CARLYLE’S DARK RAIN

Oh such a beautiful morning. Finally it’s coming through the clouds and landing on the ground. I can only go so long without rain before I feel unusual. I think I was just about at the end of my rope yesterday. I walked around my place looking at all the withered brown grasses and lilting plants while swirls of hot dust blew across my driveway. I tried to take my mind off of it by going down to the creek with the dogs but that didn’t work so I went for a run down the train tracks where I once again found a lonesome locomotive sitting down by the quarry lakes on a siding. I climbed in the window and began snooping. Now I have to admit I do worry about being caught inside one of these locomotives since it is trespassing but my worry only bothers me in so far as it detracts from my attention span when I’m looking at all the switches, levers, dials, computers, and other objects. I think I’m getting closer to figuring out how to start one up but it is pretty complicated and I don’t want to break something. I need my concentration to be pure and unfettered by frivolous annoyances like the law. I’ve contemplated writing to homeland security about this issue. For the good of the country that is. No one wants a locomotive to come roaring through their neighborhood with no trained driver at the helm. It’s like the fresh needle and free condom programs. People ARE going to do things so why not ameliorate the potential damage? Anyway, I found several very interesting little rooms in this locomotive. The electrical room was especially fascinating. You opened this nondescript door on the side of the locomotive and went down a little stair into this room full of wires and huge fuses. I also went into the compressor compartment, the generator room, and, of course took a look at the engine which was a  V16 4000 horse power general electric. It was beautiful. Finally, I crawled under the thing to see if it was possible to lay on a train track and have the engines (which are lower than other rolling stock) go over you without catching some part of your body. It would work but it would be close. There’s about two inches between your head and this piece of metal that spans the track. After my run I cleaned up and went into town where I ran into my very small friend who still stuns me by the fact that she doesn’t get carded at the bar. Hmmm…well I finally wound up at home just in time for a beautiful thunder storm. I open my window and let a few drops fall on my head while I lie in bed. It is perfect. I might have a slight stuffy nose now but I  don’t care. It’s raining!

TURBINE WINE

 I do not like admitting that I have been looking in places where I should not be looking. But really, I was just doing some work and I noticed this little piece of paper with some writing on it. I read it and then opened the book it was clipped to. It was some sort of diary. Haven’t you ever had a sister? You have to learn to read as soon as she learns to write so you can jack up your allowance with a little blackmail money. I just cannot believe the kind of stuff girls write in diaries. “Had sex with Tonto last night. Said he would marry me. Dumped me first thing in the morning after he did me one more time! Hope my brother doesn’t read this…only have six dollars left!” I only read two pieces of literature in my youth. My sister’s diary and Myra Breckinridge by Gore Vidal. I don’t know which one was worse. Myra Breckinridge was a real eye opener though because it made clear to me why people read books without pictures in them. My mom and dad both threatened to beat me for reading my sister’s diary but not only did I read it, I would actually write rebuttals to her entries, such as: “Blow your head off. Bebo thinks you are a hor and Tonto looks like Sonny Bono. Give me ten dollars or I’m telling dad.”  Well this diary I found recently is considerably more terrifying than my sister’s. It has confirmed to me that there are humans out there who are chips of television programming wrapped in blood and flesh. I would go into the details but as a professional I think it would be unprofessional to delve into the substance of someone else’s diary in a potentially public forum. I don’t even like to admit that I looked at it or that I spend five minutes every day reading through it looking for evidence of something criminal so I can vindicate myself by having some ammo. 

OK a girl who is going to play “Iris?” in some Shakespeare play has just made a face at me. Once again I came into this coffee shop and sat down by myself. Now there are two actors sitting next to me mumbling their lines. I will beat this girl one way or the other. If only she would give me access to her diary I could investigate her life in detail and give her acting advice based on my computations.

FANGOIL

Yesterday evening I went out with my salt shaker and picked my first cucumber which was delicious. I then ate a couple of the last blueberries and washed them down with some juicy blackberries. Then I picked a peach off the peach tree and ate it. I like the idea of just walking out the door and finding ready to eat food for free. I’m waiting for my corn and tomatoes to turn out plus I think I have peppers. Now I want to grow some more stuff since it is clearly very easy to do. Actually, I started out growing poppies and I just grew the other stuff to hide those drug operations. I always knew you could get drugs from nature but FOOD! It was a revelation.  Now I want a giant farm with silos and acres of growing stuff. The only trouble with that plan is that I found this wonderful book the other day called “fundamentals of petroleum” which is a very detailed technical book about how oil wells are built, operated, maintained and so forth. Once I started reading this book I couldn’t put it down. I have no idea why this subject is so fascinating to me but I think it has to do with the massive machines, the mystery of a ten thousand foot deep hole, and the millions of dollars down in the rock formations. I would be in heaven if I could afford an oil well so I could spend months in the desert grinding away at the earth and studying core samples. What I really need is about ten more lives. I love what I do but there seem to be so many other interesting things that require attention. I guess I could start drilling a hole out at my house just to see what’s down there. I’m pretty sure I could make an oil rig.

ATTACK OF THE LITTLE ONES

Well it was a pretty good weekend except for Sunday morning. I got in late Saturday night and had a pizza which I ate until I was about to explode while I drank a little beer, smoked a few cigs, and watched some sort of Swamp Thang movie. This was all while lying in bed. It was totally luxurious. When I woke up the next morning I decided to start right off cleaning my room and worked my way down the stairs gathering dust bunnies and dead june bugs who had flown in the window over night. I collected quite an armful of junk by the time I was in the living room. I dumped everything in the trash except the pizza box which still had some pizza in it. I was going to feed that to the dogs so I put it under my arm and went out into the yard wearing only my boxer shorts. I didn’t get far before I suddenly noticed that I was covered with ants who were streaming out of the box. I threw the pizza box at Daisy who ate everything including the ants while I scrapped the trespassers off me. I really like ants in general. They’re good little creatures who let you know when you need to tighten up your ship. I will never eat a pizza in my bed again. It’s just too hillbilly. From now on I’m only drinking and smoking in bed.

32 LASHES

I read a story in the post about people being hit by cars and falling over in waiting rooms and no one paying any attention to them when they clearly needed help. Let’s just cut to the quick on this right now and be done with it. The more people there are the less important any one of them will be. If you will be so kind as to notice your television set you will see that you are referred to as special and different over and over again. This is because “they” know that you are not special or different and they also know that you are subtly aware of it. I don’t know if it will happen in my generation but I suspect that it will happen by the next generation. People will actually lie on the side of the road with buzzards pecking their eyes out because it will have finally reached that point. So why even mention it? It’s like saying “and the poor suffered the most.” They always do. It’s not news…ever.

On another note I am sitting in a coffee shop across from the Dixie where they have set up a little stand for the governor who is evidently coming to talk to the citizens of podunk jr. I love this little coffee shop and its view of the Dixie which is my favorite theater. But there is one problem. There are three people on my right and three people on my left. They are all evidently actors and they are all reciting scripts from Shakespeare as I type. There are a lot of thou and thees going on and I feel inclined to turn one of these girls over my knee and teach them a lesson for being actors. Good Gawd these are some cute girls. Why in the friggen hell can’t they be locomotive engineers or nuclear scientists or even astronauts? I guess that’s a mystery I’ll never solve. OK, I’ve had enough. Where’s my whip!

SWOOP

Well I rode my scooter to podunk Jr. today and it was a treat to be freezing cold in the middle of July. I don’t know. I figured out that I will need to ride 22 thousand miles for the bike to pay for itself in gasoline… that’s not too impressive but I guess it’s good for the environment. At lunch I rode out into Swoop which is the prettiest place within a hundred miles of here. I went flying down the country roads and left the ground a few times. There’s nothing out there but the rolling green grass and the blue sky and if you stop thinking for a minute you will think you are way out in the west lands. When I’m at my own house near podunk I often think to myself, “Why would anyone live anywhere else?” Well going through Swoop I had the same thought. It’s much nicer than where I live. I really could just sit on a hill out there and dream about the horizon for hours.

CAMPHOR REEL

Well it felt good to be back out on the town last night with my miniature friend who told me that she was a train hitcher from way back though it couldn’t have been too far back since she’s only about 12 or so. I have a truly uncanny knack for meeting girls who should have nothing to do with me but I can’t seem to think of any real good reason not to hang out with them. I’ve been laying low for the last couple years but I don’t think I can’t stand it any more. So this girl asked me if I’d ever ridden in an engine and then told me about how she did and how she wanted to honk the horn. By her description of the cab I knew that she was telling the truth and how could I not be impressed by THAT? 

Yesterday I caught a bat in my client’s house. I took it outside and put it on the porch railing and then inspected it. It was bearing its teeth at me and I could see its little tongue and needle fangs.

I feel bad neglecting my blog but I just haven’t had anything to say for the last few days. For some reason I have been very un-stressed out for the last couple weeks and that cuts into my writing output. Also, it’s so nice out that I can’t bring myself to sit in front of a computer. How do people do that all day long?

WHAT I HEAR WHEN I LISTEN

 

“Good morning. This is Diane Rhem and you’re listening to the Diane Rhem show. This morning we have two really special guests and we’re going to be discussing a subject that I’m sure you’ll all enjoy…you’ve seen them on your grandmother’s table, you’ve seen them at the hotel, and certainly you’ve seen them in restaurants. Doilies. We all love them and one of my guests, Judy Ditch, has just written a wonderful book on the history of the American doily.  Also from Harvard Medical School, Dr. Plato Nisp, professor of Southern Psychiatry and Director of the Institute for Grant Driven Exercises in the Study of Known Things will be joining us from his office at Harvard. And, of course, we want to hear from you the listener. Have you ever owned a doily? Do you keep them in your house? How have your attitudes towards doilies changed over the years? Let’s start with you Judy. Why did you write this book?”

“Well Diane, I could go into a long narrative about the various aspects of my childhood that pertain to my development but I’m just going to cut to the quick and tell you that I have always loved doilies. I collected them, cataloged them, painted portraits of them and then one day it hit me that I should write a book about them.”

“That’s wonderful. I’ll tell you…I was skeptical about the book when I first got it but once I started reading it I just couldn’t put it down. I was especially moved by the chapter about your grandmother’s love for doilies. Why don’t you tell us about that.”

“Diane, my grandmother loved doilies. My grandfather used to say, “You bring one more doily into this house and I’ll kick your black ass into the street!”

“Your grandmother was black? You don’t look black but I’m guessing a doily is something that can easily transcend racial boundaries.”

“That’s right Diane. You can find doilies in the houses of every race. There’s a purity of consciousness that permeates the world of doilies.”

“What about that Dr. Nisp? Do you agree that doilies are color blind?”

“No.”

“Fascinating. Now let’s go to the phones. We have Robin in Nashville. Hello Robin, you’re on the air.”

“Hi Diane. Thank you for taking my call. I just love your show. My brother loves your show too. Even my dog, Blake, seems to listen to your show and when he hears your voice his ears go back like he’s going to attack a rat or…”

“Robin, do you have a question of comment?”

“Yes. I saw a doily with a picture of a kitten on it once.”

“That’s wonderful. Judy, how common is that? Do many doilies have pictures on them?”

“Oh yes. I’ve seen kittens and once I saw one with a little star and moon on it.”

“That’s amazing. Dr. Nisp, what about that? Have many people seen doilies with pictures on them?”

“No. Never.”

“So we’re going to take a break now but when we come back we’re going to talk to a man who dressed up as a doily and was arrested for indecent exposure while wearing the doily. It’s 9 minutes after the hour and you’re listening to the Diane Rhem show.”

 

“Welcome back. You’re listening to the Diane Rhem show and today’s subject is doilies. Dr. Nisp, I’d like ask you what drives people to hoard doilies? I’ve heard about this taking place in China but it seems to be starting to take place in Turkey according to a report by the United Nations. “

“Diane, there are all sorts of diseases of the brain but recently we’ve discovered that doilies have nothing to do with anything. Now if you smoke about a pound of pot and drill a hole through your forehead you will almost certainly like doilies and be inclined to speak of them.”

“Well Dr. Nisp, I just don’t understand that. I don’t have a hole drilled in my forehead and I don’t smoke anything but I love doilies and appreciate them to no end. Can you tell me what’s going on there?”

“No, I can’t.”

“OK, now we’re going to talk to Marvin Clayburn who was arrested for dressing as a doily in Burbank California during the annual Rain Man parade. Marvin? Welcome to the show.”

“Hello Diane, glad to be here.”

“You were arrested during the Rain Man parade for wearing a doily. Could you tell us about that?”

“Glad to Diane. Well I dressed as a doily because I’ve always loved them and thought it would make a great costume for the Rain Man parade. The only problem was I forgot to cover my rear end which I must tell you is rather hairy…”

“Hold it right there. I just want to clarify something for our listeners. You’re saying that you derriere is hairy?”

“Yes.”

“OK, go on please.”

“Well I was riding down the street on a giant bumble bee float and someone mistook my rear for a badger and shot it with a 22.”

“Good Lord! That must have hurt!”

“It was terribly painful Diane.”

“Judy, I’ve heard that there is a bill in the state legislature of California that would curtail the use of doilies because of this incident. What can you tell us about that?”

“That’s right Diane. It was an unfortunate incident to be sure but I don’t think that this legislation is going to help the situation. It wasn’t the doilies fault. The gunman in this shooting was a disgruntled police officer who had recently been reprimanded for spending too much time doing his fingernails. He didn’t even know what a doily was until he shot Mr. Clayburn.”

“Well I’ll turn to you Dr. Nisp. Do you think that it is true that people who are unfamiliar with doilies tend to be unbalanced or perhaps slightly retarded?”

“No Diane. Quite the contrary. It’s been conclusively proven that people who LIKE doilies are considerably more retarded than the general public.”

“Now I’m going to have to call you on that one Dr. Nisp. Can you show me one bit of evidence to support that statement?”

“Well, I can tell you that your guest Judy Ditch was treated for a serious psychiatric disorder just two years ago and that for two months she was in an institution.”

“Judy…tell me if this is too personal a question to ask…were you in a mental hospital?”

“Diane, that question was too personal to ask but you’ve already asked it so I can’t very well tell you after the fact that I don’t want you to ask it can I?”

“I’m going to come back to you Dr. Nisp. Is she right about it being too late to not ask the question about her being in a mental hospital?”

“What do you think Diane?”

“I think it’s time to go to the phones where we have Jill from Washington D.C., jill, you’re on the air.”

“I love your show Diane. I’ve been listening to it ever since I was a baby because my mom used to play the radio while she repaired sewing machines while we lived in Toronto where we had to go after the…”

“Jill, do you have a question or comment?”

“Yes. Diane for years I would put cups on my doilies. I guess that’s what most people do and I guess it makes sense because the doily keeps liquid from getting on the table. Well one day I was sitting there looking at some doilies and I just got this idea that was really pushing the limit. I took a pack of my husband’s cigarettes and put them on a doily. I could not believe it but it worked. Right then and there I realized that you can put other things on a doily. So I’ve been going around my house putting all sorts of things on them. I’ve never had so much fun.”

“Jill that’s beautiful. I never cease to be amazed at the resourcefulness of my listeners. Judy, have you ever heard of anything like this before…people putting strange objects on doilies?”

“No Diane I haven’t. But that’s the last question I’m going to answer. You’ve offended me by asking about me being in a menal institution.”

“Dr. Nisp. Is she right? Have I offended her?”

“Diane. I don’t think I’m going to answer any more questions either.”

“Well there you have it. Thank you for joining us. I’m Diane Rhem and you’ve been listening to the Diane Rhem show. I’ll be gone next week to have some more shrapnel removed from my brain but you’ll be in good hands with Leslie Tucker. Until next time.”

 

 

 

 

CASTOR AND CAMBER

I can still bring forth the primordial image I first saw in the woods near Vesuvius Ohio. It was a totem pole with carnivorous animal faces which were arranged in a spiral. My right hand was a furry claw with long nails resting on my girlfriend’s chest. We were lying on our backs in a swamp being bitten by mosquitoes and our friends were calling for us to get up and come with them. Talk about feeling low. The next stop was the girl’s mom and dad’s place for dinner. I was visiting  and had been there for a day or two trying to make friends with the family since I really liked the girl. But things weren’t panning our very well as far as me making a good impression. Her parents thought I was not very worthwhile because I smoked, drank, and didn’t go to church. I also dressed poorly. The girl was bent on living it up while I was there so it was her idea to take mushrooms and go into the woods with her hippie friends for an afternoon of nature viewing. I pretty much would do anything she wanted to do and she assured me we would be fine by dinner time. But of course we weren’t. Talk about uncomfortable. Dirty and covered with mosquito bites the girl and I looked at each other while the mother and father prayed over their food. We both looked worried and for all I know we may have looked like tarantulas to the parents. I can’t really remember any details of that meal except that I was uncomfortable and I sank further down on the social ladder with every bite. The next day she took me to meet her granny. While I was sitting in the living room with the granny the girl was in her medicine cabinet stealing morphine pills. Her granny was telling me how the girl had a heart of gold and was smart as a whip. We took the morphine pills and went bicycle riding around Huntington WVA. I don’t remember the pills doing anything to me but when we got back to her parent’s we were late again for some planned event. By this time it was clear that her mother was going to keep the girl out of my hands. Pretty much all the bad things we did were the girl’s idea. And it wasn’t like I could tell her mom that I was actually good and her daughter was leaning towards bad. But it was strange to come back to the house and be scowled at as a bad influence when it wasn’t exactly true. Don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t against the things she wanted to do at all. I just didn’t care about taking drugs one way or the other whereas she was ready to take all drugs. Was that the beginning of a long track record of not getting into the groove with parents of girlfriends? They almost always think I am rotten and I recall having some pretty mad mothers screaming at me over the phone. I was pretty good at ignoring them and I assumed that they were just being protective or something but then it occurred to me one day that I really might be exuding some unwholesome aura. Can their mothers read my mind? Can they see the lack of commitment before I even start lacking it? My favorite thing to wonder is this: Do they know that their daughters are rotten and have nothing to offer but their bodies? That is the most tantalizing thought and I have gone out with girls who would fall solidly into that category. But that was awhile ago. It’s been some years since I’ve gone around with a horrible girl or two and when I look back I consider them to have been diseases rather than relationships. For some strange reason a number of those horrible ones live in foreign countries now, or, at home with their moms. But I guess I have to admit I must have been horrible to go out with them. Actually, I don’t have to guess about that. I have been horrible too. Several times now I have had a mother ask me in a teasing way, “What are your intentions with my daughter?” and I have answered, “I’m going to use them up and then give them the heave ho!” They always seem to like that answer. 

BRAIL

 

Tarzan Streisand certainly had a problem. His woman, who was a sophisto from Philly, had taken up with a man who had small, clean glasses and a little dog with papers. She had caught Tarzan back when the “traditional man” rage was going around and her friends thought she was a genius for calling plumber after plumber until she met him. She and her pals talked about his pecker and his stinky feet as well as the quaint way he wondered about television stars and their habits ever  since she had introduced him to the latest shows that depicted NYC situations and the clandestine,  profoundly subliminal Jewish banter that made her howl and made him scowl in confusion.  Becky Lache just came up to him one day and told him that his woman had a thing going on with one Marfan Bealer who worked as an estimator for some giant construction company which was building a huge bridge from Tillman to Scarborough. Tarzan immediately asked Becky if she would be his woman and she laughed so hard that her gum came out of her mouth and bounced off Tarzan’s chest.  “Well then I guess I better kill the fucker.” He said. And Becky laughed hard again. The day after Becky informed on her friend, Tarzan rolled his van up to a construction trailer that sat by the bridge’s foundations.  As he was walking up the steps to the trailer he noticed his woman’s beautiful pearl Lexus sitting by a couple of trucks and partially hidden by giant rolls of wire. He went back down the steps and walked over to the car where he noticed that one of the trucks was moving slightly seemingly without anyone in it. But then he saw his woman’s shoes with her feet inside them sort of sliding back and forth on the dashboard. Now this is the amazing part. He actually thought to himself, “What the hell is she doing?”  And then suddenly he remembered something from one of the television shows they had watched. In the show someone had had a stroke and their body twitched in a rhythmic way so he thought she was having a stroke. In his mind, right then and there,  he imagined her slobbering and wobbling in a wheelchair with her brain all messed up. He backed away slowly and got into his van. He hunted down Becky and told her that he just got drafted into the Army and that he was going to be a paramedic. Becky burst out laughing again since the draft had been gone for years. The next time the girls got together and had a little party they speculated on where Tarzan was and what he was doing. They figured that he had just become lost in the woodwork but as it turned out his sister, Barbra, had finally found him after years of looking and he was living like a king in Hollywood and even boinking one of the girls he used to see on TV. One day Tarzan got the girl to wink at a certain point during the filming of an episode and incredibly the sophisto back east actually noticed it and wondered what she was winking at since it seemed to come out of nowhere. She would have been pink with senseless jealousy had she known. The next day she told Becky that she sort of missed that goof Tarzan and Becky just laughed real hard and slapped her ample thigh.