As kids we all were always looking for the “ultimate excitement thing”. I believe one place that definitely helped to fulfill this quest was when I became associated with John W. (Carolyn and Kit will know who I’m talking about here). John was the son of a friend of the family and his mother was a war bride from England. I loved to hear her talk with that neat English accent! (And Kit and Carolyn’s war bride mom too)! I got so interested in English that I even took it all through High School J It really irks me that kids these days are destroying “The King’s English” in spelling, usage, and especially using “Like” before EVERY sentence! I can’t help but wonder if Maynard G. Krebs has somehow cast an evil spell on every “Gen X’er” in this country! Whoa!!! I’m starting to sound like an old crotchety man again!!!  “Like Oh, like I’m like really like sorry DUDE!!!”  Yuuuck! OK, Now back to being “ME”… (You’ll have to choose which one is better).  I got to know John because his mother was a dance teacher and had a studio in Norwalk. It was on Main St. on the west side of town in an upstairs room in an old store building. Often, when I go to the Norwalk Public Library, I walk down a few buildings on the same side of the road a and look up the stairs through the outside door window. At least I think that’s where the studio used to be??? A “ mind“ is a terrible thing to waste with Alzheimer’s (assuming my mind was sound to begin with, which is hotly debated to this day with all those who know me).  I took free dance lessons for quite awhile since I was a friend of their family. I did modern jazz, but did not ever get into ballet, since I have never looked that good in leotards or tutus; not to mention shorts, of which since about the age of 5 or so I have NEVER worn! In fact I’ve never even owned a pair or received any for gifts since most know that I would only use them for rags anyway. I’m not saying my knees are knobby, but for some reason interior decorators always take a special interest in me when I meet them (and that’s while wearing my ubiquitous blue jeans and boots).  John W. was the kind of a guy I was really interested in hanging around because since his mother taught dancing and every year they had dance recitals. I was in a few of them during my “dancing years”, which give me great ability to “dance around” various difficult situations later in life. Special “Hollywood’ effects are part of the Broadway aura of dance recitals, and flash powder was often used.  Flash powder in the “wrong (our) hands” is FUN! Flash powder is much more volatile than gun powder and is used in cherry bombs and our home made pipe bombs.  John found the “stash” of flash powder at the dance studio and we had many fun times with the amount we swiped. I would take some home and cut a cherry bomb in half and fill it all the way up with the flash powder. Since regular cherry bombs were only filled about half full of flash powder and had a cardboard spacer inside, a full cherry bomb really packed a wallop! (Click on each link to see some of our previous fun with cherry bombs  Link 1   Link 2 )  John and I were always messing around with flash powder. The acme came one Sunday afternoon when Uncle Ned went to Roger’s (John’s dad) place to watch Cleveland Browns Football and get “tipsy” with good liquor. This was back in the early 60’s when people still watched the Browns when they could actually win games. I tagged along to mess around with John. While the men were in the house watching the game, John showed me his latest creation. It was a “cannon” he made form a length of about 1 ½ inch diameter galvanized lead pipe. (See the ((very)) rough sketch below). We both knew what to do to get the cannon to fire! We took “a whole lot” of flash powder and packed it down the barrel, then took newspaper and wadded it up and packed it tight by ramming it in with a small diameter pipe. He had the bottom end capped with a pipe cap and had drilled a small hole on the top of the bottom “breech”. We stuck a cherry bomb fuse in it and I had the “honor” of lighting it. Now that I look back, whenever anything dangerous was involved in our fun, I was the one who was unanimously elected to take the risks. I’m sure it was because of my fearless brave bearing and not because I was the “easy mark”. (Hmmm, it’s time to take my next Paxil dose- but it’s just a coincidence, really!) Well, I lit the fuse and John and I stepped back a little way. I’ll never forget the earth shattering BOOOOOOM and the large volume of white smoke that engulfed us and everything else! The force of the blast “kick” moved the barrel down to the ground from the 2 tight muffler clamps that were holding it! Uncle Ned and Roger came tearing out of the house at full run. Seeing John and I standing there somewhat stunned he yelled, “What the #$@&* was that!” After He and Uncle Ned saw what we did, he yelled, “That could have been like a “Bangalore Torpedo” and killed both of you! To this day I chuckle of how fast they both came running out of the house! Killed us? Indeed; if they only knew how many “lives” we had before this instance! Looking back, I am convinced that God sends Guardian Angels to watch over dumb kids. In our case, however, I’m sure God always issued flack jackets and steel helmets to the angels He sent to watch US!