Trans World Airlines has a special place in American History. On October 21, 1992 a special anniversary flight from Moscow to New York (via Brussels) brought my family and me to this country, full of hopes, dreams and dressed up in full-blown winter attire on a nice 70F fall day.
TWA is now a fading memory but some photos from the Life Magazine Archives may remind you of the olden days when the word “stewardess” wasn’t frowned upon, smoking was cool and the sexism was a solid corporate policy.

According to this article TWA was training the stewardesses at the corporate headquarters until the opening of the Breech Academy in 1969. More on TWA here but the link at the top of this post will let you take a look at the original TWA website. The rest of the photos are here.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iZV4JW0Nbo

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TXPwn_HaZm0

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Hit it! [audio:https://www.kcmeesha.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Tony_Babino_-_LInternationale_from_Capitalism_A_Love_Story_by_Michael_Moore.mp3|titles=Tony Babino -L’Internationale (from Capitalism A Love Story by Michael Moore)]Since I wrote about the healthcare reform last year the situation didn’t get any better. Whatever will be voted in or “shoved down the throats of the American people” – depending on which TV channel you are watching, it will not produce a meaningful reform in this country. If President Obama was even half as good as some people believed him to be, he would have used his position and Congressional majorities to institute a single-payer system paid for by an increase in taxes. That would have been the right thing to do. Sometimes the right thing needs to be done, even if it’s unpopular. Previous administration had no problem doing the unpopular and wrong things like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan based on the wrong information and misguided convictions. Obama seemed to have the right information and plenty of conviction but not enough courage, persistence, or desire to do what he promised or implied in his campaign appearances.

What will be passed soon is in no way a reform – more band-aids; few things that sound good but will be easily loopholed by the healthcare industry; few accounting gimmicks that will make spending increases look like savings; few giveaways and favors in exchange for votes with most of the changes delayed for years. Nothing here says “vision”, “courage”, “hope” and definitely not “change”. More like “lame”, “sellout”, “weak”, “dishonest”, “gimmicky” and “disappointment”. Any talk about this legislation opening doors for more reform or debate is just that. For years no one will dare to touch this subject, and there won’t be another chance of 2 branches of Government being in sync to produce anything meaningful.

The sad part is that most of the clowns protesting the healthcare reforms and spitting on congressmen are poor schmucks who are one or two paychecks away from begging for the government healthcare and other various forms of assistance, or are already using it based on income, age or previous military service. There may be problems with Medicare of VA but they are free or cheap and, most importantly, available. That’s the most important thing about the government services in general, they may not be the best but they beat not having any. Too bad that many protesters don’t understand that this is the direction we are headed in – not having enough/any coverage. Most of the workplace benefits disappeared or deteriorated and will continue to do so in the future, many people (including myself) now have to dig deeper in their pockets before the insurance payments even kick in. In this situation the failure of the President to pass the real reform is unacceptable; his attempt to mislead the people with the neutered bill they are about to pass is just disgusting.

After the election, when everyone was crying with the fake tears of joy even I let my cynicism down a bit to see if something really can happen. Looks like my streak of not voting will continue unbroken.

In conclusion, a few old photos of a socialized healthcare at work. As you can tell it looks worn out and poor. This is a small country hospital where my Father worked, you can see him making rounds with a group of colleagues (he is on the left in the top photo). The system wasn’t perfect and many times was just broken and inefficient but it was there. People were getting treatment, doctors cared, no one lost their possessions due to a medical treatment or a hospital stay. People who remember that time will tell you plenty of horror stories, but at the same time having this system available took away at least one thing to worry about.

The best chance to have a healthcare reform in this country was wasted months ago. Even when it gets passed there will be nothing to celebrate; it’s a failure at best, but is probably worse because it will allow the President to hang a “mission accomplished” banner of his own and act like the right thing was done. Too bad.

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From the author who brought to you Kansas City 1938, More from 1938 Kansas City, and critically acclaimed Even more of 1938 Kansas City, comes long-awaited:

Still More Photos from  1938 Kansas City

(not available in 3-d)

The truth is, I am lazy, my car is in the shop and I have nothing better to do working tirelessly to entertain you. Some of those might have been used in the previous posts, sorry.

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A new video clip by a popular duo Potap and Nastya Kamenskih is made in the style of the Soviet VIA – Vocal-Instrumental Ensembles – which dominated the music scene of the 1970’s and 80’s.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JC7sE-lhVLg

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@kcmeesha is there anything you haven’t blogged about?

@theDLC

As my friend The DLC pointed out, I have now blogged just about everything and now pathetically spend my time posting links to my own blog, where I previously opined on whatever subject is being discussed. I constantly catch myself thinking about writing something just to discover that I wrote about it at length last year or the year before. That’s why when we came back from the apple orchard on Sunday all I had to do is search and find my last year’s post about apples and another one about the apple recipes. Even my photos looked the same – the same place, the same apples. Luckily we made a little detour or I would’ve had nothing at all.
The Main Street in the city of Ottawa, KS hasn’t changed much since the old days. As a matter of fact it looks very similar to the old photos of Neosho, MO I recently posted, they must have used some standard project for the smaller rural towns.
This is what the Main St. in Ottawa, KS looked like in 1942:

This is what it looks like now:



We got off the highway in Ottawa to wait for the apple orchard to open and promptly found ourselves in the middle of the antique car show known as  Ol’Marais River Run. I don’t consider myself a giant car fan and all the talk about cubic inches, shaved hoods and custom paint jobs does nothing for me, but it’s hard not to stand in awe admiring the time when a car was a work of art. These cars may not have been the safest or the most technologically advanced but they represent the era when the car was still a wonder, an object of pride, an engineering dream trimmed with chrome.

Due to some peculiar historic and political circumstances the cars of my childhood looked almost identical to these, so strangely these shows are just as nostalgic for me as they are for someone who grew up here.

The car show had a feel of a State Fair complete with signage:

…Elvis and Marylin:

…delicious food:


…Republican Party:

…and boyscouts:

In the olden days, before the Ad Wizards took over our lives, the states had simple nicknames. Nebraska was known as a “Beef State”:

Iowa had to settle for the “Pork State”, Alabama went with the “Heart of Dixie”

Arizona called itself “The Grand Canyon State”

and Missouri was known as it is known now as “The State That Thinks It’s Better Than Other States But Is Sadly Mistaken” but is was hard to fit on the license plate.
After the show we finally made it to the orchard:

This year seems to be one of the best years for apples, trees were heavy with fruit.

I spent a few minutes on the pond:

enjoying the wildlife:

Here is what the pond sounds like:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a28tgsr3jRg

We picked 25 lbs of apples:

…paid a visit to the country store:

Took another look at the giant apple in the sky where all the worms go after they die:

…and were home in no time.

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