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  Updated December 28, 2016 | By Bob Fugett

      Forum 2015 3rd Quarter

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#Time ESTNameComment                       Bob's Response
75259/30/2015 11:59:59 PMGuild
Forum
Rollover
Squad
FORUM SPLIT
PERIODICALLY

To keep the Forum loading fast, it is peridoically divided into separate years and parts of years with a navigation bar found beneath the "Currently Showing" prompt above and below the comments section.

FORUM SPLIT
PERIODICALLY


(update your Bookmarks)


75219/27/2015 1:33:13 PME. StrahperHeard just now on the deck outside the Endico studio: "Watercolors ... this guy's really good at what he does."


Well, they's sure to fuck twern't talkin' 'bout me!


75169/25/2015 9:46:08 AMKevin Kern
For Anyone
interested
(generous rental)


Re: Romer’s Alley
Incubator Building
Generous rental parameters

A six or twelve-month lease will be executed with rent set at $0.00

That's right, zero dollars.

This concerns the third building in from Kings Highway which is designed for two separate spaces in a shared open environment, perfect for incubating an artistic startup.

We are looking for two artisan, artists, craft persons or boutique proprietors to share the building and watch over each other’s space.

Because there will be two separate users in an open space, shop hours can and should be better coordinated for coverage.

Failure to have consistent shop hours will terminate the agreement.

These individuals would be required to cover the utilities of the building (electric and gas) only. A six or twelve-month lease will be executed with rent set at $0. There will be a $250 dollar security deposit required from each tenant. This deposit will be returned if the building is left in its original condition upon termination of the lease. The length of the lease will be determined based on the candidates. Incubator tenants will have first right of refusal to take on permanent space when available throughout the five buildings in Romer’s Alley.

Candidates should provide Kevin Kern with a short description of their intended use with photos to kevingkern@gmail.com.
Thank You


Thanks for posting, Kevin.

I guess I don't have to remind people that this draft agreement published here will be finalized in writing before occupancy.

And at this point, anybody saying one single solitary word against Kevin Kern (owner of Romers' Alley) will have their ass kicked by me personally (and profoundly).

Signed,
Bob Fugett


75079/19/2015 12:12:10 PMClinton EverettDear Bob (from CJ Everett, Mac '66):

I just came over your interesting essay on our College.

Many thanks and congratulations.

I have attempted extolling the virtues of my education at MacMurray College in different companies over the years.

It has not been an easy task except among colleagues, one on one, usually over a discussion of the small, liberal-arts school education.

As I am attempting to gather a local group in NYC where I've lived for 47 years, next spring on the occasion of our 50th anniversary, might I pick your good mind, please?

I am sure we will have some interesting experiences to exchange.

I am still a performing musician (almost all jazz in NYC now), and I ran the Spoleto Arts Symposia in Italy for some 21 years.

Yours sincerely, CJ Everett


Perfect timing, CJ.

I just plopped down after calling the website project for the Sugar Loaf Guild done and in the can (three years of grueling full-time effort), and I started thinking about finishing (finally) the few remaining French credits I need to complete my degree at MacMurray.

And here you are.

I guess it is always something, as they say.

Thanks, thanks, thanks for writing.

You may pick my brain as much as you like.

I am toggling your e-mail onto at least one of my Forums; and, if it is ok, I will do the same with future correspondence.

In any case, what I will put in the Forum is how I almost wept on hearing from you, and how my wife almost beat me senseless when I made her read your Mac success article.

She said, "It sounds just like you and all your ranting about critical thinking, a real education, and what it did for you ... all the stuff you harass me with (and everybody around you) daily."

I shot back, "Hey! That is what I was trained to do."

BTW: Clinton, I see you graduated two years before I arrived at Mac which means you receive my immediate and enduring respect due to the fact I consider you my surrogate grandfather.

Let me know how I can help ... gramps.

Bob Fugett


75069/18/2015 2:49:03 AMHistoricHow 'bout this?


How 'bout that!


75039/17/2015 11:40:37 AMOlivia
Baldwin
HI Mary,

Thank you! This is great! Very cool. I'll share it with others. 

Have a great weekend,
Olivia


I sense a sea change.

Hope it's not a tsunami.


75029/16/2015 3:13:54 PMGuild Purveyors
Best in Show


Apparently Olivia Baldwin, Director and Resident Artist at Seligmann's, never got the memo about how everybody wants Bob Fugett dead and the Sugar Loaf Guild disappeared!


I find that odd.

But I did tell you the very best ever was just about to show up on these pages.

A real-deal Sugar Loaf heavy hitter, no less!

75009/16/2015 11:15:38 AMBob
Fugett


Meeting duration: 4 min 22 secs; minutes published within the hour.

It is called: preparation, efficiency, and focus.

How hard was that?!

74999/16/2015 10:58:38 AMGuild Meeting
Minutes
Meeting Minutes
10:30 a.m., Wednesday
Sept. 16, 2015

Location:
Endico studio

Slightly relaxed Roberts Rules are enforced, so when in doubt speak out!

Agenda Items:

1) Lawyer search report

2) Juried Show Committee report

3) Secure Background Committee report

4) Advertising budget: next $100,000 explaining Sugar Loaf's arts destination status.

4) Public Comment

Estimated duration:
4 minutes.

Actual duration:
4 minutes 22 seconds


Meeting Flow Actual
In attendance were: Bob Fugett (Chair), Mary Endico (Recording Secretary).

Bob explained there would be an audio recording plus photos (and/or video) of the meeting to be published on the Guild website, etc.

All were in agreement and stayed for the meeting.

Mary started the stopwatch and iPhone recording.

Mary took "Proof of Life Photo" and noted that for next meeting she should bring second camera in order to not interrupt iPhone recording.

AGENDA ITEMS

1) Lawyer search report

Not found yet.

ACTION: Bob entertained motion to forward report to next meeting, Mary Endico so moved, Bob seconded, vote Yes unanimous.

2) Juried Show Committee report

Bob asked Mary to prepare a report of the shows she ran in the past, and asked about the comment in one of Dick Hull's books about her first, and Mary responded it was the 1978 Craft Fair which Dick said was the best ever with 10,000 in attendence.

ACTION: Bob entertained a motion to forward the Juried Show Committee report to next meeting, Mary Endico so moved, Bob seconded, vote Yes unanimous.

3) Secure Background Committee report

Bob repeated that we are looking for a reliable service to do background checks and currently Peter Von Uchtrup remains our best bet source, but Peter has still not been informed he is the Committe Chair.

ACTION: Bob entertained a motion to forward Secure Background Committee report to next meeting, Mary Endico so moved, Bob seconded, vote Yes unanimous.

4) Advertising budget: next $100,000 explaining Sugar Loaf's arts destination status.

Mary stated that so far we have only decided on using the next portion of the money to purchase a work by Olivia Baldwin, Director of the Seligmann Property as part of the ongoing effort of the Sugar Loaf Guild to support the local artists and increase holdings for the Museum page.

ACTION: Bob entertained a motion to purchase the Olivia Baldwin piece and forward the Advertising Budget report to next meeting, Mary Endico so moved, Bob seconded, vote Yes unanimous.

4) Public Comment

No comments from public.

Bob closed the meeting and left to begin preparing minutes and templates for the next meetings.

Total elapsed meeting time: 4 min 22 secs (22 secs over planned)


All Guild Meetings are open to the full public, no membership required except for voting.

Agendas are finalized by noon the Monday before Wednesday meetings.

Meetings are audio recorded (and maybe video recorded) plus a "class photo" (proof of life) is taken of attendees to be published on the Sugar Loaf Guild website, etc.

If you wish to add an agenda item, come to the Endico studio in person (to confirm an email address) and Mary will submit the Item for consideration.

The Guild focuses exclusively on the three following concepts and only within Sugar Loaf, New York:

1) make it yourself

2) open your studio to the public

3) keep regular full-time hours

We would like to expand into the area of product quality and customer service, but that is a complex issue which must be discussed and addressed by the full membership.

Be aware that Guild Meetings are very sparsely attended, very narrowly focused, and action is taken only with regard to the three points above.

We are neither a non-profit organization nor a political action group.

We do not solicit money and only donate to worthy local community causes.

Anybody who tells you they are collecting money for the Guild is full of shit ... toss 'em out.


74979/14/2015 1:46:13 AMDawn
Keyhote
¿Que?

!Yo creo que ella (su presidente) es una estafadora!


74969/13/2015 8:23:52 PMMTRHi Mary!

What a great joy it was spending time with you and your husband today.

I can't tell you how much I appreciate your time, showing us your incredible camera equipment, and your husband's wonderful computer skills!

We had been dealing with some great personal sadness the past few years, and today was like a breath of fresh air!

Your art, and your spirit filled me with joy.

We will wear our Sugar Loaf University t-shirts with pride!

Looking forward to seeing you and your amazing work again soon!

Sincerely, Maureen and Tony

Hi Maureen : )

This is Bob handling the night desk.

What a blast from the past seeing somebody who helped so much with our beginnings in Sugar Loaf.

Mary told me how appreciative you were of the camera, what it is, and what it stands for.

Nobody has ever quite "gotten it" with regard to that camera the way you so obviously did.

Watch how cool this is.

I am toggling your kindest of messages onto the forum at Sugar Loaf Guild as well as Endico ... some spiffy slight of hand, wouldn't you say?

Thanks for writing,
Bob


74959/13/2015 11:21:22 AMBob
Fugett
It is 10:45 am again, and it's all starting to come back to me.

After three years working exclusively on the Sugar Loaf Guild town promotions, we finally have enough of the infrastructure complete to begin considering what we want to do with the next $100,000 in the advertising budget.

Unfortunately the Guild promotions so far have done such a good job, we are too busy to think much about it.

Three times I have gone downstairs to go over the plans with Mary, and three times we have been interrupted by customers.

At one point I was trapped on the back porch trying to figure out how to get back upstairs to work.

Because I never want to interfere with a sale I never tramp through ongoing conversations between Mary and collectors.

Life in the fishbowl, I almost forgot what it is like ... and we thought everybody was going through the same thing.


Of course the post above this is not about one of the interruptions earlier in the day, but about a well deserved break with an old friend later.

In any case, we should put the $100,000 advertising budget on the agenda for the next Guild Meeting in order to decide how much should be apportioned to print ads, or donated to organizations, or Sugar Loaf University scholarships, or work/live grants.


74939/12/2015 9:46:23 AMBob FugettIt is 9:45 am: Mary Endico has already finished her morning bike ride and is talking to customers in her studio while the rest of the sleepy-eyed hungover Sugar Loaf shopkeepers are trying to decide if they should come in to work or skip another day of their constant complaining blaming the economy and go have an aperitif lunch in Warwick.

On the other hand the church across the street is all freshly painted plus new blacktop on the parking lot while the congregation is busy setting up for today's bazaar, and the work guy next door provides the comforting drone of talk radio while laboring on the neighbor's porch deck.

The wrath of God and a leaky roof are great motivators.


Why do you even bother.


74919/10/2015 8:47:16 PMGuild
Fill in
the Blanks
Shufflers
SPOILER
ALERT

Coming soon, a new artist profile ... possibly the best one yet, given what we've seen so far.

EXCELLENT work!

Dual citizenship in both fine art and creative writing.

Maybe we can hook her up writing for the Canvas, if we can back Barry off his requirement of "LIES! ALL LIES!"

If we can't get Barry to budge on the requirement, maybe we can persuade him that creative writing is close enough.

Look at that, Sophia has just booked another vacation in anticipation of having another artist write their own story just like Sophia, Barry, Mark, and Bob (not Fugett) made Bob Fugett write his own.

Cheap bastards.

In any case, this artist is already a heavy hitter, major player on the Sugar Loaf art scene.

And get this: she is familiar with the Sugar Loaf Guild website and has still agreed to be part of it!

She probably never saw bad words in print before because everybody knows bad words have no place in creative writing.

But we have said too much.


Yeah, you Blankers wouldn't want to spoil this alert.

But since "her" is already out of the bag (destroying 50% of the mystery at 80.9% of the cost), I can say without warning, "As for her agreeing to be seen on the Guild website even after reading it, there is no accounting for taste."


74909/10/2015 1:08:35 PMGuild
Group
Focus
Now that the former Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce has been squashed into oblivion, we have become totally "meeting centric".

Our entire focus has moved to the regular weekly Guild meetings with easily accessible public agendas and minutes.

It has made things a whole lot easier around here.

Still have to deal with Mary however.

74889/9/2015 11:40:25 AMGuild Meeting
Minutes
Meeting Minutes
10:30 a.m., Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2015
Open to Public

Location:
Endico studio

Agenda Items:
1) Hiring a generalist lawyer to sit on the Guild Board of Directors.

2) Return of the perennially favorite high quality juried exhibitions. [fwd from last meeting]

3) Securing solid reliable criminal and financial background checks.

4) Public comment.

Estimated duration:
4 minutes.

Actual duration:
3 min 30s

Meeting Chair:
Bob Fugett

Recording Secretary:
Mary Endico

Santa may appear!



Meeting Flow Actual
In attendance were: Bob Fugett (Chair), Mary Endico (Recording Secretary).

Bob explained there would be an audio recording plus photos (and/or video) of the meeting to be published on the Guild website, etc.

All were in agreement and stayed for the meeting.

Mary started the stopwatch and iPhone recording.

Mary took "Proof of Life Photo"

AGENDA ITEMS

1) Hiring a generalist lawyer to sit on the Guild Board of Directors. [fwd from last meeting]

Santa Tim (not present) suggested Doug Stage of Warwick last meeting, otherwise, a lawyer matching our needs has been found yet.

ACTION: Bob entertained motion to table until next meeting, Mary Endico so moved, Bob seconded, vote Yes unanimous.

2) Return of the perennially favorite high quality juried exhibitions. [fwd from last meeting]

Mary volunteered to run juried shows as FREE booth spaces to be provided on our side deck, parking lot, and back yard if needed to be inserted into any and all extraneous festivals which do not focus on juried high quality arts.

ACTION: Bob entertained a motion to elect Mary Chairperson of the Sugar Loaf Juried Shows Committee, Mary Endico so moved, Bob seconded, vote Yes unanimous.

3) Securing solid reliable criminal and financial background checks.

Bob reported that some very nasty characters have arrived in town, so court proceeding levels of criminal and financial background checks need to be secured.

Bob stated that currently the best lead on background checks is Peter Von Uchtrup of 18th Century Furniture because they previously had to have a background check performed regarding a bad check they received.

ACTION: Bob entertained a motion to elect Peter Von Uchtrup Chairperson of the Sugar Loaf Guild Secure Background Committee, Mary Endico so moved, Bob seconded, vote Yes unanimous.

4) Public Comment

No comments from public.

If anybody sees Peter, let him know he is now heads a Guild Committee.

Bob closed the meeting and began preparing minutes and templates for the next meetings.


How fucking easy was that?

All I can say is those people over at the now defunct, gone from the face of the planet, cabal of a pretend organization Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce (in memoriam), must have been a bunch of total dirt wad retards.

Go try to find a meeting date, time, agenda, and minutes for those worthless assholes.

And a mission statement?

Not on your life!

It looks like the last throws of their orphaned website was being run by a committee of illiterate spider monkeys, and even if they typed on their little keyboards for an eternity, they were never going to come up with anything coherent.

As for the Guild, two new committees:

Juried Shows Committee
Chairperson: Mary Endico

Secure Background Committee
Chairperson: Peter Von Uchtrup

I am declaring this a job well done and getting on my bike.

Everybody else, get this book, read it, and implement it:


Then someday maybe you can get caught-up enough with your work to join me on a bike ride, at least as far as Kain where I will drop you for dead and crying for your mommy.

Does uhm's widdle weggies huwt?

Is uhm's tiny wasted wungs buwning an' on faiyuh?


74849/7/2015 12:27:00 AMSmack
Slap
Wake
UP!
 5 days =
$12,600

It may seem immodest, or it may seem trivial, depending on whom you ask, though I still don't feel anybody has told me the full honest truth about what they think.

But in a mere 5 days Mary made $12,600 in sales of her own hand painted watercolors to foot traffic in (what appeared to most people to be) "a totally empty Sugar Loaf".

Here's the lineup:



The final three (3) paintings are Christmas presents, so they must remain hidden for now.

They went to Ringwood, NJ and were: $300; $165; $550.


If you would like to know how we did it, come to the Sugar Loaf Guild Meeting at 10:30 Wednesday morning, and we will tell you the whole story (after the 4 minute meeting of course).

Hell, who am I kidding?

How we do this is all I have been screaming about and writing in this Forum and the rest of the Guild website for the last three years.

It is all here, so you don't have to come to the meeting; just read it.

Hell, who am I kidding a second time?

Nobody wants to know how we do it; they just want to believe it is some kind of magic, or connections, or subsidy, or as one person said to Mary, "I wish I didn't have to work!"

So let me kid myself a third time and give you the Wiki how to.

1) Make it yourself.

2) Open your doors to the public and treat people right.

3) Keep long hard full-time hours.

Oh, and one more thing.

Slowly and carefully build a reputation and business for 40 years.

Nothing to it, and while you are at it don't waste time at meetings.

Otherwise, I know what you are all thinking.

You are thinking I am taking a big risk publishing how much these paintings are worth, and somebody might pull an art heist taking all the ones that are left in the studio, or steal the images and make prints, right?

Well first off, these images are nowhere near the size required for a reasonable print, and the best print is still nowhere near as nice as the actual watercolors.

In any case, anybody who stole even the originals would NOT be able to sell them (even I can't sell them); only Mary can sell them, and especially to the customers she has serviced for nearly 40 years.

Good luck stealing that!


74829/3/2015 10:08:19 PMBob
Fugett
SIGH

I stopped focusing on it some time ago, after it was clear the Sugar Loaf Guild had acheived critical mass in everbody's psyche, but once in a while I will pull out the old Google and check on our rankings.

I keep track of a range of metrics, but one that stands out is searching for Sugar Loaf and any random business name in town.

Last night I went through some old bookmarked searches in some archive folders and found two things remarkable.

Usually I was saving search criteria for business names, but in one instance I used the owner's name instead because of the lengthy conversations I had with him about what I was doing with the Guild website, and how eventually a search for just his name plus Sugar Loaf would put Guild returns at the top with numerous other Guild returns heavily sprinkled throughout the remainder.

At the time he was skeptical and was sure the stature of the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce was going to provide his ticket to notoriety.

My bookmark for his search was notated 3/1, meaning the last time I looked the Guild return was third on page one.

Not bad.

But now the Guild return is number 1 on page 1.

Furthermore an image search (we are artists after all) returns the Guild as the first three images while 27 out of the first 30 are Sugar Loaf Guild pages.

I would like to show the guy that what I predicted (knew would happen) has now become reality, but along with the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce itself, he is already gone from town.

Ironic because he was going to "fix" the Chamber of Commerce, along with the hamlet.

Sigh.

The second thing I noticed was that the search for Sugar Loaf and Luft Gardens still results in the first three returns being Guild images.

But what was really interesting was how many other images I found that were Guild quality but were not Guild images.

I am usually thrilled because the Guild images always outshine the competition by far, but with Luft Gardens, well ...

The simple truth was obvious: the products of Luft Gardens and the way they are presented make it totally impossible for anybody to take a photo of the place that is not fucking spectacular!

Sigh.


My apologies to Christiane for stealing her wonderful sigh.

Though I must admit she does use it to much better effect.

Sigh.

74809/3/2015 11:40:44 AMKKWho'll next be caught in the Guild Meetings crossfire ... Snow White?

Could be.

Maybe Goldilocks.


74789/2/2015 1:17:51 PMBob
Fugett
ONLY IN
SUGAR LOAF

Nobody is going to believe who showed up for the first formal Sugar Loaf Guild meeting in over a quarter century.

When I scheduled the meeting and committed to weekly in-the-flesh, meet and greet, face to face, Guild Meetings continuing forward unabated in perpetuity, I hunkered down for the inevitable empty rooms expected over the next three years.

But when I was putting the final touches on the presentation, I heard somebody come into the studio downstairs and start talking to Mary like they were an old customer.

I thought, "Shit. Like I don't have enough trouble putting together this meeting, now Mary is going to be distracted by a customer."

I quickly finished up my agenda notes and went downstairs to do damage control.

And who to my wondering eyes did appear if not the one true (I am not shitting you), the absolute one and only SANTA CLAUS!

Plus he was actually here for the meeting, having read about it online.

Apparently he has a rather sizeable watchlist that takes him all day to check and then check again.

So think what it meant for Santa Claus to show up to my meeting.

That's right, not even a single solitary one of my lovely neighbors who has a vested interest in moving the town forward, and who has been benefitting greatly from Guild efforts, not one of them showed up.

But good ol' Santa Claus was here (perhaps with a record of all the bad words I've been using in the Forum).

Who knew Santa was a customer of Mary's and regularly reading the Guild website plus postings of Peg Conner?

I know what you are thinking, "Oh boy, maybe Santa is bringing me an Endico for Xmas!" [you heathen]

In fact we have heard numerous stories of his involvement with people getting their dream painting, but as it turns out, Santa also buys Endico watercolors to keep for himself, so don't hold your breath.

In any case, the first Guild meeting ... predicted to be a bust ... and Santa Claus shows up!

Go figure.

Only in Sugar Loaf, New York.

He left his card.


Man, this thing has trope written all over it!

I am going to beg Tim to open a shop in Sugar Loaf making something ... anything.

I mean he is over the top proven good with people; they don't even call the cops on him when he slips down chimneys in the middle of the night and steals everybody's cookies.

Stick him in Romers' Alley, very understated (never even come close to hyping the Santa angle), have him make some little something, and don't hand out a Santa card until people are on their way out with the thought, "That guy sure looked familiar."

Then hand 'em a card with a wink and a nod.

Really, Randy showed up one day, grabbed a bunch of trinkets at a big-box craft store, glued 'em together pretending to be an artist, and he sold a shitload of product until life in the Alley finally left him rigored on his back with his little bee legs curled up in the sunbaked air.

[Bee legs up in the air image stolen by me without attribution.]

Fuck, it would be a no-brainer for Tim.

I am also pretty sure I can get him to leave a Guild brochure under everybody's Christmas tree.

After all, he is the head of the new Get Out The Word on Guild Meeting Excellence Committee.

Now he probably wishes he kept his mouth shut, and if he so much as walked out of the room we'd have made him Guild President.

Too bad for the person who has been stealing all our brochures to avoid people seeing how ours are so much better than those stupid Chamber pieces of confetti fodder.

To whomever has been stealing our brochures: "You lost buddy; you really lost."

Now we have a distributer.

Santa says coal in the stocking is old school, the new substance is green glowing nuclear meltdown waste.

So much for brochure stealing losers.


In the photo above, Bob has just seen Tim's business card for the first time and has already written 40 stories in his head, all of them much longer than this one.

Tim said, "Please don't mention my name," and Bob is saying, "Wouldn't think of it."


74779/2/2015 11:02:14 AMGuild Meeting
Minutes
Meeting Minutes
10:30 a.m., Wednesday, Sept. 2, 2015

Location:
Endico studio

Agenda Items:
1) Hiring a generalist lawyer to sit on the Guild Board of Directors.

2) Return of the perennially favorite high quality juried exhibitions.

3) Public comment.

Estimated duration:
3.5 minutes.

Actual duration:
4 minutes



In attendance were: Bob Fugett (Chair), Mary Endico (Recording Secretary), Tim Stocken (interested party).

Bob explained there would be an audio recording plus photos of the meeting to be published on the Guild website, etc.

All were in agreement and stayed for the meeting.

Mary started the stopwatch and iPhone recording.

Bob called the meeting to order and explained the Guild Mission statement thus:

a) Make it yourself

b) Open your doors to the public

c) Keep long reliable full-time hours

These aspects of the Guild's position will be formalized on the website and voted up or down at the next meeting though all in attendance already expressed agreement.

Mary took "Proof of Life Photo"

AGENDA ITEMS

1) Hiring a generalist lawyer to sit on the Guild Board of Directors.

Bob Fugett stated he has been researching online to find a new Guild lawyer but has run into the impenetrable wall of bullshit automated sites such as Manta and Linked-in.

He realized that lawyers are like the best of the Sugar Loaf artists.

They have highly marketable excellent skills, get business by word of mouth, and do little in terms of advertising.

Tim Stocken says he is personally very happy with his lawyer from Warwick, Doug Stage, so Tim will broach the idea with him at their next meeting.

Mary Endico moved to table the discussion until next meeting, and the motion was carried unanimously.


2) Return of the perennially favorite high quality juried exhibitions.

Bob explained to Tim what a juried exhibition means, and how the recent Sugar Loaf festivals benefit from those types of shows from our past, but how the organizers have totally lost sight of what "high quality" means.

Mary Endico moved the Guild should state a position that any festival in Sugar Loaf which is not juried and focused on the arts is a total waste of time.

The motion carried unanimously.


3) Public comment.

Tim Stocken suggested there should be a get-out-the-word committee with regard to the focused excellence he observed in the Guild meeting.

He was immediately voted Chairperson for that committee and so fucking fast it made his head spin.

He said he enjoyed the ride and will get right to the task.

Bob Fugett closed the meeting, and Mary stopped the watch at 4 minutes (30 seconds over our goal).


Can you believe it?

The now defunct, gone, history, bye-bye, farewell, good riddance, don't let the door hit you on the way out, Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce never even got their shit together enough to handle a meeting just like ... that.

No fuss, no muss, how much easier could it be?

Well, apparently it was too hard for them, and now they are gone.


74769/2/2015 10:54:07 AMGuild Meeting
Preliminary
Report
WOW! The meeting went GREAT!

It went a little bit long (4 mins instead of the predicted 3.5 mins) because somebody actually did show up.

And by somebody, I mean SOMEBODY!

You are not going to believe the importance of the one person in the world showing up whom I could NEVER have predicted.

Nobody ever believes us anyway.

Good thing we have photos and audio recordings.

74759/2/2015 12:00:01 AMGuild Meeting
Sergeant
at Arms
QUICK

Guild meeting this morning,
10:30 Endico studio.

Read this quick!

See agenda here.


Be there or be square (and lose your vote).


74749/1/2015 8:25:09 AMLisaWow!  Thanks, Bob!  I will use this for sure!!  You guys are great!  Thank you!


Thanks for the kind words, Lisa; I assume you are referring to this:

08/31/15
Re: recommendation letter
For: Lisa
From: Bob Fugett, Mary Endico, Sugar Loaf, NY

Hi :)

When Lisa told me of her plan to contact you for a job, despite the fact she had as yet seen nothing to indicate you are looking for hires, I begged her to let me write a letter of recommendation.

We have only known Lisa for four (4) years, but in that time she has so impressed us with her character, people skills, and willingness to learn, plus her strong interest in doing work with her hands, I would be remiss if I did not take the opportunity to help introduce her to somebody who will really appreciate knowing her ... especially if they hire her to help move a worthy project forward.

I know worthy because I once saved a year and a half to buy a Mesa Boogie.

I told Lisa the standard success story in audio is the mix engineer who began with no experience but got their start sweeping floors in a recording studio.

She said, “Sounds good to me!”

That conversation took place in Wawayanda Park where she had just dropped off two thru-hikers she happened upon at the post office in Warwick as they were picking up supplies shipped to them.

She noticed the man was walking with crutches, and the woman was carrying both their backpacks, so she flipped her car around and asked if they needed a ride.

That is a perfect short example of Lisa’s character, while the longer story involves a bear, three cubs, plus a stumble getting away, so be sure to ask her about it.

Bob Fugett & Mary Endico




Below is a photo of Brat and Lisa showing each other the great respect only high performing athletes know how to show each other in the midst of the game.

If anybody would like to compete to win Lisa as their own employee, let us know before the other business snaps her up.


74738/31/2015 11:57:53 AMCuryousCould you please explain how you just made $5,500 from the sale of a single painting to foot traffic visitors in Sugar Loaf so are now taking the rest of today off?

Later ... but the setup is found in the post below.

74718/29/2015 1:49:26 PMGuild
Make It Right
Fixer-Uppers
The Meeting and Minutes page now includes the perfect intro to Guild process using a sign by Manon Von Uchtrup, and a quote from the Luft Gardens brochure at the top.


Well, Fixer-Uppers people, I have to tell you I am very excited.

Today I am surrounded by the busy sounds of hammering, saws, and pencil scratchings for all the building work being done by neighbors around me and down the street.

It sounds exactly like the old Sugar Loaf, maybe even better.

Plus my morning website usage logs show that a strong and growing readership is hungry for Sugar Loaf information, and readers are following the correct links to prove it.

My routine took a little longer today because of the new minutes page and coding for processes, but it's all good and things will be faster than before once I get procedures worked out.

A few years ago, Mary and I saw some pretty horrible handwriting on the wall, took steps to correct it, and now ... now things are so good, productive, and active in Sugar Loaf, I might start crying.

2:29 pm Stop the Presses update:

Mary just got off the phone with a (soon to be) new customer sitting on a golf cart in Stanford, CT with an old customer, and the (soon to be) new customer wants to drop by Monday to purchase a large painting, so they called to confirm Mary will be open Monday and can ship to Florida state.

Of course, most of the credit goes to the old customer talking us up, but my little websites are finally doing some good while Mary got her first order from a golf cart.

Now I am crying ... and going out for a ride on my bicycle.


74668/25/2015 8:11:05 PMCPHello Bob!

Thank you for letting us park at the Endico studio while Stacy (and you) took a bike ride, and I took a walk!

Thank Mary also for giving me your book, "Impulse and Strength".

I haven't finished it yet, but it is impressively clear and readable!

I am writing to ask your permission to write a review (including quotes from it) for the Music for People newsletter.

It will also be necessary for me to ask the editor whether someone else has already written one, as your book was printed in 1992, and I joined the organization much later!

Please advise.........Carol

Absolutely no problem with the parking.

How many times does a top flight cyclist plus Olympic physical therapist show up at one's door chomping at the bit for a ride and looking for a place to park?

And the fact that Mary let me play hookie to go out on the ride with Stacy was a bonus.

Looks like it is time to get Manon Von Uchtrup to make us one of her sweet signs stating "Cyclist Friendly" to put on our fence, so more people will stop for a ride, and I can get more time off from Mary.

Yes, you may absolutely have your way with the book; make use of it any way you like.

In the highly unlikely event it has already been reviewed by the newsletter, that will be another bonus and a hoot (more for me than for you I guess).

To help you with quotes (for copy/paste) here is a link to the online html version:

Plus the full version is available by clicking "Preview" below the cover image on the LuLu page:

And here is another way to read it, though as with LuLu it can't be copy/pasted from this version:

How about that?

The only way I could make that book any more available and free, I would have to pay people to read it, which on occasion I have ... : )

Thank you for the kind words, and thank Stacy for the great ride! -b


74608/20/2015 7:31:47 AMGuee
Demó
Passáw
While I was buying the best peaches on the planet at Roe's Farmstand in Chester, I heard somebody saying how you, Bob Fugett, have all of a sudden become the most loved, most respected, and most admired person in Sugar Loaf.

I find that strange, don't you?


RAZOR'S EDGE

Yes, I do find my sudden reversal of fortune odd.

Even Kevin Kern now "Likes" Peg Conner posts.

I am blaming Barry Plaxen (along with Sophia, Marc, and Bob) over at Delaware & Hudson Canvas (the region's only true art centric publication).

Here is how I see it happening.

Barry is extremely involved in all the local groups that matter, and he was probably at a meeting over at the Performing Arts Center when Kevin Kern noticed him sitting quietly in the corner all by himself slowly shaking his head.

Kevin (also extremely involved) walks over and asks, "Gee, Barry, what's got you goin' there?"

Barry moans a little and responds, "Oh, I was just thinking about that Bob Fugett guy and all the great writing and contacts he has been providing for the Canvas. Our magazine's chief editor, Sophia, raves about his writing, and he sure is getting things done right. Have you seen the Guild website? Spectacular! What a great representation of the true Sugar Loaf. It has an Interactive Walking Map and everything. Click on a building, and whoosh, takes you right to the business. Click on a business, and whoosh, pins its location on the map. Works great on all the little phone devices too. Spec-fucking-tacular!"

Up to that point Kevin probably knew only the lies about me, such as how I was supposedly arrested on his porch when I was manning the Sugar Loaf Welcome Center.

All of a sudden Kevin must have realized he had been duped by one of his tenants (the same one who phoned the Chester Historical Society trying to get my name off their website), so Kevin would have started investigating.

Turns out the Canvas has been keeping a record of things, so somebody can repeat all the lies about me they want, but I can toss third party dated source material in their face, and they can't avoid seeing all the stuff I have written and/or been instrumental in making happen.

Kevin still probably had to ask what was meant about my writing, and Barry likely replied, "Well, to tell you the truth Kevin (just like you) I really don't read very well, but Sophia says Bob's writing is as good as it gets. Ask her."

Of course Sophia would have told Kevin, "Bob's writing? Hot damn, Kevin, it sings! And the strong positive attention it is drawing for Sugar Loaf is over the top. You've heard of the Midas Touch? Well, Bob has the Midas Mouth. Everything he talks about turns to gold. You've also heard of a Silver Tongued Devil, right? Well, Bob is a Platinum Palated Pandora. There is no end to the genius spilling out of his stories. Bob Fugett is the go to person for what he does, and he Does It All. Sugar Loaf is lucky. Really, really lucky. Wish I lived there."

Obviously, as you have just read with your own eyes, Sophia herself has her own way with words albeit a little over zealous with capitalizations and a tad too cutesy with metaphors.

In any case, Kevin finally got the message and so have numerous other people ... if I read my morning website usage logs correctly ... which I do.

Our lawyer, Dan Bloom, always says, "Truth will out."

On the other hand, Barry Plaxen often says, "LIES! ALL LIES!"

Who you gonna believe?

Our lawyer goes to court for us, but Barry ups the ante and goes to bat for us.

And there is this.



74598/20/2015 3:51:41 AMGuild
Legal
Update
In the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce's recent despicable insulting defamatory letter signed by Veronica Bero, they demanded (among many other bullshit demands) that the Sugar Loaf Guild never do this:


Well, if they wouldn't like that, I wonder how the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce would respond to this:

Below are examples of the most degraded and polluted symbol of branding gone awry in the history of everything.

Despicable!

The Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce has even gone so far as to pepper the hamlet and surrounding area with illegal billboard type signage, displaying their compromised logo.

A direct attack on local law and custom.

They truly don't give a shit about Sugar Loaf.

After seeing all the flags, banners, stand alone, and internally lit signs, one new shop owner, was surprised to learn there actually is a sign law.

She said, "Oh, I thought it was a free-for-all!"

No, Irisha, it is not a free-for-all.

It is just a matter of dimwitted shitheads trying to take over something very special they can't understand — Sugar Loaf.


74588/19/2015 9:45:53 AMThought for
the Day
Being nice is important just not all important.

Truth in advertising, my friends, truth in advertising.

74578/19/2015 9:02:14 AMMorning
Loaf
Report
EARLY
MORNING
ART SALE

It is 8:48 am (in the morning).

While the bullshit branders, marketeers, and scam artists are still in their beds sleeping off last night's bacchanal, Mary Endico has already fielded a phone call from a customer for pick-up (she work/lives right here in Sugar Loaf), and she is right now downstairs handing them their paintings.

Like we said, it is 8:48 am.

We would explain this to all the bullshit branders, marketeers, and scam artists in Sugar Loaf, but of course their shops are closed, the streets are empty, and only actual workers would understand it anyway.

The central clearing house for all the bullshit branders, marketeers, and scam artists in Sugar Loaf is the equally worthless Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce, so maybe you Loaf Reporters should show up at one of their meetings and explain it to everybody at the same time.

Oops, sorry, I forgot.

The Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce has finally met its self imposed fate; it no longer exists and has no meetings ... though a couple of its former members have some sort of a closed Facebook group where they regale each other with stale repeats of the same old endless lies about the Sugar Loaf Guild, Mary Endico, and Bob Fugett.

"Sad really."

Quoted is Dan Bloom, Attorney at Law, who is helping us rectify the situation.

BTW: While Mary was waiting for her pick-up, she was composing an image of one of her paintings (scanned using our $100,000 photographic system) to be used for another magazine cover.

Also not much sense in trying to explain that system to all the bullshit branders, marketeers, and scam artists in Sugar Loaf.

10:41 am update: While I was working on my morning logs and Mary was off to UPS to ship out some paintings, somebody yelled up the stairs, "Mary?" so I went down to find them giving a tour, this time to some people from California (last time it was Montana); their question, "Is anybody ever open?"

No, they are all off making their BIG branding, marketeering, and scam artist fortunes.

Except for a cheap place to store their trinkets, none of them gives a shit about Sugar Loaf.

We used to provide them a Chamber of Commerce where they could pretend to care.

11:12 am update: Can't complain, though; Mary reports she has made over $1,700, and it isn't even noon yet.

A good start on paying for the letter that one of our lawyers (now fired) had to send to the totally fucking bullshit worthless Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce.

Plus one of the paintings that sold this morning is going to somebody in Germany as a gift.

What the FUCK is wrong with you Sugar Loaf people; stop fucking around pretending and open a goddamn business!


74568/18/2015 11:06:47 AMTruth or Guild
Consequences
YO!
Sugar Loaf
Chamber of Commerce


Having a little trouble hiding from the truth?


They are not hiding.

They are non-existent.

At least they learned the meaning of the term "self-fulfilling prophecy".




This post sponsored by Dan Bloom, Attorney at Law.

Please don't tell Dan he sponsored this, and certainly do not hire him away from us.

He is the absolute best lawyer alive (perfect process, nearly perfect knowledge, absolutely perfect character), but he is working on a very special lawsuit, and we don't want him distracted.

Please honor the Guild's wishes on this matter because, unlike the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce, the Guild actually does exist.

Just ask Google.


74558/17/2015 9:52:25 PMGuild
Flagrant
Promotions
Looks like our Canvas ad is already paying dividends:

"So they say they're an artist? Hummph! If they were any good they would have a studio open to the public in Sugar Loaf and be making a living at it."


Maybe it was not so much the ad but a simple recognition of the truth which brought our latest Warwick refugees ascending onto the lucrative Sugar Loaf art scene.



74548/15/2015 9:43:17 PMJeremiahSomebody kindly tell me when doing community service became a sin, a sign of weakness, a human frailty, a character flaw.

No.

74528/13/2015 2:04:03 PMRebecca
Towlflutter
Why don't you get the Warwick Valley Chamber of Commerce to help you out on this?

Conflict of interest.

What I did was an attempt to strengthen the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce.

On the other hand it is in the best interest of Mike Johndrow, Director of the Warwick Chamber, to see the Sugar Loaf Chamber weakened and destroyed.

In fact he has exhibited behavior that implies a gleeful willingness to watch Sugar Loaf fail along with its Chamber of Commerce.

Warwick always has wished it could be equal to Sugar Loaf in terms of community organization and the character of our business environment.

Not to mention Warwick's Chamber of Commerce is in direct competition with Sugar Loaf for members.

Historically a number of businesses in Sugar Loaf have refused local membership in favor of Warwick's.

My first impulse is to trust people and take them at face value, so it took me a while to catch on to the conflict of interest.

I was confused by Mike's feigned interest in helping us and how quickly it was followed by his abrupt and unexpected reversal.

Maybe at first glance it appeared to Mike that I would be complicit in his crusade to gobble up all the local groups under a single hegemonic umbrella, but he quickly realized that what I was doing would actually serve to make the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce stronger and more independent.

Mike couldn't allow that.

After all, what he is doing to combine area Chamber groups is not being done by statute or charter.

The laws governing formation and maintenance of Chamber groups are extremely lax, despite the common belief that Chambers function in the same manner as Better Business Bureaus and have similar powers.

The local groups are being pulled together by force of will alone, or rather by consequence of the apathy and lack of foresight of those being roped into the herd.

Mike's job was at stake; and so too, as it turned out, was one of our attorney's (now fired for lack of performance).

Unfortunately for Warwick, it does not have the infrastructure, nor the enabling statutes, nor the cultural history to compete with Sugar Loaf in the way it would like.

But the Town of Chester did a great job provisioning Sugar Loaf for success.

Sugar Loaf is a hamlet in the Town of Chester, and while Warwick is always glad to lay claim to Sugar Loaf there is no connection.

Currently the best thing that can be said of Warwick is that it functions as Sugar Loaf's cafeteria ... but without a table for the cool kids.

It is a big feather in Johndrow's cap to show up at a Sugar Loaf startup storefront for a photo op with unsuspecting newbies.

In fact the business which was the subject of the most recent ribbon cutting was already closed and the owner driving out of town within the hour of the ceremony, leaving those of us who were open still explaining to visitors why so many shops are closed.

Mary has taken up the policy of answering the question, "Why are all the shops closed?" by simply stating, "Because they are all assholes, that's why."

Our trial lawyer, Dan Bloom (much different from a mere letter writer), is also refreshingly matter of fact.

I can't wait to hear what Mike Johndrow has to say about what he did to us, on the record and under oath.

All of these powerless wannabe bureaucrats hate the Sugar Loaf Guild specifically because it represents freedom and independence of both spirit and mind.

Of course freedom of speech especially infuriates them because they are accustomed to a corporate environment that squelches independent thought and expression.

My apologies for breaking my promise to never write in the Guild Forum again, but when one's own attorney commits a lie of omission then overcharges for the scuttling, it is time to place an account of it into the permanent record.

At least that is what our other attorney, Dan Bloom (a pit bull of a trial lawyer), is telling us.

BTW: As all of this was unfolding, one of the things that Mary did was ship this painting to Cincinnati, OH.

Unfortunately nearly half the proceeds of that great work went to pay for a simple straightforward letter protecting the rights of Sugar Loaf artists.

What good is having another record week in sales when every so-called business owner around you treats their shop as nothing more than a piece of cheap jewelry to flaunt during one-off spectacle charades while complaining about the state of the economy and the impossibility of selling art?

 

 

This post sponsored by:

Sshhh ... don't tell them.


74508/7/2015 10:35:38 AMInflammatory
Truth
Sayers

And one more thing:

In case you missed the text, it reads:

"So they say they're an artist? Hummph! If they were any good they'd have a studio in Sugar Loaf and be making a living at it."

And if all the local Chambers of Commerces had anything at all to do with actual Commerce (as opposed to merely cutting ribbons and tasting wine), they would be spending an inordinate amount of time and effort trying to explain to the rest of the world that right here on the upper east-coast United States of America (this Great Country of Ours), Hudson Valley, Orange County, in this very place there exists a singular example of an actual art business community (not just trendy pretend wannabe retail shops and childlike branders), and it is producing hand-made superlative products that can be purchased right out of the hands of the human beings who make them.

Every place in the world has galleries (even lowly Warwick) with aggregate stacks of art (mostly reproduction prints and posters) from people "networking" all over the place (thus assuring not one of the artists involved will ever coalesce enough sales to live on), but Sugar Loaf has artists ... actual independent, self sustaining, highly successful artists.

More than one.

I wish those groups (a term I use advisedly) would all change their names from Chamber of Commerce to Consortium of Well Wishers in order to match their actual function.

None of them would know true commerce if it was sitting in plain sight right in front of them which on main street in Sugar Loaf, New York, it is.


Those so-called Chambers of Commerce should also choose to "get involved" rather than going out of their way to avoid all possible appearances of "giving a shit".

And to the rest of you, my strongest memory taken away from my 2 weeks on the front porch across from the Barnsider (while doing market research) was the insane level of hatred for Sugar Loaf that people expressed after being attracted here by the bullshit lies of misguided advertising only to find a street lined with unopened shops.

Sugar Loaf certainly does not need to continue hosting "promotional events" which attract people into a situation that only gets them pissed off.

I know other business owners have heard the same complaints from their own customers but may not know the severity of the problem because visitors I spoke with assumed I was a disinterested third party and were more forthright with their level of disgust.

Now when I see shoppers out on the street with Chamber brochures in their hand, obviously confused by a ghost town of closed shops, I am pained to the core.

Instead of a new round of gimmicky quick fix promotions, Sugar Loaf simply needs more studios putting their own product front and center while opening their doors to the already arriving public!

That public is here every day of the week by the way, hoping to avoid the unskilled placeholder employees they find in all the big-box stores, malls, and standard retail shops everywhere else.

Mary and I hear it all the time from new customers: "This place is ... REAL!"


74467/19/2015 3:34:21 AMOKNow I'm done.

That's right, finished, enough is enough, completely done, no matter what, don't even think about it.

No more Forum-ing around.

Now I can sit back and resume watching with enjoyment as Warwick fumbles all over itself trying to be "just like Sugar Loaf" but can't come close.

Been watching it for years.

What the hell, come to think of it, this website itself has been three years of hard work, so I may as well close down the Forum with a plug for myself.



74457/18/2015 3:52:12 PMKat ParrellaHi Mary,

It was great chatting with you the other day and thank you for the Sugar Loaf University swag, the t-shirt was much sought after / fought over at our house!

Also, a big thank you to both you and Bob for the incredibly quick work that you did to post "Merrily" on the Sugar Loaf Guild website and put my new shop "on the map". Your photo of the building is gorgeous!

Thanks again,
Kat

Well, I have been trying not to add to the Guild Forum, but I'll be damned; if somebody is going to say something so nice ... I have no choice!

And for all you other folks who might be thinking Kat has walked into a firestorm that she could never have expected, her IP# has already been here 27+ times, at least as far back as Jan. 28, 2014 (so much it was flagged "bot?").

I have to agree with Kat: we are unbeatably fast (plus totally FREE of charge); and her house is, as Mary keeps saying, "ADORABLE!"

As goes the meme, "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in."

And after Mary and I spent the morning on our front boardwalk so depressed about our neighbors that we were discussing a move to Wichita.

Now maybe we should stick around a little longer.


The best laid plans
of mice and men
go oft agley

Or better yet, end on a good note.

BTW: Kat, you do know you are entitled to more than one FREE Sugar Loaf University t-shirt, don't you?

Everybody is.

Also Francesca from Diva Dog wants to hook up with you to sell your stationery.


74447/10/2015 6:33:49 AMReally
Endico ... we're serious!


Seriously.

As for the rest of you, the saying is, "Build it and they will come," not, "Trick them into coming and maybe you will build it."

"Open for Business" is not an adjective.

It is an enlightening directive.

When Clay Boone gets back from Wyoming this year, I am personally going to kick his ass!


74427/8/2015 7:16:41 AMGuild
Cleanup
Crew
SUGAR LOAF, NY
THE WORST PLACE
IN THE WORLD
TO DO BUSINESS

The three year study is now complete and the results are in.

Sugar Loaf, NY is the worst place in the world to invest or do business.

Maybe a home based light manufacturing business can succeed with extreme attention to efficiency, over the top commitment to product quality, and uncompromising customer service, but as for regular businesses like an ordinary town, forget it.

Plus, the idea that Sugar Loaf is a sweet little low hanging fruit (a slick investment opportunity perennially just waiting to happen), well, that is a long standing cash cow myth which has not survived the test of an open Internet and the information age.

Our truck is almost pimped for the next reconnaissance drive south while our lawyers and involved agencies have all the documents needed to rip the Sugar Loaf Chamber a new one (for their complicity in the failed attempt to destroy Sugar Loaf), so I'll just leave you guys with a final thought.

1) trust fund babies
2) retiree-preneurs
3) grant grubbers
4) and tax wife-offs

Plus the difference between artisan and artist.

All subjects for another day, another life, another universe.

In the meantime, everybody research the difference between a Neighborhood Business District (NBD) versus a Neighborhood Shopping Center (NSC) and you will go a long way toward understanding the difference between Sugar Loaf and what new people invariably mistake it for.

They always try to make it a Shopping Center (regardless of the significant infrastructure and physical realities that preclude doing so) but are saddened because they only succeed in bringing it closer to something like the Orange County Fairgrounds.

That is to say, a place for a couple of yearly low level events with a bunch of poorly maintained empty buildings on a vacant lot the rest of the year.

Some people have actually used their shop here as a storage unit because the rent is just as cheap.

Throw in the concept of a home based light manufacturing nano-business (the only type of business that is suited to the environment and thrives in Sugar Loaf — which is also the only place high end arts based businesses of that sort can survive from in-town foot traffic) and you will understand the rest of it.

When I first started the revamping of the Guild website, I knew I was looking at something very different from the rest of my known universe, but I did not know there are simple planning and land use terms to describe much of that difference (see above: NBD and NSC).

To anybody who tries something like the Guild initiatives to help Sugar Loaf in the future, be on the lookout for businesses which are specifically designed to lose money.

Spotting them quickly will allow you to avoid wasting time trying to explain why a business is doing poorly only to waste more time afterwards trying to figure out why they were so apathetic (sometimes aggressively opposed) to making it better.

Their business is losing money on purpose, and they are determined to keep it that way.

Some of those types of businesses are grant traps, and just like a trap door spider the owner grant grubber may pop out to snag a subsidy once in a while, but generally they are happiest lurking in their lair taking advantage of anybody who wanders in by selling them cheap touristy trinkets.

Additionally there are similar built to lose businesses that I like to call tax wife-offs.

As in, "Oh, that's just the little wifey's business; I really don't care what happens over there."

Seriously, I heard it more than once before coming up with a suitable term to describe it.

I had an epiphany, "No wonder they don't care; it's not a business; it's a tax wife-off!"

And don't even get me started on the steady flow of wannabee businesses drifting through town who think Sugar Loaf is the perfect place to suck off our hard won reputations as they build their touring-group business model in outside shows (everywhere else) while lending support to the fiction that Sugar Loaf is just another bedroom community.

Otherwise, the businesses in Sugar Loaf that are making their own excellent product are doing well (quite well indeed); always have; always will.

Therefore, to anybody dropping into town with the newest plan of salvation for the poor little starving artists, be aware they don't need or want your "help"; never have; never will.

But for anybody looking to buy some of the highest quality, most unique artistic items in the world, directly out of the hands of the artists who make them, Sugar Loaf, NY is the place for you.


More at:


That summary sounds about right.

Now if somebody would just find out whatever happened to the so-called Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce, which has apparently gone back into hiding and is not even having meetings.

We have a present for them.

Something about this insulting and defamatory letter (page2) with the exposure to expensive litigation they have provided for every business fraudulently named as a signatory along with everybody else who paid them dues.

Otherwise, following is still my favorite quote, despite it having been supplanted in priority of relevance by the technical terms Neighborhood Business District vs Neighborhood Shopping Center.

"It’s my experience that artist communities are almost always camps because they appropriate space that nobody else wants (at the time), but by virtue of a creative progressive view of neighborhoods they create a demand from others that ultimately marginalizes them, so they are forever transient." - see top of Artist Communities


74407/7/2015 4:04:24 PMBob
Fugett

For all you people who have endured my intense shredding of your writing, below is an example of what happens to my own writing when somebody else is kind enough to put it through their own mill.

On the left is my original submittal (after a month of my own revisioning), and on the right is Barry Plaxen's final edit for publication.

Of course Barry is rather jealous of my opportunity to write without size, layout, and advertising revenue constraints; but man, he wrangled the meat out of my little hot dog, down to fit his requirements (as much as it strained against it); and he made it even better in the process.

Before you start comparing Barry's edit to my original, take a look at this image of the tear sheet of the layout that he (and Sophia and Mark) had to squeeze it into.

You might ask, "Why all the white space below?"

Well, that area is what they call in the business "prime advertising space", and Barry is going to enjoy charging people premium rates to get their ad on the same page as my writing — writing which always attracts an insane number of eyeballs.

Especially with help from the Canvas staff.


Think about it.

Barry had his way with my writing and did such a bang up superlative job that he had no problem convincing me it should reach final publication with his changes.

He left me breathless with how he kept the things most important to me in the article, and he does that on a regular basis for the Canvas.

A man who routinely rakes through carefully crafted wordsmithing of some of the most egotistical, self centered, sure of themselves, overly sensitive artists on the planet and comes up with debris that suits them just fine (in fact makes them proud to have been man handled in that manner) ... and he makes a LIVING at it!

All the while enduring the constant lashings of Sophia and Mark.

Well, ok, at least he did not have to do any fact checking because he knows Sugar Loaf very well, used to live up on Gibson Hill Road near Irving "Binny" Robbin (Bernard Rabinowitz), a true composer of great and known works for television and film plus one time President of the Sugar Loaf Foundation.

Fuck.

I couldn't even get one of the Sugar Loaf artists to accept a single tiny change I made to their writing that was an obvious high school punctuation error!

I bow before Barry and am not worthy to lick his boot straps.

The rest of you should compare the versions and learn, just like I always tell you to do with the things I edit of your own writing.

While you are doing that, I am going to start on the Guild profile for the Canvas, so I can finally shut this puppy (forum) down.

On the other hand, I just wrote this entire thing while Connie Rose (whose main problem is that she is so lovable and entertaining the people around her let her get away with the most gawd awful shit) was visiting Mary downstairs.

Like I've got time for that.


74397/7/2015 2:19:31 AMBob
Fugett
COMPARE BOB'S
ORIGINAL WRITING


The Sugar Loaf Historical Museum displays 50 years of work done by the best Sugar Loaf resident artists.

The Museum is the newest addition to the Sugar Loaf Guild website.

Following the positive reception of the revamped Sugar Loaf Guild website (2012), the site quickly grew into something much greater than the typical online promotional brochure, and the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum has become a flagship of the site's fantastic growth.

And I am not just saying so because the Sugar Loaf Guild is my website (I am Bob Fugett), and this is my article you are reading, though I could.

The strong response to the Museum is not surprising; it displays a half century of handmade artistic products unique to Sugar Loaf and thus unique to Orange County and the Hudson Valley.

Context for the artwork is given by insider firsthand accounts that I write from my perspective as a 40 year Sugar Loaf resident artist.

Read how the couple who built the Sugar Loaf Performing Arts Center (Susan and Richard Logothetis) got their start by spending weekends in a tiny camper at the back of Romers' Alley, and how they went on to build a company world renowned for manufacturing top quality stadium and theater lighting, and how they fulfilled a dream.

The dream was to host the finest dramatic works, and they began with intimate theatrical performances held in the loft of the Scott's Meadow red barn.

The fulfillment of the dream came by virtue of their construction of the Lycian Centre — which they eventually gifted back to the community — now retitled the Sugar Loaf Performing Arts Center.

Continue browsing the page to see an abstract rococo art nouveau piano (not a painting but an actual piano) which was built in Sugar Loaf and is now in the permanent collection of the New York City Metropolitan Museum of Art, in fact three of them are in the collection.

And that is just some of the old stuff.

Today's handmade by resident Sugar Loaf artist items include a wide range of work in almost all mediums that can be purchased directly out of the hands of the artists who make them, and they are better than ever.

However, the newer work is fully explained throughout the rest of the Guild website, so in this article there is no need for me to mention even my wife, watercolorist Mary Endico — Hudson Valley's artist.

This article is about the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum.

There were four main occurrences that prompted the ugrade of the Guild website and consequently the addition of the Historical Museum page.

The first prompting occurred after Mary Endico's second bout with breast cancer, plus two other significant operations for fibroid tumors in addition to a uterine endometrial ablation, at which moment she asked if I could put our story online before, well ...

She said, "There are some artists who failed here that are now saying Sugar Loaf is dead to the arts; not true; we have to set the record straight!"

Those misrepresentations circulating helped spur the reclamation of the Guild website, but the first circumstance later provoking the Museum page itself was the arrival of a painting in glass (sent all the way from Texas) which after 38 years was finding its way home to the very spot where in the interim its creator had died.

The artist's death was the result of a massive heart attack, and it happened during his first ever singing lesson as he began preparing for a new acting role at the age of 72.

His Painting in Glass now hangs on the wall where he took his last breath.

How could one fail to build a Museum around such an event, especially when the person who created the artwork was instrumental in establishing the look, the feel, and the viewpoint of the Sugar Loaf artists enclave which people have come to love.

Mary's string of health issues, then the arrival of a precious historic artifact, provided the first nudgings; but the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum became an absolute necessity after two final revelations.

The first came when a new artist in town was hungry for history but was being told nothing about the strong collaborative close-knit underground of successful artists in the hamlet (still here by the way), and secondly another artist was shocked to learn that the house they own was built by the person who fashioned those three pianos now in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Not only were new people not being given the big picture of what is in Sugar Loaf right now today, they were missing out on the historic foundation and ongoing process that ensures such a unique reality continues to thrive.

We thrive because we do.

As the timeless adage goes: "So they say they are an artist? Hummph! If they were any good they would have a studio open to the public in Sugar Loaf and be making a living at it."

Such things must be talked about, and the Sugar Loaf Guild website is the logical place for that discussion.

Go take a look; but keep in mind the Forum pages are for those who love the hot sauce while those who prefer the mild will find the rest of the Guild website perfect to their taste, especially the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum!

SugarLoafGuild.org


Our guest lecturer for today's article has been Bob Fugett, author of numerous rants and owner of the blogosphere. His only regret in life is the scandalous amount of money he receives for his writing, which he calls "filthy lucre". He has, however, never been at all shy spending that lucre on fancy high powered racing bicycles. Bob also likes to call himself a master musician whose main instrument is the written word.


COMPARE BARRY'S
EDIT FOR CANVAS


The newest addition to the Sugar Loaf Guild website, the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum, displays 50 years of work done by Sugar Loaf resident artists, a half century of handmade artistic products unique to Sugar Loaf and thus unique to Orange County and the Hudson Valley. Context for the artwork is given by insider firsthand accounts that I write from my perspective as a 40 year Sugar Loaf resident artist.

Read how the couple who built the Sugar Loaf Performing Arts Center got their start by spending weekends in a tiny camper at the back of Romer's Alley, and how they went on to build a company world renowned for manufacturing top quality stadium and theater lighting, and how they fulfilled a dream.

The dream was to host the finest dramatic works, and they began with intimate theatrical performances held in the loft of the Scott's Meadow red barn. The fulfillment of the dream came by virtue of their construction of the Lycian Centre — which they eventually gifted back to the community — now retitled, The Sugar Loaf Performing Arts Center.

Continue browsing the page to see an abstract rococo art nouveau piano (not a painting but an actual piano) which was built in Sugar Loaf and is now in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in fact three of them are in the collection.

And that is just some of the old stuff.

Today's handmade crafts by resident Sugar Loaf artists items include a wide range of work in almost all mediums that can be purchased directly out of the hands of the artists who make them, and they are better than ever.

However, the newer work is fully explained throughout the rest of the Guild website, so in this article there is no need for me to mention even my wife, watercolorist Mary Endico.

There were four main occurances that prompted the upgrade of the Guild website and consequently the addition of the Historical Museum page. The first prompting occured after Mary's second bout with breast cancer, plus two other significant operations, at which time she asked if I could put our story online. She said, "There are some artists who failed here that are now saying Sugar Loaf is dead to the arts; not true; we have to set the record straight!"

The first circumstance later provoking the Museum page itself was the arrival of a painting in glass (sent all the way from Texas) which after 38 years was finding its way home to the very spot in the interim its creator had died. The artist's death was the result of a massive heart attack, and it happened during his first ever singing lesson as he began perparing for a new acting role at the age of 72! His Painting in Glass now hangs on the wall where he took his last breath.

How could one fail to build a Museum around such an event, especially when the person who created the artwork was instrumental in establishing the look, the feel, and the viewpoint of the Sugar Loaf artists enclave which people have come to love.

Mary's string of health issues that were followed by the arrival of the precious historic artifact provided the first nudgings; but the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum became and absolutely necessity for us after two final revelations.

The first came when a new artist in town was hungry for history, who knew nothing about the strong collaborative close-knit underground of successful artists in the hamlet (still here by the way), and secondly, another artist who was shocked to learn that the house they own was built by the person who fashioned those three pianos now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Not only were new people unaware of the big picture of what is in Sugar Loaf right now today, they were missing out on the historic foundation and ongoing process that insures such a unique reality continues to thrive.

We thrive because we do.

www.SugarLoafGuild.org

Our guest lecturer for today's article has been Bob Fugett, author of numerous rants and owner of the blogosphere. His only regret in life is the scandalous amount of money he receives for his writing, which he calls "filthy lucre". He has, however, never been at all shy spending that lucre on fancy high powered racing bicycles. Bob also likes to call himself a master musician whose main instrument is the written word.

74387/7/2015 3:13:14 AMBob
Fugett
Sorry for the short post this morning.

Now that Jessica is firmly tucked under the hyper protective wing of the Sugar Loaf Guild, I have begun working on the final wrap-up of the website, so give me a sec.

Suffice it to say the Guild has tolerated the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce stealing our brochures from displays in local businesses, and turning the Endico brochures around to the blank back at the theater, etc.

After all, those brochures are meant to attract people to Sugar Loaf, not confuse them once they get here, as is the apparent sole purpose of those worthless Chamber brochures.

Besides, you people stealing them will never get to the ones behind the counters that business owners keep to pass out by hand to their most valued customers.

However, despite such low life vandalism having been tolerated (laughed at really), if you now try to fuck with Jessica — we will fuck you up in ways you can scarcely imagine, and you will never see it coming!

All three of you who are doing these things, do you get it?

You will.


Which reminds me: does anybody know when and where the next Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce meeting is being held?

It seems that the pretend Chamber pseudo-organization has dropped out of sight, and we want so much to present a little present we have for them in an open meeting with everybody watching.

Can you say "litigation"?

Or rather "costly litigation"?


74367/6/2015 10:15:05 AMCuryousAren't you forgetting Dana (Bliss) and Bruce (Colláge)?


Ok, maybe I overstated a little, but still ...


74357/6/2015 9:10:37 AMGuild
Space
Shuffle

IT HAPPENED!

Remember when a few months ago I said there was a big secret in Sugar Loaf that was going to change everything?

But I wasn't allowed to talk about it?

Well, it happened.

Jessica (everybody's favorite whipping post and the very last peckee in the Romers' Alley pecking order) bought a house directly in the midst of the tiny Sugar Loaf arts Mecca (make it and they will come) thick of it.

Didn't I tell you so?

It is all different now, my friends, all different.

I am taking full credit for putting together the Guild website, the brochures, and the promotianal campaign (while stirring things up) just for the specific purpose of going down to Romers' Alley and stealing the only asset they had — Jessica — right out from under the nose of an oblivious Kevin Kern.

I am also totally fucking proud of myself for being able to keep my big mouth shut about it!


Uncustomary restraint, Bob.

Unfortunately, now you have to help Kevin rent those golden location studio spaces again, so you can grab the next Sugar Loaf up and coming artist and slate them for fame.

Just hope Kevin continues to stay asleep at the wheel with regard to his surroundings.


74327/5/2015 4:23:51 PMAdam
Ant
You'd better explain.

Ok, I'll admit it.

Once in a very great while this website does have to be all about Mary.


74317/5/2015 3:32:10 PMMaggieMary,

I know you had your doubts yesterday! But Wilma and I completed all our chores today. Maybe everything did not go where first planned. But, I am extremely happy with the results.

Since I took one of your favorites yesterday, I will start with that.

The sea is now just a small left turn of my head from my special spot on the couch. Never far out of sight….I consider this spot my home office……it is where I sit every day relaxing. NOW I have something special to look at other than a blank wall….

I rearranged a bit….this is the new look in the alcove to my bathroom…

This is the new look in the bedroom….hard to take a picture with the shadows and glare from the sun coming in but…I love the new look.

Lastly, the last item was put in the dinning area!!! The only problem is that it looks lonely. I will have to seek friends for this piece during our next visit!!!!

Hope you had a wonderful Happy 4th of July. See you soon.

Maggie
Sent
from my iPad


That's right, folks, while everybody else was taking the Fourth of July off (thinking about all the Native Americans who gave us their homes, so we could get away from King George), Mary Endico was busy making another customer happy.

Actually, it was 2, or 3, or 4, or more, but who's counting?

"Open for Business" is not an adjective; it is a directive.

It means you must open if you want to do business.


74307/4/2015 11:09:40 AMIndependence
Day
Celebration

THE PEOPLE
WHO MADE IT
ALL POSSIBLE


- Freedom ain't free! -

A

Aane, Abenaki (Abnaki, Abanaki, Abenaqui), Absaroke, Achumawi (Achomawi), Acjachemen, Acoma, Agua Caliente, Adai, Ahtna (Atna), Ais, Akimel O'odham, Alabama-Coushatta, Aleut, Alutiiq, Algonquians (Algonkians), Algonquin (Algonkin), Alsea (Alseya), Andaste, Anishinaabe (Anishinabemowin, Anishnabay), Aniyunwiya, Antoniaño, Apache, Apalachee, Apalachicola, Applegate, Apsaalooke (Apsaroke), Arapaho (Arapahoe), Arawak, Arikara, Assiniboine, Atakapa, Atikamekw, Atsina, Atsugewi (Atsuke), Araucano (Araucanian), Avoyel (Avoyelles), Ayisiyiniwok, Aymara,Aztec

B

Babine, Bannock, Bari, Bear River, Beaver, Bella Bella, Bella Coola, Beothuks, Bidai, Biloxi, Black Carib, Blackfoot (Blackfeet), Blood Indians, Bora

C

Caddo (Caddoe), Cahita, Cahto, Cahuilla, Calapooia, Calusa (Caloosa), Carib, Carquin, Carrier, Caska, Catawba, Cathlamet, Cayuga, Cayuse, Celilo, Central Pomo, Chahta, Chalaque, Chappaquiddick (Chappaquiddic, Chappiquidic), Chatot, Chawchilla, Chehalis, Chelan, Chemehuevi, Cheraw,Cheroenhaka, Cherokee, Chetco, Cheyenne (Cheyanne), Chiaha, Chickasaw, Chilcotin, Chimariko, Chinook, Chinook Jargon, Chipewyan, Chippewa, Chitimacha (Chitamacha), Choctaw, Cholon, Chontal de Tabasco, Chukchansi, Chumash, Clackamas (Clackama), Clallam, Clatskanie, Clatsop, Cmique,Cochimi, Cochiti, Cocopa (Cocopah), Coeur d'Alene, Cofan, Columbia (Columbian), Colville, Comanche, Comcaac, Comox, Conestoga, Coos (Coosan), Coquille, Cora, Coso, Costanoan, Coushatta, Cowichan, Cowlitz, Cree, Creek, Croatan (Croatoan), Crow, Cuna, Cucupa (Cucapa), Cupa, Cupik (Cuit)

D

Dakelh, Dakota, Dawson, Deg Xinag (Deg Hit'an), Delaware, Dena'ina (Denaina), Dene, Dene Suline (Denesuline), Dene Tha, Diegueno, Dine (Dineh), Dogrib, Dohema (Dohma), Dumna, Dunne-za,

E

Eastern Inland Cree, Eastern Pomo, Eel River Athabascan, Eeyou, Endeve, Eskimo, Esselen, Etchemin, Euchee, Excelen, Eyak

F

Flathead Salish, Fox

G

Gabrielino, Gae, Galibi, Galice, Garifuna, Gitxsan (Gitksan), Gosiute (Goshute), Gros Ventre, Guarani, Guarijio, Gulf, Gwich'in (Gwichin, Gwitchin),

H

Haida, Haisla, Halkomelem, Hän, Hanis, Hare, Hatteras, Haudenosaunee, Havasupai, Hawaiian, Heiltsuk, Heve, Hiaki, Hichiti (Hitchiti), Hidatsa, Hocak (Ho-Chunk, Hochunk), Holikachuk, Hoopa, Hopi, Hualapai, Huichol, Huichun, Hupa, Huron

I

Illini (Illiniwek, Illinois), Inca, Ingalik, Innoko, Innu, Inuktitut (Inupiat, Inupiaq, Inupiatun), Iowa-Oto (Ioway), Iroquois Confederacy, Ishak, Isleño, Isleta, Itza Maya, Iynu

J

James Bay Cree, Jemez, Juaneno (Juaneño)

K

Kainai (Kainaiwa), Kalapuya (Kalapuyan), Kalina, Kanien'kehaka (Kanienkehaka), Kalispel, Kansa (Kanza, Kanze), Karankawa, Karkin, Karok (Karuk), Kashaya, Kaska, Kaskaskia, Kathlamet, Kato, Kaw, Kenaitze (Kenai), Keres (Keresan), Kichai, Kickapoo (Kikapu), Kiliwa (Kiliwi), Kiowa,Kiowa Apache, Kitanemuk, Kitsai, Klallam, Klamath-Modoc, Klickitat, Koasati, Konkow, Kootenai (Ktunaxa, Kutenai), Koso, Koyukon, Kulanapan, Kumeyaay (Kumiai), Kuna, Kupa, Kusan, Kuskokwim, Kutchin, Kwakiutl (Kwakwala), Kwantlen,

L

Laguna, Lakhota (Lakota), Lassik, Laurentian (Lawrencian), Lenape (Lenni Lenape), Lillooet, Lipan Apache, Listiguj (Listuguj), Lnuk (Lnu), Lokono, Loup, Lower Umpqua, Luckiamute, Luiseño, Lumbee, Lummi, Lushootseed

M

Macusi, Mahican, Maidu, Maina (Mayna), Makah, Makushi, Maliseet (Maliceet), Mandan, Mapuche (Mapudungun), Maricopa, Massachusett (Massachusetts), Massasoit (Massassoit, Mashpee), Mattabesic, Mattole, Maumee, Matlatzinca, Mayan, Mayo, Mengwe, Menominee (Menomini), Meskwaki (Mesquakie), Miami-Illinois, Miccosukee, Michif, Micmac (Mi'gmaq), Mikasuki, Mi'kmaq, Mingo, Minqua, Minsi, Minto, Miskito (Mosquito), Missouria, Miwok (Miwuk), Mixe, Mixtec (Mixteco, Mixteca), Mobilian Jargon, Modoc, Mohave, Mohawk, Mohegan, Mohican, Mojave, Molale (Molalla, Molala), Monache (Mono), Montagnais, Montauk, Moosehide, Multnomah, Munsee (Munsie, Muncey, Muncie), Muskogee (Muscogee, Mvskoke), Musqueam, Mutsun

N

Nabesna, Nahane (Nahani), Nahuat, Nahuatl, Nakoda (Nakota), Nambe, Nanticoke, Nantucket, Narragansett, Naskapi, Natchez, Natick, Naugutuck, Navajo (Navaho), Nawat, Nde, Nee-me-poo, Netela, New Blackfoot, Newe, Nez Perce, Niantic, Nicola, Nipmuc, Nisenan, Nisga'a (Nisgaa),Nlaka'pamux (Nlakapamux), Nomlaki, Nooksack (Nooksak), Nootka (Nutka), Northern Carrier, Northern Cheyenne, Nottoway, Nuuchahnulth, Nuxalk

O

Ocuilteco, Odawa, Ofo, Ohlone, Ojibwa (Ojibway, Ojibwe, Ojibwemowin), Oji-Cree, Okanagan (Okanogan), Omaha-Ponca, Oneida, Onondaga, O'odham (Oodham), Opata, Osage, Otchipwe, Otoe, Ottawa

P

Pai, Paipai, Paiute, Palouse, Pamlico, Panamint, Papago-Pima, Pascua Yaqui, Passamaquoddy, Patuxet, Patwin, Paugussett (Paugusset), Pawnee, Pee Dee, Peigan, Pend D'Oreille, Pennacook, Penobscot (Pentagoet), Peoria, Pequot, Picuris, Piegan (Piikani), Pima, Pima Bajo, Pipil, Pit River, Plains Indian Sign Language, Pojoaque, Pomo (Pomoan), Ponca, Poospatuck (Poosepatuck), Popoluca (Popoloca), Potawatomi (Pottawatomie, Potawatomie), Powhatan, Pueblo, Puget Sound Salish, Putun

Q

Quapaw (Quapa), Quechan, Quechua, Quilcene, Quileute, Quinault, Quinnipiac (Quinnipiack)

R

Raramuri, Red Indians, Restigouche, Rumsen, Runasimi

S

Saanich, Sac, Sahaptin, Salinan, Salish, Samish, Sandia, Sanish (Sahnish), San Felipe, San Ildefonso, San Juan, Sanpoil, Santa Ana, Santa Clara, Santiam, Santo Domingo, Saponi, Sarcee (Sarsi), Sasta, Satsop, Savannah, Sauk, Saulteaux, Schaghticoke, Sechelt, Secwepemc, Sekani, Selkirk, Seminoles,Seneca, Seri, Serrano, Seshelt, Severn Ojibwe, Shanel, Shasta (Shastan), Shawnee (Shawano), Shinnecock, Shoshone (Shoshoni), Shuar, Shuswap, Siksika, Siletz, Similkameen, Sinkyone, Sioux, Siuslaw, Skagit, Skicin, S'Klallam, Skokomish, Skraeling, Skwamish, Slavey (Slave, Slavi), Sliammon,Sm'algyax, Snohomish, Songish, Sooke, Southern Paiute, Spokane (Spokan), Squamish, St'at'imcets (St'at'imc), Stockbridge, Sto:lo, Stoney, Suquamish, Susquehannock, Suwal, Swampy Cree, Swinomish

T

Tabasco Chontal, Tachi (Tache), Taensa, Tahltan, Tagish, Taino, Takelma (Takilma), Takla, Tamyen, Tanacross, Tanaina, Tanana, Tano, Taos, Tarahumara, Tataviam, Tauira (Tawira), Tehachapi, Ten'a, Tenino, Tepehuano (Tepecano), Tequesta, Tesuque, Tewa, Thompson, Tigua, Tillamook, Timbisha,Timucua, Tinde, Tinneh, Tiwa, Tjekan, Tlahuica, Tlingit, Tohono O'odham, Tolowa, Tongva, Tonkawa, Towa, Tsalagi (Tsa-la-gi), Tsilhqot'in, Tsimshian (Tsimpshian), Tsitsistas, Tsuu T'ina, Tualatin, Tubar (Tubare), Tulalip, Tunica, Tupi, Tuscarora, Tutchone, Tutelo, Tututni, Twana, Twatwa

U

Uchi (Uche, Uchee), Ukiah (Ukian, Uki, Ukia), Umatilla, Unami, Unangax, Unkechaug Upper Chinook, Upper Tanana, Ute

V

Virginia Algonquian

W

Wailaki, Walapai, Walla Walla, Wampanoag, Wanki, Wappinger, Wappo, Warm Springs, Wasco-Wishram, Washo (Washoe), Wea, Wenatchi (Wenatchee), Wendat, Weott, Whilkut, White Clay People, Wichita (Witchita), Willapa, Winnebago, Wintu (Wintun), Wishram, Wiyot, Wolastoqiyik, Wyandot (Wyandotte)

Y

Yakama (Yakima), Yanesha, Yaquina (Yakonan, Yakon), Yavapai, Yaqui, Yakaya, Yokuts (Yokut), Yoncalla, Ysleta del Sur, Yucatec Maya (Yucateco, Yucatan), Yuchi (Yuchee) Yuki (Yukian), Yuma, Yupik (Yu'pik, Yuit), Yurok (Yu'rok)

Z

Zapotec, Zia, Zoque, Zuni


Source


You just can't help yourself.


74287/3/2015 12:43:51 PMChristiane
Groth
From: Christiane Groth
To: Mary Endico
Sent: Tue, Jun 2, 2015
Subject: Sugar Loaf "Chamber"

Mary,

I was washing a few dishes and thinking and my mind wandered onto the subject of Sugar Loaf.

What got me thinking is: what kind of legal ability/responsibility resides with the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce?

Is it an incorporated organization that provides certain services on behalf of dues paying members?

Now I will preface all of the rest by noting that I am not a lawyer.

However, I have worked with a lot of legal situations when working for an insurance company and have even filed a "cease and desist" request on my parent's neighbor for violations of the Chesapeake Bay Act simply by reading provisions of the act and going to the County governing body in question and filing the motion.

Just a quick search makes me think that your Chamber folks are ambitious and grandiose in the worst of ways in overreaching on behalf of said organization.

What I could find is that the Chamber does seem to have been incorporated at one point or another.

However, there is no publicly available information on who are the members, what are the dues, and what you get for membership.

See in contrast the Warwick Valley Chamber, or the Sugar Loaf Area Chamber

Note the services the Warwick Chamber provides (listed under the WVCC Board link). 

Organizations have rights and responsibilities established by general legal practice.

In addition to court decisions and applicable statutes, articles of incorporation govern those entities and — typically — members of those organizations can be expected to adhere to the organization's rules when either they are (1) employed by said organization, or (2) are dues paying members of said organization.

Additionally and in the case of #2, said organization has to clearly articulate the rules governing membership as well as what services members can expect will be provided by the organization.

Activities outside of these are generally NOT considered to be within the purview of the organization and could be difficult to enforce legally. 

Based on what I could NOT find, I doubt your merry little band known as the Sugar Loaf Chamber has properly incorporated itself to undertake the kind of action stated in the letter.

Rather, the "chamber" sounds like a loose collection of like minded businesses with nominal dues but no clear structure in terms of membership benefits or services.

Thus it would be hard for them to prevail in an argument that they have a legal obligation (afforded to them by their articles of incorporation) to take action (protecting their membership) such as that outlined in the letter.

The only way in which the organization could do so would be to take an open membership vote to take such action since the (seemingly nonexistent) organizational charter doesn't clearly grant the organization the ability to act in this manner.

It all comes down to what kind of articles of incorporation the "chamber" has and whether they are on file with the state.

You should be able to get those documents as they are a matter of public record and don't necessarily require an attorney in order to obtain them.

Where you would need/benefit from an attorney is in filing harassment charges and (from your description) possible defamation claim(s).

So this is where my brain goes when washing dishes ... never pays to mess with a woman who can think for herself — you could find yourself in a world of hurt   ;)

Christiane Groth


Sorry for taking a month to get back to you, but we have been busy in the gallery.

Thanks for reading that insulting letter (page2) and providing feedback.

What Sugar Loaf needs, Christiane, is some more people like you washing dishes.

You were absolutely correct about the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce.

If I may paraphrase, turns out they are total worthless ignoramuses who thought they had power, had none, and are never getting any.

I always state it thus:

Our lawyer is now preparing to explain to them the error of their ways.

Worse case scenario, a bunch of people named on that letter are going to find themselves in a court of law (at signficiant cost) explaining how they let those two carpet bagger con-artists take over their letterhead and use their names without any oversight whatsoever.

We will be getting a letter of apology to wipe the libel and slander slate clean.


07/15/15 update: I have to tell you Christiane, the director of the Warwick Chamber phoned Mary today and wishes to "... not be seen as taking sides ..." on this issue, so I have removed their name from any posting here which might inadvertently imply that they are helpful in any way and removed Guild brochures from their "Welcome Center".

I hope this has been enough, and it just shows why we must now redouble our efforts toward getting everybody into a court of law where the bullshit will be somewhat mitigated.

As one of our lawyers has said, "Sad, really ..."

It will be interesting to find out (recorded and under oath) what it was that made him take this very action at this very moment: what was said to him, who said it, what did they have to gain by saying it, that sort of stuff.

You know, instead of him otherwise just telling anybody who questioned it, "Oh, that's just Bob Fugett exercising his right to free speech. I really don't care one way or another. Would you like to pay your dues now?"

I hope the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce watches and learns that an actual functioning organization will shy away from even a sideways glance of a mention about being involved in nonsense like their defamatory and insulting letter (page2).

In the meantime the rest of what is written immediately below is merely a first hand account of events that I witnessed, so removing it would be disingenuous.


We have also hooked up with the Warwick Valley Chamber of Commerce [Whoops, see update immediately above.] (thanks to basic groundwork from our lawyer) like the rest of the actual businesses in Sugar Loaf who understand the good sense of ignoring and bypassing the local "chamber".

If the only thing the Sugar Loaf Guild accomplished (with our three years of tireless work plus personal expenditure on generalized town promotion), was getting those dipshits at the Sugar Loaf Chamber to put their stupidity in writing, it would have been well worth the effort.

But of course there was more.

A highlight was yesterday when Mary had the opportunity to hand the Executive Director of the Warwick Valley Chamber of Commerce my handwritten note with their office IP# on it, along with explaining how I figured it out.

I had already been keeping tabs on their IP# because it arrived on the Guild site last year by way of a very dangerous link from a known local troll who has the purist hatred of Sugar Loaf.

Mary warned the Warwick Valley Chamber Director of the danger while explaining that most of the "bad" stuff he has heard about Sugar Loaf can be traced back to that single Internet troll using numerous aliases while impersonating numerous individuals (myself among them) and posting both sides of pretend fights when he can't get anybody to bite.

Mary also handed the Director a printout of more than two dozen websites and Facebook accounts (plus other aliases) known to be owned and run by the troll plus our blessings to pass the list on to Alan Stenberg (one of the people impersonated and owner of Glenmere Mansion) so that Alan can throw our list onto the pile of documents his lawyers are assembling to take the guy out.

Talk about SHOCKED and APPALLED!

The Warwick Valley Chamber Director's eyes popped when he saw the number of names on our list of local "organizations" he had thought actually existed.

The Warwick Chamber is a totally different situation from the Sugar Loaf Chamber.

You should have seen the Director's face when he saw that letter (page2).

In any case, reluctantly we have totally given up on ever seeing the Sugar Loaf Chamber become anything remotely resembling an actual community organization, and we will instead pour our money into the Warwick Chamber as soon as they set up an appropriate Benefactor Program.

Aside from paying for our lawyer to reveal the impending legal action against them (and carrying through if we do not get an appropriate apology letter), we are done with the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce.

Thanks, Christiane, for setting us on the correct path!


74277/1/2015 2:02:24 PMBob
Fugett
Intercepted e-mail to the Warwick Valley Chamber of Commerce.


Hi Mike : )

Per our conversation this morning and the idea of a Benefactor Program for the Warwick Valley Chamber of Commerce, following is a link to the permanent record of our $1,000.00 gift to Wikipedia:

You can find the Sugar Loaf Guild linked from the page above, and that would be all we would ask (or anybody should ask) in return for a donation to the Warwick Valley Chamber of Commerce.

Thanks for bearing with Mary and me for this morning's impromptu organizational meeting; the following will be much quicker.

Here is my article which will run in the August issue of the Delaware and Hudson Canvas Magazine (an overview of the Sugar Loaf Museum page we talked about):

If the link doesn't take you directly to it, the post is #7400 (the bottom one on that page).

Here is a direct link to the Museum page itself:

Here is a Guild Financial page that I took extra steps to publish in 2013:

And here is a photo of the wagon wheel we talked about.

The rim is from the first wagon into Douglas, Wyoming; handed down in the family for over a century and a half; placed into the hands of Clay Boone to bring back to Sugar Loaf, NY for adding the sculptured interior:

This has been only the slightest tip of a very deep iceberg of excellence found in Sugar Loaf (rarely spoken about by our local Chamber).

Thanks for listening.

Bob Fugett


Yeah, that won't be causing any trouble.


07/15/15 update: The Warwick Valley Chamber of Commerce Director phoned Mary about 15 minutes ago and wishes to make it clear that they are not taking sides on this issue.

Still, at left is a direct copy of my e-mail out to him two weeks ago, so it should probably stay here intact.


74267/1/2015 1:46:05 PMVocal
Local
Hey, that place is no secret!

That's Harriman State Park.


Shut up.

74256/30/2015 1:30:22 PMVibrant
Vocal
Local
Dog
Community
FREE RANGE
PUPPIES

Today in the Super Secret Mountain Trails Run as You Might Free Range Puppy Park we got this photo of two Free Range Puppies enjoying a hand hewn trellis freshly assembled by Lisa using debris from this week's storm:

This article sponsored by:

With thanks to the Warwick Chamber of Commerce for Liking and allowing a FB posted link to the Diva Dog photo essay, and thus the Sugar Loaf Guild website, to appear under their banner with top honors.


I would tell you where the Super Secret dog park is, but like I said during this morning's discussion on how we should maybe map and mark the trails: "We don't want to do that. People will just start using them."

In fact, given the recent events wherein a couple of full-out charlatans took control of the weakened pretend ineffectual Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce, for their own personal gain and foul purposes, it might be prudent for me to start keeping Sugar Loaf, NY (itself with all directions to its location) a total secret as well.

You know, just to stop attracting such worthless self serving horrible human beings to town.

It would all be too dismal and depressing if not for the vibrant and vocal connected local dog community and things like this:




Photo by: Mary Endico (of course)

GSP staying where told by: Mary

Hungarian Vizsla staying where told by: Lisa


74236/29/2015 4:56:37 AMBob FugettHi Dr. Dawg : )

Below is my edit of one of your website pages as a thank you for the house call.

A copy/paste of your current web page is on the left, and my suggested changes are on the right.

Hopefully, you can quickly copy/paste the changes to your website and get immediately back to the real job of doctoring patients.

Thanks again for the house call ... very uncommon these days.


And further below that is the draft version before my blue highlighting of my changes started getting in the way of my own reading.

So what do you say kids?

Have we all found our new primary care physician, or what?

Don't forget to ask Dr. Johnson about his new local currency based on a concept out of Cornell which for some time has been making the rounds in Ithaca.

Here in Sugar Loaf, NY we call the doctor's local currency SugarCoin.


74226/28/2015 8:13:30 PMDr. Nathan Johnson
Edited by Bob
You are an Ecosystem
admin / June 16, 2014

You are an ecosystem. Microbes make up 90% of the cells of our body We share our bodies with 100 trillion microbes, living on our tongues, teeth and skin and in our intestine. While we have just over 20,000 human genes; our microbes have eight million. These microbes are quite small, with all 100 trillion weighing only 3 to 4 pounds in total, but, working together, they exert powerful effects. Modifications to our diet (with pesticides and antibiotics) and our environment (chemicals and unnatural hygiene levels) change our microbes.How are you caring for the ecosystem that is you?

This ecosystem develops right from birth. Infants with colic have more bacteria that are known to produce gas, whereas anti-inflammatory bacteria acquired from the vaginal canal are more common in colic-free infants. In one study infants were classified as excessive criers, significantly less frequently when randomized to receive prebiotic and probiotic instead of a placebo (19% vs 19% vs 47%, respectively; P = .02). In another study infants randomized to receive probiotics had NO Autism or ADHD at age 13, while the rates were 17% in those not given the probiotics. Perhaps the reductions in infantile colic, allowed better brain development.

The right balance of microbes is essential to good health and digestion. Obese and lean individuals have different gut flora composition. Obesity is associated with alterations in bacterial gut microbiota, with mainly a reduction in Bacteroidetes. Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium may have a critical role in weight regulation. Odds of being overweight adults are 26% higher for C-section babies, possibly because they miss those healthy birth canal microbes.

Microbes are important in training our immune system on what to attack and what not to. Many of the diseases of modern life are caused by our own immune system attacking our body, and there is emerging evidence that exposure to diverse microbes can be protective. Autoimmune diseases like asthma, hay fever, Type 1 diabetes and multiple sclerosis are much less common in the developing world and in children raised on farms or in large families. In contrast, asthma and hay fever rates are increased both in cities and in children given early antibiotics. The hygiene hypothesis says we need more exposure to the outdoors and dirt.

Antibiotics are a great innovation and continue to save countless live when used appropriately. Unfortunately, antibiotics target not only the harmful bacteria. When bacteria in our intestines are disturbed by antibiotics, a common side effect is diarrhea. One way to limit side effects and prevent a resistant organism is to be sure to take a probiotic whenever you take an antibiotic. Probiotics are available in pill form and in food. Another key is limiting antibiotic overuse both in human medicine and in livestock. Many factory farms rely heavily on antibiotics. Using antibiotics for viral illness like the common cold doesn’t help, but can upset your protective microbial ecosystem.

We are only just beginning to understand the complex working of our microbes. But this much seems clear — the healthiest microbes are grown when the major ingredient in our diet is a diverse array of unprocessed plants and fermented foods. Eat a colorful array of vegetables and grow your healthy ecosystem. I love the benefits of technology and am not heading back to full paleo living. But please pass the sauerkraut, yogurt and miso soup. They come with healthy bacteria and help tend my inner garden.

Nathan Johnson, MD, is a Family Medicine Physician


You are an Ecosystem
Dr. Nathan Johnson, MD
June 16, 2014
Edited by: Bob Fugett

You might not have thought of it before, but you are an ecosystem.

Microbes make up 90% of the cells of your body.

Each of us shares our body with 100 trillion microbes living on our tongues, our teeth and skin, and in our intestine.

While we humans have just over 20,000 genes, our microbes have eight million.

These microbes are quite small with all 100 trillion of them weighing only 3 to 4 pounds in total.

Working together, however, they exert a powerful influence on our health and well being.

Modifications to our diet (with pesticides and antibiotics) and to our environment (chemicals and unnatural hygiene levels) change our microbes.

Which begs the question, "How are you caring for the ecosystem that is you?"

Consider this.

The ecosystem that is you develops right from birth, and infants with colic have more bacteria that are known to produce gas, whereas anti-inflammatory bacteria acquired from the vaginal canal at birth are more common in colic-free infants.

In one study it was found that the number of infants classified as excessive criers was significantly less among those randomized to receive prebiotic or probiotic instead of a placebo (19% and 19% vs 47% respectively; P = .02).

[Double, triple, quadruple check the changes I made to the previous paragraph. Plus, does P stand for range of assumed statistical error +/-?]

06/29/15: Dr. Dog replies - P stands for the probability that the difference is due to chance. So the 'P = 0.02' means there is only a 2% chance the results were due to chance rather than the effects of the probiotic. Generally a P less than 5% is considered significant. It is probably fine to leave P out of the article for a general audience.

And Bob (me) counter replies - Due to the fact that generally there ain't no audience on the three sites where I posted this edit, I'm leaving the P here as generally of great interest to my highly not so general audience while Dr. Dog will of course be wise to drop it from his own.

Everybody continue reading with my apologies for the green and orange text.

In another study infants randomized to receive probiotics had absolutely NO Autism or ADHD at age 13, while the rates were 17% in those not given the probiotics.

Perhaps the reductions in infantile colic allowed better brain development.

Additionally the correct balance of microbes is essential to good health and digestion.

Obese and lean individuals have differing compositions of gut flora.

Obesity is associated with alterations in bacterial gut microbiota — mainly a reduction in Bacteroidetes.

Levels of Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium may have a critical role in weight regulation.

Odds of becoming an overweight adult are 26% higher for C-section babies, possibly because they miss those healthy birth canal microbes.

Microbes are important in training our immune system on what to attack and what not to attack.

Many diseases of modern life are caused by our body being attacked by its own immune system, and there is emerging evidence that exposure to diverse microbes can be protective.

Autoimmune diseases like asthma, hay fever, Type 1 diabetes, and multiple sclerosis are much less common in the developing world and in children raised on farms or in large families.

In contrast, asthma and hay fever rates are increased both among people living in cities and in children who are given early antibiotics.

One theory called the hygiene hypothesis says we need more exposure to the outdoors and dirt.

Antibiotics are a great innovation and continue to save countless lives when used appropriately, but unfortunately antibiotics target not only the harmful bacteria but our good bacteria as well.

When bacteria in our intestines are disturbed by antibiotics, a common side effect is diarrhea.

One way to limit side effects while helping prevent antibotic resistant organisms is to be sure to take a probiotic whenever you take an antibiotic.

Probiotics are available both in pill form and in food.

Another key to preventing antibiotic organisms is limiting antibiotic overuse both in human medicine and in livestock.

Using antibiotics for viral illnesses like the common cold doesn’t help, but it can upset your protective microbial ecosystem.

Many factory farms rely heavily on antibiotics being given to their livestock, and those antibiotics are passed on to people through the food they eat.

We are only just beginning to understand the complex working of our microbes.

However, this much seems clear: the healthiest microbes are grown when the major ingredient in our diet is a diverse array of unprocessed plants and fermented foods.

Eat a colorful array of vegetables in order to grow your healthy ecosystem.

Personally I love the benefits of technology and am not heading back to full paleo living.

But please pass the sauerkraut, yogurt, and miso soup.

They come complete with healthy bacteria and help tend my inner garden.

Nathan Johnson, MD, is a Family Medicine Physician


74216/28/2015 4:34:33 PMDraft EditYou are an Ecosystem
admin / June 16, 2014

You are an ecosystem. Microbes make up 90% of the cells of our body We share our bodies with 100 trillion microbes, living on our tongues, teeth and skin and in our intestine. While we have just over 20,000 human genes; our microbes have eight million. These microbes are quite small, with all 100 trillion weighing only 3 to 4 pounds in total, but, working together, they exert powerful effects. Modifications to our diet (with pesticides and antibiotics) and our environment (chemicals and unnatural hygiene levels) change our microbes.How are you caring for the ecosystem that is you?

This ecosystem develops right from birth. Infants with colic have more bacteria that are known to produce gas, whereas anti-inflammatory bacteria acquired from the vaginal canal are more common in colic-free infants. In one study infants were classified as excessive criers, significantly less frequently when randomized to receive prebiotic and probiotic instead of a placebo (19% vs 19% vs 47%, respectively; P = .02). In another study infants randomized to receive probiotics had NO Autism or ADHD at age 13, while the rates were 17% in those not given the probiotics. Perhaps the reductions in infantile colic, allowed better brain development.

The right balance of microbes is essential to good health and digestion. Obese and lean individuals have different gut flora composition. Obesity is associated with alterations in bacterial gut microbiota, with mainly a reduction in Bacteroidetes. Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium may have a critical role in weight regulation. Odds of being overweight adults are 26% higher for C-section babies, possibly because they miss those healthy birth canal microbes.

Microbes are important in training our immune system on what to attack and what not to. Many of the diseases of modern life are caused by our own immune system attacking our body, and there is emerging evidence that exposure to diverse microbes can be protective. Autoimmune diseases like asthma, hay fever, Type 1 diabetes and multiple sclerosis are much less common in the developing world and in children raised on farms or in large families. In contrast, asthma and hay fever rates are increased both in cities and in children given early antibiotics. The hygiene hypothesis says we need more exposure to the outdoors and dirt.

Antibiotics are a great innovation and continue to save countless live when used appropriately. Unfortunately, antibiotics target not only the harmful bacteria. When bacteria in our intestines are disturbed by antibiotics, a common side effect is diarrhea. One way to limit side effects and prevent a resistant organism is to be sure to take a probiotic whenever you take an antibiotic. Probiotics are available in pill form and in food. Another key is limiting antibiotic overuse both in human medicine and in livestock. Many factory farms rely heavily on antibiotics. Using antibiotics for viral illness like the common cold doesn’t help, but can upset your protective microbial ecosystem.

We are only just beginning to understand the complex working of our microbes. But this much seems clear — the healthiest microbes are grown when the major ingredient in our diet is a diverse array of unprocessed plants and fermented foods. Eat a colorful array of vegetables and grow your healthy ecosystem. I love the benefits of technology and am not heading back to full paleo living. But please pass the sauerkraut, yogurt and miso soup. They come with healthy bacteria and help tend my inner garden.

Nathan Johnson, MD, is a Family Medicine Physician


You are an Ecosystem
admin / June 16, 2014

You are an ecosystem. Microbes make up 90% of the cells of our body. Each of us shares our body with 100 trillion microbes, living on our tongues, our teeth and skin, and in our intestine. While we have just over 20,000 human genes, our microbes have eight million. These microbes are quite small, with all 100 trillion weighing only 3 to 4 pounds in total; but, working together, they exert powerful effects. Modifications to our diet (with pesticides and antibiotics) and our environment (chemicals and unnatural hygiene levels) change our microbes. How are you caring for the ecosystem that is you?

This ecosystem develops right from birth. Infants with colic have more bacteria that are known to produce gas, whereas anti-inflammatory bacteria acquired from the vaginal canal are more common in colic-free infants. In one study infants were classified as excessive criers significantly less frequently when randomized to receive prebiotic and probiotic instead of a placebo (19% and 19% vs 47% respectively; P = .02). [what does P stand for?] In another study infants randomized to receive probiotics had NO Autism or ADHD at age 13, while the rates were 17% in those not given the probiotics. Perhaps the reductions in infantile colic, allowed better brain development.

The correct balance of microbes is essential to good health and digestion. Obese and lean individuals have different gut flora composition. Obesity is associated with alterations in bacterial gut microbiota — mainly a reduction in Bacteroidetes. Levels of Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium may have a critical role in weight regulation. Odds of becoming overweight adults are 26% higher for C-section babies, possibly because they miss those healthy birth canal microbes.

Microbes are important in training our immune system on what to attack and what not to. Many of the diseases of modern life are caused by our own immune system attacking our body, and there is emerging evidence that exposure to diverse microbes can be protective.

Autoimmune diseases like asthma, hay fever, Type 1 diabetes and multiple sclerosis are much less common in the developing world and in children raised on farms or in large families. In contrast, asthma and hay fever rates are increased both in cities and in children given early antibiotics. The hygiene hypothesis says we need more exposure to the outdoors and dirt.

Antibiotics are a great innovation and continue to save countless lives when used appropriately, but unfortunately antibiotics target not only the harmful bacteria.

When bacteria in our intestines are disturbed by antibiotics, a common side effect is diarrhea. One way to limit side effects and prevent a resistant organism is to be sure to take a probiotic whenever you take an antibiotic. Probiotics are available in pill form and in food. Another key is limiting antibiotic overuse both in human medicine and in livestock. Many factory farms rely heavily on antibiotics. Using antibiotics for viral illness like the common cold doesn’t help, but they can upset your protective microbial ecosystem.

We are only just beginning to understand the complex working of our microbes. But this much seems clear — the healthiest microbes are grown when the major ingredient in our diet is a diverse array of unprocessed plants and fermented foods. Eat a colorful array of vegetables and grow your healthy ecosystem. I love the benefits of technology and am not heading back to full paleo living. But please pass the sauerkraut, yogurt and miso soup. They come with healthy bacteria and help tend my inner garden.

Nathan Johnson, MD, is a Family Medicine Physician


74206/27/2015 4:20:32 PMGuild
Never
Ending
Search
Fleet
All bets are off, Sugar Loaf.

Things are going to change.


I believe you meant to say, "Things are CHANGED!"

My next 10,000 posts should merely be:

You lucky little Loaf, you.


74196/26/2015 12:00:00 PMHooray!




















74186/25/2015 1:31:20 AMGuild
Outreach
and
Search for
Excellence
Sometimes we have to go outside Sugar Loaf to find the really good stuff (and people), and some things need more than just a little Forum post, so click here.

That's right MOTHERFUCKERS!

I said:

74136/18/2015 2:18:23 AMCollaborative
Logs review shows some people missed the link to the following, so ...

NORTH EAST
WATERCOLOR SOCIETY

What's in a name?

By 1987 Sugar Loaf had firmly established itself as a tiny Mecca for the arts, but it did not do so on its own.

Numerous art and community groups helped in building the Sugar Loaf reputation, and those strongly collaborative organizations were essential.

Shown above are Charter Members of the North East Watercolor Society, but at the moment of the photo the name was still the Orange County Watercolor Society.

As with all community organizations everywhere (in all times), finding committed individuals willing to take on leadership roles was a daunting task.

When Joan Ross agreed to become President she said she would do so only if Mary Endico agreed to become her Vice President and run the annual exhibit.

Mary explained the offer to her husband Bob Fugett (by then her strongest ally and career advisor) who said, "Don't waste your time unless they change the name of the organization to something that will help your resume."

Bob first suggested the National Watercolor Society but found the name was already in use, so he suggested the North East Watercolor Society with the side suggestion, "All the brochures and press releases can proclaim the NEWS!"

Mary reported resistance to a name change among the membership, and Bob replied, "Ok, then don't bother becoming Vice President. You have a career to tend to."

Bob knew that while a rose may smell as sweet by any other name, an organization's name is sweeter when helpful to one's bio.

Mary had already chaired and organized 8 years of Sugar Loaf Crafts Fairs when those were nationally renowned juried events, so the decision to change the name or lose her help as a Board Member and organizer of the national show carried significant weight.

By the time of the photo above Joan Ross and Dick Ochs were firmly in the name change camp, so Mary had agreed to take on the role of Vice President.

Dick went on to register the incorporated name of North East Watercolor Society by the end of that year, and later he would head the organization for many years while being instrumental in bringing it to full status as an annual host of juried International art shows.

NEWS Incorporation, 1987

Therefore Mary Endico is still proud to be associated with the organization.

Speaking of supportive and strongly collaborative art groups, the next 9 images below are from leading artists in both the North East Watercolor Society and the Schunnemunk Art Group. [see: Musem page]

The Schunnemunk group cross pollinated with NEWS and included more than just watercolors ... in particular great desserts.



Website usage logs revealed several regular readers missed the article linked, so this post was subsequently updated to include the full article.

The original post stated only -

In preparation for the upcoming article about the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum there is:


Uh oh, people might start getting the idea that Mary and I know something about organizations, what they mean, and how groups work effectively together, and we might have to stop walling ourselves off in order to continue bringing back the good old days.


74116/16/2015 6:33:53 PMGuild
Reality
Check
NOW YOU GOT
YOUR TROUBLE

Carefully compare these two letters.

The following linked letter was written by a Member of the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce.

This next linked letter was written by the President of the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce.

In the history of organizations, has there ever been a leader more out of touch with their membership?

I am sure I do not have to remind readers that the first seven people we talked to who were named on that second wretched attack letter were shocked, dismayed, and saddened to find their names on such a blasphemous misrepresentation of the facts.

The author of the first letter wins an EXTRA LINK.

DEPRECATED LINK

The author of the second letter wins a visit from our lawyer (and an appearance before a judge if we do not receive our letter of apology).

The good news all around is that the business name of the author of the first letter does not appear on the list "supporting" the horrid second letter, so they will not be required to drop their work, walk away from their customers, and show up for depositions regarding the second letter — on the outside chance a letter of apology is not forthcoming from the author of the second letter.

Even better, this time the Chamber of Commerce Bully by Proxy cannot step in and lie about the content and intent of the Sugar Loaf Guild website.

Irisha and her husband do read, and in particular they read English.

SPOILER ALERT: Our lawyer will be explaining the realities of using organizational letter heads for personal vendettas to the person who wrote the letter of intimidation, and later in a courtroom setting (if we do not get our written apology) our lawyer and her team will be explaining to the others mentioned on the letter the repercussions of allowing somebody to speak in their name without oversight.

I know, I know, that was a little too technical for this Forum, but the lack of "process" of the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce has to be addressed by somebody ... sometime ... somewhere.


74086/14/2015 1:42:12 PMCuryousJust what do you mean by calling Mary Endico an Internationally known watercolor artist?

We mean things such as this (received today from the National Watercolor Society):

Dear Mary Endico,

Congratulations!

Your painting has been accepted into the 2015-2016 China/NWS Small Image Exchange Exhibition.

The list of Accepted paintings will be posted to our webpage tomorrow.

The artists of Accepted paintings will receive an informational packet tomorrow by email.

Sincerely,
Ken Goldman, President
Linda A Doll, Exhibition Director


Got it? Mary's painting going to China.

Opening up the Chinese market to Endico paintings is HUGE!

Here is what we expect: Due to the fact that China has an incredible cultural heritage for fine art and watercolor in particular, people there are going to be overjoyed to see work done in a way they never thought possible.

We expect a bunch of sales based on the fact that China has so many great artists they will understand excellence when they see it (Mary's unparalleled handling of vibrant color to be specific), plus they will be doubly impressed that somebody from the U.S. has such a level of skill.

People will purchase Mary's paintings for the pure oddity of it, just like Americans buy paintings done by Chimpanzees because they never thought it possible!


74076/12/2015 9:47:00 PMBobby
Smiles<>
ADULTS
ONLY

If you see a kid reading this, slap their device out of their hand.

Probably it would be a good idea to slap it out no matter.

I am having a hard time trying to decide why I feel so good.

Maybe it's because I just finished a hard 40 mile bike ride and the endorphins are still raging.

Or maybe it's because Mary and I just had two fantastic conversations with two separate lawyers; our interests are going to be represented to the max, and we are sitting quite pretty indeed.

Best part is it looks like two con artists are about to endure a shit storm their disrespectful insulting imperious condescending dismissive little pea brains will never see coming.

In the meantime, all of you Facebook friends of Peg Conner, help me decide if I'm euphoric because of endorphins or legal status.

In case you don't know about exercise endorphins, let me give you a baseline.

I was in college during the last couple years of the 60's and the first two of the 70's.

I was not a casual partier; I was an aggressive, no holds barred, take no prisoners, all out (let me experience everything) proactive experimenter.

There were lots of pre-Med students, and a prize possession in the dorms was what is probably best described as the Big Golden Book of Prescription Drugs.

It had pictures of every type of pharmaceutical with a description of effects to be expected, and one of our stated goals (those of us outside the pre-Med circles) was to try every single one just to see what would happen.

The closer to death, the better; sort of like the movie Flatliners

In summary: we were total fucking idiots, and I am only alive due to a fortunate deep poverty which made the trying of all of the listed substances far beyond my means.

On the other hand, everybody thought it was a lot of fun to get high with me (especially while watching me bum on acid), so people of greater means routinely dosed me for free just for jollies.

Therefore, as a partial list:

I have done reefer (not in the book until recently).

I have done cocaine, or what some street dealer told somebody was cocaine ... vitamin B1 for all I know.

I have done heroin a couple times and once methadone stolen from a clinic, or so I was told.

I have done LSD, or more likely cyanide given my symptoms.

I have done meth for sure because I got it from my sister who got it from the doctor as diet pills.

Did peyote, psilocybin, PCP, large animal tranquilizers, ludes, reds, yellows, blacks (West Coast turn arounds), insulin (another pass-on from somebody's prescription), blotter, hasheesh, opium, gin, beer, tequila, scotch, fizzy wines and fancy wines, etc, etc.

Happily no nicotine; that shit is addictive and will kill you!

I haven't done any drugs at all since coming to Sugar Loaf (well none to speak of early on, then zero in the last 30 years).

Mary and I used our arrival as the perfect opportunity to let people think we were the straightest squares on the planet, probably narcs even, and the ruse worked like a charm.

People stopped inviting us to parties.

Mary only smoked and drank anyway, so it was a smaller change for her.

In any case, take all of that experience as my credentials giving me authority to say, without one single solitary doubt, exercise endorphins beats the fuck out of all of those other drugs ... NO JOKE.

Plus endorphins are free; your body produces them, and you can enjoy them on a whim (even right now if you just go walk briskly up and down some stairs a few times).

Maybe the best part is that they actually are good for you and make you live longer not shorter.

However, one still gets an incredible extra rush when coming in from a hard 40 mile bike ride through a 90 degree bright haze, and the wife says, "Dan called and things are great; I also asked him again about the letter (page 2), and he said, 'The level of exposure to liability they have placed on each of their members listed is substantial!'"

Mary ended with, "He used the exact same word you have been using — exposure."

Thus my dilemma.

Am I euphoric because of a 40 mile mainline endorphin injection or because I know two scumbags who are about to learn the consequences of trying to take advantage of a tiny artist community?

Additionally, if Mary and I don't get our apology letter, an entire town of people will be reminded (with legal fees and time away from their businesses for depositions) that it is not the wisest thing to keep thoughtlessly handing over dues while saying, "Here, just take the money, and don't bother me about it; I don't want to get involved, don't want to know about it, don't even want to think about it. Just take the money, and I've done my part for the community. Only glad somebody (anybody) volunteered!"

I am thinking everybody whose name is on that letter (page2) should start doing a little soul searching over the meaning of the word responsibility.


Bob, you might want to mention (in case some kids do slip through) that your 38 years of totally adamant sobriety has been nothing more than a desperate long throw attempt to forget what tripping (read: bumming) on acid was like.

But (also for the kids) leave out the part how that incident with yellows (Nembutol, Pentobarbitol) was your absolute favorite moment in life, and how you never want to forget that experience, and how you still nurse an ongoing fervent hope of acquiring some more; this time just a single hospital grade 16 gram dose, after which you solemnly swear you will go right back to being drug free.

74046/9/2015 5:03:40 PMCuryousBob, now that the Guild has crested 16 subscribers, don't you think it's about time for a meet?

Naw, I've heard that sort of stuff is a bad idea; we'll just leave it online.

I want to keep my wife.

74026/7/2015 11:50:04 PMSusan LThat's nice (and true), what you say in the Canvas article about Richard and me and the good old days.

Except you have said some pretty nasty things about us here in the past.

What's up with that?


Actually most of what I said was aimed at Orange County Tourism and how far out of touch they are with the reality of Sugar Loaf.

So insufferably stupid, they are a total washout!

I guess it is understandable given the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce's own aggressive intransigent refusal to acknowledge what is all around them, staring them right in the face.

But it has come to my attention nobody knows who you and Richard are anymore: how you built the Center, how you still live beside the Post Office, how you host the music series ... the family oriented one, the one that extends all the way back to Jon Baugh getting it going circa 1981, the one that draws so many people it is hard to get around town while it's running.

It's as if the Performance Center just appeared out of nowhere one day, and everybody started assuming it has been here forever.

In any case, how the hell am I supposed to complain about you two if nobody knows who the fuck you are!?

I have a little renovation work to do on the collective memory before I can kick back on its porch, throw my feet up on the rail again, and resume bitching about the Loco-testes.


74006/2/2015 9:44:15 PMBob
Fugett
Per Sophia Krcic's comment further below, "... was thinking about asking Bob to actually write the article himself," here is the developing article scheduled to run in the August 2015 issue of the Canvas.


The Sugar Loaf Historical Museum displays 50 years of work done by the best Sugar Loaf resident artists.

The Museum is the newest addition to the Sugar Loaf Guild website.

Following the positive reception of the revamped Sugar Loaf Guild website (2012), the site quickly grew into something much greater than the typical online promotional brochure, and the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum has become a flagship of the site's fantastic growth.

And I am not just saying so because the Sugar Loaf Guild is my website (I am Bob Fugett), and this is my article you are reading, though I could.

The strong response to the Museum is not surprising; it displays a half century of handmade artistic products unique to Sugar Loaf and thus unique to Orange County and the Hudson Valley.

Context for the artwork is given by insider firsthand accounts that I write from my perspective as a 40 year Sugar Loaf resident artist.

Read how the couple who built the Sugar Loaf Performing Arts Center (Susan and Richard Logothetis) got their start by spending weekends in a tiny camper at the back of Romers' Alley, and how they went on to build a company world renowned for manufacturing top quality stadium and theater lighting, and how they fulfilled a dream.

The dream was to host the finest dramatic works, and they began with intimate theatrical performances held in the loft of the Scott's Meadow red barn.

The fulfillment of the dream came by virtue of their construction of the Lycian Centre — which they eventually gifted back to the community — now retitled the Sugar Loaf Performing Arts Center.

Continue browsing the page to see an abstract rococo art nouveau piano (not a painting but an actual piano) which was built in Sugar Loaf and is now in the permanent collection of the New York City Metropolitan Museum of Art, in fact three of them are in the collection.

And that is just some of the old stuff.

Today's handmade by resident Sugar Loaf artist items include a wide range of work in almost all mediums that can be purchased directly out of the hands of the artists who make them, and they are better than ever.

However, the newer work is fully explained throughout the rest of the Guild website, so in this article there is no need for me to mention even my wife, watercolorist Mary Endico — Hudson Valley's artist.

This article is about the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum.

There were four main occurrences that prompted the ugrade of the Guild website and consequently the addition of the Historical Museum page.

The first prompting occurred after Mary Endico's second bout with breast cancer, plus two other significant operations for fibroid tumors in addition to a uterine endometrial ablation, at which moment she asked if I could put our story online before, well ...

She said, "There are some artists who failed here that are now saying Sugar Loaf is dead to the arts; not true; we have to set the record straight!"

Those misrepresentations circulating helped spur the reclamation of the Guild website, but the first circumstance later provoking the Museum page itself was the arrival of a painting in glass (sent all the way from Texas) which after 38 years was finding its way home to the very spot where in the interim its creator had died.

The artist's death was the result of a massive heart attack, and it happened during his first ever singing lesson as he began preparing for a new acting role at the age of 72.

His Painting in Glass now hangs on the wall where he took his last breath.

How could one fail to build a Museum around such an event, especially when the person who created the artwork was instrumental in establishing the look, the feel, and the viewpoint of the Sugar Loaf artists enclave which people have come to love.

Mary's string of health issues, then the arrival of a precious historic artifact, provided the first nudgings; but the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum became an absolute necessity after two final revelations.

The first came when a new artist in town was hungry for history but was being told nothing about the strong collaborative close-knit underground of successful artists in the hamlet (still here by the way), and secondly another artist was shocked to learn that the house they own was built by the person who fashioned those three pianos now in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Not only were new people not being given the big picture of what is in Sugar Loaf right now today, they were missing out on the historic foundation and ongoing process that ensures such a unique reality continues to thrive.

We thrive because we do.

As the timeless adage goes: "So they say they are an artist? Hummph! If they were any good they would have a studio open to the public in Sugar Loaf and be making a living at it."

Such things must be talked about, and the Sugar Loaf Guild website is the logical place for that discussion.

Go take a look; but keep in mind the Forum pages are for those who love the hot sauce while those who prefer the mild will find the rest of the Guild website perfect to their taste, especially the Sugar Loaf Historical Museum!

SugarLoafGuild.org


Our guest lecturer for today's article has been Bob Fugett, author of numerous rants and owner of the blogosphere. His only regret in life is the scandalous amount of money he receives for his writing, which he calls "filthy lucre". He has, however, never been at all shy spending that lucre on fancy high powered racing bicycles. Bob also likes to call himself a master musician whose main instrument is the written word.


Well, I wrote that article on the left pretty quickly.

Am I fucking good, or what?

And there's lots more artists like me in Sugar Loaf, New York.

And speaking of history, did you know that the Sugar Loaf Chamber of Commerce has historically done such a piss-poor job of explaining what is here that two days ago I spoke to one of the hamlet's two restaurant owners (who has been here four years), and he did not even know that ANYTHING was being made here?

Goddamned Chamber assholes.

And now they want me to shut this joint down (page2).

Yeah, right, like that could happen!

But an apology letter could happen, actually is motherfucking going to happen, even if it takes thousands of my own dollars, and thousands of the Chamber's dollars and a roomfull of lawyers with a judge writing it and making them sign it.

There is a hand hewn iron clad guarantee in there somewhere.

Mark my word!

When Mary Endico ran into Susan Logothetis today and explained that we will not be forking over the Guild's usual $1,000.00 donation for the "On the Lawn Music Series" because we are saving our money for legal action against the Chamber of Commerce (if we don't get an apology letter), Susan said, "Money well spent."

And the Chamber deuschebags have the timerity to pretend they represent Sugar Loaf!

On the other hand, Susan has some great additions for the Museum ... even a Uzenski bench with a story.

Which reminds me, Mary, track down Vickie Stellmack and get a photo or something of Greg's chairs and tables.

And see if you can't track down some of Norman Morasse's bird perches, Lena's cane, and a cat blanket from the Dirty Deli.

We'll have lunch.

I wonder if Suzie and Jamie ever knew that it was our running joke to blame Suzie when either of us stole a bite out of something we bought each other from the Deli.

It started with a candy bar.

Bob (opening the wrapper), "Hey! There's a bite out of my candy bar."

Mary very interested, "No way! Here, let me see. Well, I certainly never did it ... must have been [takes a bite], must have been Suzie. Let me look again [takes another bite] ... yep, Suzie alright ... had to be."

Pretty soon, anything went wrong, Suzie did it.

"Shit, the nail bent!"

"Suzie did it."


73996/2/2015 8:47:25 PMJust
when
I thought
I was out ...


From: Mary

Sophia :)

Loved Luft Garden's article.

Have we spotlighted Sugar Loaf Mountain Herbs and Practical Magik?

[ Bs note: "CK" ]

Thank you,

Mary


From: Sophia

My pleasure. Aaron was really nice and easy to talk to!

This is what I have in my file -

June: Luft Gardens (check!)

July: The Kastan Experience (being interviewed by Naomi Kennedy this coming week)

August: Sugar Loaf Guild Museum (will speak to the both of you about this, and was thinking about asking Bob to actually write the article himself, if he’d be cool with that! We do not have to throw in a byline, but we can if he so wishes!)

September: Practical Magik (With a k!)

[ Bs note: "CK" ]

October: Cookie Boone (Clay’s wife, as per yet another one of Mary’s great suggestions.)

And let me add:

November: Sugar Loaf Mountain Herbs :-)

Keep ‘em coming!


Sophia Krcic, Editor
Delaware & Hudson CANVAS
www.dhcanvas.com
845.926.4646


Bob grabbed
Mary's email
and responded

Bob said he'll take a stab at writing the Sugar Loaf Museum article with the byline at your discretion, though he says attribution seems part of your DNA.

Since the only people reading the Forum are you and the three people who are bitching because we never put them on the website, he hopes it will be ok for him to pre-write it as a Forum article.

He usually posts an article right away in draft mode and edits it over the next month or three until it scans correctly.

That means the article should be almost done by the time you are ready to run it, and you can do a final pick to choose what you want.

Also you can grab anything you want from the Museum page itself (actually any of Bob's writing).

Chop it up and fix it any which way you like.

He says this because over the years the Canvas has never done anything but the absolute very best by us ... and everybody who has been interviewed reports the same.

His favorite quote was from Connie Rose who said, "I can't believe it. They printed exactly what I said!"

He also wanted me to ask you, "Is there any other town you would like us to piss-off enough to start them placing full back cover and internal group ads just to fuck with us?"

He will start the Museum article in the Forum, but only if it is ok with you.

Oops, he already started.

Sincerely,
Mary (if you can believe that)


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