Category Archives: Miscellany

Captain Banana

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I loved that Peter Parker sort of threw together his first Spider-Man costume and it looked like it. And it would be silly to waste precious screen minutes establishing where he got his official outfit. But didn’t you wonder? We have to assume it didn’t come off the rack, so it was custom made. Maybe by the same tailor that makes all the WWF costumes.

While Superman’s costume was indestructible, we saw –in the final battle with the Green Goblin– that Spider-Man’s is not. So, did he have a few extra made? And what happens when they get dirty and pitted out. Wash or dry clean? Hangers or folded?

capt_bananaDDD2

I’ve had some experience in this area. For several years I lived a double life, too. Captain Banana was one of my alter egos during my radio days. My mom made my costume for me. Thermal underwear, Day-Glo cowboy boots and a plastic motorcycle helmet. It was one hot mother. I wore it for a charity Bike-a-thon and nearly died.

I really liked the movie. I’m not sure how special effects can get much better than the final 40 seconds of Spider-Man. If there was a weak spot it was probably Willem Defoe as the Green Goblin. But I respect the guy for taking the part. I mean, he played Jesus for Christ’s sake.

Roadside Memorials

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You’ve seen them. Countless times. Those small white crosses –usually with flowers– next to the highway. Sometimes there will be two or three, clustered together. I’ve always assumed these marked the spot where someone lost their life in a traffic accident. What else could it be? If there’s a mystery here, it is — at least for me– why I have never seen someone placing these little markers. Not once, in almost 40 years of driving. In fact, I can’t find anyone that has ever seen someone placing these little crosses. Think of the odds of that.

And what’s the highway department’s policy on these? Do they leave them up indefinitely? For a few weeks? If they do take them down, what do they do with them? Burn them? Store them? So many questions. Jerry Whiting has been thinking about this for a while at Roadside Memorials.

Miss America uses Google

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No big surprise, really. Almost everybody uses Google. But I was pleased to learn that even Miss America uses the same search engine I do. Katie Harman –Miss America 2002– was in town today promoting breast cancer awareness. I was on hand to record a public service announcement for one of our network advertisers. Miss America thought she was scheduled to record a TV PSA and seemed relieved to learn it was “just radio.” I mean, hell, she could have come down in her jammies with no make-up to do a radio spot. But she was as charming as you would expect Miss America to be.

According to the official Web site (“The World’s Leading Provider of Scholarships for Women”), 75 women have worn the Miss America crown in the Organization’s 82-year history (they explain the disparity). And it’s a tough gig. Katie told us she logs 20,000 miles a month, changing location every 18-36 hours. I asked if she takes a notebook computer with her on the road and she does. And she says she spends a lot of time online (she likes WebMD a lot).

Miss Harmon is 21 years old and hopes to “obtain an M.A. in Bioethics and ultimately work in health care management.” We did a little media thing and she answered some questions put by local reporters. All pretty serious, cancer-related stuff… so I kept quiet, except for the Google question. Here are the questions I really wanted to ask:

* During the Miss America Contest, did you call each other by your first names or by state?
* Do you keep in touch with the losers?
* How many squat-jumps can you do?
* Do you know where your senior ring is?
* When you go home for the holidays, do you get a lot of shit from your family? “Hey, Miss America! Get up here and clean up your room!” “Yo, Miss America! Bring me a ham sandwich.”

But I got caught up in the protocol of the thing. I mean, Jesus, she just voiced a PSA on breast cancer. I did suggest it would be funny if, at her next news conference, she waited until all the photogs got their cameras set up and then said, “Guys, I really don’t like having my picture taken.”

I look good in theater restrooms

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Maybe it’s the lighting or the tile, I can’t explain it. I first noticed it many years ago when I was a little more conscious of my appearance. I’m not a good dresser and my grooming is just so-so. But one day I dashed into the men’s room at a movie theater and saw myself in the mirror. This was how I wanted to look all the time. At first I thought it was just that theater restroom but the city or size of the theater didn’t matter. I look just as good in the Seattle Cineplex as the small art house in Kansas City.

I’ve never shared this information with anyone because there’s no way to verify it. I can’t take my wife with me for the obvious reason. And she’d tell me I looked good anyway. I can’t take a male friend (“Hey, I think I look pretty cool in the men’s room mirror… would you come with me and tell me what you think?”). I thought about trying to sneak a camera in but discarded that one pretty quickly. There’s just no acceptable explanation for taking photographs in the men’s room.

So we have here one of life’s little jokes. Sort of a “Restroom of the Magi.” I’ve been given the gift of seeing myself look just the way I want to look but I cannot share this experience. Perhaps I should be happy there is any place where I feel good about my appearance.

To those of you who know me and might have occasion to see me in a theater restroom, please don’t say anything. If you agree that I look damned fine, just give me a thumbs up or the OK sign and let it go at that.

Sheryl Crow on cover of Stuff

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A co-worker recently gave me a copy of Stuff Magazine. I’d never heard of Stuff and he explained “it’s sort of like Playboy but everyone keeps their clothes on.” He thought I’d be interested in this issue (March, I think) because Sheryl Crow as on the cover and there was a nice group of photos on the inside.

Like me, Crow grew up in Kennett, Missouri, a small town in southeast Missouri. Aside from the Kennett connection, Crow looked extremely hot in the Stuff layout. She just turned 40 and decided it might be fun to do some cheese cake.

People from Kennett are understandably proud of Sheryl Crow. She is, without a doubt, the most famous person to call our little town home. I should point out that I do not know Sheryl Crow. I’m 14 years older and our paths never crossed.

 

 

Ernest Tyler

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Ernest Tyler was executed on June 24, 1942, at the Missouri State Penitentiary. He was 37 years old and one 39 people executed by lethal gas between 1938 and 1965. He was convicted and sentenced to death for murder. Missouri switched to lethal injection when executions resumed in 1989 but the gas chamber is still located in a small stone building (called the “Death House”) on the grounds of the Jefferson City Correctional Center in Jefferson City.

Tyler, Ernest, 1948

On a wall outside the gas chamber is a group of photographs of the thirty-eight men –and one woman– that died in the gas chamber. I saw the photographs during a tour of the prison a couple of years ago. I was familiar with prison mug shots from working on a website (Capital Punishment in Missouri) but these images were so different from those of the men currently (or recently) on Missouri’s Death Row (they don’t like to call it that). Nobody seemed to know where the originals of the photographs were. I finally found them in the State Archives and the story of how they got there is interesting.

A former warden –upon retiring– took with him the prison files of those executed in the gas chamber. He was concerned the files, and whatever history they might contain, would be lost or discarded. He kept them at his home for a number of years and then turned them over to the State Archives. Where I found them. I spent several Saturday mornings going through each of the files and photocopying as much as I could afford. Along with the photographs, I found newspaper clippings; letters from the inmates; reports by prison personnel; and a variety of gruesome forms and reports related to the executions.

There was nothing remarkable about Ernest Tyler’s file. I don’t believe his case got much coverage in the press, at least there were no clippings. There was, however, a letter from Tyler to his father, a minister in Kansas City, Missouri. Prison officials apparently kept copies of outgoing correspondence. The letter was dated April 15th and Tyler was scheduled to die on April 24th, nine days later. In it, Tyler pleads with his father to come to Jefferson City to visit him before his execution. The context of the letter suggests (to me) that his father was working on some last-minute appeal to save his son. Or maybe he couldn’t bring himself to see his son on Death Row. We’ll never know. Here’s the letter:

“Hello Dad: How are you and mother today? I am not feeling so well. I received your letter, Dad. I am asking you again to please come down here, and please stop telling me about you are waiting on those papers. You may never hear from them, and when you do it will be too late, I will be looking for you or mother one by Sunday, and tell Mrs. Hill that I am praying and hoping Mr. Hill will get well, and also tell Mr. Hill, that I thank her from my heart for what they have done for me. There are no way that I can really tell her how much I thank her for her work. Dad please do something just once I ask, and not as someone else tell you to do. What I mean about I asked you to get someone to take the case back to court, but you had to go fooling around with Mr. Edon and now I am asking you to come down here and you keep telling me about you are waiting on an answer (from) them papers. Dad you will not know anything about what the Governor is going to do until the last day, which is the 23rd of this month, and on the night of the 23rd of this month I am to go down, then you will not have time to get here. So I will be looking for one of you Sunday if not before. I am writing Maron a letter, please give it to her…

I’ll close for this time, dad looking for you soon, your son,

Ernest Tyler, Hall B.B.”

Nothing in the file indicated whether Reverend Tyler visited his son. I’m guessing he did not.

The Biology of Typing

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I didn’t take biology in high school. My mom called the school and told them she didn’t think I needed to take the course. Turns out she was right. But she insisted I take typing. We used real typewriters. Manuals. There were a few electic typewriters in the back of the room but they seemed too exotic and high-tech to use. Every week or so we had these “timed typing” tests to see how many words-per-minute we could type. There some kind of formula…total words minus number of errors, something like that. I quickly figured out that my best shot was to go wide open, with no regard to errors. I frequently had the best score for a document nobody could read. This was 1964 and computers and word processors were years in the future.

Twenty years later I started working with a guy named Bob Priddy. Bob was (is) a broadcast journalist, author and –in 1984– power typist. His “office” was a cramped, dusty corner of an attic in Jefferson City, Missouri. The digital newsroom was still a few years off and Bob hammered out his news stories on a battered old Royal typewriter. The floor and walls shook when Bob was on deadline. No IBM Selectric for Bob, he was a manual guy all the way. Bob “keyboards” these days. And if he doesn’t pound the keys as he did back then, it’s only because they couldn’t take the punishment.

I recently came across an article by Roger Ebert (In Cyberspace, Writing Is A Performance) that reminded me of Bob and his battered Royal.

“A few moments ago I took the L.C. Smith down from the shelf and tried to type on it, and found that I could not. It’s just so klutzy. My fingers have to travel so far and work so hard to depress a key. You have to manually return the carriage at the end of every line. You have to hit the Tab key to indent. My fingers are no longer trained to hold down the Shift key.”

I love email. I’m trying to get comfortable with Instant Messaging but it’s a struggle. Knowing the other person is sitting there (“Mays is typing you a message”), waiting for me to respond. I find myself drifting back to typing class (“Fuck the typos, I’m going for speed!”).

I don’t think they make manual typewriters any more. Seems like I read that some place. I’m tempted to add, “too bad” but I can’t say why. Sort of like me and biology.