Franklin Speaks Out on Superhero Love

Cornered at this weekend's Southern Foodways Symposium, the eyes of a garrulous Tom Franklin filled with manly moisture as... Okay. Several points. Number one, we realize that we have implied some sort of cornering of Mr. Franklin's eyes, as if they might be cornered apart from Mr. Franklin's body, or face, and that we need to consult the old Strunk and White to see how this matter might best be addressed. Furthermore, we have no idea what garrulous means. We hope it's something nice. What we really mean to say is, How about it, folks? Can you believe we're already on Chapter 13 of our continuing examination of today's finest writers and the comic books they loved as tykes? On the occasion in question, Mr. Franklin recounted his innocent and youthful fascination with the love affair between Green Arrow and Black Canary, the commencement of which indeed stunned the old "blogmaster" himself, when he stumbled across it - if memory serves - in the back pages of an issue of ACTION COMICS. Mr. Franklin's bawdy speculation upon the marital habits of Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Girl, however, cannot be reproduced here, but will be offered by the publishing arm of the "blog" as a limited edition "chapbook" bound in plain brown paper.

Answers

I hope everyone had fun with the quiz! We certainly received a record number of telegrams here at the Pendarvis Building, so it seems to have struck a nerve in the heartland. The answers are as follows: 3, 6, 7, and 9 were from Ionesco; the remainder were from GREEN ACRES. Congratulations to everyone who guessed correctly! Unfortunately, we can only have one winner. Several "blog" fans pointed out that #9 actually occurred in Ionesco's novel THE HERMIT, rather than one of his plays, as the rules indicated. Kudos! An extra point for all of you! But ONLY Harriet McKeon's whippersnappers at Theodore Christian School noticed the trick "HERMIT" question AND the similarity between Ionesco's play THE BALD SOPRANO (Question #7) and the episode of GREEN ACRES in which Lisa forgets Oliver but remembers Hank Kimball (Alvy Moore, pictured). With that in mind, we congratulate Mrs. McKeon and the entire fifth-grade class... or as we now call them, our "littlest interns"! You should have already received three dozen sacks of mail previously delivered to the Pendarvis Building, anonymous letters which for various reasons must be sorted according to subject matter and turned over to the proper authorities. Have fun!

Chicken Blog

Hey, in my most recent "blog" entry, when I mentioned "chicken bog," I should have added, "Not to be confused with 'chicken blog!'" That would have been funny.

The Amazing Oyster Coincidence and Other Stories

The Southern Foodways Symposium never ends. That's just one of the great things about the Southern Foodways Symposium. For example, last night, when we got home from the Symposium, we called Tom Franklin and Beth Ann Fennelly to thank them for the wonderful stay in their guesthouse. Tom and Beth Ann were on their way to eat a roasted pig by a campfire in somebody's yard. It was kind of a final hurrah for the Symposium, which had officially "ended" that morning. When Theresa and I were on our way home, we stopped for gas somewhere in Alabama and a man and woman got out of their truck and started talking to us about the Symposium! See, it never ends. The man was Tommy Ward of the 13 Mile Oyster Company, who had provided the incredible, beautiful raw oysters we had eaten the night before. And tonight we're cooking a recipe for "Chicken Bog" that we got from the Lee Brothers cookbook. See? It never ends! I met Ted Lee after my panel. Then we saw the brothers later at the mass book signing. Man, that was some book signing. Everybody was eating, even though it was right before the huge oyster supper. Eating and signing and buying books and eating and reading and eating. They had West Indies salad (I just learned this weekend that people who aren't from the Gulf Coast don't know what that is!), sparkling wine and peanut brittle with bacon in it! BEFORE supper! Yes, there was lots of pork with which to reckon. The lunch on Friday included a lemongrass-roasted pork po-boy with crawfish - yes, crawfish! - mashed into condiment form. I'm sure that over the next several days I'll have lots more to say about all the nice people we met and the fine food. Everybody should go to this thing!

Jeff McNeil Is Not a Raving Lunatic

Jeff McNeil formatted his recent contribution to the "blog" quite properly and with astonishing deftness and verve. It is the fault of the "blogmaster" alone that it appeared to contain no paragraph breaks. The "blogmaster," it must now be confessed, does not know how to "do" paragraphs on the "internet." The keen observer will note that not a single of this "blog's" many entries is broken into paragraphs. This was not, alas, a decision brought about by artsiness and daring, but evidence of a particular brand of incompetence for which there is no remedy. We deeply regret any damage to Mr. McNeil's reputation as a stylist. On the bright side, those of you with a printer and some scissors can have loads of fun trying to rearrange the piece into its correct layout. Another "fun project" from your friends in the Pendarvis Building!

Epistle From a Wet Blanket

Hi, everybody! I felt bad leaving you in the "lurch"! So before I go to the symposium to speak on my panel, here is one last dispatch for the "road," this one courtesy of Jeff McNeil, who drives a truck for a large U.S. delivery service. Jeff reports: 5pm: I stop off at this place that's like a Mail Boxes Etc, but they have a name that sounds like a sandwich shop so nobody ever goes in there so, consequently, there's hardly ever anything for me to pick up - which is great! I walk in and ask them about the plane crash. (this is the day the plane crashed into the apt building in NYC) The father and son who work the joint just look at me. -- You guys should get a TV or radio in here or something. -- Then we wouldn't get any work done. I thought they were joking. I've never seen them get off their stools. -- I'm serious. Was that a terrorist plane? Can't you look it up on the internet? -- Well, I'm on the Post Office site right now. -- But did you sign a contract to be on there forever? Can't you open a new window? The son looked at his dad and screwed his face up. The dad shrugged. -- So you don't know anything about the plane crash? -- Somebody said something about it when they came in earlier. The dad said. -- Yeah? Like what? -- Just that a plane hit a building. -- Wow. Okay. So do you have anything for me today? -- Nope. Not today. -- Alright. Well, thanks for all the great information. Ha ha ha. They smiled. I adjusted my suspenders with a snap and left. I'm the only driver at this particular delivery company allowed to wear suspenders because of my accident - which happened on the job - and it's part of the 'reasonable accommodation' clause my lawyer got me as part of my compensation package. They're special suspenders that hold my hips in place, since the accident left me without hip joints. Without the suspenders my hips swivel more freely than Big E's and it freaks people out. NEXT STOP: a distribution warehouse for a large grocery store chain. It's just me and the security guard and a couple of employees passing through on their way out once in a while. First thing I notice is a big pile of boxes and letters, and all of them need labels. I hate that. The security guard comes over. Tells me how tired she is. I tell her that's not a good trait in a security guard. She says she wants to retire. She wants to win the lottery so she won't have to work anymore, or at least get a job at an elementary school in SC, which would be the same thing. I said, uh-huh. Then she walks over to her desk and comes back with a paper in her hand. -- Look at this. -- What? -- Just look at it. My water bill. $195.00. -- That sounds kinda high. -- About $175.00 too high! The toilet was running all month. All month the toilet was running. Can you believe it? -- You didn't hear it? -- We weren't there. We bought the house and then left and didn't go back with our stuff for another month and when we walked in the toilet was running full blast. She walked back to her desk despondent as all get out. -- Now I'll have to go out and buy a bunch of lottery tickets just to try to pay it. Then she started telling me about how she spent $25.00 on scratch-offs and one of them paid $10.00. She called that 'winning'. I loaded up the packages after that and left. Hey, it ain't Rome or Hollywood, but it's America, and it's real, and it's on my route until I get fired. POSTSCRIPT FROM THE "BLOGMASTER": According to Jeff, he explained to the woman that she hadn't really won anything, mathematically speaking, and she called him a "wet blanket."

No Cause For Alarm

I know I've mentioned it before, but the "blog" is shutting down for a few days while the old "blogmaster" heads out to appear on a panel. I've given you plenty to do so you shouldn't get into any trouble while I'm gone. And once you finish the quiz, why not work on your imaginary anthology? Today we're adding a new story to that one: "Do Not Disturb" by A.M. Homes. It's a dilly! We'll keep adding stories until we hit 30 of them. I have ascertained that all good anthologies contain exactly 30 stories. I don't think anyone will bother disputing the fact. Once your special anthology is put together in a tidy fashion, maybe you'll want to work on a haiku or novella for our other imaginary anthology. See? There's no need to get "blue"! You'll be perfectly fine without me. Or, if you just can't stand it, I suppose for your own good you should buy my book to keep you company. But only if it is absolutely medically necessary and prescribed by your doctor. Now dry those eyes.

Tidbit Delights Many

One of our more ambitious "blogging" interns reports intercepting a communique from Caroline Young today. "A dog is better than a job," Caroline is said to have asserted. T-shirts and bumper stickers coming soon.

Oppenheim Crestfallen

A heartbreaking wire from Phil Oppenheim, the brooding curmudgeon whose love of "Gilmore Girls" has long been a sunny respite from his bleak and bitter outlook on the state of modern entertainment. "Shame," reads his telegram in brief. The object of Oppenheim's wagging finger? Yes, the very same "Gilmore Girls." He casts shame upon that which erstwhile brought him his meagre joy! A classically tragic figure, then, this Oppenheim. The mission statement of this "blog" prevents anyone here at the Pendarvis Building from indulging in or perpetrating negativity (or do we mean "perpetuating"? We don't know!), so - despite rumblings of agreement in the mailroom and elsewhere - Oppenheim's statement cannot be elaborated upon here. We merely let it stand.

Green Acres or Ionesco? A Fun "Brainteaser"!

Well, folks, I'm going out of town again, and I didn't want you to feel lonely. So here's a little "quiz" you can take while I'm gone. Send in your answers, care of the "blog." I'll be giving out a prize for nicest try! All you have to do is guess which of the following scenes can be found in the plays of the great French absurdist Eugene Ionesco and which occurred in the classic American sitcom GREEN ACRES. It's just that simple. P.S.: I just "Googled" for "green acres" + ionesco and got 930 "hits." I guess I'm not so insightful after all! Or I should say, there are lots of insightful people in the world so hooray for us. One of them happens to be hilarious comedic actor Dave Foley, who mentions GREEN ACRES and Ionesco in the same breath in this interview. But that doesn't mean it's "fair game" to use the "internet" to help you win the prize! Let's all be good sports and do it the old-fashioned way, by using our "noggins." Answers will be supplied upon my return. Good luck! 1. A man, described as a cocktail waitress, sits silently under a sheet. 2. A toaster will only respond to the verbal command, "Five!" 3. A clock strikes 17 times. 4. A young man relishes a bowl of hot water. 5. Eggs are square. 6. A man is covered in a mountain of eggs. 7. A married couple do not recognize one another. 8. A man repeatedly and irrationally claims to be another man's son. 9. A tree disappears. 10. It rains inside a house. 11. A man obeys the commands of an unintelligible voice coming from a box.

New Hope for the Cyclops

Jamie Kornegay writes in with encouraging news for our struggling anthology STORIES FROM THE CYCLOPS CAFE. It seems that Mr. Kornegay has run across an actual Cyclops Cafe in Seattle, Washington. You know what this means, friends. We have a place for the reading!

Outpouring of Human Feeling Astonishes "Blogdom"

The "blog" drive has been going great, folks. I just want to thank all the volunteers who have been working their "behinds" off to find proper "blogging" material. Special "kudos" to longtime "blog" friend Kent Osborne, who has generously donated a portion of his OWN hard-earned "blog" for use on THIS "blog"! An offer of a kidney could hardly be greeted with more pleasure and gratitude. I have decided to quote the part that doesn't have cussing or bad activities in it. Now let's hear from Kent: "ok, so let's see, friday night i went to see THE DEPARTED with gareth and six (6) other bunkdancers. wow, what a turnout! we wanted to see it at the VISTA, but that was closed for a special screening, so unfortunately we had to go to the GROVE which is an alright place to see a movie, but it took an hour to get a table at the cheesecake factory and by the time our food came we only had like 5 minutes to get next door and find seats. i blame my good friend scott (partly because he's never on myspace, but mostly because it was TOTALLY his fault) anyway, (i don't feel bad about sleeping with his mother anymore, that's for sure) uh, let's see...i thought the movie was AWESOME." The savvier reader will note that I have left in one hint of bad activity, i.e., Kent's saucy implication of hanky-panky with a friend's silver-haired old dam. But Kent lives out in Hollywood, where such things are considered not only natural, but mandatory. None of this quibbling can negate the sheer charitable spirit with which Kent has given so freely of his "blog." I don't mean to embarrass him through my repeated touting of his virtues! But you see, on "myspace," where Kent's "blog" was originally posted, only specially registered "chums" of Kent are allowed to see his "blog." But now, thanks to newfangled technology and old-fashioned sharing, you can see it right here without filling out gloomy and debilitating "internet" forms which go directly into the wall safe of "myspace" owner Rupert Murdoch, who I am sure is a very nice man. Kent's "blog" went on to describe a party he attended with some people from Wisconsin. Details are forthcoming, as soon as the team has inspected them for profanity!

"Blogging" in Crisis: Part Three

You people think I'm kidding but I'm not. I just don't know how long the "blog" can sustain itself. It needs to be fed a constant diet of items about comic books and comic strips, donuts, the fabled Cyclops of yore, Jerry Lewis, "Gilmore Girls," classy fiction (pictured), clog dancing, and Rome - not to mention my crass self-promotion, which is not your responsibility. Heck, I'd even take another item about soccer, seeing as how both of those were pretty scintillating, even though I'm not a big sports fan. Still it makes me feel kind of manly, having it on my "blog." All I'm saying is, use your imagination. Do you live somewhere interesting like Rome or Ohio? Do you eat donuts or enjoy folk dances? Did you used to live in Japan or do graffiti art? Do you know how to "scratch" on a vinyl LP? Did you ever have to carry an "amp" up a flight of stairs for a "gig"? Do you work somewhere? A hospital, maybe? An ice cream parlor? I bet your tales of daily life would fit right in on my "blog"! These things don't cut-and-paste themselves, people. It's time to come together as a nation.

"Blogging" in Crisis: Part Two

A scarcity of "bloggables" continues to plague the "blogging" community. Today, right here in the Pendarvis Building, the tickertape machines have remained ominously silent. Nothing has come through on the subject of the Cyclops, or donuts, or any of the team's favorite topics. Small compensation last night as Theresa and I watched Martin and Lewis in LIVING IT UP on TCM... not quite the film to convert the skeptical into the Jerry fold. Later, calmer Jerry with less high-pitched screeching... THE ERRAND BOY, for example... that's the way to go. And in LIVING IT UP, Dino's role is noticably smaller than Jerry's, to the film's detriment. Though Janet Leigh looks lovely and fresh in some smart frocks. Yes, friends, this is what "blogging" has come to. Only you can help.

R.I.P. Freddy Fender

We were sad at the "blog" to hear that Freddy Fender has passed away. Theresa chipped in with my sister and folks to get me a new turntable for my birthday a few months ago. For whatever reason, the first thing Theresa and I dug out to play was an old Freddy Fender record. His voice just goes with crackling vinyl... so odd, lonesome and mysterious, kind of like a coyote. We miss you, Freddy Fender!

Another Day, Another Cyclops

It has come to my attention through my powerful connections in the world of "blogging" that some of you cannot see the Harryhausen Cyclops whose whimsical capering so blithely illustrates the previous post. Perhaps the problem involves computers! It's delightful, really, the way I did it, it looks as if the bemused Cyclops is peering down at what I have written about him. Simply delightful! Well, don't feel left out. I'm going to try to add a completely different Cyclops picture to THIS "posting." There are plenty of Cyclopes to go around! Today's "blogging" tip: "Cyclopes" is the plural of "Cyclops." Tell your friends! And enjoy the Cyclops.

Stories from the Cyclops Cafe

Speaking of Jeff McNeil, some of our "blogging" interns recently ran across a bit of his ourvre on the old information super highway, as we like to call it here at the "blog." It really took us back, folks, to our pre-"blogging" days, when Jamie Kornegay and your humble "blogmaster" conceived of an anthology of short stories dealing exclusively with that mythical beast the Cyclops. The anthology - which, due to the circumstances of our meeting, as co-authors in the STORIES FROM THE BLUE MOON CAFE series, Jamie and I wanted to call STORIES FROM THE CYCLOPS CAFE, because we are pretty lazy at titles and tend, I suppose, to grab whatever is nearest, speaking for myself, of course - never came to pass. But Jeff's story did, as well as a piece that ended up in my first story collection (thank you, "Find and Replace" function!). As for Jamie, he tried to call his new bookstore "Cyclops Books" until his wife Kelly put her foot down in favor of the slightly more mellifluous Turnrow Book Co. Feel free to submit stories about the Cyclops, care of the "blog." If you want to know how to write a story about a Cyclops, just take an old story (make sure it's one of your own!) and "Find" a particular word, mechanistically "Replacing" it with the word "Cyclops." Just remember, you will never be paid and the anthology will never exist in the real world... only in the mythical land of mystical dreams! One final word of advice: We're talking about a Ray Harryhausen kind of Cyclops (pictured), not the superhero Cyclops, as was the mistaken impression of Tom Bissell, who was on the same sunny porch on the day that the Cyclops anthology was conceived... and forgotten.

Honorable Mention

Exciting news here at the "blog," folks! We already have an honorable mention to award in our current caption contest. It seems that Caroline Young has correctly identified the site of the photo in question as "beneath a sculpture by a Belgian at the Burning Man Festival." Right you are, Caroline! Ms. Young's telegram goes on to say that she has heard the sculpture referred to as "The Belgian Waffle," whereas Caroline has always thought it to resemble, rather, "The Belgian Donut Hole," by which name she has secretly called it in the recesses of her brain. This, of course, ties in with our peculiar fascination with donuts here in the Pendarvis Building. So naturally an honorable mention was in order though, truth be told, Ms. Young did not provide a caption of any kind. Don't worry, gang, there's still plenty of time to wire in your entries - and plenty more honorable mentions to go around! Say, all this talk of donuts reminds us: Last week, Jeff McNeil - a frequent contributor to the "blog" - started a new route in the course of his duties with a major U.S. delivery service. It seems as if the donut shop on Jeff's old route bade him a fond farewell with a free lemon jelly donut. You see, folks, good things still happen in this nutty world of ours!

Asinine Project Bears Wholesome Fruit

In an arbitrary move which should be of no interest to anyone, a few months ago I decided to read one short story a day for a year... just one story per day, no more, no less, each by a different author. You mathematicians will have no trouble discerning the magnitude of my project: 365 stories by 365 different writers. Today I read story #65, "The Stick" by Kobo Abe, translated by Lane Dunlop. It was a real winner! It was so good that I ran out and bought Kobo Abe's novel, THE BOX MAN, which is about a guy with a box on his head in Tokyo. Now that's what I'm talking about! Anyway, it occurred to me that this is the kind of thing that people "blog" about. It's an exciting and titillating way to read: for example, now I want to read EVERY short story by Aimee Bender and Lorrie Moore... but now I have to wait until the year is up, or I'll be cheating! Well, I decided to do a little audit, and I discovered that I want to reread (for the umpteenth time in some cases, though I have tried to stick mostly to stories with which I'm unfamiliar) exactly 20 of the stories (so far) when my self-imposed literary exile is over. Here are those stories: "The Jelly-Bean" by F. Scott Fitzgerald; "Starving Again" by Lorrie Moore; "Feathers" by Raymond Carver; "The Calmative" by Samuel Beckett; "Up, Aloft in the Air" by Donald Barthleme; "So! I've Got You" by Robert Walser; "The Case of the Salt and Pepper Shakers" by Aimee Bender; "Uncle High Lonesome" by Barry Hannah; "Gloomy Tune" by Grace Paley; "Peasant Women" by Anton Chekhov (tr. by Richard Pevar and Larissa Volokhonsky); "Old Mr. Marblehall" by Eudora Welty; "Animals in Our Lives" by Tom Bissell; "Now I Lay Me" by Ernest Hemingway; "Hidden Ball Inside a Song" by Ben Marcus; "Say Yes" by Tobias Wolff; "Winky" by George Saunders; "The Adventures of King Dong" by Jonathan Baumbach; "Train" by Joy Williams; "Water-Message" by John Barth; "The Stick" by Kobo Abe. Now all you have to do is buy 20 books, each containing one of the above stories, find a Xerox machine and a stapler, draw yourself an imaginative cover on a piece of construction paper, and pretty soon you'll have an anthology edited and with an introduction by me (this is the introduction)! As an appendix you'll want to include the story "How it Floods" by Pia Z. Ehrhardt. The day I met her and heard her read, I was compelled to seek out one of her stories... though it violated my little obsessive-compulsive arrangement, as I had already read my "one" story for that day. Well, my friend Beth Ann told me only a jerk would write a book about this kind of exercise, and she was right! I've seen those books in the store and passed them by disdainfully! But I think it's okay to "blog" about. Okay, everyone, get cracking on your anthologies! I'm giving a prize for the best cover.

Caption Contest

I forgot to mention that the photograph below is the subject of this week's caption contest. Please send in your entry - by TELEGRAM ONLY - on or before July 14, 2012. One entry per "blog" reader. The prize, as always, is a three-month internship at the "blog," now including sleeping quarters. Entries will be judged on piquancy and tact. NO SMUT.