About The Cretacians

MANY years ago, there was this guy named Frank Zappa. He had a band, The Mothers Of Invention and it took some listening before anybody could appreciate his musical style. Fair to say he was unique, and I was a bit of a fan, in part because he was fun to watch. He was a serious contrarian, and when the world went left, he went hard right. In many ways, I identified with that.

So one day I saw this poster, "Phi Zappa Krappa", this dumb website builder won't show the whole poster below, but check out Frank below and you get the point. I decided to follow his lead and form my own fraternity "Phi Zeta Kappa" for people who don't want to be in a frat. I'd ask "Do you want to join my fraternity, Phi Zeta Kappa?" If the response was NO, I'd say "GREAT, you're in!!" This was about 50 years ago.

Well, I grew up and sorta left that part behind, did a little bit of this and a little bit of that and here I am, half a century later, in mid-geezerhood, full denial & still having fun. One day about 15 years ago I saw an article describing a Stanford University project to build a genuine flying model of a pterodactyl, from the Cretaceous period, about 100 million years ago, when those things were all the rage. OK it was actually a Pterosaur but let's not get picky, c'mon, let's move on, no dawdling. From one of the websites: "The Stanford National Geographic Pterosaur Replica Project (SNGP), a one-year project focusing on creating an airworthy replica of the Anhanguera Piscator... " The Stanford website had a great picture of the pterosaur, which I copied & saved.

Copy/paste this: 
https://biox.stanford.edu/research/seed-grants/understanding-pterosaur-flight-interdisciplinary-study-flight-and-wing-dynamics#:~:text=Since%20the%20discovery%20of%20the,comprehensive%20simulation%20of%20pterosaur%20flight

I've been riding motorcycles since 1967, if you wanta consider a Lambretta a motorcycle, that is. I quickly worked my way up to a 1969 Honda CB350 and the rest is history.  I now have a couple old Harleys, a couple Honda Trail 90's and a few more odd bikes. I'm still not much of a joiner so that has been relatively consistent part of who I am. Bikers, especially Harley folks, are all about eagles & skulls and I can't stand it. That stuff is conforming in a big way, but they're in a culture that's SUPPOSED to be all about individualism. Full confession, I have about 80 HD shirts but you won't find many eagles or skulls thank you very much.

I also belonged to a biker "club" many years ago and I couldn't be comfortable with it. It was another exercise of conforming but clubs are supposed to be about freedom & individuality. It was normal to hit a bar and hang out, and eventually one of the guys would get mouthy with someone and we had to reel him in before it got serious. It was a rule; if a fight started it was all hands in, and I'm really a peaceable guy. Eventually, I had to walk away, I simply couldn't live with that sort of a herd mentality. They were good guys, in fact they were friends, but it didn't work for me.

To bring the whole story together: contrarians, "no thanks frats", biker clubs and flying things, I recently  decided to start a geezer motorcycle club for curmudgeons & non-joiners, resurrected the pterosaur picture and named the club the Cretacians. I'm sorta in keeping with the notion of the Cretaceous period of 100 million years ago, which is pretty serious geezer territory. If you don't want to join a club (ANY club), you're in. I'm non-president and non-founder, which is something anybody can claim. Rules are simple:

1:   If you don't want in, you're in.
  - OK fine. If you DO want in, you're in because who cares if you do or don't want in.
2:  DUES: Big fat ZERO. If you're human & able to read this, odds are you've paid plenty of dues just breathing.
3:  Patches? Well, yes I do have patches but honestly I don't think there will be much interest.
4:  CLUB RULES: Beats me. Make up your own damn rules.
5:  Wanna be a club officer? President? Treasurer? Enforcer? Sure, no problem. Get yourself an officer patch and stick it over, under or to the side of your Cretacians patch if you have one, and get out there & kick some ass. Might be funny to have 37 Presidents.
  - Actually Enforcer might be a good one too. Since there are no rules in Cretacians, there's nothing to enforce so you can have an impressive title whether you're a Badass or a Dweeb.
6:  Nobody NEEDS a Cretacians patch to be a Cretacian. Just say you are because you don't want to be in any stupid club. Get a Sharpie and draw a flying thing on your leather, use crayons I don't give a shit.