool. Tom Scott from the L.A. Express, Keith Carlock, Steely Dan's amazing regular drummer, Steely Dan co-founder and guitar player Denny Dias, original vocalist Royce Jones, Freddie Washington on bass, Drew Zingg and the great Grant Geissman (ex Chuck Mangione) on more guitars, Yaron Gershovsky keyboards, a trumpeter and three more vocalists.

The vocals started out a bit rough but about three songs in it started to groove. One of the female vocalists was a powerhouse. What a neat show! I saw Steely Dan with Fagan last year and this sounded way better to me. Course the hall was way more intimate than the forum and the sound was much better too.

Carlock is a monster, reminds me of Frosty. Geissman played the flying V like a demon, great player. Good song selection, would have liked to hear more from Royal Scam and Pretzel Logic but you can't always get what you want.

We had reserved seats upstairs. Bought Thrifty ice cream on the way home. Leslie was wearing it by the time we hit our driveway, like a little kid. 

So cute.

*

Not much else, been getting a lot of cool new inventory, have workers up patching the roof, just in case. 

Went to the art opening at the library on Saturday, a little uncomfortable for me because I wasn't entirely happy with my piece.

Oh well, such is life.

Next time.

Steely Dan

Interesting take

Wise Sage

 

I saw this quote from Buffett a few months ago and my mind keeps going back to it. Worth pondering.

Buffett wrote, “We've never succeeded in making a good deal with a bad person.”“Conversely, we do not wish to join with managers who lack admirable qualities, no matter how attractive the prospects of their business,” he added in his letter.           

“I learned to go into business only with people whom I like, trust, and admire. As I noted before, this policy of itself will not ensure success: A second- class textile or department-store company won’t prosper simply because its managers are men that you would be pleased to see your daughter marry."

In my line of work I have done thousands of deals, with many, many people over the years. Of all types. Buffett's words ring so true to me. If your spider sense knows that a person is a jerk, it will be born out in time. It is never worth it in the long run. And first instincts are rarely wrong about a person. Like the parable of the scorpion and the duck.

I could illustrate with specifics but I won't. There are people who you can and can not do business with. And sometimes it is not a matter of a good or bad person, it is mere chemistry. The important thing is that both sides must win. Some people never get that. Steer clear of assholes.

Phish

The Low Spark Of High Heeled Boys

Stormin'

It has been a week of storms, both solar and rain.

A man got some good footage of the Northern Lights right here in San Diego, on Mt. Laguna. 

The Sunrise Highway is the highest paved road in San Diego, what is it, 6500'? 

We drove it last week on the way back from Jacumba.

JB took this shot from his place up in Fairbanks.

Looks pretty storybook idyllic.

It started raining here last night but there is a lot more to come, a level 3 atmospheric river. 

You never know what that means, we were stranded for two weeks back  in '93.

You sort of have to surrender to the elements and not fight anything. Let it pass by and move forward when it is safe.

On the other side of the world, Thailand, Shawn sent this shot, which looks sort of Roger Dean posed but still very cool.

I have an antique show next week up in Santa Barbara, which has a hard time with the natural elements, I hope the roads and slopes hold up.

Friday through Sunday.

I am pretty close to being packed and have a little free time, a rare commodity in my world these days.

Yesterday I did something I haven't done in ten months, I grabbed my camera and headed up to San Jacinto to take some shots of birds and tune in.

I was most interested in just being there, never even took the good lens out but took a few snapshots to put the camera though its paces and see if I still remembered how to use it.

Barely.

Nothing too riveting, I saw male and female harriers, red tailed hawks, a shrike, not a heck of a lot.

Got a good walk in, shot this pic of an immature male vermilion flycatcher.

Saw lots of coots and ibis, a few egrets, nothing earth shattering.

I did run across a pair of pheasants, no doubt escapees from the neighboring hunt club.

Good for them!

Such beautiful birds.

I drove home and came to the common realization that I honestly have better birding in my own front yard, a red tailed at twilight, and a yellow rumped warbler.

I pulled the card out of the long dormant camera and realized I had some flea market portraits of old comrades I had never seen or processed before.

I give you Jim, Stephen and Dave, for your viewing pleasure.

Strange but wonderful birds indeed!

Hardy souls who have plied the pavement for what seems like an eternity.

*

Steely Jazz at the Belly up Sunday.