One man's trash

Years ago I paid a visit to the Roy Rogers Museum, out on the edge of nothing much else near Victorville, California. Out front there was a gigantic fiberglass model of Trigger (the Smartest Horse in the Movies). Somewhere inside, Trigger was actually stuffed and mounted, while in the lobby were glass cases containing, among other stuff, every wristwatch Roy had ever owned. Here at home I'm surrounded by an exhibit of books I've already read, music I'm done with, cellphones I used to yak into. And seriously, I can't imagine anybody ever wanting to curate a Dave Maleckar Museum.

Phoenix Iron Works

In some ways, things are looking brighter for America than they have in years. There haven't been any new Styx albums for a decade, and we seem to have gotten that scarf thing out of our systems. But we're sad and twitchy because we work wimp jobs for wimp companies with Dr. Seuss names like Twitter and Google. That's why we compensate with such brutal movies and sports. Me, I'd rather see a Norma Shearer picture over the weekend, then go back Monday to bust my hump for an outfit called something like Mount Savage Locomotive Works or Consolidated Vultee.

Hollywood, you know where to find me.

The people in movies spend a disproportionately large amount of time driving and punching and nowhere near enough eating and pooping. Also, when they talk, they don't spend as much of their time as actual humans do telling each other about sports on television or the plots of movies they've seen. That would make a good movie, I think. Some people are at a table eating food, and they start talking about movies, and explaining them to each other, because they haven't all seen the same ones. Then somebody says, “Excuse me. I have to go to the toilet.”

Not smart, just clever.

A lot of times when I try to say something funny, what I get is blank stares. Then a lot of other times I'll say in all seriousness something that is, apparently, just an absolute hoot. That's what I've been told, anyway. Absolute hoot. Upon what do I not have my finger? The pulse, that's what. Fortunately, somebody always shows up to tell me about kombucha or Kneebody or Jeff Lint. Somebody whose weltanschauung is more aligned with the zeitgeist. Otherwise I could not participate in any reasonably contemporary colloquy; as it is, I still often just nod and bluff.