Incurious

Well, there's this series of books I don't really like that much. I guess the first one was okay, but as I think back, it was just sort of a novelty, maybe. And the second one I didn't enjoy at all. This hit me recently when I saw a new hardcover in Square Books the other day, a third book in the series, hot off the presses... and friends, I bought it! Why? It may have something to do with a problem in my brain. Oh boy, I've thought of a few more points to touch upon before we get to the gist, if there is one, which there almost certainly is not. Yes there is. But no one will like it. I recommended the first book in the series to Dr. Theresa recently when she was looking for something to read in bed. It was only some days later, when I saw the third in the series at Square Books, that I truly considered whether or not I had actually "enjoyed" the first... which I had, up to a point. But enough to recommend it to Dr. Theresa - a person to whom I have made sacred vows - to read in bed? Well, it was too late! It was already happening! Something else you may not be wondering... Jack, you may not be wondering, isn't it very seldom that you "post" something negative... admitting that you don't like a book, for example? Aren't you afraid of hurting the author's feelings? Well, I'll tell you. No. Because I know you! And you don't exist! And even if you do exist, which you don't, you never "click" on my "hyperlinks," so you will never, ever know what books I am talking about. I know what you're thinking! You're thinking, okay, this third book - which you bought for full price in hardcover - in a series you don't care for: does it have an owl in it? You bet your ass it does! It's a stuffed owl with "incurious glass eyes." I am sure you will recall the "cheap glass eye" an owl has in a John D. MacDonald novel. Or if you want to get fancy, you can think of a stuffed owl whose glass eyes are "knowing topazes" in a fancy Italian novel... or James Joyce, whose stuffed owl has a "clear melancholy wise bright motionless compassionate gaze." One day we'll have to write a monograph on approaches to owl eyes in literature. Apparently, there are two. Oh, and the owl in my current book is just one of a series of unfortunate stuffed creatures with "incurious glass eyes"... to quote: "Crows, foxes, rabbits, owls, just about every form of wildlife." Oh, really? Was there a walrus? A walrus with incurious glass eyes? Come on!

Orange Vinyl Spider-Man Sequel

I finished reading THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES but no I didn’t. Because you get to the end of the first book and then you have to – by law! – read the next volume, which is called INTO THE MILLENNIUM, or, I suppose, THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES: INTO THE MILLENNIUM. Either way, it sounds like a Spider-Man sequel. I need to get over to Square Books and order it up! Meanwhile, the Million Dollar Book Club is working on THE RIGHT STUFF. And here’s what I noticed! Wally Schirra, one of the Mercury astronauts, is a real prankster. Like, he has a little box and tells people he caught a mongoose in it. Then when they try to reach in and pet it, well, it jumps at them like one of those snakes out of a peanut can. You know those snakes. Wally Schirra’s mongoose is some kind of furry sock on a spring. And that made me remember my short story collection MOVIE STARS, when a character goes to an auction and tries to buy a novelty mongoose in a box, operating on the same principle. I got out the catalog from the auction of Bob Hope's personal effects, which I actually attended, and confirmed that Bob’s mongoose box, as pictured in the aforementioned catalog, appears to professionally assembled, whereas Tom Wolfe sure made it sound as if the mongoose box was something Wally Schirra thought up and slapped together himself. I think that’s an accurate memory of my reading experience. But the book is downstairs by the bed and I don’t care enough to go get it. Then I started imagining whimsical fancies, such as, maybe Wally Schirra gave Bob his very own homemade mongoose box! Wouldn’t that be something? It doesn’t seem overwhelmingly plausible, really. Although I’m sure Bob Hope hung out with the Mercury astronauts at some point. Nor does it seem plausible, though, that Wally Schirra was manufacturing his own trick mongoose boxes when there were plenty of trick mongoose boxes, apparently, in the nation’s many novelty emporiums from coast to coast. Maybe Tom Wolfe got this one thing wrong! Unless! What if Wally Schirra saw a novelty mongoose box in a store and thought, "I could make this myself for half the price!"? I guess we'll never know. Speaking of stuff we'll never know, I noticed again that the Bob Hope auction catalog wasn’t too heavy on provenance, which reminded me that I wanted to check it, and not for the first time, to see if I could find a clue (I couldn’t) about what cartoonist made these clever Bob Hope caricatures I bought at the auction. When Quinn came to town, I was like, “Look, this guy made pictures of Bob Hope as if rendered by Goya… and, uh… [trying to think of some names of other artists]” And Quinn was like, “Are these supposed to look like Bob Hope?” And I was like… “!” Because of course! Why would Bob Hope have these hanging in his office if… and my voice, as well as my thoughts, trailed off as Quinn stood there with a doubtful look on her face. So let’s get back to THE RIGHT STUFF! As I texted Megan with photographic proof, I still have an orange vinyl 45 RPM record with recordings from the actual Mercury space flights. It came with my G.I. Joe space capsule, the interior of which glowed in the dark. I got scared and thought it was a ghost! Give me a break, I was three years old. (Speaking of Megan Abbott and Square Books [see above], I’ll be “in conversation” with Megan about her new book EL DORADO DRIVE on August 13. I wouldn’t mention it so early, but I just started reading it and on page 4 [of the galley, anyway] there’s a “bird crying in the night.” As a review of the owl-spotting portion of the “blog” will remind you, we have given much thought to the matter, and just because a bird cries in the night, that does not make the bird an owl. Maybe it’s just an upset bird. I’m not worried! There are plenty more pages to come that might have a definite owl in them.) But I really came here to report about THE MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES, didn’t I? I think it’s going to end up being JOSEPH AND HIS BROTHERS length. And contrary to my advice (usually about Thomas Mann), which is, essentially, read the first 200-400 pages and then you’ll be hooked, I was really bopping along with TMWQ for, oh, let’s say 200 pages… then I hit a real dry spell until page 630 (though, miner-like, I uncovered, here and there, random chunks of boldly glittering sarcasm that made it worth the trouble). So you have to get over a very big hump in the middle. Can you handle a 400-page hump? (Remember, this is just the first volume I’m talking about.) But when I got to page 630 I think I said out loud, “Things are starting to happen!” On page 630. Then the book was over not many pages later. Well, it was and it wasn’t.

Two Knights and a Non-Knight

I am pretty far into THE MANUSCRIPT FOUND IN SARAGOSSA and there have been no owls, even though there are owls on the cover. But there are plenty of other things! Like, these two knights are talking and this one knight is like, "Alas, we all must die. Only the hour of our death is not certain." And the other knight is like, "Wait, who has told you all these pleasant novelties? It must be a mortal with an extraordinarily witty turn of conversation. Is he often invited out to supper?" And when I read that, I thought, "Hey! 'Is he often invited out to supper?' must be the 'He must be fun at parties' of the 18th century!" And then I thought, is that something people even say: "He must be fun at parties"? I think I've said it. I think, for example, when I went to see Dr. Theresa get an award - before she was a doctor! - and the speaker at the ceremony, for some reason, was a guy whose whole life was spent studying the sense of smell in lobsters... on that occasion, I do believe that as he went on for some time about the sense of smell in lobsters, I turned to our friend Chuck, who was seated next to me, and said, "He must be fun at parties." So I did a "google search" for the phrase "must be fun at parties" and turned up 145,000 matches, so I guess it is something that people say. More and more often, since my little medical hiccup, I wonder whether I know certain things or only think I know certain things. On the other hand, maybe I was never sure. As I type this long series of thoughts, I am in unbearable suspense about whether the "internet" will stop working, as it often does now, thanks to the good folks at AT&T, ties with whom I am assiduously working to sever forever as we speak. (As further evidence of my mental state, I just looked up "assiduous" to see if it means what I think it means, and it does, almost.) Oh! So a few pages later in THE MANUSCRIPT FOUND IN SARAGOSSA, someone (not a knight) is playing a cithara, which took me straight back to the "blog's" big cither/citer/cithern/cittern/kithara/zither craze of 2010. (Citterns were poised to make a comeback in 2011, but it didn't take. Though I will say that as I continue to examine the "blog" for zombie "links," I am astonished to find that the "Frequently Asked Questions about the Renaissance Cittern" webpage not only survives, it was updated - ! - as recently as April 2023. I guess they found out something new about renaissance citterns.) Now, did I immediately assume that the cithara I read about in THE MANUSCRIPT FOUND IN SARAGOSSA was identical with a kithara? Good God, no! I learned my lesson back when I stupidly assumed that a cither and a cithern were the same thing ("click" on "link" after "link" for the incredible details). I'm so glad we had this talk. Postscript: Yes, as predicted above, the godawful AT&T "internet" ceased to work at a vital juncture in the composition of this delightsome bagatelle. (Continuing a theme: I second-guessed myself about the existence of "delightsome" as a word and did not find it in the dictionary that came with this laptop. When the "internet" began to work again, however briefly, I checked out the OED online, which cites numerous uses of the word - well, maybe "numerous" is going a bit too far - beginning in the 15th century and ending only a few years ago, in what seems to be an advertising brochure: "our Sheraton Lagos Hotel teams have come up with a line-up of delightsome and inspiring culinary options." Ugh! Now I see why my computer doesn't want me to use "delightsome.")

Guff

I've given the New York Times a lot of guff over the years for their stubbon refusal to understand anything at all about the sitcom GREEN ACRES. It is only fitting, then, that I acknowledge the review they printed today of the TV show EVIL, in which the reviewer makes what I have determined after careful examination to be a neutral-to-positive allusion to GREEN ACRES. But! In the selfsame review, Roger Miller's uniquely sophisticated body of work is labeled with the regrettable and belittling umbrella term "novelty songs." Oh, Gray Lady! Why must you give with one hand and take with the other?

Without Elaboration

We went to the drugstore. I've been sick! Anyway, this drugstore packs a lot of novelties onto its shelves, such as (seen above) a lantern in the shape of an owl. I was like, "Hey, Dr. Theresa, get this for me as a treat, because I've been sick!" (I had conveniently left my wallet at home.) Then I turned over the lantern in my supple hands and read the sticker on the bottom, which said "MADE IN CHINA" and (without elaboration) "Cancer and Reproductive Harm." So we didn't buy the lantern.

Famous Fiery Skull Head

I thought I'd take this opportunity to talk about three movies, yes, three big hot up-to-the-minute entertainments that the whole world is talking about right now! 1. GHOST RIDER. Dr. Theresa and I watched GHOST RIDER. I could not help but note that the title character's famous fiery skull head set off a sprinkler system. Now, as you know, my cigarette lighter book contained a whole section about sprinkler systems being set off, and I certainly would have included this moment had I viewed it in a timely manner, if only for the novelty. 2. BOYS' NIGHT OUT. Hey! Remember when McNeil observed that every 60s movie had an obelisk in it? I was only too happy to confirm that Tony Randall stood next to an obelisk in BOYS' NIGHT OUT (see above). Furthermore, it was the SAME OBELISK that McNeil previously observed in DON'T MAKE WAVES and Dr. Theresa and I saw in AGENTS OF SHIELD, the latter of which is a TV show from present times (?), and not a 1960s movie, so I'm sorry I brought it up. 3. DEAD RECKONING. Recently, Dr. Theresa and I watched DEAD RECKONING, which takes place mainly on the Gulf Coast, the region whence I was spawned. During one scene, an attempt was made by the art department at Columbia Pictures to drape some Spanish moss artistically here and there in some tree branches, an attempt I appreciated, as it caused me to realize and exclaim, "I haven't seen Spanish moss in a long time!" And then I remembered how everyone down there loved to grab a person at every opportunity and shout in their face, "Did you know Spanish moss is related to the pineapple?" You cannot walk down a street on the Gulf Coast without someone telling you the little-known fact that Spanish moss is related to the pineapple. Why, I used to do it myself when I lived there! And I guess I am doing it now. You're not going to believe this, but Spanish moss is related to the pineapple. As I sat there during the exciting climax of DEAD RECKONING, thinking about such matters, I began to doubt myself. Spanish moss doesn't really seem to be related to the pineapple. Maybe I misheard! Maybe I misheard one hundred thousand times. So I googled for two seconds and found an article with the headline "Spanish Moss Is Related to Pineapples." That headline wasn't messing around!

Cold Leftovers

Well, hello. I thought you'd like to hear about this astonishing coincidence. I was eating some cold leftovers in front of the TV. That's not the coincidence! As I ate, I watched some of a Doris Day movie I had recorded for the purpose. At the conclusion of my repast, I turned off the movie, at which point the regular TV came on automatically. It was tuned to TCM, which happened to be playing a Tom Waits concert film. At the very moment of the program's sudden commencement I caught Tom Waits himself mid-sentence, expressing, through stage patter, his wish to purchase a novelty cigarette lighter "as big as an encyclopedia." If you are my friend, you will appreciate the nature of the coincidence. If I am being honest, however, there is at best a 50-50 chance I would have included Tom Waits's hypothetical "cigarette lighter as big as an encyclopedia" in my book about cigarette lighters, so I have decided not to add it to the official appendix at this time.

Bread Shaped Like Owls

Look. As you well know, it is NOT AND HAS NEVER BEEN my responsibility to inform you of EVERY instance of an owl in any particular book. Once I tell you that a book has an owl in it, I am done, even if fourteen more owls show up later. It is really none of my business. BUT! I feel I owe you something in the case of Till Eulenspiegel, whose name means "owl mirror." Was that really enough, as I so boldly claimed? If a guy's name happens to mean "owl mirror," does that count as "an owl" for our purposes? Well, I am happy to inform you that this haunting question is no longer relevant, because I just read a chapter in which Till Eulenspiegel gets a job with a baker and starts making loaves of bread shaped like "owls and long-tailed monkeys." This drives the baker crazy for some reason. But bread shaped like owls definitely counts. In conclusion, Till Eulenspiegel easily sold the bread shaped like owls and long-tailed monkeys, nobody cared what their bread was shaped like, in fact they seemed to enjoy the novelty, I don't know why that baker got so worked up.

Three-Eyed Christmas Owl

You know I don't "blog" anymore unless, say, I read a book with an owl in it, but what am I supposed to do with this picture Jimmy sent me? He was walking in Brooklyn, USA, when he came upon a crèche with this toy novelty owl sitting on the roof of it. He also shows the owl from another, closer angle which bolsters his claim that it has three eyes, but I shan't affright you with that. Surely there is some terrifying occult significance we shouldn't think about. This reminds me of a McNeil email from early November, in which he told me of walking his dog at midnight. "I heard a loud noise in the air - similar to a cat's cry," McNeil wrote. "I shined my flashlight toward the heavens and heard it again!" It turned out to be "a giant owl resting on the peak of [McNeil's] neighbors' roof." I didn't tell you about it because I wasn't "blogging" at the time and I'm still not "blogging."

Ye Olde Pink Trick

Ah, well. Yes! I guess tonight is my only "event" for my new book of short stories entitled MOVIE STARS. Megan Abbott has flown down from NYC to rake me over the coals "in conversation" at Square Books this evening. The primary question is which jacket to wear. What? You're reading a "blog," dimwit. This is what you get. Now, Chris Offutt has upped the ante - again and again! - on "event jackets" around here, which is why I am leaning toward the pink. BUT! I've worn it a lot. True, true, it was mostly in Los Angeles, as seen here with my friend and coworker Julia Pott and our outdated novelty pillow. But in our crazy digital age does geography matter? Besides, I've even worn it on airplanes! Look at that face. That (above) is the deadened visage of a man who has just crawled off an airplane, in fact. Has my pink jacket been overexposed? The airplane wear, in addition, has left it somewhat creased. There may be an unsightly spot or two of indefinite origin, I won't deny it. I tried that old trick of hanging it in the bathroom while the water steams and rages, in the hopes of smoothing it out, to not much avail. I did the same with my "John T. Edge" brand shirt. That's right, he has a shirt brand named after him! He's John T. Edge, damn it. And if you want to know, this particular "John T. Edge" shirt has dots on it that are cleverly made with intricate knots of thread, unseen to the casual observer, lining the inside of the shirt, giving the wearer a cozy sense of... holy God I'm even boring myself talking about this shirt now. You know what? Maybe I'll hit 'em with the old steam again. I MUST wear the pink! I must! Otherwise Chris Offutt is going to be there in who knows what manner of glory, like a wedding guest who dares to arrive in white, I just know it. Hey, I just went to BBB and ate a Pylon with lots of onions, precisely the thing before an event with people. I stopped by Square Books on my walk home and Katelyn said I should "get a puppet buddy," a suggestion I brooded over the rest of the way back, and indeed over which I continue to brood. You can take it lots of ways.

The Third Cough Drop

I caught a cold Wednesday night? Thursday night? Dr. Theresa got me some cough drops. Yesterday I put one in my mouth and the shell - I guess we'll call it - caved in (by design! though little did I know) and mentholated goo oozed out. It was a surprise! And not an unpleasant one, despite the way I just described it. These were "dual action" cough drops, according to the bag. I checked after my surprise. Like, "What is going on with these cough drops?" The effect was bracing and medicinal. I don't know how I feel about the phrase "goo oozed" - at best you could say it's sort of onomatopoeic. Makes me think of a line from "The Bishop Orders His Tomb at St. Praxed's Church" about "clammy squares which sweat as if the corpse they keep were oozing through." Sorry! But that's almost the only thing I remember from school. I also remember "Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs upon the slimy sea" from "The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner." That's all. After about the third cough drop, the novelty wears off.

Famous Novelty Pencil

You've heard about famous writers jotting things on bar napkins! Well, her features are obscured but trust me: this is famed author Mary Miller writing on a bar napkin with a giant novelty pencil belonging to Chris Offutt (his torso looming in the background). Yes, it is a giant pencil, but it really works. I saw the whole thing go down.

Photo by Bill Boyle.

Cargo Ship Full of Hot Pants

I saw that SIMPSONS episode yesterday where a ship crashes, scattering its cargo of "hot pants" all over the beach, much to the delight of the citizens of Springfield. As the episode comes to a close, the 1950s novelty song "Short Shorts" begins to play. I thought, "What a weird song! And yet it is also undeniably catchy, what with the hand claps and the full-bodied, pleasantly galumphing saxophone solo." So today I decided to look up the history of the song on the "internet." Not to be an old codger, but it does give me the chance to remind you that wikipedia is not always objective, accurate, or helpful: "On that musically fateful afternoon, Gaudio and Austin were driving up Washington Avenue in Bergenfield, New Jersey in Tom Austin's red and white 1957 Ford Fairlane 500, trying to figure out what to call the latest song they had written for their rock and roll band... Just then, two girls came strutting out of Luhmann's (the local teenage sweet shop) wearing cutoff jeans that were cut so short they were almost illegal. At that point, the song 'Short Shorts' was born." I draw your attention to "musically fateful" and the gross description of the shorts themselves, and the judgmental quality of the word "strutting." These are a few of the problems.

The Stump, the Candle and the Pencil Sharpener

Read in this book about the Middle Ages about Francesco Dantini. "Orphaned when still young, he began trading everything that could turn a profit: weapons and spices, cloth and silk." Upon his death in 1410, "he bequeathed his entire estate" to a charitable trust he had founded, called "the poor people's stump." By doing so, he "hoped to avoid punishment in Hell." His charity "still exists today, a miraculous survival," the author calls it. So that's pretty good! I hope he got into Heaven okay. Speaking of the Middle Ages, didn't they believe in unicorns back then? I'll check one of my many reference books about unicorns. Yes, yes, I see in THE LORE OF THE UNICORN that the legendary figure Prester John (in whom a lot of people believed, according to my book about the Middle Ages) was supposed to have plenty of unicorns running around in his kingdom. Oh yeah, and I forgot William Davenant got a job fetching powdered unicorn horn for a duchess way after the Middle Ages, even. So! Rhea sent me this picture of some cupcakes she had made, and as you can see, she placed them decoratively around a golden unicorn. Who wouldn't? But then she had second thoughts! She felt, perhaps, that the makers of this unicorn had improperly given it a horn, when, as you can plainly see, the candle sticking out of its head should have cleverly served in that capacity. The horn is redundant! Or so Rhea feared. And I believe that Rhea is right. Take, for example, this pencil sharpener (below) given to me by Beth Ann Fennelly. Here we have the unsharpened silver pencil properly representing the unicorn's horn. I can only hope that future manufacturers of unicorn novelties will take a lesson from Rhea's tragedy.

Jerry Epiphany #2

Just before an ADVENTURE TIME meeting the other day I was conversing with my twitter friend Brian about a talk show Jerry Lewis had in the 80s, cashing in on his role from THE KING OF COMEDY. He told Suzanne Somers (pictured) she had "pizzazz," or so I remembered.

I thought Kent Osborne's brother Mark had introduced that clip to me on a privately circulated VHS tape of oddities, but Kent didn't remember that. During the meeting he found Jerry's talk show on youtube and watched it and started cringing. Meanwhile, although (because?) from my end of the video conference I could only hear the audio and see the reactive cringing, I was cringing FOR Kent, or for Jerry, I couldn't tell which, they were inseparable. And I had an epiphany. All of my epiphanies are about Jerry Lewis. Yes, as I've observed, Jerry anticipated Andy Kaufman, and now that I think about it, Jerry's first act, when he was little more than a kid, was lip-syncing to records, mirroring exactly the first performance by Andy Kaufman on the first episode of Saturday Night Live. (Tony Clifton = Buddy Love?) As J. Hoberman observed, Jerry "both depicts and manifests inadvertent disclosure." So he can razor in on the phoniness of show biz satirically while living without qualms the actual life of a show biz phony. That old Fitzgerald thing about the rare ability to hold two opposed ideas in your mind at the same time, blah blah blah. Or as Megan Abbott said in an interview I did with her, "the unconscious and conscious are always this close... I’m putting my fingers together very closely... just this close always and always brushing up against each other constantly. And so we often are thrown into ourselves in ways that are alarming and we often have to see things about ourselves because we can’t completely hide from the unconscious." Jerry's 80s talk show was not art (was it?) but it crystalizes what Manohla Dargis said about Jerry disturbing "all those nice people in all their fancy clothes." Meaning us! So why, for me, Jerry is more powerful an artist than, say, the comedy team (how they'd probably chafe at that old-fashioned term) Tim and Eric, or any other contemporary practitioner of "anti-comedy" (I guess we call it) is that Jerry is doing what they do, but HONESTLY and not ironically. At heart it's helpless and noble. That was the epiphany.

I watched a documentary about Divine, who on some basic level was as non-ironic as Jerry Lewis. For Jerry Lewis and Divine, show biz is a joyous religion in the service of a dark god, ha ha, how dramatic. Jerry Lewis is the father of Divine. There are minor similarities too: each, while young, created an overwhelming and brilliant persona that became a kind of consuming trap. Patterns of paternal fracture and rapprochement. I don't know. Maybe Jerry (who cross-dresses kind of touchingly - like late-period Divine - in THREE ON A COUCH) has a drag queen's instinct (lip-syncing!) for novelty, exaggeration, nostalgia, luxury, disguise and self-creation. And like Divine maybe he's suspicious of (guilty about?) revering some of those things and so turns them on their head. It occurs to me that Jerry has spent most of his life in a form of drag - like Pee Wee Herman! why can't I stop typing? - and maybe like Paul Reubens's some of Jerry's "bad" behavior can be attributed to the emotional violence required to break out of its strictures. Drag as freedom, drag as constraint. Can we call Suzanne Somers hunched over on roller skates a kind of enforced "drag"? Maybe I should think this out. But I don't think I shall. Somebody else on twitter was complaining that he can't watch Jerry because Jerry is "needy." All performers are needy. The glorious thing about Jerry and Divine is that they don't cover it up. They revel in it and they make us face it. Now we're all super smart and in on the big joke. Only when we watch them are our reactions are visceral and true.

"Blog"trospective 13: When Megan Lived Here

Well, it really happened. Megan Abbott moved back to New York. Now what are we supposed to do? Besides vomit and weep I mean. I guess we will attempt to cope by constructing a "blog"trospective of everything Megan did while she lived here (this is not everything Megan did while she lived here): almost made John Currence break his neck---appeared on Anthony Bourdain's television program---appreciated Marlene Dietrich's talent for playing the musical saw---arrived at the record store just as David was putting up the new sign---attended a party where a little girl did that thing where you rapidly stab a knife between your splayed fingers---brought up Sigmund Freud a lot---by example, had me drinking negronis for a spell---called BUFFALO '66 "a child's fantasy" (not in a bad way!)---compared me to Cathy in WUTHERING HEIGHTS---considered a dance called "the mumbly peg"---contemplated the travails of Lucille Ball as a woman in Hollywood---declared intent to be meaningless---defined wildness---discussed Philip Roth a lot---displayed a cheery and tasteful novelty item---drank moonshine (twice... that I know of!)---during a visit by Kent Osborne she witnessed Kent eating chicken wings, which failed to be noted at the time---emailed me about Hank Worden---emailed me about orgone boxes---endured rude scoffing at a ghost story she repeated---expressed a correct opinion about THE GLASS KEY that I undermined with ignorant hyperbole---found a lone pom-pom (this happened more than once)---got scared by a creepy tree---guaranteed weeping---had her first belt of rye---heard Ace's master spoiler for the entire Travis McGee series---helped Dr. Theresa and me avoid trick-or-treaters---hosted a Jerry Lewis double feature---likened something to Poe---loaned me a pen---looked up "querulous" in her dictionary---meeting time at the bar was 4:02---met me at a bar after I improvised some iambic pentameter---participated in an ecstatic roar---pined for some oysters---planned to watch an Elizabeth Taylor movie---pointed a gun at me---professed a generalized affection for wax museums---read Claudia Roth Pierpont's book about Philip Roth---read my tarot cards via cell phone---received a visit from her parents---reminded me of an anecdote about Billy Wilder---researched "friendship clubs"---said something about Mary Steenburgen's accordion---sent me a picture of Bob Hope and Doris Day and Santa---sent me Dick Shawn's obituary---shared her knowledge about an illustrator who drew women with "impossibly long feet"---spent the last warm evening of the year on the balcony of the City Grocery Bar---spoiled a bat attack---started reading the new John Wayne bio---strolled past Robert Mitchum's house from HOME FROM THE HILL---studied the racy cover of UNCLE GOOD'S WEEK-END PARTY, a novel by Faulkner's brother---told a story I misheard about a Depression-era Shirley Temple cream pitcher (and she actually gave us a Depression-era Shirley Temple cream pitcher last night as a goodbye present)---took a picture of a bubble house---took a walk with me while I was wearing a hat (and bedroom slippers, not pictured)---used the old-fashioned term "smoker" to refer to a gathering of rowdy males (she was talking about Bill and Jimmy and me)---visited Elvis's birthplace---visited Faulkner's house with Laraine Newman---was followed on twitter by the manufacturers of a gross-sounding vodka---was harassed by an inflated Batman---was supposed to be on a panel with Adrienne Barbeau (the panel happened but Barbeau canceled)---watched a Norman Mailer movie---watched BARRY LYNDON with Kent Osborne---we possibly left some dvds at her apartment---went to a hobo festival---wondered about tight pants---wowed 'em at "Noir at the Bar."

Dr. Theresa Solves a Mystery

For three or four days a noise in my little home office here has been driving me crazy, Poe-style: tap-tap-tap... tap-tap-tap... tap-tap-tap... tap-tap-tap... tap-tap-tap... almost too quiet to hear. It seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere. Finally I called in Dr. Theresa to investigate. She asked for silence and sat in the center of the room. Then, almost immediately, she started laughing. "I think it's that frog on a toilet," she said. Yes, faithful readers, she was referring to that gift presented so ceremoniously to us by Ace Atkins: a novelty frog on a pink toilet, which harnesses the mighty solar power of our life-giving sun to bob its head in a humorous fashion. The thing is, the frog has never worked before. And those three or four days over which it kept going tap-tap-tap... tap-tap-tap... were gray and overcast! With nary a beam of sunlight to start it a-bobbing. Dr. Theresa cannot solve that part of the mystery. No one can. There it was, beating its little plastic head against the side of my printer. Tap-tap-tap... tap-tap-tap...

A New Year's Epiphany

We went over to Ace's house last night to watch a movie and when we were leaving Ace said, "Wait! I have a Christmas present for you in the car!" And Dr. Theresa said, "Is it a toad?" Ace was stunned, baffled and astonished! His jaw dropped, the way you've heard about people's jaws dropping but you never believed it. Ace was amazed by Dr. Theresa's secret powers! But really Dr. Theresa was sarcastically recalling something Ace had completely forgotten: the time he gave me a hideous misshapen toad dressed as Elvis Presley for my birthday. With a strange admixture of sheepishness and pride he produced last night's gift, not a toad, though Dr. Theresa was close: a plastic frog sitting on a pink toilet, reading a book. "When the sun shines on him, he bobs his head," Ace explained. Now, I knew what Ace was talking about because Megan Abbott has a figurine in her apartment that bobs its head when the sun shines on it through the miracle of solar power, but it is a dignified little man who is not sitting on a toilet, you would not catch Megan Abbott with such a shameful possession. This morning I picked up the toilet frog and was going to say to Dr. Theresa, "So I guess this goes in my office," but Dr. Theresa interjected with a forceful and serious "Yep!" - a yep of grave finality - long before I could finish the sentence. And thus was the frog banished. He now forms a kind of bookend on the opposite side of my printer from the horrific Elvis toad. During my recent achingly dull "posts" about deciding what to read next, I was going to tell you that I've always wanted to finish reading THE WAPSHOT CHRONICLE by John Cheever, which I was halfway through and very much enjoying when - not doing anything gross, just standing there juggling everything I was going to take on the plane - I accidentally dropped my paperback of THE WAPSHOT CHRONICLE in an airport toilet in 1993. And maybe I took it as a sign, because I have never gone back to that book. I dropped Sartre's autobiography in the same toilet at the same time! I decided not to tell you that because I thought maybe I "blog" about toilets too much. But last night as Ace handed me the gift, I had an important revelation: I will never stop "blogging" about toilets. That's the Pendarvis guarantee! Happy new year, toilet lovers. Together we can make 2014 the Year of the Toilet. (See also. And also.)

Of Beards and Dolphins

So when the satellite died we lost all our dvr'd movies. Am I sad? I don't know. I guess that depends on whether you think anything matters. Probably not. I lost SOME KIND OF A NUT, which had repressive desublimation written all over it. It's about Dick van Dyke REFUSING TO SHAVE HIS BEARD! It starts from a bee's point of view, sloppily... I mean, it's sometimes the bee's point of view, sometimes almost the bee's point of view, sometimes not at all the bee's point of view, but you get the distinct and troubling impression that the director THINKS he's in the bee's point of view. That's as far as I got. And now Dick van Dyke and his controversial beard are gone! Gone forever! I wanted to watch THE DAY OF THE DOLPHIN, to see if it matched up with my childhood memories. I recall being in a hotel, the first hotel I ever encountered that was running recent theatrical releases on a special channel, and they just showed THE DAY OF THE DOLPHIN over and over. MOVIE CHANNELS WERE A MIND-BLOWING NOVELTY, Y'ALL. Now they're just dirt to us. As I recall, I didn't want to go outside, wherever we were on vacation. I just wanted to sit in the room and watch THE DAY OF THE DOLPHIN as many times as possible, and I think I did. It's a talking dolphin movie from screenwriter Buck Henry and director Mike Nichols, that's right, the team behind THE GRADUATE, natch! Of course, I didn't know that at the time. I just knew my eyes were secretly welling up with tears when the dolphin, whose name, I think, was "Pha," said to George C. Scott: "Pha LOVE Pa!" The dolphin called George C. Scott "Pa" because George C. Scott had taught him to talk! So George C. Scott was the dolphin's father figure! I guess! Well, anyway, it's erased, zapped, along with 60 other movies. And I never got around to it. And really, who cares? Ward McCarthy also has fond memories of THE DAY OF THE DOLPHIN and mentioned he might try showing it to his kids. I had to remind him that - spoiler alert! - something horrible happens to the dolphins at the end, I am almost certain. As Dr. Theresa would say, and often does, "That's the 1970s for ya!"

10 Greatest Moments of 2012

Hey I see everybody is doing these end-of-the-year lists and it never gets old! So I am going to do one based on my 10 greatest moments of the year as far as I can remember them based on my "blog": 10) The time I ate a salad and watched a rerun of WHAT I LIKE ABOUT YOU. 9) When I had the idea that hardboiled eggs should make a comeback as bar food. Speaking of which, I watched some of THE VERDICT yesterday, and Paul Newman cracks a raw egg into his mug of beer before drinking it in one huge gulp! Seems manly and efficient. That is not one of the 10 greatest moments of 2012, I am just putting things in context for you. 8) The time I took a pain pill and watched GRAPE APE. 7) I watched a FRASIER where Frasier's dad kept beating him at chess. 6) I read that hyraxes defend themselves by "presenting their rumps." 5) When I watched part of a werewolf movie. 4) The time Mr. Belding from SAVED BY THE BELL and Rory from GILMORE GIRLS were on the same episode of MAD MEN! 3) The moment I first realized that Ray from EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMOND was going to make out with Lorelai from GILMORE GIRLS. 2) When I read this sentence: "Renfield has been very sick and has disgorged a whole lot of feathers." 1) Up at 4 in the morning, watching them sell skull-shaped novelties on the Gem Shopping Network.