8/5/19
I was thankful for the response to the Lake MacDonald plein air painting and felt I should fill in some personal history of the piece concerning my friend Yeva Rubloff.
Yeva Rubloff is the world's oldest living anarchist. I first met Yeva on the Odessa Steps in 1991 not long
after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union. As I stood alone
staring up at one of the most iconic monuments to social change in Europe, as I
prepared to mount the magnificent gateway to the mysterious city of Odessa that
had just been opened up to the West, I noticed a solitary figure sitting near
the top of the steps. Out of breath from the steep hike, I nevertheless smiled and nodded to her as I approached. She returned the smile and, with only a trace of an accent asked me if I had seen the famous scene in Sergei Eisenstein's movie, Battle Ship Potempkin in which, at a massacre during the stirrings of the Russian revolution, a mother was shot and her baby carriage ran out of control down the steps bouncing higher and higher. I said the movie had brought me to Odessa. She mentioned that Eisenstein was a homosexual and that he came out when he was filming in Guanajuato, Mexico, a mysterious city known for its mummies, all of which didn't sit well with Stalin. Then she changed the subject. She told me that I reminded her of the young Bakunin. I took the bait and sat down next to her, thanking her and responding that her tone reflected an almost personal experience with the famous Russian anarchist who had lived a century before.
Her response was unexpected. She told me she didn't believe the rumors that Bakunin was anti-semitic, any more than any other non jew was a hundred years ago that is. She then asked me if I knew that the Crimea was once considered a possible site for the Jewish homeland even before Palestine. I said I was unaware of it. Once again she changed the subject and offered to give me a tour of the city. As we peaked the steps, she announced that when she was very young, the great American anarchist Emma Goldman had introduced her to the Anarchist movement. She paused and pulled my collar down to her lips to whisper that Emma Goldman had personally told her that the greatest disappointment of her life was not being with Alexander Berkman when he shot Henry Clay Frick and that eternity had offered her as consolation the death of the monstrous industrialist on the eve of her deportation to Russia. Yeva shook her head and muttered that Emma's love affair with the October Revolution ended bitterly with the Kronstadt Rebelion.
Yeva Rubloff then took me on a tour of the mysterious city of Odessa, from its architecture frozen in time, to its cobbled streets scarred with threadbare tracks that shuddered and slid the slowly moving ancient trams, to the dark shops full of people torn between ignoring the young westerner and craning their necks to get a glimpse. We dodged the impromptu vendors following us down the alleys waving soviet military hats and coats to end up at the Odessa cathedral where a rousing choir filled my soul with marches, opera and hymns. Between performances, Yeva reminded me of the scene in Eisenstien's film when those responsible for the massacre of 1905 on the Odessa steps took refuge in the Odessa cathedral and were bombarded by the sailors in revolt who had taken control of the cannons of the battleship Potempkin in the harbor below.
As we walked out of the cathedral it was late afternoon and I had to get back to my ship before it sailed. We hurried to the top of the Odessa Steps. Yeva Rubloff gave me a hug and pulled me close to her once more. "Eisenstein wasn't just a homosexual, you know. He was also a Jew."
When I painted the Lake MacDonald landscape many years ago, one of my best friends fell in love with it but couldn't immediately afford my friendly price. Not too long afterwards she became seriously ill. Since she lived in Chicago and I lived in San Francisco, I could not be with her as she struggled with her disease. We kept in touch by phone and email and as things got darker, I decided to send the painting to her as a surprise in hopes of picking up her spirits and helping her with her fight. She was thrilled when it showed up unannounced and I can still hear her hugging and kissing me over the phone. A couple of weeks later I got a call from Yeva. When she answered my confused silence with the opening stanza of the Russian Revolutionary Anthem I was back on the Odessa Steps. It turned out Yeva was a very close friend of my friend without me ever knowing about it. She had emigrated from Russia, befriended and became close to my friend and after hearing about me for years, had only just seen a photo of me. It was then that she realized I was the young Bakunin she had met on the Odessa steps so many years before, and it was then that wicked fate dealt Yeva the duty of informing me that my friend had died of cancer. It was incredibly difficult to reconnect with a mysterious and wonderful acquaintance over the shock and tragedy of the unexpected sudden death of a mutual dear friend and it hung over me for weeks. A light appeared at the end of the tunnel when the painting showed up unannounced at my door. Apparently Yeva had been at our friend's apartment when the heirs descended on it like the harpies in the famous death scene from Zorba The Greek. My painting was a special prize and Yeva had to wade into a whirlwind of screeching greed to wrest it free. And so our acquaintance blossomed and bloomed into one of the most beautiful friendships of my life until an incident involving her own progressively difficult physical condition and the Chicago In Home Health Services resulted in Yeva being institutionalized in a private home for
unmanageable senior citizens. She was taken into custody while visiting Emma Goldman's grave at Forest Home Cemetery and confined to a room with two others. One morning
the nurses found her roommates bound and gagged in their beds. Her bed was
empty. I ofttimes dream of finding her once again at the top of the Odessa Steps and wake depressed. Yesterday another light at the end of the tunnel arrived in the mail, a postcard from Guanajuato.
Dear Eve,
November 2014
I hope you are OK. Have you had your cataract surgery yet? I haven't called cause things are difficult but workable. The most incomprehensible part is that I'm having no sales (zero, zilch, nada) at the shop even though this is the bincest season of the year. I figured I could pick up some sort of part time job (dog walking?) after they let me off and still have the majority of my income from sales at the shop but nothifrrng? I'm beginning to wonder if they are killing possible sale to force me out. Unless I have a hail Mary December, this year will be the worse by far than any in my 28 year career.
I keep tellin' the big guy upstairs that I get it, OK? I'm on my way to bein' the great artist, writer, shmukeroo you always wanted me to be. But how 'bout a little help?
In other news, I looked into the price of having a web site built and found I'd be lucky to get one for three grand then Stu's Dave said he'd build me one for a large painting. IT'S A MIRACLE FROM GOD!
We hope to have it up and running by Saturday and I'll send you the address.
I'm still working on the new novel. I suffered through another rejection of Cannibals from a local small publisher that dicked me around for ten weeks and they never even saw the manuscript.
I've been doing a lot of work on paper that I'm very pleased with. This one reflects my sentimental side and is called On The Window Sill.
Beauty and the Buck
Ina Baby,
The next mornin’, a nip o’ the hair o’ the dog pulls me together an’ I decide to face the day. I thought I oughta check on Rick on account of I couldn’t remember how he got home or me neither as a matter o’ fact. After some knockin’ on Rick’s door fer some time, a gorgeous babe answers. I walks in an’ seein’ Rick on the other side o’ the room with a nip o’ his own in his hand, I says, Rick, I don’t remember this Goddess anywhere near us two bums last night. Did ya decide to switch sides o’ the fence when I wasn’t lookin’? to which he replies, Buck, this is Nancy. Don’t get any ideas ‘cause she is a patron o’ mine as is her husband. Please to meet ya, Doll, says I. It is my sad misfortune that you are already spoken for. Ya might not know it at first glance but I am always sooner than later found to be irresistible to pretty much all members o’ the fair sex an’ was ya not otherwise affianced, it is my opinion that you an’ I would become very familiar with each other. Rick then puts his arm around my shoulder an’ leads me to the other side o’ the room in front of a big paintin‘ o‘ the desert. Buck, says he, Nancy here is admirin’ this landscape. I looks up at the picture an’ says, that’s a good thing, Rick. I bet she ain’t spent two seconds lookin’ at that crazy fuckin’ “Last Supper” o’ yers an’ why would she? That is the work of a very sick man. Then I hear Nancy laughin’ behind us. Buck, says she, I am always glad to meet someone so charmin’, articulate an’ full of self confidence but I am here to look at art, not handsome men. I will consider the landscape, Rick. An’ with that, she turns on her heels, blows us a kiss an’ waltzes her derriere out the door. With my eyes glued to her breathtakin’ backside, I says, Rick, if ya stop paintin’ monkeys burnin’ in hell and start paintin’ that, yer troubles’d be history.
Muchos Besos,
Buck
July 2013
Ina Baby,
I stopped over at Rick's place yesterday an' Doll, I ain't got good news. The poor bastard was locked up with that crazy 'Last Supper' paintin' o’ his paintin’ an’ paintin’ an' playin' Berlioz' Symphonie Fantastique over an' over again. First thing I do is turn off that dumb ass music an' pour us a couple o' belts. Rick, says I, what the fuck? All this nut bag artist shit went out the window a hundred years ago. Ya ain't got a pot to piss in an’ ya ain't gonna make squat waistin' yer time paintin' a bunch o' looney toons. Rick gives me a long hard look, sits down an' takes a snort. I'm just gettin' it outa my system, says he. Just gettin' what outa yer system? says I. Too much pepperoni pizza? Buck, says he, the fires o' hell are burnin, burnin, burnin'. There's a secret court called FISA secretly appointed by that right wing dirt bag Supreme Court Chief Justice that is secretly rewritin' the Constitution o’ the USA so when they secretly spy on ya an' secretly arrest ya an' secretly lock ya up fer the rest o' yer life it's all gonna be secretly legal. No shit, Sherlock, says I. When did ya figure that out? OK, OK, says he. So it's been goin' on fer years, but now there's proof an' hardly anybody's sayin' or doin' a fuckin' thing. Just cause they're not out on the streets or you don't hear about it on the "news" don’t mean people ain't talkin' an’ ain't pissed off, says I. How many people have ya heard talkin' about it? says he. An' Ina, Baby, I'm afraid he got me there so I just shuts up an' stares at the floor. When Rick sees me doing this, he gets up, pours another couple o' glasses o' hootch an' pats me on the back. Sorry, Buck, says he. Whataya say we both go out an' get wasted. An' we did.
Muchos Besos,
Buck
July 10 2013
Hiya Doll,
I walked into Rick's studio last Monday an' he was jumpin' up an' down happy that the sour ol' bitch, Maggie Thatcher that done so much hurt to the British people finally bought the farm. He told me there was a party in hell an' Ronnie Reagan was stokin' the coals waitin' fer his girl friend to show up an' start burnin' fer eternity. He was just finishin' redoin' his last big paintin' called 'Last Supper' in honor o' them two an' all the others not yet but soon to be roastin'. I asked if I could share his inspiration with you, Doll an' he thought that was a great idea.
Muchos Besos,
Buck
4/14/13
Eve,
A dream:
I was in my twenties. I was staying with a kind Italian family of a good friend. They had several children from their teens down to a toddler, an uncontrollably sadistic boy who had taken over the family. He laid by his father with his family gathered around in the living room. Suddenly he lunged for his father's arm and bit a large chunk of flesh out of it. His father screamed in agony and grabbed the hole in his arm trying to stop the spurting geyser of blood. The mother picked up the little monster and walked out side with him. I followed asking her why she was not upset and what was she going to do with her son. She reassured me in a Stockholm Syndrome stupor that everything was going to be alright. The child stared at me with ice cold hatred. His ungodly assault on the world focused on my eyes. I fought back. I bellowed that he was a monster not fit to be locked up in a cage. He leapt form his mother's arms and scuttled off into the under brush. He emerged at the base of power line, climbed to the top, grabbed a wire and let the electricity surge through him before shooting down the line and disappearing. My friend was standing next to me. He said we must go before the child returns with others of his kind. I apologized to the terrified family. My friend dragged me to a car and we drove into town. When we arrived, the town was in a panic. A group of marauding children was picking them off one by one. A man in a bar had his arms torn off. A woman in a restaurant was decapitated. A well known and beloved actor performing a well known and treasured play was surrounded on stage and torn to pieces as the audience fled the theater screaming. I looked around me. My eyes darted here and there. It wouldn't be long now.
I awoke in the depths wondering at how my world had been turned upside down so quickly and knowing the ass hole I work for who owns the collective my business is in could throw me out at any time. I checked out one of the few collectives left in the City a couple of days ago and it didn't come near in quality and I couldn't see even coming close to making a living there. I asked the front desk occupied by a couple of very self satisfied young ladies what the rent was and after a pause they told me with a lift of both of their noses, that the waiting list to get in was 'two miles long'. I smiled and said I'm sure it was.
As I lay in bed trying to hold onto my sanity, I thought of Oliver's Illuminations and wondered why it had been rejected and how the few friends who have read it have not been forthcoming with much comment. Some have reacted quite uncomfortably. Then I thought of how unceasingly brutally honest Oliver is, how they, like myself were raised to think my country was a force of good in the world and how I had learned in three years of research that it is quite the opposite. Not many Americans want to hear that. I thought of how naively sweet the fairy tale story and illustrations in Oliver are and that the contrast of the horror of the facts is almost hallucinogenic, sort of Hans Christian Anderson meets Dachau. Cannibals in the Garbage Can explores the same conundrum but gently, as a witty farce with a tragic ending. Will Cannibals be gentle enough to introduce me to the world? When it does, will the world appreciate the black illuminations of Oliver? Those questions brought me out of the darkness.
Rick
PS Thanks for the kisses.
1/27/13
Hiya, Doll,
Things are so tough that I had to put the lion I sent ya a picture of awhile back up on the alter o' Filthy Lucre .A rich dame that saw pictures of it got all wet when I told her I would sell it to her which made the sacrifice a little easier since I didn't have no money fer Christmas an' now I would. She was in Manhattan when I dropped her a line before the Holidays an' she said she would be in to look at it in a day or two. I have not seen her sorry ass since. Ain't that grand? It now sits dejected up in a corner o' the shop 'cause the owner hates it.
Rick felt so sorry for me about the loss o' my lion an' about bein' fucked by the rich dame, etc. that he made me a lion to replace my lion. It's real big, about the size of a German shepherd an' now resides on my refrigerator. I tell ya doll, if I was gay, Rick an' I would be a item fer sure. ME, TOO! Here's a picture o' my new lion. He says he will paint it what ever colors I want. I was thinkin' lion colors. Whataya think?
Muchos besos,
Buck
PS Did ya get rid o' the shrink?
1/23/13
Dear Descartes,
Ah, therapists, no more than petites parasites of the petite bourgeoisie. Do not pay him another sou! If you wish, I can have him arrested. There are only a few names for the docket this week. Saint Just in particular would be amused by him. As for my last correspondence, I am glad you enjoy a political missive from time to time. I don't want to fall into the maniacal category of so many frustrated fools who spew paranoid delusions but sometimes I stumble upon something so shameful, even for the Royalists, that I have to pass it on.
As for the Royalist Homosexuals you refer to, I have had them arrested. When they faced the Committee on the docket, because it flew in the face of reason that anyone would be a Royalist and a Homosexual at the same time, it was decided that rather than put them to the guillotine, they would be committed to the asylum at Charenton. A very interesting writer by the name of De Sade currently resides there. I hear he is writing a play about the last days of Marat. Perhaps he can find a couple of bit parts for them.
A bout of the crupe has laid me low but I am recovering in time to concentrate on the dismal state of the finances for the revolution. Can you imagine how history would judge me if I failed the revolution because I ran out of money?
And now I have to go. I must take my dear maman to the market. I have heard whispers in the Committee about this practice, that it is below me, even suggestions I have a gendarme accompany her. All falls on deaf ears.
Et maintenant, adieu, ma chere,
Robespierre
1/10/13
Juda’s Kiss
Hiya Doll,
Ya got me thinkin', querida (an' that's the highest encomium I can give) with yer Obama poster. Of all the disturbin' perturbation the Yes We Can Clown has rained down on me, none comes close to his betrayal. I don't mind bein' fooled, bein' taken for a dope, even lied to but betrayal, Doll, there ain't nothin' worse you can do to me.
How many times have I heard friends an' acqaintances say 'Just wait till he gets reelected. Then you'll see the real Obama.' ? How many times? As many times as I prayed they was right. But then I thinks of what he done to Bradley Manning an' what he's tryin' to do to Julian Assange. An' I thinks of Afghanistan an' drones an' cluster bombs an' killin' American citizens with out even so much as a trial in absentia, an' signin' into law the right to arrest an' jail any American anywhere for any amount of time without any charges. An' I sees his DOJ closing medical pot houses all over the country an' I sees him appoint a Monsanto lobbyist as Chief Agricultural Negotiator an', well I ain't got all day an’ you ain't got all day neither.
So I asks myself why? Why is bein' betrayed by the Audacity o’ Hope Dope the twist o' the knife? The lugi in the face? An’ I starts thinkin' about my old man. My old man was a good guy who got lassoed by the booze an' he died a slow an' ugly death in front o' me till he finished himself off an' let his remains clue me in. Not that that ain't no crime, cause it ain't. The booze can get any man, an it does, all the time. It's the dupes who depend on any man, who love any man who sees any man turn to the booze an' away from them, it's them who are betrayed over an' over again like some sorry dame who gets lovin' promise after lovin' promise from her cheatin' husband that he ain't never gonna cheat no more. An' I think them lovin' promises still sit in my gut like a stinkin' tumor, a stinkin' tumor that I didn't know nothin' about. Until now.
So thanks for the memories, Pops, an' thanks for the lugi, Pres., an' thanks to you, Doll for gettin' me thinkin'.
Besos siempre,
Buck
The Devil is Loose in the Land
Ina Baby,
Rick an' I were out for a couple of snorts the other night when we starts talkin' about how the devil is loose in the land. Now Rick says that that ain't all that bad what with the devil pretty much bein' loose in the land 24/7 for ever to which I says shit, he ain't never been so loose in the land as now what with the president of the good ol' US of A decidin' to snuff out our own citizens without no trial, not even in absentia an' with no explanation whatsoever except that they're a member of al qaeda or a 'associated group' at which point Rick starts jabberin' about how if yer lucky enough to get a job in our great country these days it's likely gonna be a job at America's biggest Free Market soul snuffin' employer, WalMart where you will be labeled a associate, an' that there ain't much difference between a soul snuffed Walmart associate an' a snuffed al qaeda associate but I digress. Rick, says I, ain't we supposed to be a nation of laws, not men? Ain't the snuffin' supposed to be ordered by a court of law, not a man, president or otherwise? Buck, says Rick, for all yer experience an' attitude, you are a pathetic idealist. There ain't no such thing as the constitution an' democracy an' liberty an' all that shit no more. It's all theater, smoke an' mirrors, dogs an' ponies. Yeah, yeah, yeah, says I, but ain't this the place where we draw the line? Ain't murder where we draw the line? Well, what with all this heavy shit hangin' in the air we ended up doin' the Dance of the Pachyderms quicker than shit through a tin horn, wanderin' from bar to bar expousin' on the tragedy of life an, as Rick puts it, the futility of it all an' before ya know it, I sees that look in Rick's eyes an’ I figure we’re gonna end up in the hoosegow sooner than later so I says Rick, quit thinkin' about all the shit that you can't do squat about an' start thinkin' about getting laid. He then looks me right in the eye an' gives me a kiss on the cheek an' says, you’re my pal, Buck. Let's get laid. An’ we did.
I am hopin' that you are well an' you are fightin' the shit heads with no fear in yer soul.
Muchos Besos,
Buck
PS Rick is includin' a link to a article about migraine medicine that you sniff an‘ I ain‘t talkin‘ about that kinda medicine.
Zombie Love
Hiya Doll,
Rick an' I were talkin' the other day about all them powerful parasites that run this country an' the world an' I starts thinkin' about vampires. Me personally, I think vampires an' parasites, the human variety of parasites that is are the same kinda freaks except when a vampire sucks yer blood, you become a vampire pronto. Then I start thinkin' about how just about every schmoe in this country is becomin' a vampire suckin' the money an' the property an' the rights outa everybody else an' how, just like vampires, when you get yer life sucked outa ya, you think, well shit, why don’t I start doin’ some suckin’ of my own? Next I starts thinkin' about all them movies an' TV shows showin' all them teenage sex pots that are vampires suckin' the life outa all them teenage girls. What the fuck is that all about? Why are America's teenage girls gettin' turned on by some teenage hunk who's gonna fuck em an' suck em an' turn em into a monster? How did that happen? How did we get to a place where it's a turn on to be a blood suckin' monster? What a way to sell zit cream an' panty hose. An' what about the fuckin' zombies? Every where ya' look if ya' don't run into a vampire after yer blood, ya get run over by some dumb ass corps after yer brains. An' just like a vampire, if some zombie dip shit gets ahold of yer brains, presto chango! yer a zombie too. I guess it's mornin' in America all over again what with yer teen age daughter dreamin' about gettin' porked by a blood suckin' monster at least once before her brains get sucked out by a brain suckin' monster. What's next, vampire zombie love? Bloodless, brainless teenagers hopin' to get a little before their dicks an' tits fall off?
Anyways, that's what I been thinkin' about lately. I haven't heard nothin' from ya in some time an' I am hopin’ rather than you sufferin' more from yer head problems that you are too busy gettin' bumped.
Adios, querida. Write when ya get work.
Buck
Dirt
Eve,
When Stu and I were together in the late seventies, when ever he would get drunk in a bar, let me rephrase that, every night when would get drunk in a bar he would pretend to be Brian Wilson and sing us a song.
I have been reflecting on the bits and drabs you have mentioned of the tragedy you suffered and the funeral you were going to with the two boys and wife without a father and husband. I am sorry. You have also let slip here and there details of your beating and rape that I think led to your migraines. I am sorry. I am impressed how pain and suffering has made you stronger. That's the only choice we have, isn't it? Please feel free to tell me more, or less. That's what friends are for. If you want to call me, I know you're more broke than I am, I will call you back and we can chat.
I still have not been paid for my table. The rich have us all by the short hairs.
I am editing Oliver still and it has been a good idea. I need it to be the best for the last few chances I have. It seems so mild and sweet compared to Cannibals and I suppose that's part of its allure. Maybe not. Even Cannibals seems a bit mild. These are not mild and sweet times. I feel I am struggling to get the big picture, to suddenly have the mist part and understand the surreal America dancing around us all. I have almost parted the curtains a couple of times so I know I will succeed. I can't wait for the epiphany.
I have a lot of dreams of dirt, dirt on my hands, dirt on the rug, dirt in the water, dirt, dirt, dirt. And why not? There is dirt everywhere. The clowns dancing on the television have huge gaping mouths full of dirt. When they line up for a debate, the republican clowns grunt and dirt falls from their mouths on to their podiums. The Clint Eastwood clown during the Super Bowl grunts in a tunnel of dirt. The yes we can clown calls for the return of the American Dream and all I see is a dirty rubber bobbing in a mud puddle. I think I will paint a large painting of dirt. Oil paint is so expensive. Expensive dirt. It's all the rage.
Several local socialites are throwing a dog fashion show in the design center next to my shop. They dress their little dogs up like Robin Hood and Napoleon and Margaret Thatcher and Nero. There was a big spread in the fashion section of the local paper. Little Muffie took the ribbon dressed as a cave man ($750.00 from Gumps) and flew back to The Hamptons with his master first class. Let them eat dog biscuits.
At least I don't feel like cutting something off of myself. If I cut anything off, it will be some heads.
Vincent
I found the desk!
Eve,
I found the desk! It was laying in the dirt and the legs were broken off but I found it! I stood looking at it for a moment, frozen with anticipation. Were my napkins still in there? Could they still be in there safe and sound after all this time? I reached for the drawer and then stopped myself. What if they weren't there? What if there were spiders in there instead of my napkins? What if Tiny Grandma was in there? I heard a sound. I looked toward the rise in front of me and saw something cresting it. It was the potato people! A chill went up my spine. There were several of them and they were somehow different this time. There was something on their heads. Should I run? They couldn't get me if I had a good start. And then I saw it. Then it hit me. They were wearing my napkins on their heads! Oh my God! They had my napkins and they were wearing them on their heads! They had punched holes in them and were looking at me through the holes! My shoulders drooped. I could not save myself. They came at me. Then I remembered the drawer. What was in it? A gun to shoot them? A knife to stab them? I yanked it open: no gun, no spiders, no Tiny Grandma, just a poem. Just this poem.
Dirty rubbers in the gutter.
I walk through the city’s winter streets and
dirty rubbers in the gutter taunt me.
I breathe this sticky detritus for fear of not breathing
Even though
Death
Is a comforting companion to the frightened and confused.
Life grinds on.
Dirty rubbers cling to the flesh of the city.
The air of the city is a stale puff of cigarette smoke huffed
from the dry mouth of a listless slut leaning against a lamp post,
A reeking pile of shit next to still forms beneath piles of rags.
Life grinds on.
Dirty rubbers suck at the soul of the city.
Its citizens are drifting wraiths moaning in front of pretty windows
full of shiny toys,
pretty windows in the street,
Pretty windows in their pockets.
Life grinds on.
Yellow sky hangs on the towers above me.
As I shuffle beneath the steel cathedrals raising like tomb stones,
The priests within them look down and smile.
Their rancid imprecations rattle out of the smirking mouth pieces of
dead cold windows.
They lovingly stroke the mantles of war and terror
they proudly wear on their shoulders. The world is theirs
and their glinting eyes caress it.
Their steps are quick, their shoulders squared.
They parade through their halls of bureaucratic death,
Corpses admiring their reflections.
They toss a shower of sanctified fear upon my head,
A clatter of dirty rubbers that slaps into the gutter
at my feet.
I stop and look up at them.
I smile at the thought of prying open their jaws
and dropping the dirty rubbers into their mouths one at a time.
I see the terror in their eyes
as the oozing rubbers slide to the back of their throats.
They swallow and gag and gasp for air.
The ripe odor of sold sex boils up their noses.
This is not torture, I purr. It’s enhanced interrogation.
And whatever you have to tell me will fall on deaf ears.
For now we are all, each and every one of us,
dirty rubbers in the gutter.
R.
PS More clashes yesterday and last night in Oakland between Occupy Wall Street and Police. At the noon rally before violence broke out, the first speaker said this:
"Passionate, organized hatred is the element missing in all that we do to try to change the world. Now is the time to spread hate, hatred for the rich."
Why are you so fat?
Eve,
Tracy Doe was found floating face down in the Chicago river today. DNA identification was needed as the body had been chewed by fish or eaten away by toxic sludge. Results identified her as a local receptionist at a botox clinic. No other information was released by the coroner's office.
I had suspicion about a $17 dollar check the other week and called Wells Fargo to put a stop on it. The last time I put a stop on a check was a couple of years ago and they charged me $9.99. Hey, seven bucks is seven bucks these days. Tracy, the receptionist on the phone informed me the new fee is $29.99.
A couple of months ago, a banker from Wells Fargo by the name of Tracy called me at home and asked if I would like to switch my savings account to a money market account to earn more interest. I told her I was fine with the .000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000002 interest I was currently earning annually but asked her any way what the difference was between the two types of accounts. Tracy said really, nothing except I would be earning more interest. I then asked Tracy the same question again. Tracy said there was a tiny little fee they would charge me if my savings got below 5 K , a tiny little fee of $15 a month. I said I was a little too close to 5 K in my account to consider that and Tracy asked me if she could at least send me the paper work for me to look over. Go ahead, Tracy I said and she did and I stuck it in the drawer. A week after that I got a letter from Tracy welcoming me to my new money market account. I took the letter down to the bank and showed it to a teller named Tracy who informed me that my money had been transferred to a money market account. Shaking with rage, I demanded to speak to a banker and was directed to another banker named Tracy. Tracy apologized profusely and transferred my money back to an ordinary account. A day after that, I got a letter from Tracy #1 saying that if I didn't sign the forms she sent me immediately, she could not guarantee my money would be safe. I called banker Tracy #2 who said the letter must have been mailed before the account was switched back and just tear it up. I said, "Tear it up? Tracy, you must be insane. Put in writing all that has illegally happened and mail it to me." No apology this time. A day after that I tried to do some online banking and where my savings account used to be was a nice suggestion saying, why not open a savings account? I called right away and was directed by another guy named Tracy how to set the web site right. No apology this time either. A day later I stopped at the ATM to transfer some money from my savings to my checking and a suggestion popped up on the screen saying, why not open a savings account? I stomped into the bank and was directed to a banker with a name tag that read Tracy. "Tracy,", I said. "You are the one who started all this mess. It's so good to finally meet you. When are you going to Jail?" She tittered and chuckled and offered an explanation. "It was an accident." "Tracy,", I said. "That's what Betty Davis said in The Letter when she was asked how she managed to pump six bullets in David Newal. 'Tell him there has been and accident and Tracy is dead.' " I never did get anything sent to me in writing.
A hundred and one dollars a month? Why that's nothing! It won't even buy you a meal in a decent restaurant. You people have a lot of nerve complaining what with the government giving you all your entitlements and you having the audacity to live so long, so long that you are bankrupting the nation and enslaving future generations in debt. The country would be so much the better with a hell of lot fewer of you. Why are there so many of you? You people are so god damn worthless you just get in the way. Why are you people always whining and whining? 'I lost my job. I lost my savings. I lost my apartment. I was beaten and raped -woe is me.' You get free money from Social Security and free health care from Medicare. You get free money if you don't do your job and get fired. And what's all this about the rent? There are warehouses to sleep in and churches to hand out free food. You don't even have to work at all. Everything is just handed to you on a silver plate. You live in the greatest country in the world with the best health insurance and the best schools and the biggest meanest military the world has ever seen and how do you thank those of us who actually paid for it? You piss and moan. Christ! I can hear you all the way up on my twenty fifth floor co-op on Fifth Avenue! "I'm poor. I'm poor." If you are so poor, why are you all so fat? Don't eat so much. Save some money. And now you're complaining about running? Running is good for you. If you ran more, you wouldn't be so fat. The people say they have no bread. Then let them eat sizzlean. Sizzlean is cheep. Sizzlean has forty percent less fat that bacon. If you ate sizzlean maybe you wouldn't be so fat. How much sizzlean can you buy for a hundred and one dollars? Shut up and get a job or move your fat asses to Russia or Cuba or North Korea or FRANCE!
Robespierre
In a message dated 1/27/2012 11:30:23 A.M. Pacific Standard Time, punimst@aol.com writes:
You're The Bomb.
Love,
I.
Never ever hate your life when I'm part of it. Love, r.
I.
What is with these fucking rich shit heads?! They've had my table out for a month now and still won't send it back or pay for it! The decorator says they're uber rich, flying all over the world etc. hard to pin down. FUCK! Do you go to a grocery store and take out bags of groceries without paying for it and after eating everything and shitting it out, fly off to the Cayman Islands to jerk off with your money and maybe a month later tell the grocer that you're still thinking about paying for the groceries? Five Grand to these assholes NOTHING.
Don't get me started on rich shit heads. I can't even express the hate I'm walking around with.
One day, I dunno, some day about a week ago, I had to go to the neurologist's office. Get there, sign in, and there's Tracy, the Botox lady, at the reception desk. She said, "YOU don't have an appointment today." I pulled out my book and pointed, said, "Yep...reschedule Dr. Cherchi appointment per Tracy." She looked me right in the eyes and said, "That didn't happen." I caught a glimpse of my doc walking through and thought I was going to cry so I quietly left. In and out in three minutes. The next day I had to call the nurse about a procedure code and she insisted that I "report the incident" to the office manager. Hell! I didn't know who the manager was because that (alleged) support staff changes throughout the day. She said, "I'm going to tell Blanca (Blanca?) what happened & that you'll be calling her tomorrow." Called Blanca and she asked, "Do you need to see Dr. Cherchi?" I said, "Not necessarily. He wanted a follow-up halfway between Nov & Feb Botox appointments..." So I did it. BFD.
I was already feeling fucking defeated.
Walked a few blocks to my bank to learn that when I called Chase to stop payment on the check I sent to the computer hackers (I'm so smart...figured I was creating a pretty good paper trail), they didn't actually stop it. No one said a word about it taking 2-3 business days. The bank I've been with since 1962 did not have my back. Now I'm furious.
Took a cab to the Attorney General's office downtown...so I'm already agonizing about being in the fucking Loop with all the crowds in the rain. They gave me some papers to fill out and were kind & respectful, not giving me false hope, which I appreciated. Then I had to go to the police department in my neighborhood. At this point, I'm dragging, shlepping, hating & really don't have the resources to be taking cabs all over the city. A white-shirt, Sgt. Hernandez, couldn't be disturbed from putting her lip gloss on so she handed me a piece of paper with the three credit reporting bureaus and their 800 numbers. She was done with me. No documentation came out of my bag for this bitch. She was having none of it. I left, checking the wall of photographs for Commander Emil Giese, hoping I could deface the picture in some way. He was the guy who, after being stalked, raped & beaten in '81, actually asked me, "Can't you just look at it as a bad lay?" No such luck. Emil, now dead, is not stuffed or pictured anywhere. When I left the police station, I was actually running -- for the first time in years. It was pure rage. This, over $149.95. God, I didn't need any of this shit. It was not a place I could pull my ass over and take a shot or a pill so I grabbed another cab. There's no way I could have bought lunch but I did a day in cabs all over the place.
There IS no peace.
Every day has brought a new surprise. Until 5:00 today, I thought I was losing my apartment. Finally, my contact at Chicago Housing Authority came up with a new strategy. They turned my condo owner down for a $40 raise in rent and increased mine $101 a month. Where-the-fuck am I going to get an extra hundred bucks a month...in the Catskills? The new strategy is I signed myself up for THERAPY because if I show $20 out-of-pocket every other week, I will have met the requirements to stay put.
I hate my life.
I see the shrink tomorrow. Well, he's sorta shrink-like, poor thing. I did it for several years just to move the papers. My real shrink, an exquisite human being who really saved my life many years ago, died in '93. Everything since then has been to please the government. This guy, Dr. Yufit, a seventy-ish sawed off little Jew, is a nice man, sadly ineffective, but served a purpose. One short bus ride, right to the elevator, water in the waiting room and interesting enough magazines. I can do this. He always had sort of an odd crush on my psychiatric history, not to mention my psychiatrist. He's a little touchy about being a psychologist...but apparently not touchy about having the worst comb over in the history of mankind: It looks like Sizzlean.
Back to the rich shit heads. They win. They always win. And we wait. That's what we do. I can't believe my bitterness at people who never have to worry about losing their home or their income -- or their fucking health. "Why wouldn't you go to Mayo?" asks the anti-Semitic Dr. Professor Rubloff. "Are you that strapped?" No, I'm making it up for attention. Now, please roll up your pocket protector and stick it up your ass.
And YOU should calm down?
Naw! Go ahead and hate with me. I need you on my team. The assholes with the table are probably insulted that you're not O.K. that they're "good for it." When my niece graduated from law school, my brother bought her a co-op in Manhattan and was absolutely indignant that The Board wanted to interview him first. That entitlement is repulsive. In fact, maybe he's the one with your table, wondering, "What is HIS problem??"
Please calm down only for health reasons -- but stay pissed. There is no justice in any world. We're in limbo and, with our luck, we'll both live to be 114, die & come back as us.
I'm sitting in a puddle of hate. My shoulders are several inches above the top of my head. I absolutely want to hurt someone.
Rick, I was running down the street. Running!
So other than my fake shrink appointment tomorrow, I'm doing life in my dorm room.
I have to calm down. I can't have another episode like the one in the elevator today. I got on and a young woman followed with a horrible little dog. Every young adult in the city has a little dog these days. What the fuck is the matter with them? Don't they have something better to do with their time like go to parties or fuck or dance or sing? All they do is walk the dog. How are they going to feel when they're old and look back at their youth full of horrible little animals that do nothing but whine and howl and shit? There are plastic bags full of shit every where you go now. It would almost be better if they weren't forced to pick up the dog shit. At least the rain would wash it away. When archeologists sift through the detritus of the 21st century they will find millions and millions of little plastic bags full of dog shit and look back in horror. The little dog in the elevator started barking at me. "Oh, fluffy. Stop barking at the nice man.", pleaded the brain dead bitch. The dog barked louder, working his way into a fury. I looked down and said "Now fluffy. I've had enough of your barking. Your going to have to stop." but Fluffy barked louder and faster. "What's the matter, Fluffy?", I asked. "Can't you hear me?" "Oh, Fluffy.", the woman wined. "Why won't you listen to mommy?" Fluffy flew into an snarling fit. I raised my foot in the air. "What's the matter, Fluffy? Can't you hear me? I said stop barking!" I slammed my foot down onto the little monster. "Can you hear my now?!" I roared. I stomped again and again. "Can you hear me now!? Can you hear me now!?" Blood spattered all over the floor. There was no more barking, only the crunch of bones and squash of guts. The girl screamed and fainted. I kicked the mutilated corps through the elevator grate and it slid down into the elevator shaft. I mopped up the blood with my under shirt and threw it down after the dog. The elevator stopped at my floor. I opened my wallet and found only a five and a couple of ones. I tossed them at the girl and stepped out. Those fucking sons of bitches better pay me for my table or there will be hell to pay.
This is one hysterical rant. Thank you, thank you, thank you! I am a dog lover...which is exactly why I don't have one. Why would I impose my depression on a dog? "Sorry, Grandma can't get out of bed for the next three days...fetch me a Xanax." When I say I'm a dog lover, I mean REAL dogs, not those fucking little yippers that live in blonde purses. I, too, can hear them crunching under my foot. I think the girls like 'em because they distract from unsightly facial hair and thick ankles.
NOW WHAT DO WE DO?
NOW WHAT DO WE DO?
Drugs and bed for Grandma.
Be well. I'll hate the rich shit heads with you. And to add insult to injury, my curser is going wild again. Can you hear the screaming inside my head?
...when I can.
Bet those asswipes are thinking, "It's just a table." I'm sorrry.
With love and no editing,
Ina
Dog blood on my hands
I.
What is with these fucking rich shit heads?! They've had my table out for a month now and still won't send it back or pay for it! The decorator says they're uber rich, flying all over the world etc. hard to pin down. FUCK! Do you go to a grocery store and take out bags of groceries without paying for it and after eating everything and shitting it out, fly off to the Cayman Islands to jerk off with your money and maybe a month later tell the grocer that you're still thinking about paying for the groceries? Five Grand to these assholes NOTHING. I have to calm down. I can't have another episode like the one in the elevator today. I got on and a young woman followed with a horrible little dog. Every young adult in the city has a little dog these days. What the fuck is the matter with them? Don't they have something better to do with their time like go to parties or fuck or dance or sing? All they do is walk the dog. How are they going to feel when they're old and look back at their youth full of horrible little animals that do nothing but whine and howl and shit? There are plastic bags full of shit every where you go now. It would almost be better if they weren't forced to pick up the dog shit. At least the rain would wash it away. When archeologists sift through the detritus of the 21st century they will find millions and millions of little plastic bags full of dog shit and look back in horror. The little dog in the elevator started barking at me. "Oh, fluffy. Stop barking at the nice man.", pleaded the brain dead bitch. The dog barked louder, working his way into a fury. I looked down and said "Now fluffy. I've had enough of your barking. Your going to have to stop." but fluffy barked louder and faster. "What's the matter, Fluffy?", I asked. "Can't you hear me?" "Oh, Fluffy.", the woman wined. "Why won't you listen to mommy?" Fluffy flew into an snarling fit. I raised my foot in the air. "What's the matter, Fluffy? Can't you hear me? I said stop barking!" I slammed my foot down onto the little monster. "Can you hear my now?!" I roared. I stomped again and again."Can you hear me now!? Can you hear me now!?" Blood spattered all over the floor. There was no more barking, only the crunch of bones and squash of guts. The girl screamed and fainted. I kicked the mutilated corps through the elevator grate and it slid down into the elevator shaft. I mopped up the blood with my under shirt and threw it down after the dog. The elevator stopped at my floor. I opened my wallet and found only a five and a couple of ones. I tossed them at the girl and stepped out. Those fucking sons of bitches better pay me for my table or there will be hell to pay.
R.
Eve,
I got so pissed off at the San Francisco Chronicle, known anywhere else in the country as a liberal rag and known in San Francisco as just another corporate mouthpiece, that I did something I've never done before. I wrote a letter to the editor. I rewrote it a couple of times to try and be nice (and bring it down to the 200 word maximum) and in fact it was too nice but I sent it anyway and they didn't print it. Behold:
The Occupy movement has got The Chronicle in a snit. While columnists C.W. Nevius and Chip Johnson rant that Occupy Oakland and San Francisco are unsanitary squatters who harm local businesses, political cartoonist, Meyer depicts protestors keeping truckers from their jobs. A front page article on December 13th titled “Blacks don't feel drawn to white led movement” complains that African Americans made up only 10% of the Occupiers in Zuccatti Park. African Americans make up 13.6 % of the population. Above the article is another titled “Protestors celebrate blocking port access”. The photo for that article features an African American protestor. As Rick Perry would say, “Oops”. The article laments the loss of wages by truck drivers kept from doing a day’s work. Trucking at American ports was deregulated in the 1980’s. Truckers have no health insurance, pension or unemployment benefits. They often work under degrading and dangerous conditions and after expenses make around ten dollars an hour. The Occupy movement is helping to expose this injustice. On December 14th, an article titled “Occupy looking beyond blockades” states that some independent truckers lost as much as $1000 dollars when the port of Oakland was shut down for a day. That’s about $125 an hour. “Oops”.
A word from Buck:
Now that the Indefinite Detention bill that lets the fascist government lock any sad sack away for ever without due process has been passed by both houses an' the Yes We Can Clown promised to sign it, I want you, Ina baby to savor with mucho appreciation all your back and forth with yours truly while yours truly still walks the streets. I am still workin' with Rick on the new book an' you will be pleased as punch that I have put the pointy yarn of my pre induction physical all them years ago I told to you into it, an' as for any of you zipper heads readin' my email and listenin' to my phone calls, I ain't no terrorist an' by the way, fuck you. Rick is kinda encouraged cause he's got a couple of supportive rejections from agents on the order of "Wow, I like this but I'm swamped or Very interesting and I think you have something here but I'm swamped". It's gonna be a hard candy Christmas around here as Rick's business is sufferin' from the intentional recession/depression that the Marie Antoinettes of the world purposely foisted on us so they could steal what's fuck all left. Both Rick an' me are tryin' to cut down on the cocktails, an I ain't talkin' about Molotov cocktails, ass holes. Did I say fuck you? Me an' Rick an' Bill an' Rohda an' Robespierre an' Ilyich an' Karl are plannin' on havin' a quiet couple of holidays. I hope you are stayin' away from the migraines and gettin' porked a lot.
muchos besos, querida,
Buck
We are many, they are few
Eve,
"Death solves all problems. No person, no problem." Joseph Stalin
My feet were caked with dirt. I washed them in a pool of stagnant water. I opened a broken drawer of the filthy desk and pulled out a pair of worn white socks. Some one handed me an old calendar on which I'd scratched illegible notes and X's on all the dates. This and the puppet were the only things I took with me. I tried to fold up the puppet but it broke in my hands. All the sticks with little heads on them were in splinters and the cloth with the face on it was torn. I could hear them in the distance now. Every one was running before them in a panic. I began to run.....
I skipped the pomp and ceremony for the tenth anniversary of 9/11. What I did catch tore me up. People jumping from the flames a hundred stories up, fifteen seconds of life left as they plummeted to earth, their make shift parachutes shredding. All those people dead so Dubya and Dick could steal Iraq's oil. All those Iraqis dead. All those American soldiers dead and horribly wounded. Mission accomplished. Now it's time to get rid of the "entitlements". Now it's time to get rid of government. When you hear the loudspeakers braying that government is not the solution, government is the problem, that government should just get out of the way, the word government is dog whistle for democracy. The high tech weapons and surveillance developed to fight the "war on terror" were developed to fight the war on democracy. The dictatorship is almost in place. The black messiah who was elected with hope is now running for reelection on fear. The evil republican army of trolls must be defeated so the dear leader can rule with benevolent magnanimity.
What is most interesting, ma chere is the various manifestations of tortured denial Americans are going through as their world collapses all around them, as their leaders betray them and beat them and rob them. Perhaps some Shelley to fortify us as we stand before the breach:
Stand ye calm and resolute,
Like a forest close and mute,
With folded arms and looks which are
Weapons of unvanquished war.
St. 79
The old laws of England — they
Whose reverend heads with age are gray,
Children of a wiser day;
And whose solemn voice must be
Thine own echo — Liberty!
St. 82
Rise like Lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number —
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you —
Ye are many — they are few.
Toujours avec toi,
Robspierre
Eve,
The last thing you have ever done is let me down. I just love hearing what YOU think. I had no idea you sent the blog off to so many people and I am humbled by your attention. The hard fact is that almost NOBODY has the time or the inclination to read period, let alone something different and most important of all, unpublished. Anything not yet "legitimized" is almost always brushed off as amateurish especially if it is different. NO friends of mine, ZERO have read more than a couple of pages but they still think it is wonderful and support me in their own way. That way can be very strange sometimes like the email Stu sent me the other day about a free class I should attend on how to write children's books (???!!!) Lord, give me patience. My dear old mom has read one of the final drafts and though she is incredibly well read and she likes it, she is ninety and Italian. Bill is the type who doesn't read novels, never has, though I do read the book to him and he likes what he hears. He is brilliant but not in an artistic way and that has been a plus for our almost thirty years together. So that leaves you, Eve, my mysterious muse from the far off Midwest. I hope you consider it an honor. I do.
I am flattered of course that everyone loves the art work which is somewhat of a paradox as I think the writing is more sophisticated in its fairy tale way (Shut up, Buck!). I have heard the "too wordy" comment before which I find at first amazing since the book is a mere 40,000 words, more of a novella, really. People seem to think that since there is an illustration for every page, I don't have to write about what they can see in the picture. The thing is, the illustrations are an added plus or bonus. The writing is all about the visual and the poetry and the rhythm and emotion of words. The development of the story is intentionally slow in order to create the mood and establish the characters so you really care for them when they are about to be beheaded by catamites or see their lover crushed under the weight of a naked, thirty foot, purple Apostolic Prayer Warrior.
A couple of the agents want a complete synopsis as well so I have written one (a first draft. I'll include it in this email) and reading it is illuminating. It's just one adventure after another after another and you don't get the frustration and love and loss and anger the book conveys unless you actually read it, all of it. The whole idea of the book is to take an around the world tour to tell what America has done to country after country in the name of power and greed. Making that little jaunt without sounding preachy or worse, boring is a difficult assignment, hence the Gulliver's Travels - Alice's Adventures in Wonderland format: an American Empire Primer, a children's book for 300,000 naive Americans who have little or no idea that this has been done in their name because it has been purposely kept from them. Of course, the bottom line is that telling the painful truth pisses the hell out of people. They don't want to hear it, it's simply not true and how the fuck DARE I tell it. I had a renowned professor from a renowned university look at me like I was crazy when I told him about our 'School of the Americas' in Fort Benning Georgia that has been spewing out Latin American dictators, torturers and murderers since the end of World War II. It's a steep hill for me and Sisyphus, I ain't.
The new book is an actual novel and as much as the bitch rides me, I love her and know I can't live without her. The financial situation is the most distracting and worrisome. In thirty years in the antique business, I have never seen it so bad. More weathered dealers say prices have not been so low since the depression and what a fucking surprise that is. What is big in San Francisco, at least is IT and biotech. We are getting a flood of young technicians and the rents are going through the roof. I pay $1500 a month for my studio with a garage but it would rent for $2500 easy now. Thus my worry. If I can't keep it, there's nowhere for me to go so it's "Onward, into the breach, my friends!" My rage keeps me going. Michelle Bachman and now Rick Perry both say that God has told them to run for president. God talks to me all the time. He tells me to quit bothering him.
But here I am going on and on and on and on about myself. The two of us, God and myself are ecstatic that your migraines have let up, that you have been socializing and getting out in the sun, and of course, most importantly seeing your gentleman caller.
Well, I gotta go. Thanks for being patient. Here is the illustration of our four heroes rowing through a sleeping pod of slimy, belching, farting CEOs. The synopsis follows.
Love,
Rick
Synopsis: Oliver’s Illuminations - An American Empire Primer
It is 2006. Oliver dreams he is a little boy terrorized in a dark house by our forty-third president, his Vice President and his Secretary of State. When he wakes, he stomps off into the night in search of a double scotch on the rocks. He is furious and at a loss that, in the wake of two wars, a Kafkaesque security state and a mountain of debt, everyone is obsessed with the latest tech toy, the latest Hollywood scandal and the latest home loan. Before he can get near a bar, he is mugged by a well heeled gang of thugs and offered up for sacrifice to the goons in his nightmare. Pat and Nanette, a pair of flying dogs rescue him and start him on a journey of illumination of the American Empire. They begin in Egypt where a God-awful sphinx wannabe spouting Kissinger platitudes chases them to the Nile. A snarling baby Moses bobbing in the reeds provides and excellent projectile that stops the monster in its tracks. They escape down river and meet a sixty foot saurian fabulist who tells them about America’s very own terrorist training school. He presents them to Claudia, an orphaned Chilean beauty who sails the skies in a balloon of bankers’ skins. She makes love to Oliver and takes him and the dogs in her balloon on an adventure throughout Latin America. They meet a socialite heifer in leopard spandex, an amorous barman, a swarm of green brokers, talking corpses, singing mummies, a cynical centipede and a sarcastic geoglyph who expose a litany of coups and repression America has unleashed upon the continent. On a moonlit night above the rainforest, the balloon is ambushed by an Apostolic Prayer Warrior and Oliver and his girl are separated. The dogs get him to Valparaiso where a match maker sets him up with Conrad, a Minotaur of a man who seduces him and takes him and the dogs on a tramp steamer West across the Pacific. He meets the Iguana captain and her crew and learns of our forty first president’s invasion of Panama and of the American annexation of Hawaii. The four of them are kidnapped by Catamites who tell them of the conquest of the Philippines. The Catamites are murdered by Mormons who kidnap them once again. They are delivered to Vivian, a nine foot drag queen with a square head who relates the agony of Viet Nam. When he tries to behead them, they are saved by Catamites and the crew of the tramp steamer. The following night they are put off the steamer just before it is attacked by a pod of CEOs. They row to an island where Komodo dragons begin the story of the Indonesian genocide. The dragons introduce them to a priest who finishes the tale and lends them a dragonfly of an aircraft that gets them to Iran via Diego Garcia. In Tehran, a beautiful woman named Amira tells Oliver the story of the American 1953 coup. They are ambushed once again and Amira is captured. Nanette and Conrad are wounded but they escape in a 1933 Bugatti coup. They race through the dessert to Bagdad where Oliver confronts the power that has ruthlessly oppressed countries all over the globe for over a century in the name of the purposely uninformed American people. It is impressed with Oliver and asks him to join the elite few who plan to inherit the earth. When he refuses, he is set upon and saved one last time by his girl who returns in a felucca with a sail of banker skins. The reunion is wonderful but the journey is at an end. The world he has come to know is being devoured by the one he has left and he wakes up for a final time. He is heartbroken that his friends and lovers are gone but he is filled with the knowledge of the world he has lost and is determined to change the world he has returned to.
Cookies
Ina, Baby
I'm fillin’ in for Rick once again. He says he is 'sequestered' which I take to mean, don't fuck with me as I am bein’ some kinda hoity toity writer or somthin‘. As I always do when I hear such bullshit as that, I ask him what good is sittin around in a dark closet in front of a computer with your thumb up your ass listenin’ to that wobbly, tobbly music from south India, an he says, Buck, this time I am writin’ a very important part of the book where all the characters gets together in the bar on the ship and expound their ideas on why the country is now a drooling, gurgling, shit for brained, shoulda been aborted, eight hundred pound accident, all the time writin’ it in such a way as to make it a symphony. Yadda, yadda, yadda, I says. Knock yourself out. I will relate the condition of your sorry ass to Ina which I have just done.
Ya know, Ina, baby, in a way Rick ain't that far off the mark. I was at a dinner the other night with him an a buncha other rubes when the subject of how we have more people in jail in this country than any other country now or ever comes up. Rick starts telling’ the crowd how the dick heads who are tryin’ to privatize the country have done a bang up job in doin’ the same with the prisons in the country an how they are turnin’ these gray bar hotels into slave factories puttin’ out everything from flack jackets for the grunts fightin’ in Muslimistan to regular shit like processed chicken an beef an eyeglasses, an how they are shuttin’ down a lotta small businesses what with payin’ the prisoners zilch since the fifty cents an hour they get goes to room an board. Everyone seemed kinda blown away about all that an the fact that the private prison system is lobbying the feds and the states to give even longer prison time for smoking’ pot an lookin’ cross eyed at a cop so's they can get even more slaves. I was about to say that there's a couple of hundred thousand potential chicken an beef pounders on Wall Street that have been over looked by the Yes We Can Clown in the White House when before I can open my trap, some fruit loop next to me starts squakin’ about how the prison system has to be privatized because there is so much corruption which he knows to be a fact because a friend of his told him that when he delivered some cookies to a relative in prison, all the cookies got absconded with and the relative got no cookies whatsoever, all the time spewin’ such swill at the top of his lungs while waving’ his arms in the air, arms I might add, that were large an fat an draped in one of the ugliest shirts I have seen since 1976, but I digress. While I am bein’ assaulted by all this shit pourin’ outa this loony tune's mouth, I happen to look over at Rick an I see him getting redder an redder in the face. I figures I better say somethin before all hell brakes loose so I yells as loud as I can, "Cookies? Cookies? What the fuck are you talkin’ about?", an that seemed to do the trick by causin’ laughter all around.
I almost forgot that Rick wanted me to tell ya that he really appreciates you goin’ over his latest query letter an also sendin’ off Oliver's Illuminations to various victims. He says he finds the negative reactions such as 'too wordy', "too condensed' an 'no place to take a breath' a interesting insight to the (an I'm gonna quote the high mucky-muck himself here,) "necessary rush of information in a simple, childlike format that the three hundred million children in this country so desperately need." Well, stick that in your pipe an smoke it, I says to him. He kinda turned red an asked if you might pass on any of the positive reactions you might have been privy to if there was any, to which I says, what the fuck do you care? Maybe you oughta think about changing’ the sound track in that cave of yours, Swami.
Well, doll, that's about it for now. Both of us are hopin’ you are avoidin’ those fuck all head aches an are not fallin’ down any more. We are expectin’ a full report.
Hasta la proxima, querida.
Buck
Nam
Ina, Baby
When you asked me if I was ever in Nam. I am thinking I told you about Nam but my memory ain't too good either these days. Anyways, here goes. Nah, I really wasn't in the Navy in Nam but Nam did jump outa hell an try to grab me by the balls. I was in college (an that's the truth) hooked up with a shiny blond babe, the one and only blond babe I ever hooked up with as I swore off blonds after her an only went for brunettes an red heads, when Tricky Dick decides he’s gonna nix college deferments and put out a lottery on the last year of the draft. Shit outa luck morons who drew a hundred or less were all gonna die in some shit hole swamp in Nam an I was number 44. I wasn't the robust specimen of manhood I am today an Nam, jail, Canada or never porkin my shiny blond again gave me an ulcer. The Doc looks me over, puts me on Belladonna an durin the rest of the check up notices I have real flat feet. He writes a letter to the Army sayin I am a wuss with an ulcer an recommends me to a commie foot Doc who looks at my feet an says I have a 50-50 chance of foolin the Army. The commie foot Doc writes a letter to the Army foot Doc sayin I am a cripple wuss. He then writes a bunch of mumbo jumbo to prove it an tells me to go out an buy the weirdest pair of shoes I can find an before ya know it, this double wuss is standin naked with a bunch of other naked wusses in the Army preinduction physical. I see this fairy Doc goin from wuss to wuss puttin his finger under their balls an telling them to cough. When he gets to yours truly, an I ain’t braggin here, it just happened, OK? he starts feelin me up like Henry Kissinger feels up a whore just before he snuffs her. I finally have to grab his ear and give it a yank in order to wake him outa his fairy dreams. But I digress. The rest of the day is the usual Nazi routine marchin from station to station gettin checked out to see if I am fit enough to die in a foxhole sittin in my own shit. I soon become so pissed off an mixed up that I make a bad mistake that lookin back on it was a good mistake. There was a station where ya all have to stand in front of a urinal an piss in a cup. I then turns a corner an cause I was a little slow in pissin, all the other wusses have marched on an I find my self alone with some black queen all decked out in a white jacket an, I kid you not, three inch fingernails, an don’t ask me why I kept runnin into queens cause I ain‘t got no answer for that. Anyways, this queen motions me over with one of her horrible fingernails and sticks some sorta paper in my cup. She then looks at the paper an I guess everything was fine cause she waves me on an I find myself with a cup fulla piss wonderin what to do next. I sees a sink an next to it is some sorta rack with all kinda holes and tubes and whatnot an for some reason, I pours the piss on this insteada down the sink. All of a sudden the queen is screamin like a stuck pig an I am high tailin it outa there only to find myself in a small room with another queen who is gonna decide if I’m bonkers enough to give myself an ulcer. The bitch lets me know pronto that if I fuck with her in anyway my ass will be on the next flight to Nam. She asks all kinda personal questions an I tell her all kinda personal lies an before you could say fuck me in the ass, she tells me that even though she thinks I’m too bonkers for Nam, she’s gonna send me there anyways. I walks out with my head hangin an only one chance left. When the army foot Doc reads the commie foot Doc’s letter he gets a real concerned look on his face an I’m thinking maybe I have a chance after all so I waves my weird shoes in his face. He gives a jump an says, “He make you wear those?” at which point I sees him scribblin “Unfit for Military Service” on a piece of paper which I take right away to some dip shit behind a desk who says “Head for the hills, kid“. There is one more part of this story that I personally find to be a sign from God. As I am hitch hikin back to the motel thinking about bumpin my shiny blond, a guy in a mustang convertible pulls up an tells me he is goin my way. He asks me why I have such a shit eatin grin on my face an I tells him I have just got a big fat ticket outa Nam. There is a pause an he tells me he is just back from Nam and outa the Army where he was a helicopter gunner. There is another pause where I am wondering if I am about to be ejected out of a mustang movin along at sixty miles an hour when all of a sudden he says “Congratulations, Kid. Open the glove box and help yourself.“, an Ina, baby, as God is my witness, I ain’t never seen so much coke an crank an smack an weed an plenty o stuff I ain’t never seen before. I thanks him and takes some Thai stick an that is the end of my story.
Yours truly,
Buck
Dear Eve:
Independence Day has come and gone and I'm not in jail. The weekend at the lake was uneventful and relaxing for the most part. The people are lovely, if conservative. I have known them through Bill for almost thirty years. They are a widow and her son and his girlfriend. The girlfriend does percocet for her bad back and can go on and on and on and on and on and on about such interesting topics as celebrity breakups and TV sitcoms and her back and also her back and her back. The son is a good kid seven years my junior, quiet and conservative and suburban. The mother is a sweetheart but another victim of Fox News. It's amazing how they will not just repeat some lie they hear but repeat it word for word (yes, I know because I sometimes watch it, know your enemy and all). I kept Robespierre quiet and as I said, left Rhoda at home. Buck would get out once in a while and say something like "That flat bottom boat out on the lake looks real good for fuckin" which was met with silence and strained smiles. Now it's back to work on Cannibals. The page #s have become chapter #s as the text takes over so if you want to check out Buck's first appearance, it's in chapter or page # 7 on the blog.
I'm so sorry about you losing your wonderful piano stool. My antique furniture is sometimes threatened by 21st century bodies and I'm always careful about directing certain guests to certain chairs. There is one who is very large and does a lot of twitching. I have a wing back chair that so far has survived. And what happened to your phone? Do you have a cell phone? I'm glad you got to be with children. If they are raised right they really can be a joy. If not - well I better keep my mouth shut what with every email we write these days being stored away for future use. That's a joke, assholes! Your stories about Little Egypt are fascinating and I'd love to hear you elaborate. What kind of paintings did you sell in the sixties?
I've got a new lead for Cannibals dealing with the myth of the Minotaur which amazingly enough, besides taking place in Greece, coincides with the plot and could take it to some very interesting places. I've also got to send off some new query letters, maybe tone down the letter a little or explain the book a little more. I know the subject matter could turn a lot of people off. I'm going to try and look into finding agents for writers I admire who write about the truth. I talked to one guest this weekend and Oliver's Illuminations came up. I threw a few facts at him and he said he didn't want to know about all that because it makes him so mad. I told him he was following the program like a good little lemming.
More later and please take care of yourself.
One Who Clears Rooms
Ina, Baby
I hope you are sittin pretty and I hope you had a snort with Spike an all. I have mucho gusto to tell ya. I have snuck my way into that pinko manifesto The Cannibals in the Garbage Can by that pinko fairy. Don't worry your pretty little head about me callin Rick a pinko fairy. He approves all the way and I gotta admitt, I can't claim no virtue myself what with my stint in the navy on that recon ship in Nam. I tell ya, doll that ship was so light in her bulk heads, she floated ten feet off the water and so, as our dear President says more often than not, if ya can't beat em, join em. But I digress. Anyways, it was yours truly who wrote the song the rats sing while they're tryin to decide whether to eat our hero's ears in chapter one. I will now evidence my song here:
The world's an angry world and God's an angry God.
It's survival of the fittest and dog eat dog.
There ain't no place for love and compassion.
It's eat or be eaten, that's the fashion.
A rat's a rat and a man's a man.
There ain't no difference and that's God's plan.
I also connived my way into the book itself. That's right, me personally. I am introduced in chapter seven at the bar, no surprise there, where I talk about music and fuckin an other worthy topics.
I am hopin you have a very good 4th of July an think about all the shit heads that need to be wiped off the ass of our great country.
Buck
Ina baby,
Do ya remember Stu Smith all gowed up on that shit horn, facebook? I thought your crack about a pretty face is like a melody was the cat's meow and I laughed louder than a Preacher's fart. Anyways, Spike, that's what I calls Stu for about thirty-five years now on account of him callin me Buck is gonna be in your town from the 19th through the Fourth of July stayin with that guy with the broom stick up his ass. What's his name? Bill Dawes, that's it. I think that college kid Spike got hitched to is also gonna be there and I really hope you can arrange to have a couple a shots with them. Did ya happen to notice my crack on the shit horn about Spike? You know, the one about Peaches finally comin back to us? Anyways, sometimes when Spike was hammered, all of a sudden this big ol drag queen would jump outa his skin, and I mean a really good, really crack up, spit shined performance. After a few appearances, I decided this babe needed a name so I starts callin her Peaches. Every body loved Peaches and so it came to no surprise that when Spike gave up the bottle and Peaches took a powder that every body was put out and real sorry to see her go. I used to say that Spike had locked her in the Betty Ford Clinic and that someday Peaches was gonna dig a tunnel under the cyclone fence and come back to us and I'll be God damned after all these years there she was lookin out at me from the shit horn. It was almost like seein Jesus, not that I ever seen Jesus and, no offense to the big guy, not that I really ever wanna see Jesus. It's just an expression, if ya know what I mean. But I digress. So, darlin, when ya see Spike, tell him I sends a big kiss to Peaches who was sorely missed, and have a snort for your pal, Buck.
Adios, querida.
Buck
Ina,
Are you really that good? Hell, yes you are: "Scolding on your end?" "It's not exactly a holiday, honey!"
A great big lesbian chill went up my spine and you got me. It's so great when someone so brilliant gets me. You're inspiring.
As for Rhoda, hell she never was wrapped too tight and after the lightning strike, well, if you had a billion volts blasted right between your eyes, you might be a little sensitive too. She called me this afternoon three sheets to the wind. Apparently even though every thing was going better down at the lemonade stand, the owners have once again decided that all is lost (that sounds familiar somehow) and have made her life miserable. I think we should ease up a bit on the poor little homicidal maniac.
Where am I going with the writing? I have no idea. It takes on a life of its own and if I tamper with it, I'll kill it. It's a first draft and all and I am fascinated with pitting the sexual attraction and the ideological antagonism against each other. Their star crossed love seems like a boiled down metaphor for the country: idiocy, passion, stubbornness, love, arrogance, blindness, a funeral pyre.
That's all for now. I'm shot after a day of hysteria and falling sky and we're supposed to have Chinese dinner tonight with the "friend" who screamed at me because I "hate" Obama. Don't worry, I'm leaving Rhoda home with a bottle of scotch.
Here's looking at you, kid.
Rick
PS. I know this is a long shot but I was reading about carbon monoxide poisoning from faulty furnaces here in the City and some of the symptoms were severe and migraine headaches and vertigo including scrolling vision. You just might want to check it out.
Dear Eve,
I'm telling you and you only this. I did kill that little shit, Claude and it wasn't about any penmanship medal. We were out on the pier when everyone else was at the picnic and Claude started talking politics. I was telling him how much I loved President Obama and how much he had done for our country when Claude started talking about the Patriot Act and Bradley Manning and privatizing public schools and on and on. I told him to stop saying bad things about our President but he just wouldn't shut up! I took off my shoes and I hit him over and over and then I rolled him into the lake and it felt good!
I'm so happy about your WONDERFUL birthday with all your friends and your dinners and your vodka and your weed and your sex. When I got your email I got so depressed. I cried and cried. The only thing to do to bring myself out of it was to burn that dumb handyman alive, so I did!
Well, now that we're even, I feel so much better. Business has been so slow down at my lemonade stand. I can't imagine why, but this last week things picked up. I'm sure it has a lot to do with President Obama extending the tax cuts and wining and dining all the Wall Street big shots at Daniel in NYC. Have you ever been there? They have crispy Scottish langoustines to die for. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/linda-keenan/with-obamas-dinner-date-w_b_877232.html?ir=Politics
As far as my publishing forays for Oliver's Disembowelments, all the literature told me that an agent would respond to query letters only if they were interested. Last week I opened my email and I had two responses! I opened them and they both said thanks but no thanks. For one brief second it was like beating Claude to death all over again and then all I wanted to do was pull my pigtails out!
I find consolation in the new book. I had the hardest time trying to paint Lucia. I've finally managed a beginning and I think I caught the satanic side of her. I was inspired by my third grade graduation picture.
Take a look and tell me what you think. If you don't, I will hunt you down.
Love and kisses as always,
Rhoda Penmark
Bobble heads
Ina baby,
Oh, great, you send me a picture of a fucking straight jacket. That's all I need to see after my brunch from hell. OK, so it goes like this: Some of Bill's "rail fans" are in town and they want to have brunch, one of them , a female, I haven't had the pleasure of meeting. In case you haven't had the pleasure of having a meal with rail fans, the conversation sort of goes like this:" Blah, blah, blah, steam. Blah, blah, blah, street car." It's sorta like swimming in a swimming pool filled with green water. So after a while, I break in and I says, "A few years back I was walking next to Washington Square and a trolley bus passes by and the shoe where the trolley pole rides the over head wire (that happens to be a six by three inch ten pound piece of steel) comes off the pole and lands an inch in front of my foot. My point, of course was that by the grace of God I was an inch away from sudden death but what was the response of the goggle eyed zombies? An involved discussion of how the shoe is attached to the pole, how many screws attach it and how deep they are drilled. My interjection of an example of heavenly intervention was met with a buncha robots wondering why none of them can take a shit. So anyways, after the brunch, Bill decides to go with the zipper heads to look at trolley cars in the City and the one rail fan I hadn't had the pleasure of meeting offers to drive me home. So I gets in her car and as God is my witness, it's filled from dashboard to rear window with bobble headed figures. The last time I was so unnerved was when I was a child at that hell on earth, Disney Land. What was the shit hole I was in? I think it was called the Tiki Room. All's I remember was hundreds and hundreds of mechanical birds and monkeys and rats and spiders all jiggling and jittering and screeching "Tiki! Tiki! Tiki!" So now I'm in the Tiki Room on wheels and while I'm trying with all my strength to keep down my bacon cheddar cheese burger, I notice that all of the quivering shit piles are Jesus Christ. Well, I don't know if you've ever driven the streets of San Francisco but let's just say there are so many pot holes and so much torn up asphalt that I was soon feeling like Mata Hari on the set of Hatari on a do or die mission to find out if John Wayne's dick really was only three inches long, racing along the African Velt chasing after a zebra or a giraffe or what ever the fuck Red Buttons wants to screw that day surrounded by bobble headed Jesuses dancing like they'd snorted speed instead of coke. When the female rail fan (there aren't many but like crazy Chinese, when you find one, run) turns to me with a Squeaky Fromme expression on her face and asks me if I'd ever considered Jesus, I thought I'd better dodge into a quick distraction so I checks my email on my cell phone and see your message about the mail room in your building run by the bitter dwarf from somewhere in the depraved depths of the Orient clutching your package next to her cold, black heart and I am reminded of when I went to the UPS store to mail your package. I just had the 14 x 8 inch tube and its contents as I figured the store would have the rest of the wrappings. The hag on this end of the continent grabs my tube and wraps the ends with packing tape and yells at me that everything will be fine. I was so discombobulated with the toxic fumes that came blasting out of her mouth that I stood there stunned and allowed her to take my money and toss your package into the pile of the lost and the damned. But I digress. When the rail fan/Jesus freak/Nazi bitch doesn't get an answer out of me, she repeats herself, this time more loudly and in a voice five or six octaves lower. I tells her I am aware of Jesus and have always wondered why the instrument on which he was tortured to death is worshiped as much, if not more than he is but never the less I think that, as a prophet he wasn't bad, that is of course if he had actually existed what with his apostles not bothering to write anything about him until fifty or so years after his supposed death and speaking of apostles, what was with the routine of him never getting married and wandering around in the desert with twelve other guys? Well, shit I probably don't have to tell you what happened next, but why not? Before you could say suck my dick, Squeaky Fromme had turned into Charlie Manson and there was another bobble head in the car, this one large and homicidal and behind the steering wheel. Thank God she ran head long into an anti abortion rally. I was lucky enough to slip away as the bodies were being loaded into the meat wagon and she was being maced.
So now I'm home, safe and sound pouring myself a double scotch on the rocks and thinking of you Ina, my beautiful and mysterious muse.
Love,
Buck
Ma chere Eve,
I fear I am undone. The traitors at the Convention had me arrested along with my brother, Crathon, Lebas and Saint-Just but God has vindicated me and I have been liberated from the Luxembourg. Upon my triumphal return to the Hotel de Ville, Henriot and his cannoneers surrounded the Convention but the cannoneers refused to fire upon it! The Convention has marched against us and the Commune. The Place de Greve was full of patriots waiting to defeat them but Henriot has just returned to tell us that the Place de Greve is deserted! I fear I am undone.
I send to you, Eve by courier my letters and aspirations for a truly free France. They should arrive Friday. Guard them well and remember me always.
Vivre la France!
Robespierre
Eve,
Svitlana call. Tell of funeral railroad car to big town in south full of whores. Ilych tell Svitlana he have croup and cough green. Svitlana tell Ilych, no IIych, no Svitlana in funeral railroad car with free vodka. Ilych go on car for two days. Many rich and fun people on funeral railroad car. Much vodka and caviar. Ilyich tell rich wife of Boss who own car of Fracking and Monsanto and Goldman Sachs. Rich wife tell of children who cannot spell and show Ilyich painted toenails. Ilyich think rich woman good. Svitlana see flirt and hit Ilyich with shoe.
Ilyich dream of people turn into mushrooms. Ilyich cut off mushrooms. Ilyich home now and still have croup and cough green but glad of toenails.
Ilyich
Dearest Eve,
After return from funeral train car Ilyich sleep in room at Housing Building on Petrushka Street so get rid of croup. Croup bad but only tiny, atomic version of what Eve go through. Housing Building General, Sasha hear Ilyich cough all night and threaten with TB sanitarium. On funeral train car, Ilyich take picture of feet of rich woman. Picture help Ilyich with croup. Beautiful pictures by American Corporation Eve send also help. Ilyich think of someday leave Motherland and work for American Corporation instead of Oligarchy. When fever very bad, Ilyich dream of beautiful, free America.
Very warm embraces from deep in heart.
Ilyich
Comrade Eve,
Fever confuse Ilyich in last letter. Ilyich never work for capitalist pig corporation! But Ilyich sick of working for Oligarchy. Svitlana fly Aeroflot back to Chicago for job boss around Americans. She tell Ilyich of wonderful paradise in Chicago where freed slaves make utopian paradise of peace and love called South Chicago. Svitlana say American Kenyan president learn in South Chicago how to make America change you can believe in. Ilyich see Motherland run by Oligarchy and America run by corporations but now there is Obama and South Chicago.
Is tapping at door!!
Housing unit general Sasha at door! Svitlana tell her of rare and valuable photo of feet of important female oligarch on railroad funeral car! Must now send to you Eve for keep safe when Ilyich come to America!
Is pounding at door!!
KGB at door!!
Keep picture safe Eve and always think of Ilyich
Dear Eve,
Some thoughts on your marvelous breakthrough in virtual drawing. If you are thinking of ways to reawaken old synapses or built new ones I would like to, if I could relate some of my own thoughts about and experiences with that blob of jelly in our head. When I was much younger, I had many spontaneous out of body experiences while asleep or on the edge of sleep. I did a lot of research and experimentation and began to be able at times to control my dreams. The most important thing I learned was that the brain, the unconscious and the subconscious will not be told what to do by the conscious. If you try and control a dream consciously, you cannot. If you try and resurrect a memory consciously, it is very difficult, but the power of suggestion held in a little box in the back of your mind while you are dreaming or struggling for a memory will suddenly open up sometimes and offer you a flood of memories, dreams or abilities. Place your desires in that little box while you float down the river and whatever you do don't get out the oars or start the engine.
Hang in there. It will get better.
R.
Dear Eve,
Svetlana fly to Ukraine last week for sister's wedding. In Airport building, sweaty man tell Svetlana to stand in naked picture machine or sweaty man place sweaty hands on Svetlana's muffin. Svetlana beat sweaty man to death with vacuum cleaner.
I have been very much astounded and somewhat amused (thank goodness) at the direction of all the screaming about the the new scanners that give you a dose of radiation that never leaves your body and all the groping thing. Bill had to go through the groping thing because his new knees set off the metal detector. Believe me, it isn't pretty. I have been alarmed and somewhat amused that many pundits and writers on the left have taken the "I'll put up with anything to be safe" cool aide. Few seem to mention that the manufacturers of these scanners are paying Bush's head of Homeland Security, Micheal Chertoff to lobby for them or that many rich congress men of both persuasions (thief or liar) have stock in the companies. I also would like to ask the blathering class why no one has mentioned the glaring mistakes in intelligence regarding the poster boy for these newest Orwellian intrusions, the Underwear Bomber.
The man's father is one of the richest men in Nigeria and went door to door in London warning the authorities that his son was about to commit mass murder and yet his son got on an airplane bound for the US in Saudi Arabia with no luggage after paying cash for his ticket. That kind of blunder sounds like the intentional blundering that resulted in 911. Too bad that Dutch man on the airplane stopped the bastard and prevented an ensuing tsunami of authoritarian measures made excusable by another terror attack on our nation. But I guess they don't really need an excuse, do they?
Hope all is well.
Svetlana
PS Dogs have been proven the most reliable in (literally) sniffing out explosives and yet, no dogs. Imagine that.
Hi Ina,
I'm so sorry you're having such a hard time and relieved that you still have your sense of humor. Things could always be worse or you're dead, I always say, and keep your hands off the twelve year olds! I used to wear one of those bracelets during my serious drinking days. I used to push the button over and over again but no one ever came. Hopefully the technology has advanced.
I'm in the process of getting the book onto a disk which I somehow managed to figure out on my own, believe it or not. Finances are still very scary but all I need is one really good sale and I could relax for a bit while I get the book published. A fantastic collapsible captain's desk from about 1830 came up on ebay and I managed to snag it. I needed something for my somewhat vacant looking studio since I've had to take all the good stuff down and put it up for sale. In a couple of months when all goes well I plan to go saling anyway.
I have erected a cyclone fence in front of my television to protect it from the things I throw at it when I hear the democrats and Obama talk about having to change course to the right after the election outcome. They're so fucking stupid to think we can't see through their lies as thin as a shit slick in a toilet.
Ah, what a lovely day. Isn't it just beautiful?
Kisses
Oliver
PS. Olga say, in Russia, vacume cleaner sex good.
Dear Pollyana,
I just ran into Lucy and she says Charlie Brown is over at Snoopy's and drunk as a skunk. I respect your right to hold out hope for Obama. No one wants to be proven wrong about him more than I do but I'm tired of saying 'Thank you, sir. May I have another?"
I've been remiss about keeping up with the correspondence because I've just spent five days in the Belly Of The Beast. Bill has been running an antique trolley museum all his life and the annual convention of museums this year was in Washington DC. A friend of ours so wanted us to come, he paid for our trip and accommodations. The capital never looked better all decked out with corporate logos like a Christmas tree. The yellow brick road is called K Street and the yellow bricks ain't made of brick. A statue of Dubya Bush sits in the Lincoln Memorial and Cheny himself resides in the Jefferson Monument. I tried to chain myself the White House fence but you can't get within three blocks of it these days. I was just dying to give Obama a great big gay kiss but he was too busy challenging the latest court decision against Don't Ask, Fuck You and demanding a stay against the judge's injunction prohibiting persecution of Arabic speaking perverts in the military.
I'm sorry, my dear but the worst thing you can do to me is betray me.
You know how smitten I am with fate. Wouldn't you know it, Bill has always wanted to see the Gilded Age "cottages" in New Port so before you could say "Off with their heads!" we were touring the Vanderbilt's Petit Hameau. I feel so much better about Wall Street bonuses now. How could I have been such a fool?
And then there was the night and day in the Gotham! We took the train into Penn Station and Bill wanted to stay at the Pennsylvania Hotel across the street before they tear it down. The online reviews were iffy at best or "stay in your car before staying here" and while waiting in line to check in in the lobby someone behind me went on and on about what a dump the place was. After much genuflecting before opening the door to the room, we found we had a fantastic corner room, clean as a whistle with a view down seventh avenue out of one window and 34th street out the other. And it was on the ELEVENTH FLOOR! (see 'Oliver's Iluminations' by R. T. Hill).
Another night and a day in Boston with friends then back. Bill did amazingly well, even tackling the subway in the Big Apple. I'm back and more pissed off than ever.
I'll do my best to be gentle with you regarding the truth and all that goofy stuff but it won't be easy.
Karl
dear splatter proof,
Just a quick note as I'm down with bronchitis I got from Bill who got it in the nursing home (that would have ended up as pneumonia if I hadn't done some screaming). I liberated him last Sunday and am taking care of him at his place about five blocks away from mine. Having two places worked well when we were younger but not so much now. The problem is that now we couldn't find a decent place for any where near what we pay in rent for the two places together. Anyway, even though he's lost a great deal of weight and is still very weak he is doing quite well in recovery and can get around the apt. on a walker. Another week or two and he can use a cane and come over to my place which will be a relief as nursing him and trying to work around his room mate and his room mate's friend isn't easy no matter how accommodating they are.
I caught a great documentary the other day that brought me out of my nurse maid anger and back to my normal rage so I feel like there's a light at the end of the tunnel. PLEASE check it out on line. It's called 911 Press for Truth. Just google it and watch .
Yours in disgust of small minded idiots,
Rick
Dearest Eve,
An interesting interlude with the Kaiser nurse at the rest home currently caging Bill:
Me: (thinking) My God this woman looks hung over.
(saying) How do you do? I'm glad to finally meet the Kaiser nurse. I am continually stonewalled by everyone when I try to get an idea of when Bill will be released.
Nurse Ratchet: I have no idea when he will be released! We have an assessment every Tuesday and the patient has shown little sign of improvement!
Me:( Thinking) Jesus, woman. Did you spend the night at O'Malley's on the pool table?
(saying) He has shown remarkable improvement just these last few days.
Bill: I want to introduce you to Rick, my partner of 27 years.
Nurse Ratchet: Yeah, I figured that out!
Me:(thinking) You booze soaked Irish Hag. Fuck you and your filthy,oily, parasitic Catholic Church.
(saying) I thought you would like to know that a friend at Kaiser looked over the nursing home records and noticed there was nothing about the bed sores Bill is suffering from.
Nurse Ratchet: Who told you that!? There is no way Kaiser can access the records of this home!
Me: (thinking) My god you pathetic insect. When was the last time your husband tickled your china?
(saying) Never the less I checked with the front desk this morning and there is no record of bed sores in his file I thought you would appreciate knowing about the obvious glaring oversight.
Nurse Ratchet: Yeah, yeah. (exeunt stage left)
Me (thinking) If you ever cross me again, you self loathing car wreck of a human being, I will - na, it ain't worth it.
Kisses,
Rohda Penmark
