Bird’s Eye View (Mar 4, 2015)

Greetings one and all. If you are sitting comfortably then I shall begin. I must start this week’s column with a sincere apology to the AV High School Girls basketball team who progressed to the play-offs. A fact that I sloppily failed to mention last week. Then, last Wednesday evening, while the boys were here in the Valley beating Tomales in their play-off game, the girls visited Rio Linda in Healdsburg and also won! The boys and girls thus progressed to away games in the quarterfinals played last Saturday evening in Oakland and Round Valley respectively, where unfortunately the girls were defeated. But our #11 seeded boys produced a superb performance to win 53-51 against #2 seed St Elizabeth’s. The boys will now travel to Sonoma this evening, Wednesday, March 4, to face Archbishop Hanna in the semi-final, while the girls can reflect on an excellent season. The basketball programs had not reached the postseason in recent years, so it has clearly been a memorable season for all of involved and the student athletes and coaches alike are to be heartily congratulated on their success.

For your Quotes of the Week, given my faux pas with the basketball girls, perhaps it would be appropriate to have some wise comments about “Apologies.” Here we go. From England’s King Charles I we have, “Never make a defense or apology before you be accused.” Not my style, but perhaps it worked in 17th century England. Although not too well obviously. Charles was beheaded in 1649. Writer G.K. Chesterton commented, “A stiff apology is a second insult.” which is certainly not my intention. And finally, with advice that I perhaps should have followed before writing all the above, P.G. Wodehouse: “It is a good rule in life never to apologize. The right sort of people do not want apologies, and the wrong sort take a mean advantage of them.” I can see that; but “surely it is right to take responsibility for one’s actions and apologize for them if they needlessly result in suffering or hurt for others.” That’s a quote from me!

Public Service Announcements. #687. It’s approaching that time again: St. Patrick’s Day! The Senior Center Fundraising Corned Beef and Cabbage Dinner to celebrate the occasion is on Saturday, March 14 in the Apple Hall in Boonville, with a happy hour at 5.30pm and dinner served at 6.30pm. Among the refreshments available will be Green beer, Irish coffee, Margaritas, and a selection of local wines and beers, and as always there will be the popular cake/dessert auction. Tickets ($15 adults; $12 for kids 10 and under) are available at the Senior Center, AV Market, and Rossi Hardware. Call 895-3609 for further details. #688. As previously mentioned, the Vets from Mendocino Animal Hospital will not be making a visit to the Valley until Thursday, March 26. #689. The 24th Annual Variety Show returns this coming Friday/Saturday, March 7/8. #690. The Mendocino Bookmobile returns to the Valley on Tuesday, March 10. They are here on alternate Tuesdays for 45 minutes at each of these places and times: Navarro Store 9am (for just 30 minutes); the Floodgate 12.30pm; Philo 1.30pm; Boonville (Apple Hall) 2.30pm. Phone 463-4694 for further details. #691. Need a burn permit? You can get one from the Firehouse in Boonville, also home of the oddly named Community Services District which, for those of you wondering, performs a great job in dealing with all issues connected with the fire department, our local airport, and the recreation center, along with the maintenance of the street lights in the center of our heaving metropolis, all seven of them! Call 895-2020 for permits or 895-2075 on any questions regarding any of these services or stop by. You will be efficiently served with a smile. # 692. For now, the AV Museum continues its winter/spring hours of Saturday and Sunday, from 1pm to 4pm. Situated in The Little Red Schoolhouse next to the Elementary School on AV Way, this is a perfect thing to do in the Valley when you have a couple of hours spare on a weekend afternoon — “The Best Little Museum in the West.” #693. The Grange’s pancake breakfast will not be on the second Sunday this month, but on the third Sunday instead, that’s March 15. #694. The Cuban singer-songwriter Marcos Pereda will be performing at Lauren’s Restaurant in Boonville this coming Saturday, March 14. This presentation of soft Spanish style guitar, “poetry put to music,” begins at 9pm and there is a suggested donation of $15.

Here is the menu for the Community lunches and dinners over the next week at the Senior Center at the Veterans Building in Boonville. The Center asks for a $6 donation from seniors for both lunches and dinners and charges $7 for Non-seniors for lunches and $8 for the dinners. Tomorrow, Thursday, March 5, the lunch, served by Marti Titus and her crew at Noon, will be Tostadas, chicken, refried beans, cheese, lettuce, avocados, salsa, Corn, quinoa and avocado salad, and Elvis Presley cake. Then, next Tuesday evening, March 10 at 6pm, the dinner will feature Chicken Diane, carrots, Potluck potatoes, Cherry gelatin, Barley salad, and Strawberry Lemon Dessert. As this is the 2nd Tuesday of the month, the dinner will be followed by Bingo at 7pm. All meals include vegetables, salad bar, and fruit, plus milk, coffee, tea, and lemonade. Hopefully you will be able to attend, and remember. All ages welcome! Hope to see you there.

Heads-up for this coming weekend. We resume Daylight Savings Time on Sunday March 8 when the clocks will go forward. This means that for some Valley folks unaware of this fact, “Boonville Time” will be almost two hours later than regular time until they become aware of the change.

From the Old Buzzard, comes another in his insightful series. “Signs that the Apocalypse is Approaching.” Buzzard reports, “As I’ve said before, may I suggest that we can all broaden our horizons by considering what Carl Sagan, creator and presenter of the wonderful series “Cosmos” once said. “Used properly, television can educate and inspire awe as well as any book, painting, or film.” To support this claim may I also suggest that each of the following television programs are well worth your time if you enjoy intelligent, entertaining, informative, somewhat adult, well-crafted dramas. they are certainly better than 90% of the drivel you are expected to endure if you go to the cinema. Downton Abbey, a drama series set in the fictional Yorkshire countryside, depicts the lives of the aristocratic Crawley family and their servants in the post-Edwardian era: Babylon, a comedy-drama television series co-created by film director Danny Boyle, set in modern day London; Better Call Saul, a spin-off, prequel, and sequel to Breaking Bad, which was created by that show’s creator, Vince Gilligan, and is set in 2002 about small-time lawyer James McGill (Bob Odenkirk), seven years before his appearance on Breaking Bad, though events during and after the original series are also explored; Togetherness, a wonderfully acted and written drama that is brutally honest about the compromises that eat away at domestic life, but it's also sly and funny; Grantchester, a detective drama set in a 1950s Cambridgeshire village of Grantchester, near Cambridge, England where local Anglican vicar Sidney Chambers (James Norton) develops a sideline in sleuthing; and last but by no means least, The Jinx, in which filmmaker Andrew Jarecki examines the complicated life of reclusive real estate scion, Robert Durst, the key suspect in a series of unsolved crimes. If folks cannot appreciate these enlightening programs (and I have not mentioned regular informative and entertaining shows such as The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and Real Time with Bill Maher), and continue to dismiss all television from their high horse, as if wearing some sort of badge of intellectual superiority, then we really must be closer to the Apocalypse than I had feared.”

Time to take my leave. I’ve got see a man about a sheep. So, until we talk again. Keep the Faith; be careful out there; stay out of the ditches; think good thoughts; be wary of strangers with more dogs than teeth; please remember to keep your windows cracked if you have pets in your vehicle; and may your god go with you. A final request, “Let us prey.” Sometimes poking, often stroking, but almost always humbly yours, Turkey Vulture. PS. Contact me with words of support/abuse through the Letters Page or by at turkeyvulture1@earthlink.net. … On the sheep, Grace. Hi, Silver Swan; behaving yourself? Hopefully not! Bobwhite Quail, keep up the knitting!