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Archive for the ‘humor’ Category

Kevin for Veep!

I don’t wish to intrude, but with so many highly-placed Republican vice presidential hopefuls trekking to New York to kiss Trump’s ring, I felt compelled by the Veepstakes to do even more: Now with Trump’s head on the chopping block in the Stormy Daniels trial, I too traveled to New York, but to kiss his ass.

Not wanting to arrive empty-handed, I watched as many of Stormy Daniels’ 169 videos as my eyes tolerated, read six books about the Trump presidency, immersed myself in the scandal magazine industry, perused the archives of several TV networks in New York and Hollywood, worked with U.S. government archivists to unearth as many related documents as possible, examined photographs, read seven scholarly papers, spoke with three historians who told me the court proceedings were a storm in a teacup, interviewed several lawyers who told me not to quit my day job, conversed with a half dozen dudes at federal prisons serving time for the January 6 insurrection, visited two museums and discussed family history over Zoom with purported Trump relatives at scraggly vineyards in southern Germany. Maybe they were bona fide relatives, maybe not. It’s always maddeningly difficult to nail down Trump connections to the Old Country.

I even consummated two trysts with sweet Black professional ladies from “the block,” Balto’s Red Light District, since extramarital sex appears germane to Trump’s case.

Since the journey is half the experience and ’tis better to travel hopefully than to arrive, I took a Zero Bus from Balto’s dilapidated Chinatown full of Ethiopian immigrants to Chinatown in NYC. Not surprisingly, seats on the bus were occupied primarily by Asians: Chinese, Koreans, Filipinos, Japanese and Chegroes. Sitting next to a pretty, 26-year-old Taiwanese, I considered myself lucky and spoke in a clucking English patois as close to Hong Kong dialect as I could muster. “Stop that,” she said. “Just talk ordinary English!” The damsel was not impressed. As the bus pulled into Chinatown in Philadelphia to disgorge and pick up passengers, I took advantage of the 15-minute layover to sprint across the street and grab dim sum take-out. Delicious!

Arriving in NYC, springtime in the air, I walked the 10 minutes from Chinatown to the Manhattan Criminal Court building at 100 Centre Street. Once on-site, I wasted no time in banging the drum for Trump:

“Trump who’s accused is not amused by being abused!

He’s got the Mar-a-Lago blues,”

I sang, loud enough to draw attention to myself but not loud enough to get arrested.

“Name’s Kevin Feingold. Can I become Vice President now?” I asked representatives of various news media. Dressed in my best dark blue suit and a red, white and blue striped tie, I also sported red socks imprinted with a black hammer and sickle, a left-over from the British rock scene of the 1980’s. I felt insanely envious of the broadcasters with their perfect hair and pearly white veneers. The networks’ assembled gear had converted Collect Pond Park across the street from the courthouse into a veritable Mars-scape of satellite dishes and high tech paraphernalia.

One-time presidential contender Vivek Ramaswamy stood in the park, claiming the trial was an attempt to derail Trump’s reelection campaign. “Straight out of a Kafka novel,” Vivek complained. Meanwhile, I got a guard to let me in a side door of the courthouse to use the men’s room.   

In the hallway outside the courtroom, after a fusillade of invective from Trump himself, House Speaker Mike Johnson called the trial ­a shame, a travesty and a partisan witch hunt. Other notables supporting Trump in a clump were North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum and U.S. Congressmen Byron Donalds and Cory Mills, the latter two from Florida. “It is sad that we’re here today and not out talking to the American people,” declared Burgum.

“Who’s stopping you?” I wondered, at which point I myself went back outside and spoke to the American people.

“People will little note nor long remember what I say here today,” I intoned. Aiming for ABC, CBS, MSNBC, CNN or at worst Fox News, I ended up facing the single camera of the West Piedmont Intelligencer YouTube channel. I understand that they specialize in cooking tips: recipes for apple butter, corn grits, cooked possum and the like. Makes my mouth water just writing about it.

“We need a strong leader to get through these troubled times,” I declared. “That strong leader needs a strong right hand. I will be that strong leader’s strong right-hand man.

“Why listen to Senators Tommy Tuberville and J.D. Vance? Why listen to Representatives Andy Biggs and Eli Crane of Arizona, Lauren Boebert from Colorado, Matt Gaetz and Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, Nicole Malliotakis from New York, Bob Good of Virginia and all those other groveling Trump sycophants when you can listen to my groveling instead? They have all made the trek here to New York, their pilgrimage to Mecca, but my pandering is at least as sincere as their pandering. Mine is U.S. Grade A groveling. The groveling that can Make This Country Great Again!

“When you say ‘America First,’ I say ‘Yes! First in Thirst, Leader of the Free World in carbonated beverages!’

“Thinking back to Afghanistan, to Iraq, to Mogadishu, to Grenada, to Lebanon, Vietnam, Korea, the Eastern Front, the Western Front, the beaches of Normandy, the Battle of Verdun, the Halls of Montezuma and the shores of Tripoli, I say ‘Honor our fallen martyrs! Honor the living as well as the dead.’ If elected, I will impose a high tariff on the import of tea cozies from Muslim countries. Let America find and fund its tea cozies locally, as we always have done, since the time of the Boston Tea Party.

“The libs may find me P.U., Politically Uncorrect, but I am proudly hetero. I like young girls! I like everybody else, too. Doesn’t mean I want to shag everything that moves. When I take stock of our country, our natural heritage, I want to admit more beautiful immigrant women to our shores, not less. Where is the ‘Erica’ in America? I wear my cred as a male chauvinist pig with pride: From mulatto matrons’ majesty to the fruitfully plain, I find all these women beautiful. Just beautiful. They are energizing the lifeblood of our country. We’re a beautiful country. Just beautiful. GAMA! Get America More Amazons!   

“Currently, I am gathering signatures to appear on the ballot in Maryland and Virginia. This is my two-state solution. Jihadists have got me on the run! To prove my bona fides, I have hired Mustafa al-Salim as a political adviser. Mustafa has not a single good word to say about Israel. Left-wing radicals need to take a sabbatical. Visit the encampments on our college campuses and you’ll see that all of life has become a comic book. Identity fanaticism is our way of life. Each of us is an action hero starring in a movie inside our own heads. Damn the bangalore torpedoes, full speed ahead!  

“It is time to deify the downtrodden hamburger. We Trumpists wear our victimhood on our sleeves. Witch hunt! Rigged elections! We seek humanitarian aid. We demand social justice for the martyrs of January 6th! I won’t shoot your dog or your goat— or even your mother-in-law on Fifth Avenue. But as Vice President, I am offering to plant swastika-shaped flower beds on the White House lawn and declare the resurrection of the 4th Reich. Long live Trump!”

Watching the videographer worriedly pack up his equipment and scurry away, I asked myself if it was something I said. Casting my eyes upon the multitudes, I didn’t see squat. Trolls we have, but where were the needy Palestinians now that I really needed them to fill out the frame?      

“Wanna party?” a raven-haired young lady in incredibly provocative brown leather thigh boots, a pink miniskirt, a white blouse and black leather jacket asked me, eyes flashing jovially. I think she applied her eyeliner with a spatula.

“Uh, I’m here running for a political party,” I stammered, feeling my face go beet red. “Republican Party. Legacy stuff,” I babbled.

“We can have a party of our own,” she giggled, her tiny white teeth peeking from between her ruby red lips.

Me like. You come to New York City, you gonna see the sights. Grabbing a cab, we proceeded to a cheap dive in the Bowery and did further research.   

Returning to the courthouse, I got back just in time to watch Michael Cohen, after his day’s testimony, get escorted to a black, armor-plated sedan by federal marshals.

I spent 20 minutes handing out campaign buttons. My slogan:

Find Gold with Feingold in 2024!

While in da city, I intended to plumb the law books in the library at Columbia, but I got chased off campus by angry anti-Israel demonstrators who mistook me for an Israeli spy. These things happen. I’m Jewish.

Instead, walking the High Line in the early evening, I got waylaid by a lady sitting on a bench with a tan Pekingese. Wrapped in a black leather trench coat that looked too warm for the season, she was an eyeful. Her fluffy dog had a flat face and the personality of a lion. I thought he was going to gnaw my leg off. “Don’t you like dogs?” she asked in a deep voice.

“I like you!” I joked.

“Fuhgeddaboudit!” she exclaimed, making room for me on the bench.

Her name was Suzanne. Long story short, after accompanying Bog the Dog back to her apartment and ordering Chinese take-out, we spent the evening listening to Arab pop music and watching YouTube on her wide-screen TV. Mostly “Boots on the Ground” pro-Israeli reports from Gaza. A secretary, when I told her about my vice presidential aspirations, she laughed and said, “If you try to grab me by the pussy, I’m gonna knee you in the balls!”

Wow! My kind of woman. I stayed over and, despite my forebodings, ended up with a friend in NYC.

Failing to make a dent with the Trump people, I was going to try to be Dr. Jill Stein’s vice presidential running mate in the Green Party, but I suspect that the war in Gaza pits me far outside the pale of Green Party orthodoxy.

My younger brother Tim thinks I am a libertarian, even if I don’t yet know it.

We all face our trials, even Donald Trump.

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humor, political satire

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My Broken Tooth

Music maestro Mutte Fjutt in Uppsala, Sweden and punk rocker Clive Flatenbad—a k a rap duo realPfft— continue their odyssey through the world of AI-generated sights and sounds.  

Mutte accessed the Suno music app at Microsoft Copilot, using the prompt: “Create a song about a broken tooth.” AI generated a complete track— music, lyrics and singing voice— even if the music was fuzzy, the vocal only 37 seconds long and the singer forgot some of the lyrics. Mutte deconstructed the music and re-recorded it, adding flourishes, solos and final mix.   

Graphic artist Kuny used Bing Image Creator DALL-E for the artwork. Prompt: “Show a handsome man and woman kissing.” AI rules!

Since March 2018, Mutte and Clive have been grinding out their quirky version of hit music. They started their collaboration doing political satire and have branched out from there into rap, hip hop, rock, pop, R&B, soul, jazz, bebop, K-pop and whatever else tickles their funny bone. “Everything we do is comedy,” insists Clive.

Sweden is joining NATO (my old stomping ground), Donald Trump is up for re-election, there’s heartache in Ukraine and headache in Gaza. Extreme weather plagues the planet and mass extinction looms on the horizon. Rarely have we been more in need of a laugh. Love that funky music!

Kev

My Broken Tooth

It tasted blood on my tongue

When our lips collided, something came undone

A rush of pain, a moment’s hesitation

But I couldn’t resist the thrill of your sensation (ooh-yeah)

You left a piece of you in my broken tooth

A bittersweet reminder of our reckless youth

Every time I smile, I’m reminded of the past

But I wouldn’t change a thing, those memories last (yeah-yeah-yeah)

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humor, music

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Penguin Mania

Yellow sunshine fills the sky. The fall weather is unseasonably warm. It’s early in November and 34 residents of Washington, DC stand on the Observation Tower of Dulles International Airport, waving goodbye to the last of the pandas. Dressed in panda-inspired knitted caps, their hearts are breaking as they press against one another and hold hands, already pining for their missing teddy bears. Frantically loyal, they seriously wonder what will become of the panda habitat so assiduously created at the National Zoo, now that its inhabitants are being repatriated to China.  

They need not worry. Locating an Italian manufacturer of snowmaking equipment in the Tyrol and flying one of its machines across the ocean, within two weeks, the zoo proudly announces that it has been ranked as Number Four worldwide in Emperor Penguin habitat. The future looks icy bright! On the Endangered Species List, classified as Near Threatened, Emperor Penguins’ existence is being propped up by cryogenically archiving penguin DNA as well as having them breed in captivity.

As the first pair of Emperor Penguins arrives from the Antarctic, they are whisked from the airport to the zoo by Constitutional Van Lines LLC, who landed a government contract after proffering the lowest bid to Congress. All well and good, but unfortunately, not everyone gets the memo: A trio of 13-year-old carjackers from Anacostia waylay the red, white and blue Constitutional Van Lines truck and make off with its two avian passengers.

“Who has our penguins and when will we get them back?!” thunders the Style section of The Washington Post.

The penguincam at the National Zoo shows a forlorn image: A state-of-the-art orange snow gun on wheels is parked in the corner of an empty, snow-encrusted enclosure. With neither penguins nor pandas in attendance, only a nest of mice can be seen scurrying about, black squiggles on a white background.

Offering a $10,000 reward, Fiends of the Zoo manages to provide the authorities with the names and addresses of the perpetrators, who have surreptitiously stashed their captives in a refrigerated meat locker at a local grocery store. The boys feed the birds canned sardines and raw Maryland perch.

This trio of miscreants is promptly captured by the police and brought before a judge. Since they are being tried as minors, The Post withholds their names from publication, although this doesn’t stop Antoine, Reggie and Tupac from getting thoroughly doxed online.

Having defecated in every corner of the meat locker, the penguins— nicknamed Lunchcart and Boxcar— seem no worse off for their ordeal. They are transported forthwith to the zoo.

Nothing in the Nation’s Capital, however, goes in quite as straightforward a fashion as one might wish. Thoroughly fed up with the Biden administration’s support of Israel, in December of 2023, Palestinian college students from Gaza— in the U.S. on student visas— tunnel their way into the penguin enclosure and capture Boxcar. Lunchcart escapes getting taken hostage only because he is housed separately and under observation after being inoculated against bird flu.

All over the zoo, Palestinian protesters march in groups, chanting through megaphones “Ha! Ha! Hamas! From the border to the sea, Ha-Ha-Hamas is you and me!” The noise level is deafening. Young girls in traditional checkered black and white kaffiyeh look like the devilish progeny of Yasser Arafat. They hang posters on the wire cages that say “LET GAZA BE FREE AS A BIRD!”

Waving Palestinian flags, they scrawl graffiti on retaining walls. Many of them get arrested and threatened with deportation. Who has raised these radicals? They promise a whole new generation of discord in international politics.

Naturally, this hostage drama garners both headlines and worldwide indignation. It feels as if Berke Breathed’s penguin hero Opus has jumped off the pages of the comic strip Bloom County and is being chased in circles in real life.

“While America considers this to be a case of domestic terrorism,” announces the Secretary-General of the United Nations at a press conference, looking appropriately somber and serious, “the United Nations insists on providing assistance, lest this form of activism become a daily occurrence.”

A special session of the United Nations is called to order to confront the dilemma. The sun is shining on First Avenue in New York City, but it’s cold. “Terrorism is as terrorism does,” insists the American ambassador.

The government of Antarctica would protest the capture of its citizen if Antarctica had a government. Since Antarctica has no government, Israel offers to represent the fauna of the region, claiming preeminence in dealing with Palestinians. “You can count the number of anti-Hamas Gazans on the fingers of one hand,” the Israeli ambassador assures the General Assembly.

After a tumultuous debate that includes a walkout and boycott by the Gulf States, Russia is assigned the responsibility of rescuing the penguin, based on their expertise in back-channel, underhanded double-dealing. Normally, these traits would be frowned upon, but beggars can’t be choosers. “If the Palestinians misbehave, don’t look at us!” swears the Russian ambassador. “Talk to the Iranians. Hamas warriors are clients of Iran.”

Everyone agrees that choosing Russia as negotiator is not a perfect solution, but it’s an acceptable compromise under trying circumstances.

The Russians and the Palestinians meet at the Rosemont Day Spa in the Catskills. Taking the Palestinian negotiators prisoner, the Russians pump sleeping gas into their quarters and storm the building. Using brute force, they rescue Boxcar. Unfortunately, the penguin succumbs to injuries sustained during her liberation.

It is at this point that noted theologian Meyer Bahnhof enters the picture, claiming from Lagos, Portugal that penguins are “the Chosen Ones,” anointed by God. Banned on many social media platforms for his rabidly Zionist outbursts, Bahnhof goes on Reddit and prophesizes a telepathic link between the thought processes of penguins and Artificial Intelligence. When asked, A.I. confirms this hypothesis. “Behold, the Lion of Zion is a penguin!” rants the theologian. “Down with the Philistines. Delilah be damned! Yahweh rules.”

While the whole world seems to be screaming for a ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza war, almost no one is insisting that Russia accept a ceasefire in Ukraine.   

Slowly, methodically, Israel drives the Palestinians of Gaza deep into the Sinai Peninsula. For want of a better solution, the United Nations, the Gulf States, Egypt and the International Court in The Hague spearhead a humanitarian rescue operation which leaves two million Gazans as semi-permanent refugees in Egypt.

“Who needs Gaza?” ask the Israelis, taking a scorched-earth approach to Palestinian intransigence.

Global warming once again grabs the headlines. “We have plenty of water, but it’s in the wrong place,” declares the United Nations, alarmed over melting icecaps and rising sea levels. They decide to seriously curb emissions and combat global warming by the year 2055. As long as it doesn’t cost too much.

Since almost nothing is known about the mating habits of penguins, intensive study, scientific research and public scrutiny are applied to the problem. Eventually, Lunchcart and a newly-arrived female nicknamed Mayfly mate. They have a chick named Lotus Leopard, who grows up to become one of the leaders of the zoo’s Emperor Penguin colony.

Meanwhile, flummoxed by melting sea ice, Emperor Penguins in Antarctica face total extinction by the year 2100.

Mankind soon to follow.

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humor, political satire

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Strike!

The Writers Guild of America— 11,500 screenwriters— are on strike and I have a lot of time on my hands. Not that I am a commercial screenwriter. It’s summer and I have a lot of time on my hands.

Just this month, I applied to a talent agency to rep me. Their second Q was “What kind of work are you looking for?” Having low self-esteem, I don’t expect to get signed up straight-away by a major blockbuster. As many as half the new shows on streaming services like Netflix, Amazon Prime, HBO Max, Hulu, Disney+, Peacock, YouTube and Apple tv get canceled after just one season. The metrics are brutal that way. Since everyone has to start somewhere, I have instructed the agency that I am looking for gainful employment on one or more of those series, the ones facing extinction.

In the meantime, I dog walk.

Fortunately, there are dozens of online courses, competitions and workshops for would-be screenwriters. There is a whole cottage industry of helpmates who, for a nominal fee, will explain why your writing sucks. You are using the wrong-colored notecards. Your pegboard is the wrong size. Stuff like that. I signed up with Three Media in Stockholm, Sweden, for the course “Screenwriting. It’s Complicated.” The first thing I have learned is that no one knows what makes a show great. Good writing, high production values, talented actors and meaningful direction all contribute to the possibility of major success. Yet, sometimes, in spite of the very best laid plans, a show still lacks “heart.” The writers never seem to find their voice. Everyone on set seems to be simply going through the motions. The “star” phones it in. The director never gets a grip on the material. Some of which may even be in French!

Je me souviens, I think back fondly to the desert location of a recent TV pilot titled “Roar of the Lion!” Hired to assist the caterers, I was thrilled to be part of a major film project, I can tell you, the smell of pancake make-up and Fresnel lenses baking in the sun. I offered to assist the writing staff in any way I possibly could. Editing. Rewrite. Even transcription. (Typing up notes from a brainstorming session.) Appreciative, they sent me into town to buy donuts.

The good news is, I really hit it off with the female lead, Anna Petrovska. What a darling lady! A ruddy redhead, her skin luminous, her bright red toenails shone like rubies against the backdrop of desert sand. A notorious insomniac, she stayed up all night, practicing lines. Bleary-eyed, I accompanied her on this emotional journey. The line “I love you, Robert” was delivered with the following motivation (I quote verbatim from the script):

Sweating in the sweltering heat of the Kalahari, Cecilia mentions this in passing, meanwhile gutting the carcass of the dead lion in prep to stuffing it.

An anti-poaching polemic, the film skates the razor-sharp edge of satirical discontent.

Lying in one another’s arms, Anna and I worked up a sweat, as well.

All of this was before the writers strike, of course.

At home in Maryland, I was surprised to get an email from L.A. It was the director, informing me that additional dialogue was needed during post-production. I mean, this is in the middle of the writers strike. The film cutter, the assistant director and the director found themselves sitting at the editing console, trying to figure out how best to rescue their baby from early oblivion. “We know you harbor the ambition to become a wordsmith on the soundstages of Hollywood,” wrote my erstwhile benefactor. “Here’s a warm-up exercise in the dramatic arts. Cecilia needs to write to Robert from Paris where she is held captive by the villain Sultan Rhubarb. What does she say to Robert? We know that his answer is yes, since we filmed the chase sequence that takes up the last third of the movie. But what does Cecilia actually say? Your thoughts on the matter are most welcome.”

It was super groovy of the director to get in touch with me! I greatly appreciate it. You’ll notice that, since screenwriters are on strike, he never asks me to write any actual dialogue.

Being a blabbermouth, I have a pupu platter of great ideas about what to put in Cecilia’s letter to Robert. As I see it, she is more than just a blood-and-guts taxidermist, up to her elbows in animal cadavers. The lass has a lion’s heart worth of emotion pent-up inside her artisan persona. “Oh, boykie!” she writes, adding a touch of South African flair to the cocktail. “When I think of the blackness of night during our sojourn in Darkest Africa,” she exclaims, using the classical, chauvinistic, colonial moniker for the continent, “my memory of the braying of the hyenas sustains me, confirming that ‘We’ll always have Botswana.’ Come rescue me & etc. Yours, CC.”

Coming to a streaming service near you. Release date TBA.

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humor

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Mudlowe

Another take on a Raymond Chandler movie has arrived and I want a piece of the action.

My name is Oscar Mudlowe, not to be confused with Moscar Ludlow whose mail keeps getting delivered to my office. I’ve never met the fellow, but if you know him, please have him straighten out this business with the post office.

Those Hollywood movie people used to sit on the front stoop of their bungalow offices on sunny days, exchanging tall tales and congratulating one another on the exceptional California weather. It sure beats Pittsburg! Sunny, cloudy, I don’t get to sit outside. I’m holed up in my office, waiting for a new client to telephone or some hot dame with a problem to beat a path to my office door.

These things happen.

Many glamorous Beautiful People flock to Hollywood and sometimes some of them get into scrapes. I consider myself a scrape eliminator. I’m a P. I. but some folks say my services are P. U. Let them take their trade elsewhere. I don’t work for bellyachers. You want a referral? I’ll even give you a referral. Anything to get you out of my hair, off my calendar, your card eliminated from my Rolodex and all memory of you expunged. Poof! U R so gone! That’s how I stay busy and solvent. Deadheads like you I don’t need.

Some perps have accused me of ineptitude. To them, I plainly state, “Lookee what it says on our office door, etched into the glass:

Graham,

Crackers

&

Son

I am the son in that statement.”

Old man Graham and the Cracker family represented the two extremes here in SoCal: Old Money and poverty, the Amazing Blue Ribbon 400 and ditchdiggers. They let my dad Murray join their landscaping business. When they went belly-up in the drought of ’87, they segued into private investigation.

Coming into my office, she looked a treat. Dames like her I need. They keep me solvent. The bank accounts of their fiancés provide a constant source of renewal. She had the good gams, blond hair and chiseled good looks prevalent among dames of Austro-Hungarian descent.

“ ’Scuse me, lady,” I said, sitting behind my desk. “Are you possibly of Austro-Hungarian descent?”

“I’m from Argentina,” she replied coldly.

I pitch ’em like I see ’em. Sometimes I am so on the money. Other times, dead wrong.

Over my desk, I have a framed testimonial from Chief Running Bird of the Comanche Tribe. It says:

Him uniform a gray trenchcoat

Him stamina in reserve

Him make haste to find

Every single guilty perv.

“What can I do for you, lady?” I asked.

“I ordered a bookcase from a Swedish furniture manufacturer and it seems to have disappeared,” she enunciated, sucking down great clouds of cigarette smoke.

Sometimes in the course of human events, everything gets all screwed up. “Sounds like a job for their service department,” I suggested.

“It was a very expensive bookcase.”

“I charge $50 an hour. I don’t intend to work seven days a week on your case. I’ll provide an itemized account, how many hours on which days, gas money, incidental expenses.”

“What about dental?” she asked, lightning bolts flashing from her icy blue eyes.

“Get real.”

“You’re hired,” she replied.

I figured there was probably a lot more to this bookcase angle than meets the eye. There are some bad dudes in this burg. Some pretty shady characters occupy nooks in the furniture trade. A lot of the fentanyl powder and pills hitch a ride on furniture deliveries. Saves on gas. Postage and handling. Taxes. I could see where a lot of digging will uncover some pretty ugly skeletons from Davy Jones’s closet. I know this stuff. That’s why they pay me the big bucks.

If you don’t have a car in L.A., you’re toast. When I went to her bungalow at the Chateau Marmont that evening to report on my progress, she didn’t seem all that interested in furniture. I got a definite vibe that loose lips would sink ships and prices on villas in Topanga Canyon have skylined. You have to be a movie mogul to live there!

“Come on in and join me for a drink,” she suggested in a smoky bedroom voice.

Entering her rental, I scanned the inventory, looking for a Scandinavian bookcase, probably in furu. Swedish pine. Heavy, yellow wood. I didn’t find it, so maybe this lady was legit after all. A lot of people hire me in April so they can list my expenses on their tax statement for the write-off. She wasn’t one of them. With those blood-red nails of hers, she seemed legit.

“I don’t drink when I’m on duty, ma’am.”

“Okay, detective, I now officially declare you off duty. A whiskey and branch water for me, please,” she told me, stalking me like prey, blowing smoke rings with every third word.

Looking at the drink tray, I thought I was going meatballs and bananas.

I liked the leprechaun green throw rug she was wearing. Not my style, but even I had to admit that on her, it looked good. “What’s with the glad rag?” I wondered.

“This?” she asked me, batting her eyebrows. “This old thing belonged to my grandmother. I only wear it for the sentimental value.”

Looking closer, I realized that the gold thread resembled real gold. Hmmm. There are some bad eggs in this town, but apparently she wasn’t one of them.  

“Take off your jacket and let’s get comfy,” she said, loosening her robe.

“I don’t fool around with clients, ma’am.”

“Okay, detective. You are now officially fired. I’m still waiting for that drink.”

Oh. Shit. I really needed the work.

She was leading me by the nose. The very next day, she telephoned me to say I was rehired and she wanted hourly updates. This was gonna be a long one. I once had a case that lasted 366 days, from a post-Oscar After Party one year to the Oscar Ceremony the next. I didn’t think the Case of the Runaway Bookcase was going to take a full year, but I had a whole rack of pens and several reams of paper suitable for transcribing bills. Days, hours, gas, incidentals. California state tax.

The day after that a man named Arthur Chromedaddy tracked me down to a film lot where I was pulling security outside the Ladies Room. “I saw your ad in the personal notices in the newspaper,” he told me. “I always check the classifieds. Where do you want the bookcase delivered?”

The damned thing had been off-loaded by mistake to a warehouse in San Pedro, 25 miles from downtown. Go figure.

I charged her for days, hours, gas, the newspaper notice, incidentals and California state tax. I squared her account with the police. I think this is the beginning of a beautiful Freundschaft. Not bad for a couple of days gumshoeing around the City of Angels.           

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humor

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Truly Dense

People who have followed my blog know that I take great civic pride in our Township of Oxburg in the state of Maryland. Incorporated in the 1950’s, we have a rich, west side of town and a poorer east side, separated by the famous 1812 Highway, a sunken road from the War of 1812. Ever since I was born, my family has lived on West 3rd Street. We try not to be snooty, but we are only human. We are proud to live on the right side of the highway, the “right side of the tracks”!

Now after 50 years of relative tranquility, despite America’s endless wars, the threat of climate change, Maryland and DC politics and the cultural war, I am sad to announce that members of the Oxburg Town Council have lost their minds!

In their thirst for more tax revenue, they have opted for greater population density in Oxburg by abolishing the zoning restrictions that have kept Oxburg a community of single-family homes. “Multi-family homes of up to six units are the wave of the future and will be allowed on existing lots,” they have announced. “Portland, Oregon is our role model. If they can do it in Portland and South Carolina and other such places, we should follow their lead and expand affordable housing in Oxburg.”

Portland, Oregon. Homeless people and feces-on-the-sidewalk Portland. When my younger brother Tim, who is an airline pilot, flies into PDX, the airline puts the crew up in a motel over the bridge in Vancouver, Washington, since Portland has become untenable.   

“You are talking about architectural monstrosities springing up on suburban streets,” I have argued. “Twenty years ago, the Town Council insisted on allowing McMansions and we have had to live with that ever since. But to build mini-apartment houses in the middle of suburban neighborhoods is crazy. That is not what Oxburg is all about!”

Up until now, we have had zoning restrictions that prohibited the building of anything beyond a one-family home. You couldn’t even rent out your basement to a live-in tenant. Oxburg has been notoriously suburban that way, block after block of Levittown style homes. Yes, we are a throwback to the 1950’s, but hey, we like it that way!

When I say zoning restrictions, I mean rules that have been as strict as the decorum in a third-grade classroom. Any homeowner wishing to add on a bedroom or porch to their house has gone through purgatory. The Oxburg Zoning Board is notorious for arriving on the scene of a planned addition with tape measure in hand and declaring, “Wait a minute! The overhang of the roofline is going to be three inches too close to the property line and two inches too close to the street. You’ll have to get the contractor to redraw the plans.” Everybody has been through it. We have the gray hairs to show for it!

Why this sudden change? “Diversity!” the libs claim. “Housing prices are so expensive in Oxburg, Blacks cannot afford to live here!” This is their Culture Warrior chant.

To them, I say, “What about Cannon Hill and East 5th Street, two neighborhoods that are predominantly Black? Those families live in single-family homes just like everybody else. They don’t want multi-family architectural monstrosities springing up in their neighborhoods either!”

The white liberals’ argument about fair housing is particularly annoying, as I have friends who live in those Black neighborhoods, while the lily-white proponents of greater population density do not.

“George Floyd was killed, so America needs to re-evaluate our racist past!” chant the liberals. I mean, these are members of the Democratic Party, they are supposed to be the Good Guys! Having drunk the Kool-Aid, they have gone deaf. The only voices they hear are their own.

You know, I was the Yard Sign Guy for the Anna Bola campaign way back in 2011 and through my clever use of yard signs, I dare say I helped swing the electorate. Hey, she won the election! In the past six months, at the hearings held by the Town Council, all these proponents of multi-family housing have marched into the Meeting Room waving the same effing red yard signs. Ugh!

Justice = Fair Housing

Freedom to Choose!

Stop racist housing!

Demand housing reform!

NOW!

it says on the yard signs they wave in our faces, we who like Oxburg the way it is and always has been.

“Old fuddy-duddy,” they call me and stick out their tongues.

I guess I am supposed to be glad that they haven’t doxed me or resorted to telephone terror. Still, it’s frustrating when westsiders have hopped on the greater population density bandwagon and refuse to see our viewpoint or even meet us halfway.

This is what happens in post-Trump America when well-meaning liberals get a bee in their bonnet.

“I take this very personally,” I told the Town Council when it was my turn to speak for two and a half minutes. “Just down the street from us, a developer has purchased a single-story yellow brick house over a year ago and let it just sit. ‘Why doesn’t he tear down and build?’ my neighbors and I wondered. Now we get it! He’s waiting for you to pass this legislation, so he can build a six-family architectural monstrosity 200 feet from my front door. My property value is going to plummet, since prospective home buyers won’t want to live down the street from an architectural monstrosity.”

“That’s the purpose of the program,” explained the Town Council Chairman. “To lower housing prices so middle-income families can afford to live here.”

So much for using my home collateral as my nest egg when I retire. Cripes!

“You should be glad that we are honest enough to admit our intentions,” the Chairman lectured me, sitting up there on the podium together with the four other members of the Town Council. “When the FBI relocates to Landover, we want to get a piece of that. New workers will come streaming into the area. Why should Oxburg get shut out of a housing boom just because you don’t happen to like it?”

Money talks.

“You’ll still get top dollar for the house and the land,” my brother Tim has counseled me. “All you need to do is sell to a crooked developer who wants to build Aesop’s Pyramid on our lot.” Since ours is the biggest lot in the neighborhood, Tim has a point. Morally repugnant, but a point none-the-less.          

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essay, humor, Politics

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Up Air

A Letter from Our CEO

Good is the better part of excellence.

No doubt you are aware of the difficult holiday season which has just transpired for the airline industry. Hundreds of thousands of flights cancelled, enormous queues, people camping out at the airports, baggage delivered abroad by domestic carriers. (There’s more than one Panama City, genius, and they’re not all in Panama!)

Cry havoc and unleash the dogs of corporate dysfunction!

But enough about me.

Flying passengers is more than just a new paint job and an updated corporate logo. Let me just say on behalf of everyone at Up Air, and in utmost sincerity, that now is not the time for the faint of heart. Major decisions require backbone.

No doubt you have also read in the past week about the corporate reshuffling among some major carriers.

2023 is going to be way different when it comes to Up Air, the airline that truly cares about its passengers.

Did you know that we have over 100 planes on back order from major manufacturers in unspecified Third World countries? Globalists, we say, why shouldn’t they get a slice of the aviation pie in, for example, Kuala Lumpur? We all live on the same planet.

Our existing fleet is due for a meaningful upgrade with a price tag in the millions of dollars, featuring major improvements to our accommodations. You won’t believe some of the customer-facing technologies on the drawing board: Cushions on every seat, enough overhead room for every cranium, toothy sandwiches for sale on the lunch cart and fast, safe access to the toilets. Ear plugs. There are even plans to retrofit wider seats in parts of the plane previously dedicated to baggage.

Looking at a map of the world, we can name over 40 different cities worldwide to which we would like to fly non-stop.

Do you have a ticket from Up Air that is gathering dust on the hall table? Do I have news for you!

In order to minimize cancellations, frustration and stress, avoid those endless lines, lessen overcrowding, reduce security issues to zero and get people out of the airports, we at Up Air have decided, at long last, to go out of business!

A Happy 2023 to one and all.

Marvin Freundlich

CEO, Up Air

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humor

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Season Forgiving 2022

Ho ho ho, ‘tis the Season to be Jolly and what could make me Jollier than receiving a gift of hard cash from you, a contributor to our Annual Season Forgiving at the Oxburg Historical Hysterical Commemorative Something or Other Entrepreneurial Foundation Collection Fund Drive?

Nothing.

Nothing could make me happier.

YOUR NAME— that’s right— through the wonders of data science, YOUR NAME will be exhibited in the space below. In caps if you want it. Or bold. Or both, caps and bold text,

__________________________________________________

holy mackerel you can’t beat that!!! For a measly contribution of $50.

For $100, I personally will get down on my knees and say a prayer or two in your honor.

Oxburg, Beloved Oxburg, named for our Founding Father John Ox, a Calvinist who settled in Catholic Maryland during the Colonial Period.

Your gift will help maintain and preserve the memory of our historical past: Oxburg Courthouse as depicted in memory and photographic image— alas, not audio— torn down in 2006 to build the Royal Guardian Apartments. Or Haley’s Crossroad, scene of the Haley Country Store and Gas Pump, a scene of nostalgic yarn and Oxburgian humor. Where Old Cyrus Haley held the Annual Turkey Shoot in preparation for Thanksgiving in what today is Natalie Woods. Falling down drunk. Demolished in 1964 to build the Annex to the Town Hospital. The store, not Cyrus.

In these difficult times— unrest in the Middle East, war in Ukraine, I stubbed my left big toe— may a blessing be upon you for pulling out that old plastic card and contributing. Contributing ‘till it hurts. Contributing more than ‘till it hurts.

The story of Oxburg is the story of America. Our country wouldn’t be what it is today— MAGA hats and angry mobs, armed militiamen in tactical gear hovering over election day drop boxes, multi-billionaires screwing up on social media, Chinese apps and Italian sausage— if not for the hard sweat and aching backs of our Founding Fathers who tilled the fields and husked the corn and baked the bread that sustained many a pilgrim through a hard, cold winter, snow knee-deep against the walls of rustic cabins, the smell of spruce wafting through the night air from the brick chimneys of our forebears.

I could go on, but who needs to???

Just send cash.

Kevin Feingold, Esquire       

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humor

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Swedish Hot-rodders

Classic turtleback Volvo in flower-power mode.

In a celebration of small-town life, Swedish rap duo realPfft sings the praises of Swedish hot-rodders and their beloved wheels. Here’s an English translation:

Hot-rodders

Turtleback Volvo… hot rod… leather-clad steering wheel

See you at the hot dog stand

Hot rod babe in wooden shoes

Moped… small-town life

Classic Chevy

Payin’ at the pump

I’ll be broke by Thursday

Fighting in town

Hot-rodders

Making out in the backseat of a muscle car

The jukebox plays golden oldies

Cops come patrolling in a black and white

Moonshine! Clunk, clunk, clunk

Transistor radio on a beach blanket at 3 o’clock in the afternoon

But today I listen to death metal

Girls in knitted sweaters snack on hot dogs

DON’T STOP! DON’T STOP!

Hot rod

The Top Ten on Top 40 radio

Hot-rodders… Chevy… moped

In the backseat of a convertible

Transistor radio at 3 o’clock

My paycheck never lasts to the end of the month

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humor, music, translation

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A.C.R.O.N.Y.M.

Rap artists, Mutte and Clive have accumulated a catalog of 91 songs. Every fifth track is a rap song. On  A.C.R.O.N.Y.M., Clive raps, Mutte raps and the voice simulator raps.

Enjoy!

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humor, music

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