Archive for the ‘The Stories’ Category

Close up of Keith Richards skin. Also the condition of several California reservoirs.

What if your tap was tapped-out? What if you turned on your faucet and the only sound you heard was the telltale groan of a creaky system run dry? Instead of water emerging from your pipes you’d be mocked by the mournful cry of Chewbacca’s melancholy wail. This decidedly bleak future from the Dark Side may yet come to pass if California doesn’t get some rain soon. May the Force reign over us and then rain over us. Having such a plentiful resource suddenly morph into a scarce commodity is a new experience to a state perennially flush with nature’s bounty. And if John Q. Public doesn’t have enough problems deciding which photos to delete from his capacity-filled iPhone, now he has to make a Sophie’s choice between watering his begonia or irrigating his wife’s petunia. I know which one I’d choose. Read the rest of this entry »

Not photoshopped. Seafarers can walk from shore to shore using boats as stepping stones.

Few things bind a country together more tightly than an attack on our shared interests. 911 proved that as did the hasty return of the McRib sandwich after MacDonald’s unwisely removed it from their menu. And now the latest wagon-circling calamity: California’s third year of record drought brought about by the coordinated efforts of El Niña and Al-Qaeda. Alright maybe Al-Qaeda has nothing to do with it, but they’re sure happy about our parched state (get it). If a rising tide lifts all boats, well then a falling tide makes them look like cock-eyed toy boats run aground in a bathtub. And right now California looks like somebody drained all the fun out of our hot tub. Read the rest of this entry »

My first love was the NY Yankees. And this iconic logo was the centerfold.

Few things in life thrilled little David Hardiman more than the pinstriped wonders known as the New York Yankees. I was a lovelorn 6 year old Little Leaguer when I first fell under the Yankees Big League spell. The New York Yankees were a legendary and scarce commodity in Syracuse; the club being located 200 miles to the southeast in the teeming metropolis of Gotham – home to the Empire State Building and Batman. My fanatical bond and romantic sentiments for the Yankees were fed by neighborhood friends, by cataloguing their exploits in scrapbooks (now thoughtfully displayed deep in a Syracuse landfill) and by listening to them on the radio or watching them on TV. Well, not exactly on traditional TV. Read the rest of this entry »

Money is, if not the root of all evil, certainly the soil of all evil. Here we see a formerly happy sapling weighed down by financial considerations.

It is a little known fact that Jesus Christ almost missed the Last Supper because of a jury summons. He was invariably rejected by the court because of his “I cannot judge thee, lest I be judged” sentiments. If only he’d been selected he might have lived longer and we’d all be coloring Easter eggs in July. Jesus was well ahead of his time. Before Christ it was like BC. His carbon footprint was practically zero. In fact when he walked on the beach he had no footprints at all. Sometimes I think (and I’m not alone on this) the man was a God. But how does Jesus’ experience relate to me? Well looking back I too would’ve done great things if a jury hadn’t gotten in my way. Who do they think they are – my peers? I mean judge not lest ye too operated a Ponzi Scheme. 

I, Sonny Upside, deserved better. Having received several offshore diplomas, I was knowledgeable, persuasive, and seemingly disinterested enough to evince an aura of certainty around whatever financial scheme I proposed. Investors wanted sure things in their wanton lives and I gave it to them by promising them not millions, but thousands in easy profits. Reasonable enough – right? My actuarially-tuned asset allocation strategy was shiftily constructed of hypes and dreams. It all seemed ironclad enough until Mr. IRS and Lady SEC started nosing around my second set of books. They said I should’ve done better crunching the numbers. Well if hindsight is 20/20, then embezzling is 10 to 20. Read the rest of this entry »

Why Mr. Hardiman. Please get a clue. Don’t you know who this is?

As an inveterate New York Times crossword puzzle solver, I’d hit a dead end with 28 Across. 8 letters starting with d and ending in s. The clue read “Certain numbers.” Hmmm, I pondered; unable to shrink “denominators” or stretch “digits” into 8 letters. Having spent an embarrassingly long time ruminating over it and having exhausted every internet crossword site, I decided to call the New York Times Crossword Clue 976 number where I’d get the answer to my clue and the closure I so dearly sought. At $2 per minute though, I’d need to be quick about it or I’d rack up certain enormous numbers. Evidently in my haste to expedite matters, I misdialed (mis-poked really) and unknowingly called a phone sex number. I should’ve known something was amiss when the lady on the other end said, “Listen honey, do you know who you dialed? You haven’t got a clue do you?”

“No. I do have a clue,” I protested. “I do have a clue and it’s 28 across…8 letters…certain numbers. Any ideas?” 

“We get this a lot of this sweetie. You misdialed,” she instructed me. “This is 976-KISS, not 976-CLUE. You need to dial certain numbers to speak to the proper party.” I quickly hung up.

Yikes! I’d accidentally called a phone sex operator and it was now part of my permanent record. I was unclean. I wondered if I wouldn’t be allowed within 100 yards of Taylor Swift or locked out of the Disney Channel. But as the experience settled in and my curious mind began to consider this industry as an economic entity, I did some research and began an examination of this unique service from a labor management point of view. What I discovered was worth reading all the way to the end. Especially if you want to know the answer to the crossword puzzle clue.  I did not realize the industry was on the cusp of unionizing. You can learn a lot from doing crossword puzzles. Here’s my report:   Read the rest of this entry »

Author and lady-Viking Siri Hustvedt

Reviewer extraordinaire and lady-Lesbian Terry Castle

That line is from the movie Jaws, where an incredulous Richard Dreyfus surveys the peculiar wreckage of a shattered boat and announces, “This was no boating accident.” And in a sense this could apply to Terry Castle’s review of Siri Hustvedt’s novel The Blazing World. That is, at first glance the decimated boat looks just like any other wreck, but upon closer inspection Dreyfus observes the imprints of shark teeth and the telltale splinters and concludes otherwise. Similarly, at first glance, Castle’s well formatted review looks just like any other review, but upon closer inspection, we see the imprints of snark teeth and the telltale heart of the reviewer and I conclude: “This is no book review.” It’s something much more interesting than that and I was on to it early – I could smell the blood in the water.

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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 »

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 »

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 »

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 »