Here’s a missing episode of the adventures of Wild Dog as he circumnavigated, counter-clockwise, the Lower Forty-Eight in 1991-1992. – JDW
So we raced towards Grant’s place. Arrived about midnight.
“What were you expecting?,” Grant Justice asked, delighted at our mouth-agaped expressions of exultant wonder.
“You said we’d be sleeping in the barn,” I reminded him, “so, at worst, I figured we could park the van inside a dry place. Sleep in there. To tell you the truth, LIFESTYLES OF THE RICH AND FAMOUS never entered my mind.
“Don’t get me wrong,” I said smiling. “This will do just fine, thank you.”
I broke the slightly stunned silence. “How soon do we need to be gone?,” I asked directly.
“Go? I was hoping you would stay.”
I was reminded in the paper today that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is a big user of pornography. Can we expect he’ll be a staunch advocate for our freedoms of expression?
Is a vote for Clinton a vote for Bush?, I wonder. Bush represents the conservatives and business. Clinton is representing the liberals and the blacks. Hymen R. Perot seems destined for the middle ground. Will a vote for Clinton cancel out a vote for Bush?
I can’t vote for Hesus R. Perot, can I? A billionaire dwarf reactionary. “I got to see a problem before I can tell you how to solve it,” His Immense Miserliness said squeakily. “I got to swallow it and crap it out my shorts before I can say this is what we should do.
“I won’t know the score until I sleep with the White House.” I can almost imagine Hortense R. Perot saying just that very thing.
Would Napolean get elected in today’s political climate? He’d seem to have all the right qualifications.
Except for being alive.
I read the newspapers, the lines between the lines between the lines, for the questions that never seem to get asked, let alone answered.
The Mets are paying Bobbie Bonilla (based on his 1991 statistics) nearly $60,000 for every RBI he produces. Is Bonilla worth it?, that’s a question all the New York papers were asking after Bonilla signed his $29 million contract.
“The worst current TV commercial: the Nike spot that makes beasts of the U.S. Olympic basketball players, most of whom are black.”
Sports media critic Stan Isaacs wrote that in his NEWSDAY column today. Stan’s a white guy, late 50’s, I’d guess from the photo. Maybe Jewish.
Does Stan know the accusation itself is racist? Like when Howard Cosell told millions of Monday Night Football fans to “look at that little monkey go.” I never think of blacks as any different than myself and so I never think of them as ANIMALS.
I watched the commercial. I saw superstars transformed into superbeings and I saw the imaginative hand of the Weiden & Kennedy advertising agency.
I saw my own great paws in Nike High-Tops, a timber wolf built like Schwarzenegger. Massive fur-covered pectorals flatten as I soar above the hoop for a monster jam. AIR DOG FLYS ALPHA MALE 1.
I watch that Nike shoe commercial glorify a bunch of college drop-outs earning millions of dollars for playing a child’s game. It’s not even a full-time job.
Entertaining the masses with athletic acrobatics for the profit of a few dozen white men. Protected by anti-monopoly exemptions from Congress.
Who get free tickets to the Redskins games.
And isn’t that an ironic twist of fate. Naming the home team for the nation’s capitol after the people we stole the place from.
But, I digest. Ha!
Well, as The President/Leader Of The Free World said to conclude a recent press conference, “I’ve got to run now and relax. The doctor told me to relax. The doctor told me to relax. The doctor told me. He was the one. He said, ‘Relax.'”
BARKER AJAX PSYCHO JOURNALIST VISITS JIMMY THUDDPUCKER. At the home of an enormously special person. I AM ONE WITH THE WORLD AND HIAWATHA IS TOTALLY BLISSED OUT.
Not to mention she cannot get enough of me. Luckily, I am suddenly feeling muy hombre. But enough about our torrid affairs. Back to our story.
We are safely ensconced at the new home of my gadzillionaire good buddy from wayback, the legendary songwriter and superrock star, recording artist Jimmy Thuddpucker.
You probably know him best from the DOONESBURY CHRONICLES.
That was his group.
Anyway, back in high school, at a CYO dance at St. Aretha’s, I was banging the skins for a group called JACK’S REVENGE. Loud and proud. Drove the nuns crazy. Not to mention those nubby girls in the plaid skirts and the shiny shoes.
Jimmy Thuddpucker had been the drummer when the group moved up from the city in 1962. I was the hot townie who took his job. Jimmy went acoustic and solo and wrote “Rocky Mounting Vi” right out of the blocks.
He’s been richer than Jay Leno ever since. Call Barker Ajax crazy, but, well, you know me, I lost touch.
One day a check comes into WILD DOG, which is my legitimate front. It’s from HIM.
Actually, Jimmy thought I was another Barker, another friend who was once driven to start a magazine. And was just strange enough to try it again.
Here’s just what I told him.
“Your alacritous response to my subscription solicitation loses some of its luster when we learn you thought it was someone else.
“Here I thought you and me, well, shared some unique bond. Imagine my chagrin to learn you’d forgotten of my existence. To avoid any further confusion, you might choose to think of me as “Coach” Barker Ajax. That’s my pen name.
“I guess you’ve been busy. Your apologia – about which the reader must remain unenlightened – was a masterful encapsulation of the last half-dozen years. Thanks for letting me catch up with you.”
Included in the letter was an invitation to visit his newly completed – after years of painstaking planning and replanning – personal getaway nestled just down the road.
For purposes of privacy, let’s just say the place is Upper Poorfield, New Hampshire. Halfway between Dartmouth College and an ALL-NIGHT STATE HIGHWAY REST STOP & LIQUOR STORE.
My response.
“I am still telling stories about your old house. The new joint looks swell. Except for that Subaru station wagon, you’ve never heard me cast doubt on your taste. It looks like a hundred acres of magic. (I told Hiawatha you probably had the snow brought in for the photo.)
We accept your invitation to the farm. (What’s in the barn?) Having said that, I don’t know if we’ll get there. We are living on the road. It’s difficult to tell you anything more concrete than that.
I would love to see you.
A few days later, a brief note came back. “Seems to me you may be on to something. Think we have much to talk about. Interested to learn more about WILD DOG. Hope you can visit. Instructions enclosed.”
If you guessed we’re at the home of John Denver… HA!