Aug 27 - Flying with a bomb on Western Airlines**

Sunday, August 27, 1972 - Page 240
LOCATION: Bethlehem; Rapid City; Salt Lake City; Los Angeles; Anaheim

(2:18:30 AM 8/30/1972)
BLECCH! I shan't use that blue felt pen again -- It soaked thru the page. Que sera, will be -- Sunday? What happened Sunday? Bruce woke up later than ever before, about nine, because he forgot to set his clock. He told me yesterday that he will be returning home [to Chicago] in the first week of September.

I got up for good around 11:00 -- Bruce was reading "The Merchants of Venus" in my "IF" magazine. Sr. Sylvester banged on the door. "Get up you sleepy boogers" she said. Bruce was wanted to entertain tourists in the Shrine. Yesterday he had to take some tourists into the lower cave, tho he'd never before done it and was qualified only for tours to the Shrine. Brad was already giving a tour and Jim was ill, so he was stuck with it. He improvised a lot. So now he's qualified and has to give tours.

I read a bit more of "I'm OK, You're OK," tried to call home again but failed, and talked with Fr. Henry, giving him my address so he can visit when he returns to California. He's trying to become a chaplain in the Navy, so will be in San Diego for awhile.

It became 1:30, and my flight left at 2:50, so I tried to find some transportation. I saw Bruce at the cave entrance with some tourists -- he'd finished one tour and was starting another. I told him I had to leave, so he quit what he was doing and eventually got around to driving me. We left in the van at 1:45. I was fairly sure I'd be late, but we weren't, tho it was pretty close. We got there at 2:30. Bought the ticket for $55 (Student Standby), but had trouble with the guy -- he wanted two forms of identification but I only had a Driver's License and Social Security card. He reluctantly accepted it, filled out a form, wrote the ticket, took my money and said the baggage had been taken out already so I had to carry it out myself. This was fortunate too, because my duffle bag weighed 80 lbs, and 70 lbs is the legal limit for single parcels. I packed the bomb in the Abbott's cabin that nobody belonged to -- It weighed 10 lbs by itself.

[I think I should explain that. The little 20-inch "bomb" was a World War II souvenir that nobody wanted so I adopted it as a cool curiosity. It didn't contain any explosive -- it was just a harmless paperweight -- but I wouldn't advise anyone to take something like this on an airline today.]

The World War II bomb I had in my
duffle bag looked something like this

I came back with more than I went with, tho I discarded a couple of things any way. I staggered to the 737, left the duffle bag for the packers, and found an empty seat in the back (the very last seat). I stared out the window all the time -- We flew over Mt. Rushmore and I was on the right side (the right) so I saw it clearly from the air. Such a thrill.

Got into Salt Lake City Int'l Airport at around 4:15 and had to wait. The flights to LA were filled, so standby didn't help much. They had no room for me on the first flight, but I just barely managed to get on the 6:30 flight -- If I'd missed it I'd have to wait till 11:00. I bought the new Analog while waiting.

Got into LA around 7:30 (note the 1-hour time difference) and saw it from the sky for the first time in the daytime glowing golden through the smog. Beauteous. Tried calling Mom, then Dad, then Chunk -- Nobody home. Called Laramée and she told me to take a bus -- She was too tired to pick me up. Tried calling Mom, Dad or Chunk a few more times -- Got the operator mad. Gave up and took a bus -- Closest I could get to N.B. was Orange Co. Airport.

Ticket cost $4.00. Bus stopped at Disneyland Hotel, and I decided to get off there tho I had a farther ticket -- No refunds. I had $16.00 left so I wandered around until I found the lobby (the bus stopped under the monorail where there are a bunch of lockers -- I put my 35¢ into the only locker that didn't work, but I left my bag in it any way figuring no one could steal an 80-pound duffle bag even if they wanted to).

I asked the fellow in the lobby if he had any rooms for one person one night. They had a "Crash Pad" for business men for $16. I took it. An old fellow drove me out to the room (1930). I tipped him 25¢ tho, as he pointed out, I had carried the 80 pound duffle bag -- he took the quarter anyway.

From my room (which had an air conditioner, B&W TV, shower & king size bed) I telephoned Mom. This was around nine o'clock. She decided to come by -- while waiting, I took a shower and watched one part of the special series on Da Vinci. Went out to meet her at 10:30 P.M. She drove home around 12:30, and called again at 1:00 A.M. I got to sleep around 2:00 after playing with my recorder.

TOMORROW: Disneyland for $4.95

Jun 30 - Flood cleanup in Rapid**

Friday, June 30, 1972 - Page 182
LOCATION: Newport Beach to LAX for flight to Salt Lake City, then on to Rapid City to arrive in Bethlehem, South Dakota

A whole big mess of too many words...

JUNE 30, 1972 WAS THE LONGEST MEASURED DAY IN THE HISTORY OF MANKIND ---

8:30 PM
At the moment I am sitting atop a bunk in the Retreat house in S.D. so this journal -- (I took about an hour break there, losing another game of chess and talking to Clint bout L.A., S.F., jail, landscaping, etc.) is once again out on a trip. It started out Friday morn -- Thursday nite I packed my duffle bag (so heavy I could barely lift it -- Mom found out the airlines wouldn't take baggage over 40 lbs.) (There again -- I (busybusybusy) was gone for an hour--) Never mind all that -- I woke up with the alarm at 5:00 -- So did Mom. We left by six and the traffic was heavy. I got there at LAX at around 7:30 -- Mom of course was late for work (Another delay -- Took time out to win three chess games). (Another delay -- Took time out to win another game of chess --)

(Monday night 7/3/1972)
NOW! It is 11:41 P.M. 7/3/72 --- NO -- NOW it is 15 to 12:00 -- Talked with Clint again -- he got back from cave crawling. Okay, I'm gonna finish this now, and I'll have to shave plenty to make it fit. I gave my duffle bag to the baggage guys and left quickly before they could tell me it was too heavy. I got my ticket and boarded okay -- I have a window seat but three girls wanted to stay together, so I gave them my place, finding an aisle seat beside a fat aging business man. He was reading a newspaper, and I asked him if he was going to look out the window much. He said YES, tersely. That's all he said during the whole trip. Most of the hour and 20 minutes of the flight he spent sleeping, snoring, hacking and drooling over himself. Breakfast was served on that flight -- we landed in Salt Lake City, and I then boarded the second flight to Rapid and St. Paul.

(Tis now quarter to 1:00 A.M. -- Another delay while Mike and Mike came in for awhile.) I got into the plane late due to a misunderstanding so I could only find an aisle seat beside two guys. They were friendly, being from California, departing from SFX to Bismark, N.D. They were over forty and enjoying the hell out of their flight. I was on Western Airlines (the Champagne Airline) so I had 3 or 4 glasses of free champagne. Flew over Mt. Rushmore, but it was on the wrong side so I got only a glimpse.

Landed in Rapid at 11:55 (flying over the Black Hills, you could tell they'd had a flood, it looked like they had lots of lakes down there), and Tom was there to meet me, along with a guy named Ben (Gentle Ben, a huge fellow reminiscent of Little John, of the Merry Men). It was in the upper 70°s with more or less clear skies. We drove in the Econoline van thru Rapid, stopped at a McDonald's where Ben bought food, and then we drove to a house they were working on -- There we found Greg, Bruce, and Mike (Freak -- Not Mike National Guard or Mike Youngster -- I don't know the last names). They filed in and we drove back to the McDonald's to eat lunch. After which, we dropped Ben off to hitch into town, then to go back to the house. The house was a two story structure which had a creek behind it -- resultantly (I've decided to stop writing for tonight -- to be continued --- 1:02 A.M.)

(Tuesday morning 7/4/1972)
Now it's 11:00 A.M., 4 of July, and I'm going to catch up -- resultantly, water from the flood brought several inches of mud into the first floor, and the water line inside was neck high. The occupants evacuated just in time and most of the personal possessions were gone. A two story house next door was up against the Becker's house (the one we were working on), having been washed 20 or 30 feet. Mike Freak and Greg worked on one part of the house shoveling mud, and Me, Bruce King and Tom Hildebrand shoveled mud in the bedroom downstairs -- or maybe it was the living room. Alternately we manned the wheelbarrow, dumping the mud in a ditch outside. Mike and Greg left to look for food as we three finished with the mud. Then we tore up the carpet to throw it outside, but it was too heavy -- so we tore a hole in the wall with great difficulty, and at the expense of a rake which I was swinging at the wall to break it open -- the handle broke.

Eventually, we rolled the carpet out, and Mike and Greg returned with soft drinks and snacks from a Salvation Army truck. Ben arrived with Leslie (a girl -- you might have guessed). We were through for the time being, so Tom, Greg and I went out in the van to get some stuff for Bethlehem. We finished with that, returned to Becker's and got everything (Leslie tho had left by then). We all drove back to Bethlehem, and I ate dinner which was about 7:00, and then went to the retreat house where my bunk was, in a room containing Mike Freak and Bruce King. I got to sleep at around 7:30, and slept through to 7:30 the next day.

[Side note] Friday was sunny to start with, but as we were working at Becker's, it rained hard with thunder and pea-sized hail -- It quit after an hour or so. It didn't rain at all at Beth we were told.

TOMORROW: I will begin foretelling the future by announcing the next entry