Owl Farm Blog

Hi. For some reason I was inspired today to read one of Hunter’s wonderfully  twisted stories you know of as S-C-R-E-W-J-A-C-K.  Oh yes.  Remember Screwjack?  Hunter often used it as a test, to see who could handle the kitchen and who couldn’t.  Seven years ago, when he finally decided to have me read it,  I passed the test…just barely.  Anyway, here is a bit of it:

       I am guilty, Lord, but I am also a lover – and I am one of your best people, as you know; and yea tho I have walked in many strange shadows and acted crazy from time to time and even drooled on many High Priests, I have not been an embarrassment to you… So leave me alone, goddamnit, and send Mr. Screwjack back to me; and if the others have any questions of snide comments about it, tell them to eat shit and die.

       Who among them is pure enough to cast the first stone?  Or to look on me with those rheumy courtroom eyes and say that I was wrong…. 

That’s all I can divulge to you from that story.  I don’t want to spoil it for those of you who haven’t read it. It’s a hot one.

Until next time, your friend,

Anita Thompson

Owl Farm

Posted by Anita Thompson at 08:46 PM | Permalink

Hi. I just got back from a great afternoon with Gary Hart and Doug Brinkley in Denver. They both send their regards and I’ll be excerpting my interviews with them in The Gonzo Way and The Woody Creeker. Isn’t it fun to be in the company of VERY smart people? What? You say you love smart people? Me too. 
 
Okay, the HST wisdom for today is from a letter Hunter wrote to Paul Semonin in Jan 1964. This is many years before Hunter declared Bob Dylan, Muhammad Ali and Fidel Castro his three life-long heroes: 
 
Now and then I get the scent of a man with enough balls to try and whip things around to a decent position. Kennedy was one; Betancourt was another; Castro was and may still be; I even go along now and then withKhrushchev. This man Nyerere in Tanganika may be one, but I barely know him. And I’m sure there are others – but that doesn’t really alter my basic feelings about power and government. It’s pretty old to say that “power corrupts,” but I think it does and I don’t think it corrupted Kennedy any more than it has Castro. 
— Hunter S. Thompson, the Proud Highway. 
 
I picked that quote because it’s an interesting statement from Hunter about Power when he was only 27 years old and just starting to build some power of his own. 
FYI  here is a list of leaders Castro outlived (politically) and gives me a better perspective of his Reign: 
 
John F. Kennedy Us pres that Hunter truly loved (1961-1963) 
Lyndon Johnson U.S. Pres. (1963-1969) 
Indira Gandhi, prime minister of India (1966 –1977), (1980 – 1984) 
Richard Nixon Hunter’s favorite. Just kidding (1969-1974) 
Anwar Sadat, president of Egypt (1970 – 1981) 
Gerald Ford U.S. Pres. (1974-1977) 
Yitzhak Rabin, Israeli prime minister (1974 to 1977), (1992 – 1995) 
Jimmy Carter Hunter’s pick, president of US(1977-1981) 
Margaret Thatcher, prime minister of the UK (1979 – 1990) 
Daniel Ortega, president of Nicaragua (1979 – 1999) 
Saddam Hussein, president of Iraq (now in chains) (1979 – 2003) 
Ronald Reagan US pres (Brinkley working on his letters now (1981-1989) 
Mikhail Gorbachev, president of the Soviet Union (1985 – 1991) 
George H.W. Bush yes, the father (1989-1993) 
Lech Walesa, president of Poland (yeah! I’m Polish) (1990 – 1995) 
Bill Clinton pres US (1993-2001) 
Nelson Mandela, president of South Africa (1994 – 1999) 

Until next time, your friend, 
Anita Thompson 
back at Owl Farm. yeah.  
 
(p.s. special thanks to Owl Farm intern Laura Doty who made links for all the above names for me. thanks Laura) 
 

Posted by Anita Thompson at 09:07 PM | Permalink

So everybody seemed to enjoy the contest. Me too. I love to play. Yes, the quote from yesterday was to Kraig Juenger in 1958 printed in The Proud Highway. Kraig and Hunter had a beautiful love affair in his early life. I’m grateful for all the smart beautiful women that came before me. 
  I would never have enough feathers for everyone who got the correct answer, but Owl Farm intern Liz Yount will be emailing all the participants back in the next few days. I was moved by the amount of people that know Hunter’s work inside & out and fired off the answer within minutes. Bravo. 
  I’ll bring out some political HST wisdom tomorrow. Today, however, I must post one more graf Hunter wrote to the beautiful Kraig Juenger: 

  In the final analysis, I think it is better that we left the ashes of the flame to settle on the white sands of the lonely Gulf Coast beach, where the wind can carry them over the dunes at night and back over the moonlit lowlands and the still waters of the bayous. That way, we are spared the agony of having to fan the flame in the teeming cities of the loud American north, where the mere act of life is so hurried and difficult that no one really has time for love. At least we have a memory unscarred by the horrors of democratic realities. Certainly it is not the typical vacation memory, where you have to forget nine-tenths of everything that happened, in order to enjoy the other tenth. No, it was actually a two-day love, with all the pungent emotion and atmosphere of the timeless ideal. Its ashes still float in the night over the lonely little hamlets of Choctawatchee  Bay. 
— Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway 

Indeed.  

And Guess what? I have a few nuggets of gonzo wisdom from Ralph Steadman. He emailed me a cache of them to post for you periodically. Here are a few, enjoy: 

 

 “– Far more people have known poverty than riches 
— A lot of nice people is a hell of a lot better than a lot of bad people but only half as interesting. 
–Time passes but we only pass water.” 
–Ralph Steadman, Kent, England. 
 
Okay. 
Until next time, your friend, 
Anita Thompson 
 
 

Posted by Anita Thompson at 10:59 AM | Permalink