Arbor Day Celebration

By Alexis Pencar

SHARON SPRINGS — This year, the Village of Sharon Springs honored Arbor Day with a two day

commemoration on April 25th and April 26th. Arbor Day is an annual celebration, started in 1872, dedicated to planting and nurturing trees to promote environmental conservation and sustainability.

On April 25th, New York State’s official Arbor Day, the Village of Sharon Springs Tree

Board, in conjunction with Sharon Springs Central School, had the opportunity to plant two Silky

Dogwood trees on the school grounds in honor of this special day. 

Local Arborist Elliott Adams gave an educational presentation to Anne Allen’s Environmental Science and Agricultural Science Class at SSCS and then continued to plant the significant shrubs together afterwards.

Then, on April 26th, the Village of Sharon Springs, one of the newest “Tree City” recipients, held their 3rd Annual Tree Giveaway in the parking lot of the Sharon Community Building, to celebrate Arbor Day. The Official Arbor Day Proclamation for the Village of Sharon Springs was read by Mayor Denise Kelly. Fifty Silky Dogwood trees were given away to 22 Village of Sharon Springs and Town of Sharon residents. These trees all counted towards the ‘25

Million Trees by 2033’ initiative by Governor Kathy Hochul.

This Arbor Day celebration was a positive event for Sharon Springs overall and shows the commitment to conservation and sustainability by this small, yet dedicated community. If you are interested in joining the Village of Sharon Springs Tree Board and/or volunteering, please contact the Village Office at (518) 284-2625 for more information.

 

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Share Your Memories of Fleischmanns

FLEISCHMANNS — DID YOU GROW UP IN FLEISCHMANNS, NEW YORK?

Come share your memories of a magical time growing up in this historic Catskill Mountain town.

The Fleischmanns Oral History Project, founded by Sarah Stitham and Linda Lukow Weinberg, will launch its first recording session during 

The Fleischmanns First Street Fair on Sunday, May 25, 2025, from 10 AM to 4 PM at the Greater Fleischmanns Museum of Memories.

Did you swim in Lake Switzerland? Attend Fleischmanns High School? Shop at Solomon’s Market? Dance to the jukebox at the Sugar Bowl? 

Careen down Main Street on your bike? March in the Halloween Parade? Grow up in your family’s boarding house? 

COME TELL US YOUR STORY!

For more information, contact:

Sarah Stitham – 845-594-5932

Linda Lukow Weinberg – 607-434-6930

Email: fleischmannsoralhistory@gmail.com

 

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Roxbury Fire Department Elects 2025 Officers

ROXBURY - The Roxbury Fire Department elected its slate of officers at their April 21st meeting. 

Chief: Jim Bouton Jr.

1st Assistant: Larry DeMaio

2nd Assistant: Jamie Needam

Captain: Matt Cammer                               

Lieutenant: Bill Lalosh

Engineer: Trent Perry

EMS Captain: Joe Aulino

EMS Lieutenant: Ashley Pettersen

Directors:

President: Jim Bouton Sr.                             

Vice President: Bill Lalosh

Treasurer: Lynette Liberatore   

Secretary: Edie Mesick

Chaplin: Richard Dykstra 

The Executive Committee membership is:

Jim Bouton Sr

Joe Aulino

Billy Lalosh

Ken Macker Davies

Kellie Sullivan 

Anthony Liberatore

 

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Margaretville Man Indicted for Alleged Rape

DELHI — Delaware County District Attorney Shawn J. Smith announced the unsealing of a seven-count indictment against Mason A. Kowatch, 18, of Margaretville on April 18.

Count One alleges Rape in the First Degree, a Class B Felony. It is alleged that on or about October 22, 2024, Kowatch used force to compel a child victim to engage in vaginal sex with him.

Count Two alleges Rape in the Third Degree, a Class E Felony. It is alleged that on or about October 22, 2024, Kowatch engaged in vaginal sexual contact with another person without their consent.

Count Three alleges Promoting a Sexual Performance by a Child, a Class D Felony. It is alleged that Kowatch on or about June 7, 2024, knowing the character and content thereof, did produce a performance which included sexual conduct by a child less than seventeen years of age. 

Count Four alleges Promoting a Sexual Performance by a Child, a Class D Felony. It is alleged that Kowatch on or about June 8, 2024, knowing the character and content thereof, did produce a performance which included sexual conduct by a child less than seventeen years of age. 

Count Five alleges Unlawful Surveillance in the 2nd Degree, a Class E Felony. It is alleged that on or about June 7, 2024, Kowatch, for his own amusement, entertainment, sexual arousal or sexual gratification, did intentionally use an imaging device to surreptitiously record another person in an identifiable manner engaging in sexual activity at a time and place when they had a reasonable expectation of privacy, and without their knowledge or consent.

Count Six alleges Unlawful Surveillance in the 2nd Degree, a Class E Felony. It is alleged that on or about June 8, 2024, Kowatch, for his own amusement, entertainment, sexual arousal or sexual gratification, did intentionally use an imaging device to surreptitiously record another person in an identifiable manner engaging in sexual activity at a time and place when they had a reasonable expectation of privacy, and without their knowledge or consent.

Count Six alleges Unlawful Surveillance in the 2nd Degree, a Class E Felony. It is alleged that on or about July 2, 2024, Kowatch, for his own amusement, entertainment, sexual arousal or sexual gratification, did intentionally use an imaging device to surreptitiously record the sexual or intimate parts of a person at a time and place when they had a reasonable expectation of privacy, and without their knowledge or consent.

As with all cases involving minors, the identity of the victim is being withheld per office policy.

District Attorney Shawn Smith commended Investigator Adam Cernauskas of the New York State Police for his thorough investigation into this serious case. DA Smith also thanked the tireless advocates at Safe Against Violence for making sure the victim was and is supported as the case progresses. 

Chief Assistant District Attorney Richard D. Northrup Jr. presented the case to the Grand Jury.

Indictments and Criminal Complaints are allegations.  All defendants are presumed innocent unless proven guilty. 

 

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Paws for Celebration at the Historic Spillian Estate

By Robert Brune

FLEISCHMANNS — This past weekend, the Heart of the Catskills Humane Society (HCHS) held their annual spring fundraiser at the iconic late 1900’s Victorian Spillian venue. Director of Operations at HCHS Deb Crute and her staff were buzzing with activity working to make it special for everyone attending this standing room only event. Crute was kind enough to take a moment to speak with the Mountain Eagle to share about the fundraiser and appreciation of Leigh Melandern of Spillian, “We cover a lot of area for animals that we are responsible for, so we try to include different areas and communities. We do lots of events in different areas because we try to be inclusive. We are fortunate that Spillian was available this year for us to hold our spring event for a second year here.” While interviewing Crute, a participant joined the conversation by saying, “I just wanted to say that I got my best dog in my whole life at the Heart of the Catskills. I come every year in Jupiter’s memory” 

Crute said it’s kitten season, “We are always looking for people to foster kittens for us. We are always looking for assistance for people to help keep them in their homes, help keep kittens healthy and socialize with them. Then we get to put them up for adoption.” She went on to emphasize that their foster network is critical to HCHS because they often find homes for the kittens. 

Leading up to the auction, Adam Ippolito, the brilliantly entertaining musician who performed for many years with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, performed classic songs such as ‘Imagine’, ‘Lady Madonna’ and ‘It Was a Very Good Year’. Ippolito was thrilled to participate, “It is a beautiful place, I love Spillian. It was a terrific turnout. People were very appreciative of the music, and we all had a great time.” 

Owner of Spillian Leigh Melander moved to Fleischmanns sixteen years ago and came to the Catskills with two older dogs to start their business, losing them quickly after they moved to the area. Melander speaks to her connection to HCHS, “We stumbled into the Heart of the Catskills and found Riley who was the first dog that we adopted from them. Over the years we have adopted three dogs and a cat. We have lived all over the country and it’s one of the best run Humane Society’s we’ve come across. They are managing a very challenging situation with animals in need and not always enough adopters. So, they are our first place to go look if we’re looking for another critter in the house.” This being the second year hosting the fundraiser for HCHS, Melander said, “All of our staff here at Spillian have adopted animals from them. We would be happy to host a third year.” Spillian hosts all sorts of events such as weddings and family gatherings, and Melander said it’s important to her and her husband to contribute to the community in every way they are able. The generosity of Melander and those that attended this event was prevalent as the auction was able to take in thousands of dollars on this unseasonably chilly day. 

For more information on HCHS see www.heartofthecatskills.org 

May 16th and 17th is the HCHS rummage sale in Delhi 

For more information on Spillian see www.spillian.com which also has a great description of the history of the venue. 

 

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Gary Mayer Unveils His Artistic Visions: A Divided Eye

By Robert Brune

MARGARETVILLE — This past weekend on Saturday the Longyear Gallery in the Commons of Margaretville opened with Gary Mayer’s solo exhibition, A Divided Eye. The title of this show refers to the diversity of his extraordinary gifts in painting and sketches.  As Gary explains it, his creations are reflective of landscape contemporary expressionism and abstract art styles, which he believes complement each other.  Although, if you flip through his portfolio, you may see the prism of his talents, including shades of M.C. Escher designs and playful self-portrait sketches.  In an interview with Gary a few days prior to the opening of this show, I spoke with him as he explained some of his influences, one of whom was James Ensor. Ensor is associated with the 1880’s – 90’s Brussels Les XX group of painters which includes such greats as Vincent van Gogh, Paul Cezanne, and Georges Seurat. The style of Ensor is best characterized by a writer for the Guardian, Boyd Tonkin in his article in 2016. 

“You could stuff a student textbook with the “isms” that Ensor arguably pioneered from surrealism to symbolism, expressionism, fauvism, and post-modernism. A stylistic nomad, he not only roved among landscape, portraiture, still life, fantasy, satire, and caricature but often whisked them together into a tipsy burlesque of skewed and addled forms. 

Evidence of how well celebrated Gary is within the local art community, in attendance at the opening, Christopher Broadwell of the Roxbury Arts Group, “Gary’s art is fantastic and so appropriate for this area because he captures historic and scenic reality, but at the same time opens you to questions of what’s behind it.”  Returning to our conversation on the Thursday prior to the opening we discussed his series of sunflowers. In this show was the magnificent ‘Sunflowers of Autumn’.  Gary talks about this piece, “I was working this construction job. We’d go up this road every day. It was bleak in the winter. There were these sunflowers that were bent over, looked like they were weeping. I thought it really summed up here in the winter, the way it twists people.” 

Gary grew up in Detroit with an attraction to punk rock music. When asked about the music scene in Detroit, “Well, I loved Iggy Pop. I saw the Stooges at least five or six times. Definitely the first three albums of the Stooges had an influence on me.” He would go to a club called Bookies where he saw bands such as the Ramones, John Cale of the Velvet Underground, and the British band Gang of Four. From Detroit he moved to Baltimore to attend the Baltimore Institute of Art. He spoke fondly of seeing an exhibit of Albert Pinken Ryder a few times, “It was one of the best shows, ever.” After finishing art school made his way to Brooklyn, NY. Then he settled in Bovina, NY 20 years ago. As we spoke about the painting ‘Pink Street Studio’ of his studio barn, he looks back on his life and living experiences of city life, “The one thing about being out there in Detroit or Brooklyn, the sky is kinda like an afterthought. But when you’re out on a plain, it makes everything else inconsequential.” 

Bill Lynch is a local documentary filmmaker who’s in the process of filming a short film on Gary Mayer. Gary comes across as a very humble person, when asked if he was nervous about the documentary at all, “I’m not nervous about my work, but I don’t know how interesting I am. There’s a decent amount of time about me talking about my process. I mean, it’s interesting to me, but I’m not sure about how it’s going to communicate, if it’s interesting to anyone else. I don’t know we’ll see.” Bill Lynch says he should be finished with the half hour long documentary by the end of this summer. 

Gary is also partners with Patrice Lorenz and Ted Hannan with their new art gallery called Art Up, around the corner from Longyear Gallery. On the same day as The Divided Eye opened, Art Up also had an opening exhibit “CARNIVAL!” Besides attracting quite a few people to these two openings, it was a surprise to see Lindsay Comstock, the curator, and Eddie Donoghue, the manager, of the 1053 Gallery in Fleischmanns make an appearance. They both do such an incredible job. It was great to see them come support this second exhibit of Art Up since opening their doors. Eddie Donoghue has four photos in the “CARNIVAL!” show, along with four other extremely talented artists. If you’re looking for an interesting day out, and might be seeking to purchase some intriguing artwork, this weekend is the final week of the “CARNIVAL!” exhibit, but Divided Eye runs through August 6th at the Longyear Gallery. 

For a better idea of all the artists at the Longyear Gallery and Art Up, see their Instagram pages @LongyearGallery and @ArtUpMargaretville

 

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Union Grove Grand Ole Opry Trivia Night

By Robert Brune

ARKVILLE — This past Friday night Union Grove Distillery was host of an astonishing number of folks dressed up in the Country and Western themed outfits for the Brett Rollins Trivia Night. The theme was the Grand Ole Opry   

Rollins has a fabulous talent for organizing entertaining events, shares his love for bringing folks together, “We’ve been really excited to see these nights get bigger and bigger. We love Union Grove, it’s a great home for us, and we love doing something where the community can get together and just have a fun night! Everyone gets into the themes and dresses up, and they come to play!” Putting together events such as these takes a village as Rollins thanks some of the people who helped make the event so special, “Also I think you know my partners on this but it’s Berns Rothchild and Trish Catera” 

Owner of the Union Grove Distillery Brian Mulder was over the moon delighted by the turnout, “We had every table filled with people standing around and edges of the room. There had to be at least seventy people participating”. Mulder emphasized that the Brett Rollins and team will be returning with their very popular Burlesque ‘Kittens in the Catskills’ extravaganza on Saturday June 7th at the Union Grove Distillery. 

 

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Whittling Away with Dick Brooks - Knowledge

I have always thought of myself as a lifelong learner.  I am by nature a curious being and like to experience new things.  My head is full of the thousands of bits of trivia that I’ve acquired  over the eight decades I’ve been riding around the Sun on this old mud ball called Earth.  As I age and have more time for self-analysis, I can see areas where my expertise is as thin as my hair.  Electricity is one such area.  I know how it’s made, how it’s transported and how it makes things work.  It still scares the she-bangs out of me.  I don’t mess with anything with a cord on it.  I’ve taken a college course on household electrical wiring and learned how to rewire a lamp and install an outlet.  I bought “The Complete Idiots Guide to Electricity” and read it from cover to cover.  I just can’t shake the feeling that I have that it was developed by Wizards ions ago and if not worshiped properly will kill you and burn down your house.  I have handled my lack of knowledge in this area by having fathered a young techno-wizard of my own who knows all about appeasing the gods of sparking things and I let him handle all things electrical.  

Another area where I will admit to a woeful lack of knowledge is birds.  I like the little feathered critters and realizing how hard it is for them to make a living during the winter, I open “The Brooks Fly Inn and Diner” around the time of the first frost.  The menu doesn’t vary from year to year, Black Oil Sunflower Seeds being the only item on it.  They come in a brightly colored forty pound bag which has to be wrestled from the pile in the bird seed store into a cart, from the cart into the back of Casper, The Friendly Kia, hauled home where I gird up my loins and lug it from the driveway to the metal garbage can from which it can be dispensed to the four feeders.  This usually leaves me rather warm, damp and requiring some recliner time.  Our feathered guests slurped down over 300 pounds of seed this year.  Between the squirrels and the birds, we have one of the more active back yards in the hamlet.  There are birds everywhere.  I know several of the more recognizable ones, Blue Jays, Chickadees, and Cardinals but then there’s the whole herd of brown birds.  I know Sparrows are brown so I identify the brown birds as Little Sparrows and big Sparrows which works for me although I know it’s inaccurate.  We inherited some bird identification books from the Queen’s mother.  The problem is most of the birds in the books are various sized brown ones and they don’t look like anything like the residents in our back yard.  I’ve started eliminating some of them so I can narrow down the proper names of the feathered friends at our feeders.  So far I’ve eliminated Golden Eagles, Ostriches, and California Condors.  I think I’m going to stick to calling them little and big Sparrows.

Thought for the week—The early bird may get the worm but the second mouse gets the cheese.

Until next week, may you and yours be happy and well.

Whittle12124@yahoo.com      

 

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THE CATSKILLS GEOLOGISTS BY ROBERT AND JOHANNA TITUS - The Willows I: A Glacial Lake

We had never even heard of the Willows until recently. It’s a very old (Ca 1788) and very large Dutch, Georgian style farmhouse, located on 65 acres of land. See our first picture. That property rises above the Hudson, along Rte. 385 just a bit south of Athens. It was built by the Brandows, a family of Palatine Germans who came to America in about 1710.  It’s now a preserve, managed by the Greene Land Trust and open to the public. We spoke there recently and immediately started looking into its geological past. We were surprised at just how much there was. The first thing that we spotted was that the old farm lies upon the sediments of Glacial Lake Albany. We wrote about the lake just last week. We always carry a barbeque skewer in our car in order to spot the old lake sediments. If we can easily shove that skewer into the soil, then we know that there are few if any rocks in the ground. That means it’s not gravelly soil but that it’s very likely all lake silt. It did just that so we were sure. That made us wonder if this was not a coincidence. Did the Brandow family settle here by accident or was it intentional? We checked out the glacial geology map from the New York State Museum and sure enough: the Willows sits upon an isolated mass of lake sediments. That’s the brown triangle right at the center of the map.

                                                

                                                 

So, our next question was why did the Brandow’s settle upon ancient lake sediments? They weren’t geologists; they didn’t know about Lake Albany. Why did their farm conform so well with a modern ice age map? We, of course, had some research to do. We got out our copy of the Greene County soil survey and went to work. It turns out that the Brandow farm lies upon something called the Hudson and Vergennes soil. That corresponds closely with that same brown triangle. The farm, the soil and the geology match almost perfectly. We went on to read about this soil. The survey told us that it was “well suited to cultivated crops.” We had just done a lot of explaining; we had learned so much about the Brandow farm. No, they knew nothing of Lake Albany, but they were good judges of good soils. We knew there was a lot more to learn here and so off we set out to explore the Willows trail system. We were off to a good start. Let’s do some of that next week.

                                         

   

Contact the authors at randjtitus@prodigy.net. Join their facebook page “The Catskills Geologists.” Read their blogs at “thecatskillgeologist.com.”

 

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A Conversation about ...Fruit

By Jean Thomas

This morning, as the last few days of April swirl past, I walked through a blizzard of white. Not snow, although it isn't unheard of even this late, but petals from cherry blossoms on an adjacent tree. Naturally, being a food-oriented type, I looked forward to harvesting the fruit later in the year. And thought about how busy that tree was in its process. Once the petals are disposed of, the tiny fruit begin to develop, passing through a series of predictable phases on the way to harvest.

A little further down the road my attention was drawn by a branch chock full of small samaras amid a few unfolding leaves. A samara is the fancy word that describes maple fruit, or, as some of us know them, “helicopters” because of their behavior when they are ready to drop from the mother tree. In the vast maple (AKA Acer) family, there are subdivisions according to how early or late the samaras form. This one is probably a red maple, and a type that flowers early.

Around the corner from the maple is a group of big spruce trees. The ground is covered with what looks like a cross between strawberries and teeny pine cones. They are soft, and some spill out pollen when I pick them up. These are male “flowers”, called strobili. The pollen is meant for their female counterpart, which grow at the same time on the same tree (yes, I had to Google it.)

Further along my trail, I came across an Elm bursting with papery discs that serve the same purpose as the strobili and the samaras. These are also a seed dispersal engine. Those of us who live among a large population of elms see the scattered discs late in the season and usually mistake them for fallen leaflets.  Now, when I think of fruit, I more often think of berries. But most of the commonest wild berries are just beginning to flower and are on a slightly later timetable because they need more solar heat and power to build. Blueberries and strawberries are full of cheer and optimism right now, but won't be ready to eat for weeks.

Readiness to eat is the basis of my definition of fruit, so the maple and spruce seem like odd choices until you consider who the diners are. Squirrels and mice are obvious candidates, but remember that many birds are freshly arrived and very hungry. Watch the activity in a tree for awhile. You'll see birds feasting on both the “fruit” and the insects that seek their own meals as well.

Human foragers are definitely omnivores (that means they'll eat everything), and over time have no doubt tasted everything I'm talking about. The practice of foraging is newly popular among a wide range of people. Your local nature and conservation groups, as well as your county's Cooperative Extension conduct frequent foraging walks. The target vegetation varies from week to week, as nature continues through the seasons with each plant and animal following its own timetable in sequence. The elm I referred to above is apparently considered an absolute gourmet delight. Tomorrow I'll taste one.

The podcast, “Nature Calls, Conversations from the Hudson Valley,” has an episode about foraging with Cooperative Extension Specialist Tracey Testo, and it was recorded about this time of year.

https://ccecolumbiagreene.org/gardening/nature-calls-conversations-from-the-hudson-valley/episode-10-wildflowers-and-foraging.               

 

                                                                                                 

 

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Sung Locally - Warren Zevon

PALENVILLE — As one drives west through the land of Rip Van Winkle into Palenville on Route 23A before the windy path leading up to Kaaterskill Falls, a large mural on the east-facing wall of the Circle W Market urges travelers to "Enjoy Every Sandwich." It's not an old bit of wisdom from Washington Irving, but a quote from the late singer-songwriter Warren Zevon, who, it was announced this week, will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in the Musical Influence Award Category. It's an honor that has evaded the late artist and frustrated fans of the unique lyricist and musician for decades. He is considered a one-hit wonder for some, thanks to his quirky and enduring 1978 hit "Werewolves of London." If people know one Zevon song, that's probably it. But Zevon's body of work includes some of the strangest and most captivating topics in Rock and Roll, from ill-fated Hawaiin vacations and vengeful, headless, machine gunner ghosts to the singer's deeply personal confrontation with death on his final album, The Wind, if you know more than one Warren Zevon song, you probably know many. 

Zevon's early life reads like a story he would have concocted. His father, William "Stumpy" Zevon, a Jewish-Ukranian immigrant, worked for the Los Angeles gangster Mickey Cohen with a carpet store as a front, and his mother was a Mormon housewife. He was a musical prodigy and studied classical music in Igor Stravinsky's home under Robert Craft. When Zevon left home at 16 to pursue a career in music, he drove across the country in a sports car his father had won in a card game. 

Zevon toiled for years trying to make it in the difficult music business and started out primarily selling songs to others. He had small successes. His "He Quit Me" was included in the Midnight Cowboy soundtrack but performed by Lesley Miller. He toured with the Everly Brothers as their keyboardist and bandleader, but the brothers soon split acrimoniously. Zevon then moved to Spain, where he lived with a mercenary, composing and playing pub gigs. In 1976, when Linda Ronstadt recorded Zevon's "Hasten Down the Wind" and made it the title track to her hit album, Zevon's star began to rise. He released an eponymous album that same year to critical acclaim but was still struggling to break through. 1978's Excitable Boy, with "Werewolves of London" as the hit single, became the break the musically brilliant son of a gangster had been dreaming of. 

Popularity-wise, this was Zevon's peak. His career and life became an uneven struggle following his success, a trajectory exquisitely examined in C.M. Kushins' captivating and extensive biography Nothing's Bad Luck: The Life and Times of Warren Zevon. But despite his ups and downs, Zevon never ceased to generate odd tales in his brilliant songs—it's no coincidence some of his best friends were writers. In 2000, Zevon released the critically acclaimed Life'll Kill Ya, an album filled with meditations on death and mortality with Zevon's brand of humor and peculiar sadness woven throughout. Critics hailed it as a return to form and a comeback (and, for the record, my favorite in the Zevon record). He followed it up with another album confronting mortality, My Ride's Here. Perhaps his artistic unconscious was communicating something he did not yet know. In 2002, Zevon was diagnosed with mesothelioma and given only months to live. Shaken, Zevon focused on doing what he did best and gathered his friends to make one final album. 

In 2002, David Letterman, whom Zevon called "the best friend my music has ever had," invited the singer to be the sole guest on The Late Show with David Letterman. By then, it was widely known that Zevon was dying, and on October 30, 2002, he sat down to talk with his pal Dave and to perform his music publicly one last time. Zevon insisted that the show contain humor, of which there was plenty despite the moment's innate somberness. He joked that not going to a doctor for twenty years may have been a "tactical error" and that it was "one of those phobias that really didn't pay off." It was in that interview that Zevon delivered a quote that, in many ways, has become as enduring as his musical legacy. "From your perspective now," asked Letterman of the singer, "do you know something about life or death that maybe I don't?" Zevon took a beat and shifted his head before answering. "Not unless I know how much you're supposed to enjoy every sandwich, you know," replied Zevon with a wry smile. It was the second time he had said the line in the interview, and it quickly became an iconic slogan (whether or not one knows the origin) and advice that anyone visiting Palenville may be reminded of as they pass through. Zevon passed away a year later, on September 7, 2003, just two weeks after the release of his final work.

Maybe an induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame doesn't mean much on the grand scale of things. But the grand scale of things is currently a bit bleak, and maybe the Hall finally honoring Warren Zevon for his artistry is the sandwich we should all take a moment to enjoy right now. 

 

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