Paul: Wow! You got your license! Now you can go to the Prom! :-) petey

That's great Paul! Soooo glad for you - freedom to go where you want, when you want to go (assuming that you have enough gas)!

btw, home monitoring is really pretty cool... insurance pays for it over here, too (since 2011).

When I go to the prom, get I say out late and make out in the back seat???

Congratulations Paul! So happy to hear you get your wheels back :)

Paul said: "When I go to the prom, get I say out late and make out in the back seat???"

As long as you're not alone when you do it.

petey

Nice pictures. I didn't know you were in the mafia. Did Dion DiMucci live next door? When I look at your group from da Bronx and I can hear Ray Liotta saying... "To me, being a gangster was better than being President of the United States..."

Anyway, I like your woodworking.

petey

Dion was a few blocks away, on Belmont Ave. When the Mafia ran the neighborhood in DA Bronx, you didn't have any 'crime', and everyone was safe. Boy I miss the old neighborhood.
And for those in Middle America who haven't got clue as to what we are talking about, here's a trailer from Goodfellas http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qo5jJpHtI1Y. However, a good deal of Goodfellas was actually filmed in McHales neighborhood in Astoria.

Did you ever see 'Bronx Tale' with Robert DeNiro. Like old home week. That was filmed very close to my neighborhood.

Yo Paulie,
I LOVE the pic of your gang in '66! And of course I love Dion! My Dad, who grew up in the Irish section of Philly, used to reminisce about the Italian section and the mob guys (he was born in 1925 and raised in Philly). He told me that it was ALWAYS safe in those neighborhoods for the regular folks. The mob kept the punks in line. And I remember a mob guy talking on the Mike Douglas show, saying how back in the day, you were warned ONCE. They didn't just go down the street shooting up everything and everyone. If you continued to mess up, you "went away." But nothing like the senseless violence of the gangs today. I always found that interesting that an old Irish guy would speak fondly of youse guys! Now I want to watch Goodfellas!

Bill

Oh crap! Made the mistake of showing my wife Paul's pic from 1966...now she is in love with another man! I won't make THAT mistake again!

Downtrodden Bill

Bill: There is nothing worse than "disorganized" crime. Anyway, the Irish had their own mob to be feared... the Westies from Manhattan. After you watch Goodfellas, watch "Two Bits" with Al Pacino. Not a mob movie, but a movie about one day in Philly during the depression. It is about the relationship between a grandfather and his grandson (Italian of course). petey

I'm coming to grips with some of the more subtle effects of my stroke, so I thought I'd share these with all of you so we all can grow together. Let me preface this by noting that luckily this was a relatively small stroke (the speech and muscular issues resolved within a day) with little impact that can be observed by others now four weeks after the event. Keep in mind that strokes can range from unobservable, though catastrophic, to fatal.

The subjective issues take a bit of time to pinpoint. I would say that my balance is off by a little bit (2%), my focus is off a little bit (2%). I have periods of lightheadedness that come and go, not like AFIB lightheadedness (my AFIB has been pretty calm, except for one day about 10 days ago). I either get fatigued more easily or I am very hesitant to push myself. I drove the car some on Saturday and Sunday. Worked out at home about 20 minutes each day of the last week, and went walking around the local mall with Sharon for about 1/2 hour today. I think the biggest thing is a bit of loss of self confidence, like I'm feel hesitant to be alone or go somewhere alone for fear something might happen to me that I can't control. I think that Sharon is contributing a little to this since she is watching me like a hawk (she was standing next to me when I had the stroke, you can imagine how frightening it is to watch a loved one have a stroke)! I've read a number of articles on stroke recovery and the items I've reported above are rather common and not harbingers of doom.

So, I keep writing these for my own sanity and to encourage the rest of you not to skimp on your anti coagulants!

Hey,

What can I say? This is a great support group! Not only can we learn about afib and EPs, but can learn where the name of Dion's group came from (Belmont Street)..I actually figured that Dion was one of the Philly boys to be honest... like Fabian and Frankie Avalon. And we can get movie recommendations! The wife and I just watched "Two Bits" (on Neflix), and loved it. My Dad would have been 8 years old when this movie was taking place. I told my wife there were a few things wrong with it. No way the price of a movie was 50 cents in 1933. I remember paying a quarter in 1962. So we looked it up. The average price of a movie in 1933? 51 cents! So, perhaps my memory was faulty. And I didn't think they called it "Welfare" back then, but rather "The Dole." But what do I know? I was wrong about the price of going to the movies. Petey, when his Aunt yelled at him for begging, and the kid says "I was doing like the redheads," does he mean the Irish? Just wondering. My wife and I both loved the movie. Very touching. Don't stop wanting! Worth a view on NETFLIX everyone!

Bill

Bill:

In regard to redheads in Two Bits. It means "non-Italian). It is rare for Italians to have red hair unless mixed with Ashkenazi Jews.* As far as Irish are concerned, 10% of the Irish have red hair. In Scotland, it is 13%.

*"In Italy, red hair was associated with Italian Jews, and Judas was traditionally depicted as red-haired in Italian and Spanish art."

In any case, he was referring to the people he watched dancing and singing before he goes out and "begs".

I love the haunting music in that movie. Hey Bill... "You wanna see your quartah?" (quarter)

petey

There was a Norman conquest of southern Italy beginning around 1260, the Norman stronghold was near where my fathers family came from in Puglia. By the end on the 1200's the Normans had conquered all of southern Italy Puglia, Campania, Calabria, and Sicily. At the time of the Norman conquest for Sicily, Sicily was 80% Moslem having been taken in the first jihad (like Spain) in the 700's. The Normans took the best of the cultures they found in Sicily at the time and Palermo become the intellectual capital of Europe (the rest of Europe being in the dark ages). Thus in Palermo you find Latin churches with Arabic artwork and inscriptions, and Byzantine (Greek) iconography. Since the Normans started out as Vikings who settled in northern France, they often had red or blond hair. Which you will often find in southern Italy, not necessarily descended from the Ashkenazi who would probably been more Mediterranean in appearance

Paul & Bill (the rest please bear with me): I had my DNA checked out. They give you estimates. I am half Italian and half Irish descent. The Irish, I read, are pretty much (95%) the same genetically. In Southern Italy, there is a huge mixture of some West Asia and Near East DNA, which is apparently the case with me:

Europe 83%
Ireland 40%
Italy/Greece 37%
Great Britain 2%
European Jewish 1% (Primarily found in: Poland, Belarus, Ukraine, Russia, Hungary, Israel. Also found in:
Germany, France, Lithuania, Latvia, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Romania, Bosnia, Serbia, Estonia)
Iberian Peninsula < 1% (Primarily found in: Spain, Portugal)
May also be found in: France, Morocco, Algeria, Italy
Europe West < 1% (Primarily located in: Belgium, France, Germany, Netherlands, Switzerland, Luxembourg,
Liechtenstein. Also found in: England, Denmark, Italy, Slovenia, Czech Republic)
Scandinavia < 1%

West Asia 17%:
Caucasus 13% (Primarily located in: Iran, Georgia, Armenia, Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Azerbijan
Also found in: Turkmenistan, Kuwait, Bulgaria, Romania, Greece, Italy, Jordan, Palestine)
Near East 4% (Primarily located in: Syria, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Oman, Yemen, United Arab Emirates
(U.A.E.), Lebanon, Israel. Also found in: Iran, Pakistan)

ZERO:
Africa 0%
Africa North 0%
Ivory Coast/Ghana 0%
Senegal 0%
Cameroon/Congo 0%
Mali 0%
Nigeria 0%
Africa Southeastern Bantu 0%
Africa South-Central Hunter-Gatherers 0%
Benin/Togo 0%
America 0%
Native American 0%
Asia 0%
Asia South 0%
Asia Central 0%
Asia East 0%
Other 0%
Finnish/Northern Russia 0%
Europe East 0%
Pacific Islander 0%
Polynesia 0%
Melanesia 0%


petey