(Ready for some more? I didn't think so.)
Sweet dreams.
Monday, May 13, 2013
Sunday, May 12, 2013
Taco Time: fun with the Shatmeister
They don't call him Kinky Jim for nothing.
"That. . . last. . . taco. . . too. . . much. . . hot. . .sauce. . ."
"Calgon! Take me away!"
"My wife doesn't understand me."
"Yes, but Sulu's busy tonight."
Chased down with horse and hounds
“Happiness leaves such slender records; it is the dark days that are so voluminously documented.”
Oh MY my. This was a quote by Truman Capote that rattled around in my head for years and years. But I only remembered the gist of it, something about not remembering when we've been happy. Like all Capote quotes, it was elegant, graceful and went straight to the point. I never thought I'd find it again, and even doing a google search was pretty unfruitful (to coin a phrase) for the first couple of hours or so. Then, under the tag "happiness". . .
Oh yes.
Back in his youth, he was a sort of male literary Marilyn Monroe, probably showing his hairy leg to journalists if it would get him laid. He was like that.
But Jesus-bloody-Murphy and hell's bells, wasn't he beautiful?
What can I say? These exotic poses pre-dated the Advocate Personal Ads by quite a few decades. But I guess that pouty lounging look got him noticed. His infuriating ability to stun with a phrase did the rest.
Whoever you are, holding me now in hand
Whoever you are, holding me now in hand,
Without one thing, all will be useless,
I give you fair warning, before you attempt me further,
I am not what you supposed, but far different.
Who is he that would become my follower?
ho would sign himself a candidate for my affections?
The way is suspicious - the result uncertain, perhaps destructive;
You would have to give up all else - I alone would expect to be your
God, sole and exclusive,
Your novitiate would even then be long and exhausting,
The whole past theory of your life, and all conformity to the lives
around you, would have to be abandon'd;
Therefore release me now, before troubling yourself any further - Let
go your hand from my shoulders,
Put me down, and depart on your way.
Or else, by stealth, in some wood, for trial,
Or back of a rock, in the open air,
(For in any roof'd room of a house I emerge not - nor in company,
And in libraries I lie as one dumb, a gawk, or unborn, or dead,)
But just possibly with you on a high hill - first watching lest any
person, for miles around, approach unawares,
Or possibly with you sailing at sea, or on the beach of the sea, or
some quiet island,
Here to put your lips upon mine I permit you,
With the comrade's long-dwelling kiss, or the new husband's kiss,
For I am the new husband, and I am the comrade.
Or, if you will, thrusting me beneath your clothing,
Where I may feel the throbs of your heart, or rest upon your hip,
Carry me when you go forth over land or sea;
For thus, merely touching you, is enough - is best,
And thus, touching you, would I silently sleep and be carried
eternally.
But these leaves conning, you con at peril,
For these leaves, and me, you will not understand,
They will elude you at first, and still more afterward - I will
certainly elude you,
Even while you should think you had unquestionably caught me,
behold!
Already you see I have escaped from you.
For it is not for what I have put into it that I have written this
book,
Nor is it by reading it you will acquire it,
Nor do those know me best who admire me, and vauntingly praise me,
Nor will the candidates for my love, (unless at most a very few,)
prove victorious,
Nor will my poems do good only - they will do just as much evil,
perhaps more;
For all is useless without that which you may guess at many times and
not hit - that which I hinted at;
Therefore release me, and depart on your way.
'Scuse me while I kiss this guy (or commit suicide)
Truman Capote: Quotable Quote!
“There were hints of sunrise on the rim of the sky, yet it was still dark, and the traces of morning color were like goldfish swimming in ink.”
Thursday, May 9, 2013
Jon Hamm, the Kent-Smoking Man
I think we may have walked this way before. But it's time to walk it again. This is the Kent Man, with the gleaming skyscrapers of Madison Avenue towering above him. Though the ad copy refers to "scientists and educators", my first thought was, "Like fuck! He's an ad man."
The ad is circa sometime in the early '60s, when medical experts were beginning to grumble about the negative health effects of smoking. Imagine the panicked discussions in boardrooms across the nation! "How are we going to put a positive spin on this so people think it's GOOD for them to smoke?" One astonishing television ad from the era had a bellicose man with a cigarette in his mouth proclaiming, "I want a treat, not a treatment."
Unfortunately, his "treat" all too often DID lead to a "treatment", usually received too late.
The ad guy puffing away on his Kent ("For the best combina-tion of fil-ter and good taste/Kent satisfies best!" went the cheery little jingle) looks so startlingly like Don Draper of Mad Men, it's downright eerie. I wondered if I could get Don's head into the Kent ad, and was almost successful.
Of course it's never perfect. Head shape and angle, skin color, all that stuff, will never match up exactly.
Besides, in the ad the guy is looking up, squinting actually, in a cool Madison Avenue sort of way.
Kind of like this? Looks a bit like Rod Serling on a bad day. One eye looks more or less OK (these are the Kent Man's eyes, by the way) but the other one, well. . . It would have been best to have that eye in shadow, but I don't have those kind of skills.
Here Don stares into nothingness in his typical God-how-misunderstood-I-am-because-I-was-poorly-mothered-if-in-fact-I-was-ever-mothered-at-all expression. I guess he stares at the sidewalk when he lights up.
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DEFINITELY not mothered. At all. Ever.
Plus it looks like he's going to throw up.
Plus it looks like he's going to throw up.
This is my personal favorite. His hands have suddenly turned into brown oven mitts, but never mind.
At least he looks happy.
Wednesday, May 8, 2013
BIG BANG THEORY: some choice moments
Whea-tonnnnnnnnnn!!!!!
Dance of the sugarplum nerds
Shamy dance
No Goofy, no. . .
AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH! Not Euclid Avenue!!!
Heh heh!
Tuesday, May 7, 2013
Oh rapture!: New Images of Milky the Clown
It's not every day I find a new image (new to ME, I mean - these were likely taken 50 years ago) of the source of my childhood nightmares, Milky the Clown. Milky was the surreal symbol of Twin Pines Dairy, sponsor of Milky's Party Time and other lactitious Detroit children's programs.
This one I haven't seen before. Like a nun's habit, Milky's costume covers everything but his face, which is thickly plastered with white greasepaint like something from a movie made in 1917. And his hat. . . his hat isn't like any other clown's hat, unless you look back about 100 years.
Milky wasn't a clown of his times. This was why he was so scary. He seemed like the nightmare reverse negative of an old Betty Boop cartoon, jumping not out of an inkwell but a vat of Twin Pines milk.
Was this magic, or a form of sorcery? Was his baggy monochromatic white costume and dead-white face a deliberate attempt to mimic the ancient itinerant carnival clowns depicted by Leoncavallo in Pagliacci?
Well, maybe. Except for the pompoms.
And this one is no less than Enrico Caruso, the most famous tenor of all time. Wearing Milky's costume, or a close approximation of it.
What's the magic word? . . . Twin Pines! ("But that's two words," I used to protest, provoking offended stares.)
We hope not.
Dear Sir or Madam, will you read my book
It took me years to write, will you take a look
Order The Glass Character from:
http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B001K7NGDA
Barnes & Noble
Thistledown Press
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