Author Archive

Early DC. Virginia eventually reclaimed its unused gift west of the Potomac.

Dear Maria,

Good evening and hello. We’ll just assume it’s evening. It reads better that way. It appears your next adventure in this journey we call “life” remands you to the District of Columbia (originally a 10 mile square tilted cube until 1846 when Virginia retroceded its portion back into the state leaving Maryland’s cession as the location of present day DC.). You are both fortunate and burdened to have your intellectual capacities exercised to the degreee they will be in DC (The extra e in degreee was intentional, although it serves no purpose, in much the same way long parenthetical entries are more confusing than enlightening – agreed? Agreed!). Yes Maria, your lot in life will soon revolve around DuPont Circle (formerly DuPont Square, but numerous revolutions have rounded its corners rendering it DuPont Circle). Read the rest of this entry »

Phil Silvers: A star of the species Hamus Actorum.

Among the constellation of worthy subjects demanding to be illuminated, Phil Silvers is not one of them. Not that he’s unworthy. But Phil Silvers. Really? He’s a fossilized relic leftover from the Vaudevillian Era – a prehistoric time when tummlers, crooners and acrobats performed on poorly lit, unmicrophoned stages. As you may recall from your high school Celebrity Geology classes, the Vaudevillian Era was sandwiched between the Shakespearian Period – a period marked by proto-thespians in unmolted drag crawling out from under the curtain and soliloquizing anyone at the Globe who would listen, and the Television Epoch when shadowy 2-dimensional images ruled the airwaves and were at the apex of the entertainment food chain.

Phil Silvers barely registers with me and probably doesn’t move the needle with most of you either. Although justly beloved by many, he was the kind of entertainer I despised as a child (me being the child here, not Phil) for one reason – utterly predictable humor. Mr. Silvers strutted around ‘neath the proscenium arch like the well-trained pro that he was: hitting his marks and delivering his punchlines. He larded his performances with super-sized gestures and lusty dollops of feigned disbelief. His predictable repertoire of hammy attributes only served to harden my bias against the so-called other white meat. He was like a very uncool uncle who you hoped would just leave the pink box of goodies from Lyncourt Bakery on the kitchen table, then get back in his 9 mpg, 1973 Plymouth Gran Fury and drive his insincere persona back to Weedsport where his “scenery eating” talents weren’t much appreciated either. And to think that Phil Silvers is responsible for today’s microwave oven technology, just boggles the mind. He isn’t responsible for it. But to think he is – oy vey. Read the rest of this entry »

Give us this day our daily kitty, as we would give kitties unto others.

I’m so crazy-go-nuts for our rescue cat. I spend way too much time nuzzling her. She’s smusher-dependent and I’m smusher-codependent, so we’re very compatible. I enable her cuddlemorphic binges by making sure her furry ears are properly smushed every 30 minutes. She in turn uses her little sandpaper tongue to keep my eyebrows sparklingly groomed – like they’ve been threaded or something. She is like a cuddly drug that’s good for what ails you.

Her formal name is Joan. Yes. Joan the cat. Her nickname is Midge, but I usually end up calling her BubBay or if I’m feeling a little frisky I may resort to BooBay or (if I’ve eaten too much of her Science Diet) BooBooheimer. As in “How’s daddy’s little BooBooheimer today.” And she understands everything I say. It’s so rewarding to be fully understood when you make baby talk.

Here are some snatches of dialogue I lapse into whenever I get near her. It’s not really dialogue because that would suggest 2 people are talking. And even if she only says, “Meow,” I hear her loud and clear:

“Who’s the best kitty in the world? It’s you isn’t it? Well yes it is. You’re a ThunderKitty with superpowers and when they make a Superhero movie based on your superior fluffiness, I’ll be your agent and make sure you get a Cat Trailer filled with aged mice.” Read the rest of this entry »

While all men might be created equally, it ain’t necessarily so with animals. And if you’ve ever seen a squirrel try to cross a street or a horse eating his own road apples, you know what I’m talking about. From all outward appearances most animals look quite normal, but sadly, many are one taco short of a combination platter. This article, offensive on so many levels, is an attempt to give voice to the untreated problem of mental retardation in animals. In some skewed way though, perhaps this essay is really a cry for help. Not for animals, but for me. For perhaps it is I who suffers some form of mental retardation. After all, I am writing this. But how could it be me? I took the long bus to school. Read the rest of this entry »

Way too soon and with a thousand apologies I submit the newest marketing slogans for Malaysia Airlines:

• We’re still the safest airline in the world. Based in Malaysia 
• Now selling half-way tickets.
• The only airline with odds.
• If you’re flying another airline all we can say is, “Chicken!”

• Proving that what goes up doesn’t necessarily come down.
• We must be safer now. All our bad luck has been used up.
• Win-Win. You either arrive safely or rest assured your loved ones will receive a handsome insurance settlement.
• Statistically we’re still safer than jumping into an active volcano.
• We recognize that man’s ultimate destination is God’s Kingdom. We just try to get you there faster.

Greek Mythological class reunion. Still crazy after all these years. Can’t even cooperate for a class picture.

Understanding Greek mythology has always been my Achilles’ heel. Whether it’s mighty Hercules slaying the 9-headed Hydra or Thetis dipping her son Achilles into the protective waters of the River Styx, I’m continuously flummoxed by the never-ending array of fantastic characters populating this Grecian game board. It’s like Game of Thrones, but with thunderbolts, tridents and togas. As we delve more deeply into this proto-religion, I’m sure you’ll agree with me when I say: Greek Mythology is just a bunch of crazy made up stuff. And not your regular crazy either. It’s bat-shit crazy. Oh sure it elevates the challenges of life to epic sagas. But it does so with 3-headed dogs, 9-headed Hydras and snake-headed Medusas. Greek mythology is a head case of hallucinogenic seizures somebody took the time to write down. The fact that it has stuck around this long astounds me. But perhaps I’m being too harsh. I’m probably doing a disservice to bat-shit when I compare it to Greek mythology.  Read the rest of this entry »

What Steve Martin looks like in a photograph. He’s actually much bigger.

Selfie taken at 4:30 a.m. I’m the one in the glasses. “Does Steve even know I exist?”

Dear Mr. Martin,

First of all please recognize this communication as the least creepiest form of stalking ever devised. Nonetheless do recognize it as at least some form of stalking. Second of all, I don’t have a “second of all.” May this most attenuated of warnings be a motivator for you to either Like, Nudge or Poke me (depending on the form of social media you employ). I request this not to feed my outsized sense of entitlement, but to feed something very similar to it. Again, some might call this stalking, but you and I know better due to our connection which you’ll shortly establish with me.

I was going to signal my willingness to receive your acknowledgement by writing a screenplay entitled Being Steve Martin, but Charlie Kaufman beat me to that entrée. Besides being alive on the planet simultaneously, you and I have much in common; and I’m not just referring to our love of chutneys. No, Mr. Martin (May I call you Steve?). Thank you. No Steve, besides the fact that we have both “hung out” with Edie Brickell’s husband Paul Simon (You at his house, and me at a concert he performed recently with Sting for which I had the privilege to pay $250 to “hang out” with him. I presume you paid nothing for the same privilege), our worlds have occasionally intersected. For example, my sister and I hung out with you at the Syracuse War Memorial in 1977 back when you were getting paid to be funny on purpose. Lots of other people showed up too so I doubt you noticed me. There is even a picture of the event in your book “Born Standing Up.” That’s me unseen in the background. Just like it is right now. If you stop reading this and look out into space, that’s me right there; only you can’t quite see me. Not yet anyway. Certainly this is nothing for you to worry about. Especially since we’re only in the early stages of our friendship. Read the rest of this entry »

Ponder, if you will, the sublimity of the Moon and the Sun having the same diameter relative to their distance from Earth. Another cosmic prank?

Preamble:     There are things in the realm of experience that are astonishing yet understandable. For example the diameter of the moon is the exact diameter of the sun relative to its distance from the earth so that during a solar eclipse the moon perfectly covers the sun leaving only its fiery corona blazing at the circumference. As the kids say; “How cool is that?” Then there are things that are astonishing and not understandable. Like dreams. I suppose there are different kinds of dreams just like there are different kinds of Campbell Soups. I mean they’re all called soups, but the difference between Bean with Bacon and Cream of Celery is fairly significant. Similarly, they’re all called dreams, but the difference between a dream where you’re an Otter Pop being slurped on by Anne Hathaway and a dream where you’re an alligator floating in a glade with other alligators, is fairly significant. It’s like my daddy once told me, he said, “Son, the difference between 12 a.m. and 12 p.m. is like night and day.” Read the rest of this entry »

Pantheism ~ When one God just isn’t enough. 

Stillwell, Darnell et al. Feelin’ it. Tonight’s gonna be a good, good night.

The Gods, also known as the powers that be, are overheard kibitzing in the cloak roam amidst a collection of robes, togas and laurel wreaths when Stillwell (not his real name) conspiratorially leans over to Darnell (his real name) and unctuously announces, “Localized Consciousness. It’s the next big thing.” Darnell heartily agrees saying, “Yeah, why should we keep all this exquisite awareness to ourselves. Let’s exhibit some spiritual largesse and create some soulful spin-offs. Nothing too large mind you. We don’t want to be challenged in any meaningful way, we just want to be amused.”

Stilwell:          That’s what I’m saying. I call it Localized Consciousness and it’ll give the natives illusory fits. We’ll create them in our image using the evolutionary system. That will be the first dichotomy. They’ll think they’re really separate and distinct from everything else. They’ll confuse independence for isolation when the entire time we’re all one and we love them exceptionally.  

Darnell:          Well I’m all for it but we’ll have to create a playpen big enough to overawe the so-called individual and his “Localized Consciousness.” He thinks he’s really that person in the mirror, identifying completely with the body and its senses. If they really knew how serene our heaven is, they’d never sweat a thing on earth and that Lennon song Imagine would have to be retitled Reality.

Stillwell:         (affects “jazz hands” as he conjures up power) Boom! Done. (And the universe as we know it, is before them)

Darnell:          Wow! That was one Big Bang. Maybe you could warn me next time.

Stillwell:         Here take this eye dropper and start animating these human vessels with a tincture of awareness. Use the short one for North Korea and that special one for Jesus, the Buddha, Moses and Bill Gates.

And so it came to pass that there was one insurance company that we all happily subscribed to. But Lucifer tempted mankind with ill-gotten booty and a great fraud was perpetrated in the Garden of Indemnification which begat the multi-headed hydra of AFLAC, GEICO and Progressive Insurance. And now no one knows Flo, from the gecko, from the duck. A Babel of coverages, riders and deductibles. The only real insurance is faith. Faith and an awareness in an incomprehensible power infinitely greater than ourselves. Ooooh.

Everything you don’t need to know all in one incomprehensible edition.

As a dilettante of the second order, I occasionally glance at The New York Review of Books just to see how the other half lives. Alright, just to see how the other .00000000025% live. Except for Presidents giving a State of the Union Address, no one reads any more. Instead they troll for satisfying videos of some do-gooder giving a homeless guy $100 or an abandoned kitten being breast fed by a honey badger. I know I do. And I get it. Reading takes time and application. It’s proactive, but it is ultimately more rewarding and nourishing than idly surfing some video screen seeking temporary fulfillment. Well that’s as preachy as I’ll get because Wimp.com just posted a video of a Dolphin making oatmeal. That Dolphin happened to be former Miami Dolphin fullback Larry Csonka.

The NY Review of Books is bone dry and devoid of juicy gossip. If it were any drier it would spontaneously combust. It’s a narrow publication appealing to people who sometimes equate intellectual heft with spiritual awareness. The NY Review of Books is replete with bravura verbal muscularity and apposite aphorisms, soft as church music. However as comprehensive as it may be, the following words or ideas seem to creep into about half the articles or reviews. For example I’ve detected these recurring themes or phrases throughout the NY Review of Books:

• • Sylvia Plath’s suicide changed nothing. She was still unhappy.
  • So that was it. Jane immersed herself in English romantic poets as a means of coping with her intractable psoriasis.
  • Harold’s homosexuality was known only to his wife, Ralph.
  • All we had were parsnips. Fortunately all we wanted were parsnips.
  • the Zionist experience of Jewish Semites
  • the Jewish experience of Semitic Zionists
  • the Semitic experience of Zionist Jews
  • the influence of chivalric modalities in 12th century Hohoenzollern 
  • Marcel Proust would often mispronounce his name as “Proust.” Knowing that if anyone were to write about the event, no one would be able to know how Proust pronounced “Proust” in the first place. 

Read the rest of this entry »