PUN TIME IS FUN TIME

My brother, who has nooooo interest in politics, made a topical pun last week that was so inspired I had to share it here:

"Bigots back in the day said a black man would be elected President 'when pigs fly.' But Barack Obama was elected President and what happened? Swine flu!"







Thanks to my brother, President Obama, and my friend Ted, who made the image above.

Odd names of real people

I have family back in my home state of Arkansas, and I get reports from home. This week I was told that a man named "Anos Arkangel" was listed in the local court dockets! His body part homonym made me think of the old joke about Elvis Presley and his nickname: "You know how they call Elvis 'the Pelvis'? Well, he's got a brother named Enos."

Wonder if Anos Arkangel's appellation is his birth name, or a self-applied one? Bet it's the latter.

Also in my home town there's a guy named "Sunshine Mudhole." (I bet that ain't HIS birth name, either!)

But ya never know. I remember going to school with a girl with the first name of Bambi, and another with the last name of Crapser. (I'd hate for her to be stopped by a male State Trooper: "What's your name, ma'am? Crap, sir.") And when I was a kid I knew a fella named Hugh Monger--of course, sometimes he got called "Humongous." There also was a man with the last name of Batman listed in the phone book.

My parents and grandparents have all sworn to me that they knew a girl named America Mae Riddicky Biddicky Joshuaway Arlena. Oddly, no one remembers her last name.

And I grew up with family members with the names "Othar" and "Monk"--names I like very much for their distinctiveness. (People with unusual names often seem to hate them when they are children, but appreciate them as adults.) When I was a child, I knew no one outside my family with the name Max. I hated it--then.

However, maybe none of this should be surprising, since my home state has towns named Old Joe, Toad Suck, Bull Shoals, Yellville, Gassville, and Flippin! But I'm not being insulting. I love the fact that Arkansas has some colorful town names--I wish it had more!

In Memphis, TN, when I lived there, were doctors Oliver Hardy and Vincent Price (the latter actually a dentist!).

And news came out this week that jazz singer/songwriter Blossom Dearie has died. (And yes, that was her real name.)

But for sheer weirdness, little beats the cruelty of Frank Zappa: he named two of his kids "Moon Unit" and "Diva Muffin."

Well, except for naming your kid "Adolph Hitler."

Sheesh.


Relevant link: Baby Name Games

Ah, yoot!

In a nostalgic mood today.

I think an ideal day would be to be ten years old once more, and experience all the following activities one more time:

After waking, I'd get up and have a bowl of Freakies cereal (or maybe Count Chocula) while I read a new horror comic (or watched Johnny Quest or Scooby Doo), followed by sitting under a tree and reading a Ray Bradbury story for the first time. After lunch, I'd buy a Dreamsicle from a passing ice-cream truck, then go back and find a new monster 8mm film clip in the mail. After watching it in the dark basement, I'd ride my bike to Ben Franklin's 5 & 10 and get some cheap rubber monster toy that would spark my imagination like the machines in a mad doctor's lab.

From there I'd ride over to Baker's Drugstore and get a Coke with cherry syrup in it, and drink it while ogling the latest issue of Famous Monsters, (or one of the other horror mags in the Warren lineup) and hope Shock Theater would get around to showing some of the films Uncle Forry so lovingly (and punningly) described. I'd go home and find my Memaw there to take me to a matinee. We'd go see a monster or fantasy flick, natch. (I'd have a Cherry Bomb, or maybe a Reese's cup.)

We'd go home after the movie and I'd draw monsters while dinner was prepared. Maybe play my Disney LP Chilling Sounds of the Haunted House while I was at it. Then, I'd go out after supper and catch fireflies with my brother, then he'd tell a scary story he'd made up. I'd describe the scenes in the monster film I was planning on making one day (it would have Dracula, Frankenstein, a teenage Mr. Hyde, AND a robot in it!) My father would holler at us (he did a lot of that) to get in the car (a station wagon with a moon roof) and we'd go to the Starlite Drive In.

We'd see something with a rubber makeup job prominently featured, like Planet of the Apes. (My dad did take us to see that, as he was interested in special makeup effects, bless him.) I'd come home tired, but would have fun taking my Marx Creature into the tub, then squirting a soapy blob from my Monster Crazy Foam can that would eat him! Yay!

I would go to bed feeling mighty powerful...The Basil Gogos versions of the Universal monsters (who lived in my closet) would be powerless to scare me that night...

(All the things I've just described I HAVE experienced, just not all on the same day!)

"BACKWARD, turn backward, O Time, in your flight,
Make me a child again just for to-night!"
(Elizabth Akers Allen)

Today is the day The King died.

Today I am remembering the King of Terror, Boris Karloff, and BLACK FRIDAY.

Not the 1940 film Karloff made with Bela Lugosi, but Friday, February 2nd, 1969. Forty years ago today--the day the King of Terror was taken by Prince Sirki, and all horror film fandom wept. I know I did. I was 7 years old when my father told me my favorite actor was gone. I cried hot tears in my bedroom. I had looked forward to growing up with new Boris Karloff films! Wasn't he the man who vowed to never stop working? Hadn't Famous Monsters magazine informed monster kids everywhere of his future film plans? I couldn't imagine Forrest Ackerman no longer cheerfully reporting on Boris' busy schedule of appearances on TV and film. Karloff's workload was amazing for a man in his 80's, despite crippling, painful arthritis and debilitating emphysema. He seemed to be imbued with the immortal life force that Frankenstein's monster was given. But like the films Boris appeared in, that was only a wonderful illusion.

He was a man I wanted to be like. He was courteous, energetic, and dedicated to a profession that made others happy. Respected and loved, his life was productive, despite his ailments and in spite of his experiencing the tragedy of divorce. My young life had known a lot of illness, and my family had suffered through divorce. But Mr. Karloff had overcome these problems, so I believed life was not as scary as the films I watched Boris in.

And now he was gone, joining Bela Lugosi for a final time. My mother had died a year before, and the power of death to change life for the worse was now confirmed as absolute. So I sobbed until I couldn't anymore. I lay on the bed, miserable.

My father came back with a copy of Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine. I said nothing. He said nothing. He just smiled an awkward smile, set it on my bed, and left.

Inside were new photos of Boris not run before. I lost myself in the pictures, imagining the stories they seemed to tell. Boris' baritone was speaking words of menace and power, and in the back of my mind was the thought that there were future issues of FM to look forward to. And no one ever died in Famous Monsters of Filmland.

I wish I still had that issue.

And speaking of family...

I have to be concerned about mine, because they all live in northern Arkansas, which is buried under ice and is without power. (Fortunately my parents have a generator.)

To give you an idea how bad it is there, my brother sent me a picture that a friend of his took, showing Severed's sibling digging out of his driveway:

It's all about family

Now that Jane and I are settled (more or less) into our new home, we are beginning to think of long-range plans for our lives. Jane was adopted as a baby, and so we've wondered if we wanted to adopt. Recently, at a hospital maternity ward, we saw the CUTEST baby, and we so wanted to have him as our own:

The baby even resembles members of my own family! Below, from the days before I was a drunken severed head, are pictures of a young cousin coming to visit me in my home in St. Louis. First, a photo of us being movie-watchin' couch potatoes:


And a pic of a farewell handshake:

Sadly, my cousin's wrist stitches were loose and his hand popped off in my palm! (I'm known to pop off on occasion myself-- especially after having Popov!) Luckily, Cuz's paw was later put back on by his doctor.

Apparently, losing body parts (hands, heads, etc.) runs in my family...

31 Days of Halloween: Feels like Halloween! (Pt. 2)

When I was a kid, I always wanted Halloween to have the cache of Christmas, and as many traditions as Christmas. So I was thrilled one year in the ' 70s to get a book of carols to sing at Halloween-- The PEANUTS Book of Pumpkin Carols.


It featured some appealing Halloween themed art emphasizing gift-giving--


And sending cards to friends to celebrate the season!

Just like Christmas.

In my post 31 Days of Halloween: Feels like Halloween! (Pt. 1) from a couple of weeks ago, I'd groused that I hadn't really truly been in a Halloween mood.

Then, in the same week, I got Halloween cards from friends AND "Monster Mash" by Bobby Pickett was played on a local station! ("Monster Mash", though I've heard at least 40 different covers of it and heard the original a hundred times or more-- hell, I even sang it in a stage musical back in the Nineties-- is the "Jingle Bells" of the spooky season. I need it to kick off Halloween.) It felt like Halloween!

I send out cards when I can for the holiday to those friends I think might like them. I try to send out as many as I can afford-- but my house-hunting (Jane and I have bought our first home) has put a crimp in my Halloween plans, time- AND money-wise. Still, Jane and I sent out a good number, and we got many cards as well. Here they are (below), ranging from cute, to creepy, to crass, and I celebrate them all.

Of course, we got a card that was the same as one I sent (I won't say which one). That happens every year at Halloween and Christmas, and amuses me every time. The fact that this year I got only one means I found some less common ones for my friends, I'm happy to say.















Of course, the Voodoo Queen and I exchanged Halloween cards and gifts. I bought Jane a cat-themed card because, well, she likes cards with cats on them.


And she bought me a cat-themed card, because, well, she likes cards with cats on them.

Our thanks to all of our friends who sent Halloween greetings-- Dixon, Jeff P., Jeff C., Sara, Jill, Rob, Raymond, Eyrdie, John C. (whose wonderful card was too big to scan), John R., Polly, Craig, Jim, Dale, Nancy, Karen, Lee, Brian, Mirek, Gary, Gord, Dave, and my family.

Now it's time to go be with my wife and enjoy the holiday AND our anniversary. YOU have a happy Halloween, whatever you are!

31 Days of Halloween: My relations

Yesterday, I mentioned my hard-drinking great-great-granny. Well, her great-grandaughter is the spittin' image of her. So I thought I'd share a photo of my kissin' cousin!


Severedheadism runs in my family, as you can see! But cuz here is the only one of us to break into movin' pictures...