So, Unca Joel,

The muse was with you, huh. What were you and he drinking to ease it
along??? :-)

John Rodgers
88 GL Driver

Joel Walker wrote:

> yes, friends and neighbors, it's Frydaye once again.
> and that means something ...i just can't recall what it was ...
> anyway, here's some stuff dug up many years ago from an attic across
> town by the water tank.
> it seems that Willie "da Bard" Shakespeare was a vw bus nut, and even
> wrote some pomes
> about the subject. course, vw buses didn't look much the same back
> then, and they were powered
> by smallish poor (but strong!) folks hiding under the rear of the bus.
> :)
>
> don't belief it? check out All's Well That Ends Well, Act 4, Scene 4
>
>   Our wagon is prepared, and time revives us:
>           All's well that ends well; still the fine's the crown;
>   Whate'er the course, the end is the renown.
>
> a bus-like sentiment if ever i heard one! :)
>
> and Cymbeline, Act 5, Scene 5
>
>   And would so, had it been a carbuncle
>   Of Phoebus' wheel, and might so safely, had it
>   Been all the worth of's car.
>
> now, i'm not quite so sure just who Phoebus was in this play, but
> usually they were
> referring to Apollo, who used to cruise up and down the california
> coast highway
> in his bright sun-yellow split-window bus.  don't recall the carbuncle
> on it, though ...
>
> and in Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5
>
>    O, how the wheel becomes it!
>
> (lots of you folks keep on and on and on about this very same
> subject!!!). ;)
>
> and even King Lear, Act 2, Scene 2, talks about the high costs of
> alloy wheels:
>
>   Fortune, good night: smile once more: turn thy wheel!
>
> and later in Act 2, Scene 4 ...
>
>    Let go thy hold when a great wheel
>            runs down a hill, lest it break thy neck with
>            following it: but the great one that goes up the
>    hill, let him draw thee after.
>
> or basically: it's dangerous to push buses DOWNhill ... you'll break
> your neck.
> they used to talk funny back in them days. probably had something to
> do with
> those strange clothes they wore.
>
> and again in Act 4, Scene 7, where he talks about what happens if you
> don't replace your fuel
> lines in a timely manner (you've all seen those photos of buses
> burning on the side of the road,
> tires all aflame and metal melting off the bus) ...
>
>    but I am bound
>            Upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears
>    Do scald like moulten lead.
>
> and in Coriolanus, Act 1, Scene 6, we have a situation most familiar
> to the old split-window hippie
> generations, trying to avoid the fuzz/gestapo/police ...
>
>   Spies of the Volsces
>   Held me in chase, that I was forced to wheel
>   Three or four miles about, else had I, sir,
>   Half an hour since brought my report.
>
> anyhoo, here's some offerings from the Bard hisself ...
>
>
> Believe It ... or Don't Department
> Willy "Bill the Bard" Shakesbeer drove a vw bus!
>
>              Sonnet xviii
>
>  Shall I compare thee to the summer's days?
>  Nah, for thou art too ugly and too fat;
>  No lines of grace nor speed thy form displays,
>  More like the Snail, with speed akin to that;
>  But when the showers of April are forgot,
>  And darling buds of May do grace the land,
>  Are thoughts of camping given rein to trot
>  Within the wintered hearts and minds of Man,
>  For it is then thy use belies thy form,
>  As caterpillar turns to butterfly,
>  From cargo's bus to camper's little dorm,
>  You turn whenever weekends happen by.
>     So long as campers camp, from sea to sea,
>     So lives a Bus, and those who camp with thee.
>
>
>               Sonnet  xxix
>
>  When, in this race of Fortune and men's lies,
>  I often sit alone and contemplate ...
>  Where might I be, had I been much more wise
>  In choice of cars with which to link my fate?
>  What might I drive to work, to play, to cope
>  In rageous traffic, more than some can bear,
>  Were I to let someone decree my scope
>  In what to buy, to say, or clothes to wear?
>  How more in profit might my time be spent
>  Than nursemaid to some broken old auto?
>  A smile does ease my brow with troubles bent
>  As to the wheel I climb and off I go ...
>     And though my drives through rolling country end,
>     I love this bus, this one that makes me grin.
>
> and just to prove that Shakespeare wasn't the only literary figure
> that knew about buses and such ...
>
>  SONNET #43
>
>     From the Portuguese Man-of-War
>     By Lizzie Barrel Browning .50 cal.
>
>  How do I drive thee? Let me count the ways ...
>  I drive thee to the length and breadth and height
>  My bumpers reach, when feeling, out of sight,
>  For the ends of other Cars in parking space.
>
>  I drive thee by the headlights glowing trace
>  At Dawn, and Dusk, and yawning dead of Night.
>  I drive thee slowly, in the lanes upon the Right;
>  I drive thee quickly, when in Rushing Hour's Race.
>
>  I drive thee with a verve I seldom choose
>  In other cars, when out upon the Lanes;
>  But then a Calm descends upon my Brain,
>  And daily Woes and Worries oft I lose.
>
>  So, all in all, I drive thee with a Smile,
>  And shall but drive thee more, for years and miles.
>
>
>   SONNET #8,349.2  (Name Game)
>
>      Sonnets from the Manganese
>      by Lizzie Barrel Browning .50 cal.
>
>   How shall I call thee? What shall be thy Name?
>   The name of Roses matters not to those
>   Who smell the Flowers' sweet Perfume and close
>   Their eyes to fondly see a Face again.
>
>   Should Names reflect some Memories of Olde?
>   Or attributes of Strength, or Skill, or Dare?
>   Or should I give thee Ancient Names to bear,
>   Of People, Places, Things in Tales still told?
>
>   Or should a Name be new, and picked from Now?
>   A chosen Symbol of the Modern Times?
>   Somewhere, Someone, Something - a Name that rhymes
>   Our View of Life with all somehow.
>
>   But thou art naught but steel, glass and rubber ...
>   Eureka, that's it: thy Name is Bubba!!
>
> :)
> unca joel
>
>