Hello folks, sorry I haven't written much lately. I have a slew of bloggery waiting-in-the-wings, but I need to get access to a computer at a house to put the accompanying images on.
Yes, images. Yes, eye-furniture.
It is like having crates of bananas on the docks and not shipping because each nanner does not have little blue sticker! Frustrational.
So please, be patient. I know, I know, you've been pounding on the virtual door, booing and baying for more blog!
Actually, I get the meter count from this blog in my email once a month. And, since January, to all one of you who have visited here I say: Thank You.
Today I will tell all one of you about Julius, my pet tornado. He is not the Hurty Kind! Not dangerous at all. In fact, by meteorological standards, Julius is just a pup! Not even a pup! A pip!
My job is a busy place, and I get a lot of customers in, all of them asking me questions, wanting to know where things are. Standing with their clip boards, with pleading eyes. Sometimes it is like a McDonalds on a football Saturday.
So, like twice a day I go out on the loading dock for a minute, look at the sky, watch people go by and so forth.
The loading dock is set on the west side of the building, in a kind of canyon of buildings. Whenever the barometer says so, Big Air comes to town! That is where Julius comes in. He is not always there. Sometimes the air is static, fat and slow.
But every once in awhile I go out and there is Julius, usually playing with a plastic bag or
a flock of leaves, spinning them around, setting them down, stirring them up again. A capricious beast, this Julius.
I suppose on one of the security cameras , me saying "Hey, Julius. What's up." He thinks that over, then spins some more like a perky pooch wagging it's tail. "Say 'woosh' for papa. Who's a good boy? Who's a good boy?" I sure like that lil 'nader.
But the other day Julius was going bat-shit crazy! And, get this, he had collected like a bushel basket of petals from cherry blossums, which were fluttering off the trees like snow that day. It was like a hectic little storm of petals, snaking across the parking lot, setting them down.
It was at that point I decided to go stand in the funnel-cloud of white petals. They swirled around me and made my hair go straight up!
And then - BUSTED! Two Japanese girls, students, came walking by carrying their books. They smiled and giggled. I said something like "Wasn't that refreshing." and went back inside.
Wednesday, May 2, 2007
Sunday, January 14, 2007
SCROLL DOWN FOR CELEBRITY DEATH CAR PHOTOS
Hey,
For some reason this machine printed today's swell blog on my visit to the Museum of Tragedy in American History WAY DOWN ON 14 DEC, 2006! So go down a little ways and you can see it.
For some reason this machine printed today's swell blog on my visit to the Museum of Tragedy in American History WAY DOWN ON 14 DEC, 2006! So go down a little ways and you can see it.
Monday, January 8, 2007
The Second Last Look.
Long ago when I was a kid I had some pet rabbits. I raised them as part of a 4H
project. I had so hoped to be a cattle baron someday. Such was not to be. We lived in town, and my pleas fell on deaf ears. No, you may not have cows. So: I had to make do with plastic cattle, horses, and a mule, which I lined up and would play with long after I should have moved on to something else. Please don't tell anyone.
I got the rabbits - and from a smoke-colored doe and an amber-gold buck I raised a number of litters, which ended up being taken as pets by other kids,
and some I sold to various heartless dutchmen who fattened and ate them.
The buck, whose name was Buck, was quite a rabbit. He ended up weighing in at 14 lbs - an impressive heft. As I mentioned, he was an honey-colored, blocky beast and tame, too. Often times I would bring him into the house, and it was nothing to get him to make his dung onto a pie-plate, so long as it was set in a corner . He was way-up-big, as they say, had big, padded feet, a set a nuts like a Chester White Boar. Most of his days were spent taking naps and twitching his nose. At night he was active, would thump his foot LOUDLY whenever startled and seemingly vanish into thin air, only to reappear in another room or from under the davenport. I remember he was curious about TV. He would slowly hop up, stare and sniff the screen, illumned in the blue-white light, you could see the veins in his ears, like an X-ray. Maybe he thought those things on TV were real, just behind a window.
Mr. Buck lived to a very advanced age, surviving into my high-school years, long after I had abandoned 4-H and my plastic herd. The only problem I ever had with him was once he had a boil on his lower jaw, which we lanced and swabbed with iodine. He didn't care much for the procedure and what with his kicking, clawing, kangaroid feet neither did I. Clawed the hell out of one of my arms. He had to eat soft food only for a couple weeks after that episode, but he made a full recovery.
When he got old and died, I wrapped him in a t-shirt and buried him in the back yard, with the last cup of his grain, he died right on time, made a crucifix out of sticks and set it up over him.
The next day I kinda missed him, dug him up for a second last-look, petted him a few times, buried him again. I really hated to see him go!
Years passed. I was in college, living in a dormitory. My roommate had a Playboy magazine, which I had a look at.
Then as now, I read text really, really fast, and words that are interesting will catch my eye. While perusing that issue I noticed there was an interview with Marlon Brando, the famous entertainer. The word 'rabbit' sort of hopped out- and I read an anecdote that said he, too, had once lived in Nebraska, and had a pet rabbit as a child, buried it, and then dug it up for another final look. Wow, I thought, that's different.
And Hugh Heffner, the publisher of Playboy, I have been told he is from Nebraska. And there is a rabbit logo on every one of those magazines he sells. My Dad once saw him on TV and growled "Look at that pipe-suckin pimp."
I figure in the next life, about every ten-thousand years or so, Messers Brando, Heffner and myself will wander to the same spot. And I will bring up this anecdote, and the connections inherent in it that bind the three of us together in such a special way.
There will be embarrassed silence, I suppose. And then we will go our separate ways, and do whatever there is to do in eternity. And then we will wander to a like spot again. We will have forgotten whatever the hell it is/was we have/had in common, until I figure it out and bring it up again. Repeat. Ad infinitum.
project. I had so hoped to be a cattle baron someday. Such was not to be. We lived in town, and my pleas fell on deaf ears. No, you may not have cows. So: I had to make do with plastic cattle, horses, and a mule, which I lined up and would play with long after I should have moved on to something else. Please don't tell anyone.
I got the rabbits - and from a smoke-colored doe and an amber-gold buck I raised a number of litters, which ended up being taken as pets by other kids,
and some I sold to various heartless dutchmen who fattened and ate them.
The buck, whose name was Buck, was quite a rabbit. He ended up weighing in at 14 lbs - an impressive heft. As I mentioned, he was an honey-colored, blocky beast and tame, too. Often times I would bring him into the house, and it was nothing to get him to make his dung onto a pie-plate, so long as it was set in a corner . He was way-up-big, as they say, had big, padded feet, a set a nuts like a Chester White Boar. Most of his days were spent taking naps and twitching his nose. At night he was active, would thump his foot LOUDLY whenever startled and seemingly vanish into thin air, only to reappear in another room or from under the davenport. I remember he was curious about TV. He would slowly hop up, stare and sniff the screen, illumned in the blue-white light, you could see the veins in his ears, like an X-ray. Maybe he thought those things on TV were real, just behind a window.
Mr. Buck lived to a very advanced age, surviving into my high-school years, long after I had abandoned 4-H and my plastic herd. The only problem I ever had with him was once he had a boil on his lower jaw, which we lanced and swabbed with iodine. He didn't care much for the procedure and what with his kicking, clawing, kangaroid feet neither did I. Clawed the hell out of one of my arms. He had to eat soft food only for a couple weeks after that episode, but he made a full recovery.
When he got old and died, I wrapped him in a t-shirt and buried him in the back yard, with the last cup of his grain, he died right on time, made a crucifix out of sticks and set it up over him.
The next day I kinda missed him, dug him up for a second last-look, petted him a few times, buried him again. I really hated to see him go!
Years passed. I was in college, living in a dormitory. My roommate had a Playboy magazine, which I had a look at.
Then as now, I read text really, really fast, and words that are interesting will catch my eye. While perusing that issue I noticed there was an interview with Marlon Brando, the famous entertainer. The word 'rabbit' sort of hopped out- and I read an anecdote that said he, too, had once lived in Nebraska, and had a pet rabbit as a child, buried it, and then dug it up for another final look. Wow, I thought, that's different.
And Hugh Heffner, the publisher of Playboy, I have been told he is from Nebraska. And there is a rabbit logo on every one of those magazines he sells. My Dad once saw him on TV and growled "Look at that pipe-suckin pimp."
I figure in the next life, about every ten-thousand years or so, Messers Brando, Heffner and myself will wander to the same spot. And I will bring up this anecdote, and the connections inherent in it that bind the three of us together in such a special way.
There will be embarrassed silence, I suppose. And then we will go our separate ways, and do whatever there is to do in eternity. And then we will wander to a like spot again. We will have forgotten whatever the hell it is/was we have/had in common, until I figure it out and bring it up again. Repeat. Ad infinitum.
Friday, December 22, 2006
The Spectral Bell
I read an interesting article from the Lincoln Star, printed 10 March 1950, page 2, column 4.
That day a horrible windstorm and blizzard hit Lincoln. There were a slew of photographs showing the results of the wind's pranks - one of a screen door nicely becalmed high in a tree bough.
'Lincoln Family Stranded in Blizzard Finds Farm Refuge' was the headline. Lincoln Garage operator Ed Klein, 123 N 23rd, and his children Carol (14), Lee Ann (8) and Max (12) were enroute to Hastings when the blizzard hit. Their car slid into a deep ditch, and Mr. Klein was on crutches from a previous injury. Prospects looked grim as the temperature dipped well below zero as the sun set.
The children heard a mysterious bell ringing, and two went to investigate the sound. This led them to the sight of the lights of a distant farmhouse. The children therein found shelter at the home of Mr. & Mrs. Elvin Johnson. The Johnsons found it curious that the children had heard a bell as there was none on their farm.
Other "Storm Orphans" were stranded there and aided in
carrying Mr. Klein to the house. Among them were two truckers and three men from Eugene Oregon. These three men proved to be the uncle and two cousins of the Comedian Bob Hope. They were travelling by auto to Florida to visit their famous cousin and were unable to continue in the storm. The "refugees" enjoyed the Johnson's hospitality until the storm broke and the roads were cleared.
That day a horrible windstorm and blizzard hit Lincoln. There were a slew of photographs showing the results of the wind's pranks - one of a screen door nicely becalmed high in a tree bough.
'Lincoln Family Stranded in Blizzard Finds Farm Refuge' was the headline. Lincoln Garage operator Ed Klein, 123 N 23rd, and his children Carol (14), Lee Ann (8) and Max (12) were enroute to Hastings when the blizzard hit. Their car slid into a deep ditch, and Mr. Klein was on crutches from a previous injury. Prospects looked grim as the temperature dipped well below zero as the sun set.
The children heard a mysterious bell ringing, and two went to investigate the sound. This led them to the sight of the lights of a distant farmhouse. The children therein found shelter at the home of Mr. & Mrs. Elvin Johnson. The Johnsons found it curious that the children had heard a bell as there was none on their farm.
Other "Storm Orphans" were stranded there and aided in
carrying Mr. Klein to the house. Among them were two truckers and three men from Eugene Oregon. These three men proved to be the uncle and two cousins of the Comedian Bob Hope. They were travelling by auto to Florida to visit their famous cousin and were unable to continue in the storm. The "refugees" enjoyed the Johnson's hospitality until the storm broke and the roads were cleared.
Tuesday, December 19, 2006
Box of Bugs
Back in the mid-80s I worked for a restaurant downtown, a nice place, doing food-prep and washing dishes. I worked till about ten at night, went out and drank beer with my friends afterwards, slept till noon. I lived in a big, red, ugly house over on 17th and A. We entertained frequently, my roommates and I, and didn't move around a whole lot in the heat of the day if it could be helped.
One afternoon I went in to work. My boss said "Here, we got some boxes of romaine lettuce in, why don't you get it ready."
This I set to do, filled a big sink with lukewarm water, dumped in the heads of romaine, stirred them about with a stainless steel paddle, to get any gobs of mud or sand off them. Once they had soaked awhile I'd take them out and chop them and spin them dry, load it all into plastic tubs with paper-towells lining the bottom and stack them back in the walk-in cooler. No problem.
Oops, yes , there was a problem. Or actually hundreds of little problems. The water was full of lady-bugs, all over the top of the water. I suppose the cool air in the truck had put them into hibernation. The warm water had awakened them. It was like the sinking of a cruise ship!
I didn't want them to drown. I stuck my arms in the water, swished them very slowly to-and-fro. They clung to my arms , the stragglers I scooped up with the paddle, and poked them off of it into a cup, got a handfull or so. I poked my head around the corner (Didn't want my boss to see me covered with bugs) into the grill area and said "Back in a minute."
I trotted down the stairs and into the bright heat of the alley, our "smoke-lounge", carrying my little charges along.
So far so good. Once there, some of them began to hop or fly off. Most of them were still trying to figure out their predicament, or liked it fine where they were. I figured if they dried off quicker they would take off and my work would be done here and I could go back upstairs. It was kind of strange feeling all those tiny feet on my skin, but after all they were lady-birds, not mosquitoes or cockroaches or centipedes.
I held my arms up, waved them gently in the breeze. I reminded me of one of those plastic bell-divers you see in people's tropical fish-tanks. Wave this arm, wave that arm, blow some bubbles. Wave this arm, wave that arm, blow some bubbles. Repeat.
It was Friday afternoon, getting on 5:20. Lincoln's best and brightest were off work and lookin to get dinner! Here came two. I think of them as being named Chad Ubber and Jill-Bethe Tightcoat. These were young, sprassi, salad-eatin machines! The kind of folks you'd see over at The Foxy Lady, dancing to Bruce Springsteen's Born in the USA and waving little flags they handed out at the bar whenever that song was played. And around the corner and into the alley this twosome came. We were face to face. We stared at each other across an impassible distance.
Did I mention I was wearing white pants, a white t-shirt, a hairnet and rubber boots? Well I was. And my arms were still crawling with lady-bugs.
Whatever personal ritual Chad and Jill-Bethe had stumbled upon, they made clear they didn't want to be a part of it. They fled, Chad guiding and pulling, Pepsi tick-tick-ticking in her pumps. "Just keep walking!" he said, sounding like Indiana Jones.
Would it have made a difference, their impression of me and so forth, if I had followed? Braying out "NO STOP WAIT YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND THEY CAME HERE IN A BOX AND THEY MUST FLY!!" or something like that?
Well, Chad, Jill-Bethe with an 'e', if you're out there somewhere and by some chance you are reading this, now you will understand.
One afternoon I went in to work. My boss said "Here, we got some boxes of romaine lettuce in, why don't you get it ready."
This I set to do, filled a big sink with lukewarm water, dumped in the heads of romaine, stirred them about with a stainless steel paddle, to get any gobs of mud or sand off them. Once they had soaked awhile I'd take them out and chop them and spin them dry, load it all into plastic tubs with paper-towells lining the bottom and stack them back in the walk-in cooler. No problem.
Oops, yes , there was a problem. Or actually hundreds of little problems. The water was full of lady-bugs, all over the top of the water. I suppose the cool air in the truck had put them into hibernation. The warm water had awakened them. It was like the sinking of a cruise ship!
I didn't want them to drown. I stuck my arms in the water, swished them very slowly to-and-fro. They clung to my arms , the stragglers I scooped up with the paddle, and poked them off of it into a cup, got a handfull or so. I poked my head around the corner (Didn't want my boss to see me covered with bugs) into the grill area and said "Back in a minute."
I trotted down the stairs and into the bright heat of the alley, our "smoke-lounge", carrying my little charges along.
So far so good. Once there, some of them began to hop or fly off. Most of them were still trying to figure out their predicament, or liked it fine where they were. I figured if they dried off quicker they would take off and my work would be done here and I could go back upstairs. It was kind of strange feeling all those tiny feet on my skin, but after all they were lady-birds, not mosquitoes or cockroaches or centipedes.
I held my arms up, waved them gently in the breeze. I reminded me of one of those plastic bell-divers you see in people's tropical fish-tanks. Wave this arm, wave that arm, blow some bubbles. Wave this arm, wave that arm, blow some bubbles. Repeat.
It was Friday afternoon, getting on 5:20. Lincoln's best and brightest were off work and lookin to get dinner! Here came two. I think of them as being named Chad Ubber and Jill-Bethe Tightcoat. These were young, sprassi, salad-eatin machines! The kind of folks you'd see over at The Foxy Lady, dancing to Bruce Springsteen's Born in the USA and waving little flags they handed out at the bar whenever that song was played. And around the corner and into the alley this twosome came. We were face to face. We stared at each other across an impassible distance.
Did I mention I was wearing white pants, a white t-shirt, a hairnet and rubber boots? Well I was. And my arms were still crawling with lady-bugs.
Whatever personal ritual Chad and Jill-Bethe had stumbled upon, they made clear they didn't want to be a part of it. They fled, Chad guiding and pulling, Pepsi tick-tick-ticking in her pumps. "Just keep walking!" he said, sounding like Indiana Jones.
Would it have made a difference, their impression of me and so forth, if I had followed? Braying out "NO STOP WAIT YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND THEY CAME HERE IN A BOX AND THEY MUST FLY!!" or something like that?
Well, Chad, Jill-Bethe with an 'e', if you're out there somewhere and by some chance you are reading this, now you will understand.
Saturday, December 16, 2006
The Museum of Tragedy in American History
Once some years ago we took a family vacation to Florida, my (then) wife and my son.
In Miami we got in my mother-in-law's car and drove to St. Augustine to visit my brother-in-law. He was working there in a restaurant washing dishes. He had the day off. In the afternoon he and I were given liberty to wander about. St. Augustine is full of tourists, or was that day. There were a number of bus and foot-tours people went on, sight-seeing. I suggested to Willie that we should get himself a Spanish helmet, some leotards , and a sword with a scabbard and he could show tourists around. People would love it, and probably pay handsomely to have their picture taken with a would-be Ponce De Leon. Naw, he was okay washing dishes.
While my wife and mother-in-law went shopping, my brother-in-law and I went into a nice dark air-conditioned tavern . There were four other customers in there, big guys gone to lard, probably homecoming kings back when Kennedy was president. One of them had snow-white hair and a beet-red face - he bore an uncanny resemblance to former house of representatives leader Tip O'Neal. These men watched ESPN and drank. After awhile an alarm went off on sombody's watch. "Well..." Mr. Tip-alike proclaimed. They got up, chairs squawking, ambled out into the bright heat of the day.
Did I forget to mention they were dressed in colonial outfits? Big George Washington style three-corner hats, military uniforms rowed with bright buttons, epaulets, knee socks. I doubt that anybody got as big as these fellows before fried cheese was invented though.
As they went out the door a bus pulled up. A bunch of tourists got out.
The colonial boys stuffed a wad into a cannon that was set up, fired it. There was a big puff of smoke. The report was loud. It set off a couple of car-alarms. Noone seemed too suprised. It was too hot to be suprised about much of anything.
The tourists took pictures. And then back into the bar went the artillery squad, to prepare for and confer upon their next assault.
The tour guide , who had a name-tag that said "Jodi" and looked like a "Jodi", said something about how the flags of three nations had flown over St. Augustine, and so forth. I asked about the cannon firing - and Jodi said that the soldiers fired it every hour from nine to six.
I thought I had a strange job. My brother-in-law and I followed the soldiers back into the tavern.
The bar had a stand-up rack of tourist-attraction brochures. One of the brochures displayed was for The Museum Of Tragedy In American History. I was on that brochure like ugly on an ape. Shaking like I was reading a love-letter. I stated quite clearly that I wanted to go there immediately.
My brother-in-law had heard of it. It was just about five blocks away.
"It's kind of a dump." he said. "I think the other tourist places are trying to run 'em outta business."
Minutes later I stood before it. It was all I could hope for. It was a two story house, really. And in the big front window stood an ex- Montgomery-Ward mannequinn holding what appeared to be a mock-up of an italian carbine. His face seemed to say "Say there - wouldn't you like to buy this smart 'n dandy suit?" Yet he was posed awaiting a motorcade that could never come by, wearing workman's clothing, standing before a bunch of boxes. On each box, someone had written with a fat black marker : "Send To: Texas Book Depository - Dallas".There was no way to connect that goofy-ass grin to a murderous, perching reprobate. Oh well.
Inside I went. There was a little bell on the door. Someone came down some stairs. Clump, clump, clump. It was a lady who appeared to have spent her life in a museum of tragedy.
Admission was ten bucks or so, for me and my brother-in-law. I was happy to pay. All around me were one thousand and one wonders! A rock touched by Helen Keller! Lee Harvey Oswald's can-opener! A real Egyptian mummy, priced to sell for $4,500! Just look at the pictures
My enthusiasm clearly wasn't catching. "The exhibits pretty much speak for themselves." the woman said, coughing, turning around, heading back up the steps.
So: I was left unattended in the Museum of Tragedy in American History.
I was amazed at the way the curators' museum life and personal life came together in such a super way - in the back, for example, right next to a 14 by 10 foot steel cage of ancient, rivetted steel - inside of which lay a human skeleton - there was a row of dinner-plate sized plastic daisies spinning lazilly in the breeze. And a garden hose meandered through it all- grass must be watered - even among Celebrity Death Cars. There was a picnic table, too, so you could eat your lunch, I suppose even have a birthday party in the midst of all that tragedy.
There was a life-size fiberglass cow by the picnic table, such as one might see on top of a supermarket. I am not sure why this cow was there. What could be less tragic than a cow? Isn't she the Grand-Dame of a thousand petting zoos? They give us cheese!
I suspect it *might* have had something to do with THE CHICAGO FIRE. Which was started, I am told, by a cow kicking over a lantern. This is the only link with tragedy - and I mean wholesale, catastrophic TRAGIC tragedy, not just getting chased by an angry cow - that I can fathom.
Maybe they just liked it, found it on a curb somewhere, and brought it home. I would.
My brother in law showed at least a little interest in the celebrity death cars, but overall I would guess he would have rather been anyplace else. Little did he know that a visit to a wax museum was in store for him later in the afternnoon.
Look! I found a helicopter egg back by the Celebrity Death Cars!
What could be more American than a collection of Celebrity Death Cars? They had the hearses that carried JFK AND Oswald after their respective shootings - but those were kept indoors. How they got them in the house, I haven't a clue. The hearses, while antique, were in like-new condition, and buffed to a high-gloss I-can-see-my-face-in-it-finish! But these were not Celebrity-Death-Cars in the strictest sense of the term. Just wanted to make sure we were on the same page on that.
Now: Bonnie and Clyde's Death Car. There is a celebrity death-car for you. Uh-oh. Wait a second. Read the fine print and you find out that this was the/a car used in a movie about those two. Some Hollywood dingle-berries had riddled this car with holes - not a posse of kill-happy Texas Rangers.
There was a helpfull lil kiosk built into the booth/hut the car was displayed in - it offered gruesome black and white nude coroner's photographs of the ill-fated twosome. Who, by the way, didn't look much like Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty, dead or alive.
The Jayne Mansfield Death Car, while not riddled with bullets, had endured worse. It looked like it had suffered in the hands of a gargantuan two-year-old having a temper tantrum.
It would have brought a tear to the eye of even the most seasoned of body-and-fender men.
I took pictures of the Celebrity Death Cars, and every photo was botched- by an impish trick of the light. Remember the aforementioned fiber-glass cow? Well, it's image was reflected off of the plexiglass booths which sheltered the cars. In every picture I took.
When I got the pictures back from the photo-developer, had a look at them,I felt as if the universe was at once tormenting, and then comforting itself, and I was the medium through which these sentiments flowed:
"Just look - Death Car!"
"No - cow."
"Death Car!"
"NO! Cow."
"Death Car!
"Cow."
"Death Car!"
"Cow."
In Miami we got in my mother-in-law's car and drove to St. Augustine to visit my brother-in-law. He was working there in a restaurant washing dishes. He had the day off. In the afternoon he and I were given liberty to wander about. St. Augustine is full of tourists, or was that day. There were a number of bus and foot-tours people went on, sight-seeing. I suggested to Willie that we should get himself a Spanish helmet, some leotards , and a sword with a scabbard and he could show tourists around. People would love it, and probably pay handsomely to have their picture taken with a would-be Ponce De Leon. Naw, he was okay washing dishes.
While my wife and mother-in-law went shopping, my brother-in-law and I went into a nice dark air-conditioned tavern . There were four other customers in there, big guys gone to lard, probably homecoming kings back when Kennedy was president. One of them had snow-white hair and a beet-red face - he bore an uncanny resemblance to former house of representatives leader Tip O'Neal. These men watched ESPN and drank. After awhile an alarm went off on sombody's watch. "Well..." Mr. Tip-alike proclaimed. They got up, chairs squawking, ambled out into the bright heat of the day.
Did I forget to mention they were dressed in colonial outfits? Big George Washington style three-corner hats, military uniforms rowed with bright buttons, epaulets, knee socks. I doubt that anybody got as big as these fellows before fried cheese was invented though.
As they went out the door a bus pulled up. A bunch of tourists got out.
The colonial boys stuffed a wad into a cannon that was set up, fired it. There was a big puff of smoke. The report was loud. It set off a couple of car-alarms. Noone seemed too suprised. It was too hot to be suprised about much of anything.
The tourists took pictures. And then back into the bar went the artillery squad, to prepare for and confer upon their next assault.
The tour guide , who had a name-tag that said "Jodi" and looked like a "Jodi", said something about how the flags of three nations had flown over St. Augustine, and so forth. I asked about the cannon firing - and Jodi said that the soldiers fired it every hour from nine to six.
I thought I had a strange job. My brother-in-law and I followed the soldiers back into the tavern.
The bar had a stand-up rack of tourist-attraction brochures. One of the brochures displayed was for The Museum Of Tragedy In American History. I was on that brochure like ugly on an ape. Shaking like I was reading a love-letter. I stated quite clearly that I wanted to go there immediately.
My brother-in-law had heard of it. It was just about five blocks away.
"It's kind of a dump." he said. "I think the other tourist places are trying to run 'em outta business."
Minutes later I stood before it. It was all I could hope for. It was a two story house, really. And in the big front window stood an ex- Montgomery-Ward mannequinn holding what appeared to be a mock-up of an italian carbine. His face seemed to say "Say there - wouldn't you like to buy this smart 'n dandy suit?" Yet he was posed awaiting a motorcade that could never come by, wearing workman's clothing, standing before a bunch of boxes. On each box, someone had written with a fat black marker : "Send To: Texas Book Depository - Dallas".There was no way to connect that goofy-ass grin to a murderous, perching reprobate. Oh well.
Inside I went. There was a little bell on the door. Someone came down some stairs. Clump, clump, clump. It was a lady who appeared to have spent her life in a museum of tragedy.
Admission was ten bucks or so, for me and my brother-in-law. I was happy to pay. All around me were one thousand and one wonders! A rock touched by Helen Keller! Lee Harvey Oswald's can-opener! A real Egyptian mummy, priced to sell for $4,500! Just look at the pictures
My enthusiasm clearly wasn't catching. "The exhibits pretty much speak for themselves." the woman said, coughing, turning around, heading back up the steps.
So: I was left unattended in the Museum of Tragedy in American History.
I was amazed at the way the curators' museum life and personal life came together in such a super way - in the back, for example, right next to a 14 by 10 foot steel cage of ancient, rivetted steel - inside of which lay a human skeleton - there was a row of dinner-plate sized plastic daisies spinning lazilly in the breeze. And a garden hose meandered through it all- grass must be watered - even among Celebrity Death Cars. There was a picnic table, too, so you could eat your lunch, I suppose even have a birthday party in the midst of all that tragedy.
There was a life-size fiberglass cow by the picnic table, such as one might see on top of a supermarket. I am not sure why this cow was there. What could be less tragic than a cow? Isn't she the Grand-Dame of a thousand petting zoos? They give us cheese!
I suspect it *might* have had something to do with THE CHICAGO FIRE. Which was started, I am told, by a cow kicking over a lantern. This is the only link with tragedy - and I mean wholesale, catastrophic TRAGIC tragedy, not just getting chased by an angry cow - that I can fathom.
Maybe they just liked it, found it on a curb somewhere, and brought it home. I would.
My brother in law showed at least a little interest in the celebrity death cars, but overall I would guess he would have rather been anyplace else. Little did he know that a visit to a wax museum was in store for him later in the afternnoon.
Look! I found a helicopter egg back by the Celebrity Death Cars!What could be more American than a collection of Celebrity Death Cars? They had the hearses that carried JFK AND Oswald after their respective shootings - but those were kept indoors. How they got them in the house, I haven't a clue. The hearses, while antique, were in like-new condition, and buffed to a high-gloss I-can-see-my-face-in-it-finish! But these were not Celebrity-Death-Cars in the strictest sense of the term. Just wanted to make sure we were on the same page on that.
Now: Bonnie and Clyde's Death Car. There is a celebrity death-car for you. Uh-oh. Wait a second. Read the fine print and you find out that this was the/a car used in a movie about those two. Some Hollywood dingle-berries had riddled this car with holes - not a posse of kill-happy Texas Rangers.
There was a helpfull lil kiosk built into the booth/hut the car was displayed in - it offered gruesome black and white nude coroner's photographs of the ill-fated twosome. Who, by the way, didn't look much like Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty, dead or alive.
The Jayne Mansfield Death Car, while not riddled with bullets, had endured worse. It looked like it had suffered in the hands of a gargantuan two-year-old having a temper tantrum.
It would have brought a tear to the eye of even the most seasoned of body-and-fender men.
I took pictures of the Celebrity Death Cars, and every photo was botched- by an impish trick of the light. Remember the aforementioned fiber-glass cow? Well, it's image was reflected off of the plexiglass booths which sheltered the cars. In every picture I took.
When I got the pictures back from the photo-developer, had a look at them,I felt as if the universe was at once tormenting, and then comforting itself, and I was the medium through which these sentiments flowed:
"Just look - Death Car!"
"No - cow."
"Death Car!"
"NO! Cow."
"Death Car!
"Cow."
"Death Car!"
"Cow."
Big Letter 'T'
I have a friend, Todd, who works as a bartender downtown. He is really funny. When he told me this, it was about the year 2000. I remember thinking it was, when I heard it, possibly the
best way for the millenium to end. Ey, Armageddon postponed and there's all the free popcorn you can eat in the vicinity of 14th & O!!
There was a customer who came into Todd's bar every afternoon, not to drink but to eat popcorn, which was provided free-of-charge. They keep it in a big barrell and set a stack of bowls out and you just help yourself. Surely this guy, whose name was Marty, must have eaten a bushel of it a week. I don't think he had a job, just ate popcorn and chatted with friendly merchants most of the day.
Todd told Marty that his name was "Todd Wellendowd". And Marty believed it. And so whenever Marty saw Todd, he called out sunnily. "Hi Todd Wellendowd. "
One cannot speak of Marty without superlatives.
He wore the thickest glasses I have ever seen.
He had the highest voice I have ever heard in an adult male.
He had an enormous and round ass. None more round.
And possibly the whitest legs that could ever be.
Wearing his trademark short-shorts and not just any bike helmet, but again, the very biggest bike helmet available, he munched and munched contentedly, would rest awhile and then announce:
"Welp. I'm gonna go now, Todd Wellendowd."
"Okay Marty."
"I'm gonna go over to O'Rourke's and eat some popcorn now."
"Okay, we'll see ya later."
"Okay! 'Bye Todd Wellendowd!"
...climb onto his bike and pedal the 100 feet or so where another feast awaited.
But please understand, that when he rode his bike he brazenly broke all laws of physics. Perched so high on the seat, hovering so slow as to practically be motionless, and yet not tipping over. So round, startling and creamy, someone who didn't know him might mistake him for a moonman! I saw him ride by several times and it was like, I don't know, seeing an anteater walking around in the broad daylight? Having it rain live minnows on your lawn? Disturbing, I guess is the word I want, or better yet unsettling. I need a nap just thinking about it. How did
he do it? It is a mystery!
There were a number of 'Martyisms' - an example would be when asked what kind of pizza he had eaten for lunch, Marty replied, without a hint of irony "The Round Kind."
One time Marty was again on a barstool, watching TV, eating popcorn. Todd was working behind the bar, getting ready for the evening shift. A sleepy afternoon in Lincoln, Nebraska.
All of a sudden here comes this guy dragging a huge crucifix made of four-by-fours. He is looking a little ragged around the edges. He is hollaring that the world is going to end soon, and that you'd best repent-if you know what is good for you. And so forth.
Todd looks up from his sink, Marty from his popcorn.
And Marty says in the pastiest, most innocent voice imaginable: "Todd Wellendowd, what's that man doing with that big letter 'T'?"
best way for the millenium to end. Ey, Armageddon postponed and there's all the free popcorn you can eat in the vicinity of 14th & O!!
There was a customer who came into Todd's bar every afternoon, not to drink but to eat popcorn, which was provided free-of-charge. They keep it in a big barrell and set a stack of bowls out and you just help yourself. Surely this guy, whose name was Marty, must have eaten a bushel of it a week. I don't think he had a job, just ate popcorn and chatted with friendly merchants most of the day.
Todd told Marty that his name was "Todd Wellendowd". And Marty believed it. And so whenever Marty saw Todd, he called out sunnily. "Hi Todd Wellendowd. "
One cannot speak of Marty without superlatives.
He wore the thickest glasses I have ever seen.
He had the highest voice I have ever heard in an adult male.
He had an enormous and round ass. None more round.
And possibly the whitest legs that could ever be.
Wearing his trademark short-shorts and not just any bike helmet, but again, the very biggest bike helmet available, he munched and munched contentedly, would rest awhile and then announce:
"Welp. I'm gonna go now, Todd Wellendowd."
"Okay Marty."
"I'm gonna go over to O'Rourke's and eat some popcorn now."
"Okay, we'll see ya later."
"Okay! 'Bye Todd Wellendowd!"
...climb onto his bike and pedal the 100 feet or so where another feast awaited.
But please understand, that when he rode his bike he brazenly broke all laws of physics. Perched so high on the seat, hovering so slow as to practically be motionless, and yet not tipping over. So round, startling and creamy, someone who didn't know him might mistake him for a moonman! I saw him ride by several times and it was like, I don't know, seeing an anteater walking around in the broad daylight? Having it rain live minnows on your lawn? Disturbing, I guess is the word I want, or better yet unsettling. I need a nap just thinking about it. How did
he do it? It is a mystery!
There were a number of 'Martyisms' - an example would be when asked what kind of pizza he had eaten for lunch, Marty replied, without a hint of irony "The Round Kind."
One time Marty was again on a barstool, watching TV, eating popcorn. Todd was working behind the bar, getting ready for the evening shift. A sleepy afternoon in Lincoln, Nebraska.
All of a sudden here comes this guy dragging a huge crucifix made of four-by-fours. He is looking a little ragged around the edges. He is hollaring that the world is going to end soon, and that you'd best repent-if you know what is good for you. And so forth.
Todd looks up from his sink, Marty from his popcorn.
And Marty says in the pastiest, most innocent voice imaginable: "Todd Wellendowd, what's that man doing with that big letter 'T'?"
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)