Much ado

Here’s a question that always fills me with dread: “Don’t we know each other from somewhere?”

Whenever I hear this, I expect a fleet of black-robed judges to spring from the wings, because surely this person recognizes me from my axe-murderer days, or my erstwhile job as a pole dancer, or saw me that time I threw up eggs and whiskey outside my house. 

Ok, it has yet to turn out so badly. But I was in a store the other day in my never-ending search for a decent white t-shirt, and the sales person asked me, “Kennen wir uns nicht?,” which of course means, “Don’t we know each other?,” which for me usually means, "I really hope not." 

You know, another difficult thing about this situation is, say we did know each other once and have no contact anymore - well there must be a reason for that, even if it’s not because we got drunk and slept together 20 years ago and you or maybe even I never called back.... 

Anyway, on the note of sleeping dogs and difficult goodbyes, here’s a funny typo I saw today: “without further adieu.”

quite the

So ok let me check that I’m getting the gist of this article -

"Dwayne and Wanda Smallwood worry the gravel pit threatens the town’s RURAL CHARACTER."

"So Brite Tattoos believes the proposal is at odds with the town's RURAL CHARACTER."

"Wee Ones Play–n-Day Care have joined the protest, saying the town's RURAL CHARACTER is at stake."

Ok, think I got it.

the past, there you have it

Like many blonde children I was born royal but abducted by envious pygmy bunnies and taken to keep their warren clean. They pecked me, and did not pay well. Still I was able to learn three languages, including bird slang of the western hemisphere. When I got too big the bunnies left me with with the management of Sloat’s Tavern in Scranton, PA in exchange for a purse of chocolate coins wrapped in tinfoil. The man who became my father swept up the tavern. He was a music critic who hated the phrase “head cheese” and his parents were bartenders beset by moods. My greatgrandfather was a tap-dancing Dane who died of typhoid fever while doing the vaudeville circuit. He introduced yoga to the US. but they hid this fact from me, thinking I’d be too full of myself to continue the flute lessons if I knew.

munchies

My poem Ambien is in Barrelhouse Magazine #4.

Barrelhouse is now looking for fiction and non-fiction about dive bars. In my hometown, I suppose it was the Lakeside Tavern, though it wasn't such a dive, and having gone through many owners it changed character frequently. But it never thrived, and the body of water it stood beside was more of a swamp than a lake...