Always Heard About this Literary Feud

While I think both Gore Vidal and Norman Mailer are fine writers, the level of writer stereotype they allow themselves to descend to here is hilarious--upper class intellectual vs working class yabbo.  I don't know if the fistfight was before or after this broadcast. I'm assuming after. Props to the woman in the middle who calls them out for being cartoon characters.  

This is good to know...

Website EnergyFiend calculates how much caffeine (lethal in moderate doses) it would take to off ya!
Here's mine: "It would take 214.86 cans of Mountain Dew to put you down."
               YES! I AM A MACHINE!!!! A MOUNTAIN DEW GUZZLIN' MACHINE!! And it would only cost around $350. for a tasty suicide. Death: The Final Rush. Put that on my tombstone with a little engraved Dew can above it, and send the endorsement check to my family.


http://www.energyfiend.com/death-by-caffeine

Why Was I not Invited to this Party?

                                                                                    via Awesome People Hanging Out Together
                                           L-R Pee-Wee Herman, Rodney Dangerfield, David Lee Roth.

Architectural Abominations from the Age of Aquarius

 

All pics from the book Interiors for Today (1975) via Woot!
http://www.woot.com/


Screw intro paragraphs! (Okay, I forgot to write an intro paragraph). Simply put: I look at some 70's decorating; I question its purpose. You won't be lost!
                                -Freditor

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                 Maybe I’ve lived in too many places w/out ac, but those furry pillows just look cloying. I do dig the corduroy bed spread though.  I could swish my hand across the material to play rhythm along with whatever I’d rock on the hi-fi. I imagine it would have to be this:

The reflective wallpaper’s cool, but you’d have to polish it all the time for a peak shine. Each and every morning would be a blinding sunrise.

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                       This looks like the type of guest bedroom I’d fear passing out in at a friend’s party because the next morning I’d wake up totally discombobulated from the mirrors. I’d fear that I would never get out, let alone find the bathroom. And no one would hear my cries. The Tiki idols would laugh mockingly from their mood-lit pedestals. 

                   
               Also, the room looks like the type of place a black gloved killer would murder you in an Italian 70’s giallo. At least you’d see your throat slit from twenty different angles, and could gurgle out your killer’s name inaudibly before you kaleidoscopically bled to death.

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                 Maybe it’s all the autumnal colors in this study, but I can’t help but fear there’s a cool dampness to the furniture. Like, maybe I could enjoy a sherry and read a chapter or two in complete comfort, but to nap on this couch would be inviting a dank moistness. I'm afraid I’d always have to mess with the dehumidifier whenever I enter. Stylistically, I don’t know if it’s really functional either…

LADY FRIEND: May I sit on the divan?

ME: No, you may not. As you can see, the giant polished ball bearing currently resides upon the divan. Sherry?

LADY FRIEND: No, thank you. And don’t call me Cherie, my name is Diane.

BRUSHES WITH GREATNESS: In Which I Recount the Times in My Life Wherein I Met the Rich and/or Famous and was Severely Disappointed by Fred Hagemeister

 

Tonight's Episode: Kobot: the Coca-Cola Robot

                                                                                           all pics via the coca-cola company 

            
             It was 1979, and all America's youth was excited about next year's premiere of the Empire Strikes Back. In the meantime, I was seven years old and living in Medford, MA.  In June of that year, my mother, my little brother and I waited for a bus outside of a Johnny's Foodmaster supermarket.  I was admiring the sunlight flashing off the chrome of the parked cars, when I heard a strange chirping noise. I turned around, but couldn't find anything beside a woman loading her car with groceries, and a white Coca-Cola van.
           There it was again! A series of beeps and chirps, definitely coming from the lot behind us. My brother and I craned our necks to locate the source, when suddenly, from the back of the Coca-Cola van, a robot came shuddering toward us over the cracked pavement. It was as short as I was, and it rolled to where we stood. It beeped again. My brother and I gave imploring looks to our mother, as if it were a playful stray dog that had trotted our way.
           It was white and chrome with Coca-Cola splashed across its front in red. I shaded my eyes to see more clearly this R2D2 rip-off in the midday sun. A mechanized voice said, " I am Kobot: The Coca-Cola Robot."   

           The robot asked my brother and I our names. It kept asking us if we were thirsty. It was thirsty. We knew it was thirsty. We knew it was thirsty because it kept telling us it was thirsty. It was very thirsty.  It was so very thirsty, in fact, that it couldn't stop talking about all the times it had been so very thirsty in the past. About how its parched circuits, on very long space flights, were quenched from a simple can of Coca-Cola; or even how, after a galactic battle (on a very humid planet, no doubt) it was very grateful for that one last drop of Coke to pour down its smoking valves.
           I never imagined that robots drank so much. I never imagined that robots cared so much about soda. In fact, I'd never seen a robot drink anything except for oil once on a Creature Double Feature matinee. This robot though, went on and on about how delicious an ice-cold Coca-Cola could be on a warm summer day. I began to wonder if maybe it was malfunctioning. The only time my mother looked annoyed was when it insulted us for the Pepsi we were sipping.
      Our bus arrived, and we said goodbye to the robot. It rolled on to another nearby family. In a moment, I would learn that things were not always as they seem. As the bus turned the corner of the supermarket, I spied a man with a feathery perm and a Coca-Cola jacket peering from around the back of the store. He talked into a device with an antenna.Through the open window of the bus, I heard both the robot and the gentleman speaking simultaneously. Betrayed by a soft drink corporation! A tiny piece of my childhood evaporated away like so much carbonation from a forgotten soda can.

                 A week later I was with my brother and mother at McDonald's for lunch. I was dipping a chicken McNugget into honey sauce when I saw, from the glass window in the dining area, the Kobot appear in the parking lot. I watched as it rolled down the van ramp, and traversed through the drive-thru lane. Drivers laid on their horns and attempted to swerve around it. My mother asked if my brother and I wanted to talk with the Kobot again. I didn't answer. I simply shook my head, and sipped my vanilla shake.
          I didn't even care when teenagers began pelting the Kobot with hamburgers and french fries. It did try to escape. It swiveled to the left, it swiveled to the right, but it's tiny wheels couldn't swivel fast enough for an escape. Through the window I could hear the teens' mocking laughter. Then the machine began beeping.  It sounded as if a button was stuck, or as if the Kobot was caught in some kind of program glitch. I didn't understand any of that at my age. From where I sat, it sounded like the thing was crying in distress.
          From the cola van, the operator appeared and dragged the wailing machine back inside. Then he leaned out of the back doors and shook his fist at the youths.
        As the van sped off, the beeping stopped and a robotic voice faintly repeated from inside, "Have a Coke and a smile. Have a Coke and a smile. Have a Coke and a smile..." until it was so far down the highway that we could no longer could hear it.
             I never saw the Kobot again. I imagine years later Coca-Cola took him back out for the Return of the Jedi premiere, but my path never crossed its tour of supermarts and car dealerships. Or maybe it was retired. Maybe the Coca-Cola Bottling Company realized that the country wasn't ready for a talking robot concerned with how America slakes its thirst. I know I wasn't ready. I don't think anybody was ready. God bless you, Kobot. Part can, part robot; you were my first -Brush with Greatness!  

Grill Fe-vah!!!

Grilling this early in the season is bad for me. I get the fever. When I'm grilling, I start looking in cabinets for ridiculous shit to throw on there. "Smoked oysters...why not? Maybe they'll be even better smokier." They were.

BRUSHES WITH GREATNESS: In Which I Recount the Times in My Life Wherein I Met the Rich and/or Famous and was Severely Disappointed by Fred Hagemeister

                             Tonight's episode: THE STOOGES

              

                The year was 2003, ridiculously early in the millennium’s oughts. America was still recovering from the World Trade Center tragedy.  Myself? I was in need of a good time; to loosen up so to speak, so when I had the chance to meet one of my favorite bands, The Stooges, of course I said yes.   

Here’s what happened: The records store I worked for was  hosting a reunion of the legendary 60's proto-punk band. The two original members, Scott and Ron Asheton (drums and guitar respectively), had played together that year with singer Iggy Pop on his Skull Ring album. The industry was all abuzz with the news of a Stooges tour to promote the work. Joining the band on bass, to replace the deceased Dave Alexander, would be ex-Minutemen Mike Watt.

As a kid, when I had asked a record store clerk for something heavy, he had kindly crossed my palm with the Stooges' Funhouse album. It became the yardstick by how I measured all rock music since. So when my company asked for volunteers to drive to the NH store and work security for the show, I jumped at the chance. 

I arrived in NH with my co-worker, Paul, and we were told to control the line in front of the store. The store was temporary closed while the stage was set up inside. The crowd itself numbered about 200, and was comprised mainly of fifty-year-olds in leather jackets; the majority telling us in confidence that if the Stooges wanted to “smoke up,” they could provide the fuel. I promised around 20 of them to relay the message to the band.  

The doors reopened at 7pm, allowing the crowd to shamble to the back of the store around the makeshift stage. Inside, I noticed the band’s roadies laughing. Apparently the drum stool, cymbals, and stands were shipped to the store, but someone had forgotten the drums. To their credit, the roadies began micing up a washing machine box they found in the parking lot to substitute for the missing percussion.

 The manager of the store was as frazzled as his hair. He kept quickly running his fingers through it while talking to me. He was a nice guy, a middle-aged dude in a Hawaiian shirt, but that day he looked like a cross between Keith Richards and Wembley from Fraggle Rock.

One incident soured my time with him.  Once the crowd was in, they reopened the store for shoppers. I watched 10 customers wait in line at the register for fifteen minutes with none of the staff coming by. I thought I’d do the right thing, since I worked for the company, and hopped on to ring up the increasingly disgruntled crowd. The store manager ran up when I was through and had a mini-breakdown. His voice changed pitch as he lectured me on assigned cashiers in his store. I walked off leaving the store’s reputation to him, and tried to find something else to do before the show.  

Eventually we volunteers were assigned security areas. We were to scan 360’ around us to deter theft from the crowd who were wedged around the CD bins. Me and a kid from that store were assigned to the center register, a lone ringing station placed in the middle of the store. It was simply a cashier area, bordered by flimsy, waist high, cubicle slats; dead center in the crowd. From us, the band stage was ten feet away. The crowd was getting severely ripped pre-show. Tiny empty nip bottles of every variety were picked up by employees and tossed into our waist bucket. The kid glanced around the mob and said to me, smiling, “You know, if there’s a riot, we’re trapped.  Like, completely dead.”

Then the band appeared and tuned up without Iggy. Members of the audience began to scale the cd racks in order to get a view above the crowd. Besides crushing cds, these drunkards were sitting on flimsy shelves only designed to hold the weight of things like novelty lunchboxes and tie-dyed glitter socks. I signaled that they should come down, and each one did, but not before giving me that look that accused me of being “The Man.” Now I realized how the cop at the door felt. Only one guy gave me a hard time, a photographer atop an especially flimsy display case who kept shaking his head in disbelief that I needed him to return to the ground. I finally told him he could either get down for me, or he could get down for the police officer. He finally slid down, making a big drama about his footing as if I were endangering his life.  

Iggy ran out from the store’s breakroom, and the crowd roared. The frazzled store manager signaled me through a series of wild gesticulations, not unlike an exotic bird’s territorial dance, to leave my area and move closer to the stage.  As I threaded my way through the crowd, I began to embrace my cop-like role, flashing my store nametag to make a pathway. This area had a mirrored ceiling and no cd bins. I looked around at the concertgoers to spot any trouble, but they stared straight at the band. Those who caught my gaze merely smiled and jumped in time to the beat.

Iggy’s beautiful wife sat on a couch near the stage. An Asian woman in a low cut dress, she held a tiny Pomeranian in her lap and a mink stole across her shoulders. I was doing another pass of the crowd, when I noticed that a bunch of the concertgoers weren’t looking at the band, but instead were looking at the mirrored ceiling. I followed their gaze and realized that, from the reflection angle, they were looking down the woman’s ample cleavage. As I made another circuit of the crowd, I happened to turn and catch Iggy’s wife following the crowd’s eyes. She good naturedly laughed, flashed a fake pout, and covered herself with her stole.

The band played all the hits, and it was as amazing as you’d expect. It was doubly amazing as I never in my wildest dreams imagined they would get back together, much less that I’d see them in a tiny record store, upfront, and that Scott Asheton would be playing a cardboard box. But it wasn’t until after the show that my brush with greatness truly happened.

 At the end of the show, we set up a table for the band to sign whatever autograph material people had brought. Paul had a “Skull Ring” promotional poster he wanted signed for our store. We were assigned line duty to make sure no one cut, but everyone remained civil. By the end, all the customers had passed through and now it was the employees turn to enter the line. Paul felt funny asking the band to sign the poster, and he asked me to go. I was the last person in line.

 The Stooges had a British manager who I think his name was Reg, or something.  When there were only two people ahead of me, Iggy said aloud to his manager, “Reg, man, I can’t do this anymore.” Reg tried to persuade him, his Limey accent stating that these people had helped set up the show and they just wanted to say “hello” to the band.

Iggy grudgingly consented as I, the last person, reached him. I was star struck. I’ve never been tongue-tied before in my life, but the memory of first hearing the Stooges as a kid came flooding back. I sputtered out, “Funhouse was a revelation to me, I-.” Iggy cut me off with a, "Yeah, that’s nice,”  quickly signed his name, stood up, threw his marker on the table, did some funky chicken dance move, and said, “Reg, I am done, man. I am outta here!” Then he kicked his chair out from behind him and strode off to the break room. I was stunned.  I looked over, and Ron and Scott Ashton were laughing at their singer. I finally finished my sentence to those guys as they signed. They told me Iggy is always like that as they got up from their folding chairs. Employees were milling around. All the customers had been guided out of the store. Where we were standing, it was just me, my co-worker Paul and the Asheton brothers. I felt bad as no one was really saying anything to them. I  didn't know what to say, so I congratulated them on a good show.

In hindsight, I should have asked them why Mike Watt wasn't at the signing table. It was only years later when the band released The Weirdness with Watt that I noticed he was in none of the band photos either. It seems a cold decision on the band’s part, but on my Funhouse CD there’s a picture of the saxophone player, Steve MacKay, and it says “not a Stooge” underneath, so maybe they’re sensitive about that stuff. Original members only.

Anyway, we’re standing there and Paul is talking to them, and one of the Asheton brothers asks if Paul has “anything to smoke?” Paul explained he doesn’t smoke cigarettes, and there was silence. I asked them if they were talking about marijuana and they said they were. I told them if they went outside, any of the crowd could smoke them up. They just nodded. We hung out and talked about the tour, the drum box, and recording the old albums until the owner of my company and record company reps came over for photo opportunities.

In summation: The guy I thought would be cool was kind of a dick, and the guys that really didn’t have to talk to me were nice enough to spend a good fifteen minutes talking about their reunion and  what a jerk their singer was. To me, Iggy’s action were just surreal, like a desperate move to be the center of attention or avoid the post-show photo session. Overall, the image he conveyed is funny. As if Iggy’s so wild and uncivilized (at what 50?), that he can’t stand the confinement of a folding chair for more than 30 minutes. His blood courses with the raw power of a thousand energized volts! Truly a streetwalking cheetah with a heart full of napalm as the song goes.  
         For years, in interviews, Iggy always portrayed the brothers as barely functioning high school drop outs; stoner cretins with no class, but I'd say the opposite was true.  If anything, after Iggy's tantrum I am surprised the band could function, tour, and record as it did up until Ron Asheton's death in 2009. I got to see the band play again at a large venue months before he passed away, but it paled in comparison to that show. So ends my first: Brush with Greatness!

New Name!

         Trying out new blog titles. I felt that THE SIGNAL MOON IS ZERO (a nod to poet Dylan Thomas) was a little too literary. Readers unfamiliar with the reference could get confused (not that confusion is always a bad thing), and tune out. On the other hand, Lit-heads may have found the site through a search engine, but could be disappointed by the lack of actually literary merit found here. I'm not crazy about the word frustration in our new title, but it suits our mindset right now.
                                                               rock on,
                                                                           Freditor