From the bus stations of Rt. 66 to the smoky, neon-tinged jazz dives of the big cities, these wanton tales of longing introduce us to vixens on the fringe and those shifty men that drove them there.
Read the pulp novella that one reviewer called 'A potboiler in the style of old school writers like Mickey Spillane, Dashiell Hammett or Raymond Chandler...'
I guess I can buy into the fact that the couple wanted to leave their swingin' cocktail party. But what I'm wondering about in this odd formal wear ad is why they felt the need to swing by the 7-11 for a newspaper, loaf of bread, carton of milk and an orange? And what sense does 'Why have a party when you can just have a ball' make? Is it me?
"Boardwalk Empire" Episode 11 - "Paris Green" was the 11th episode in the series. With only one more to go in the stupendous first season, Nucky Thompson's world is starting to close in on him. Will things be wrapped up by next week?
Some key events:
• Jimmy Darmody (Michael Pitt) navigates some delicate family issues and we finally learn the identity of his father.
• Prohibition Agent Nelson Van Alden (Michael Shannon) is starting to unravel and spends most of the episode addressing Agent Sebso's "temptations." While searching for an illegal still in Mays Landing, their relationship comes to a horrific conclusion.
• Nucky and Margaret address key concerns in their relationship as the pair go toe-to-toe. When Margaret brings up the fact that Nucky may have had her husband killed, Nucky defends his actions and it only gets uglier from there.
• Arnold Rothstein's lawyer advises him to face the World Series Black Sox scandal head-on by showing his face in Chicago and holding his head high.
• Nucky's fear of the consequences of an impending electoral disaster by the Democrats forces him to make changes in his Republican machine by shaking up the pecking order.
In his office, Nucky chastises the Mayoral candidate Edward Bader (Kevin O' Rourke), acting Sheriff Halloran (Adam Mucci) and the rest of the ward bosses for clowning around.
"This is the toughest election in our lifetime and you're telling jokes... Do you think Fletcher is over in the Democratic club doing a vaudeville routine? He's not... He's out there shaking hands."
Nucky announces that he's making a change to meet the future head on. While Ed Bader will be a big part of that, Nucky says the new mayor can't do it alone. "He'll need a strong arm if he's swinging for the fences. A strong arm and clean record. That's why with great regret and much gratitude for years of service, I have accepted the resignation of my brother Elias Thompson for the office of sheriff"
The men are shocked. Nucky offers the star to Halloran if he wants it. Halloran tells Nucky he won't let him down.
For my full annotated recap, historical footnotes, episode videos, tunes from the era and other thoughts, click HERE.
I plopped in my barstool in the way-too-bright airport lounge at Denver International Airport and looked through my notes. I had them jotted them down in a small black Moleskine because I wanted to look inconspicuous. Nursing a Jack before my flight back to Manhattan, I combed through what I had uncovered and the more I thought about it, the more I felt uneasy.
Now I've always loved a juicy conspiracy theory like the next guy but what turned up at one of the world's busiest airports was beyond compare.
Let me backtrack. When Esquire approached me to do this piece a month back, I thought they were batshit. The more I dug, though, and saw the "what the fuck?" evidence, I knew those Big Apple eds were on to something odd if anything else.
* * *
First things first. I've spoken to many people who had told me that back in 1995, Denver didn't even necessarily need a new airport. What's more, the new DIA has less runways and boasts absolutely any new innovations whatsoever.
I've been told that from the get go, the actual work methods of the new airport was unorthodox at best. Main contractors and sub-contractors were hired to carry out only small pockets of work then quickly dismissed from the site. At the end of the day, I've been told off the record that it certainly was a tactic to ensure no construction worker would ever see the entire scale of the project.
And what of it? Originally budgeted at around a billion dollars, it soon skyrocketed to $5.3 billion. Why? Five large buildings were fully constructed and subsequently deemed to have been positioned incorrectly. So what happened? They were buried and the current airport in constructed on top of those original structures. Conspiracy theory wackos say its in those very underground buildings where our next government will be located.
I also have recorded several other goofy things that I kept hearing repeatedly during the course of my stay here in Denver.
While juicy, do I really need to include that the aerial view of the DIA appears to have been designed in a shape of a swastika? A leading air traffic official tells me that it probably is a coincidence and designed that way for optimum efficiency.
Oh, and then there's the Queen of England who was said to have bought up large chunks of land around the airport. Why would the Crown want huge plots of land in a remote part of Colorado?
And don't even get me started on the the rash of cracked airplane windshields and delayed flights. Architects have told me that the location for the new airport, is at best ludicrous, and it's very elevated location is a result of those delayed flights and mysterious airplane ailments.
* * *
A nearby stewardess, also waiting for her flight, noticed me and my notes and casually asked what I was reading. I smirked and told her she didn't wanna know. She had my number, though. She said I looked like a cop or some sort of investigator.
"Close..." I said. "I'm a reporter..."
She was intrigued enough to ask me what I was working on.
"The airport..." was all I said.
Again, she looked like she was two steps ahead of me. "Did you see the plaque?"
I shook my head. "Come on..." she said, leading me to an odd mounted capstone. In the center was a Masonic square and compass symbol with a dedication from something called “New World Airport Commission.” The only rub? No such body exists.
She also showed me a floor inlay with the symbols AU/AG. While the easy answer pegs this towards gold and silver, another theory may suggest that its symbols also stand for a new strain of Hepatitis Australia Antigen.
Now I wouldn't have given that last argument much of a thought but since it was located in front of a particular mural, it gave me a quick chill.
The Denver International Airport if chock full of creepy murals peppered throughout the terminals. I told her that while I didn't buy into creative images per se, I do need to feel at ease when I'm in a goddamn airport. Obviously subjective, there's no denying, however, the fucking art at DIA is downright horrific.
I stared at the AU/AG plate in the floor and looked up at the mural. It depicted a scene of mass genocide, death and harsh social control. It was plain staggering. I took a quick shot of it with my iPhone. Where to begin? The Nazi-like figure in a gas mask wielding a machine gun and Arabian sword spearing the dove of peace or the women carrying dead babies amidst a genocide stream of what can be conceived as some sort of germ warfare? In one corner of the mural is an copy of a poem, known to have been written by a child who died in a German concentration camp.
She pointed towards "Blue Devil's Horse" outside in the distance. It was supposed to greet passengers on their approach. When I told her that it was hardly a reassuring symbol of safe travel, she said that the rearing mustang sculpture has been likened to a horse associated with the secret Government Montauk Project, which followed the more well known Philadelphia Experiment. The Montauk Air Force on Long Island New York is purported to be the site of an amazing experiment that studied mind control, spontaneous object creation as well as time and space travel.
But screw it, like I said, I'm no art critic. By the time we arrived at the gargoyle in the suitcase, I all but needed another drink.
* * *
We sat down and as I checked the time she leaned in and asked me if I needed to know anything else.
That threw me and after I pressed her for who she really was, she admitted that she indeed was a low level member of The New World Order and that I shouldn't get on the plane.
"Why would you be telling me all this?" I asked.
"The people need to eventually know all of this," she answered. "After all, 2012 is almost here. It soon won't matter."
Driving on the highway hours later, the plane crash was all over the news and my blood ran cold.
I kept repeating her words in my mind. It. Soon. Won't. Matter.
When I pulled into the driveway, I decided it was time to buy a gas mask. MUSIC: "Airport1.0" by Joel Putman can be downloaded HERE. Enjoy the creepy documentary below.
I'd say that my parents screwed me up pretty good. They weren't normal. In fact, I'd say they were pretty fucking crazy.
My dad Rusty was the fourth bill in a traveling wild west show that had all the authenticity of your basic dime store six shooter.
And Ma? She was his apprentice and, truth be told, none too bright either. What else would explain how she'd let a two year-old brave the old man's "legendary" knife toss? He'd tell audiences he learned his trade from a Sioux on the South Dakota plains when in fact Uncle Snippy taught pop everything he knew in the back alley of a Baltimore liquor store. His mentor in the Art of Stupidity...
Yeah, they were all fucked.
Holidays were tough on the road. I remember one year the rickety show brought us somewhere outside of Sante Fe. I thing I learned - even as a baby - was Christmas just ain't the same without the cold. I needed to see that fake smoke coming out of my mouth.
Thinking they were doing their son a favor, they brought me to some fucking excuse for a North Pole at some Christmas tree farm outside of Lubbock, Texas. From the satanic Saint Nick to the sad burrow they plopped me on, it was a goddamn joke. Where were the elves? The presents? The fucking snow? Another holiday ruined.
And you know how most kids go nuts on Halloween? One year, Pop decides to invite Uncle Snippy to the road and figured it would be more fun if they dressed up and I took them trick-or-treating. Flasks and all. By the 15th house, they were shitfaced and eventually hauled to the drunk tank. After I wandered back to our rodeo tent, all mom wanted to know is if I got her some candy.
# # #
But the years flew by and eventually they died. It wasn't anything as simple as a heart attack or stroke. Nope. Even in death, they embarrassed.
Constipated for days, Uncle Snippy suffered a brain hemorrhage while trying to force out a huge turd. They found him in the outhouse by the billygoat pen.
Ma? Well, she found Jesus. And while she was being baptized during her 'Born Again' ceremony in a cruddy lake, she slipped, hit her head under the water and drowned in no time flat.
But Pops takes the cake. One night after one of his benders, he decided to instigate a rabid monkey. Even in a cage, that chimp was stronger than a group of five men. He clutched onto dad's arm, turned him around and strangled him in 78 seconds flat.
Truth be told, I more relieved than bereaved. What I find funny, though, is that while they were fuck ups, their entire lives, someone had the forethought to draft a last will and testament.
Thinking they would repay me for the life of shit they bestowed upon me, I learned that I was willed the assets of their crappy rodeo act. Yup, I was the proud owner of a deaf horse named Trixter, 14 dull knives of various sizes, a pair of dirty chaps and of course, the right to use the name "Pronto Billy and his First Dame of the Open Frontier."
Yippie.
In my early 20s, I stayed with the rodeo and developed my own act of sorts. I sharpened those knives and employ about four illegals who dodge these blades every night.
I'm now known as Pronto Billy, Jr. and close the show to standing ovations whenever there's a crowd.
Every now and then, though, I see Ma and Pop peeking from behind that curtain and I have to be honest, it scares the shit out of me.
It was an era when tough guys were able to sell cigarettes on TV... Enjoy.
"Paul Mall" was the sponsor of "M Squad," a television program which ran on NBC during the '50s. That's perhaps why Lee Marvin, the show's star, appeared on its commercials during the episodes.
As for his quirky pronunciation? The cigarette's name is correctly pronounced with the rhyming couplet "pell mell," as made evident in the advertisement.
The American Tobacco company would dispatch numerous publicists to instruct the cast and staff of the correct pronunciation during live commercials. With the dissipation of cigarette advertising, first with bans on radio, then television, the pronunciation has found a decidedly generational tone. Those who lived in the era of the audible advertisements pronounce it "pell mell" while those of us -- MOST of us -- have only the visual title of the packaging to refer to often use the increasingly more common phonetic "paul mall."
Sunday's episode of "Boardwalk Empire" was written by Steve Kornacki and directed by Brad Anderson. Between the looming election and the damage control following an attempt on his brother Eli's life, Atlantic City Treasurer Nucky Thompson (Steve Buscemi) seems to be spinning many of his plates in the air.
Some key events:
• A matured Jimmy Darmody (Michael Pitt) returns to Atlantic City after spending months in Chicago only to find Agent Nelson Van Alden (Michael Shannon) waiting in the wings ready to arrest him on five counts of murder. • Margaret (Kelly Macdonald) decides to helps Madame Jeunet (Anna Katarina) when she tells her that Nucky is charging her double rent and may have to close the shop.
• As a result of a weakening political machine, Nucky decides to shake things up as he positions a new Atlantic City Mayor and acting sheriff.
• In New York, Nucky Thompson-rivals the D'Alessio brothers are introduced to Arnold Rothstien (Michael Stuhlberg) and hatch a plan against the Atlantic City Treasurer.
"I understand that you’re interested in the liquor business," Rothstein asks them. He goes on to say that he can only see going into the bootlegging business one way -- with good hooch, not the diluted "rot gut" kind.
"There's a growing demand for good whiskey in the United States," Rothstein tells them. "And I'm not talking about the swill you stirred up in your chamber pot. I'm talking about the best scotch from Britain." He wants to set up a business to import scotch and have ships with crews waiting outside the three mile limit so all they have to do is smuggle it ashore.
Rothstein says that the ports in Atlantic City are ideal for their kind of distribution. The only snag? "The man that runs that city," Rothstein tells them.
"Normally I would make a deal with such a man," he tells them. "But I find Nucky Thompson greedy and unreasonable."
You'll never guess how Rothstein chooses to deal with his problem ...
For my full annotated recap, historical footnotes, episode videos, tunes from the era and other thoughts, click HERE.
When Flapjack Collins got wind that the Mexican government was shelling out up to fifty American for Apache scalps, he pondered if he was the killing kind of man.
He worked grain at Buffalo Trace Distillery in Franklin County, Kentucky and being that there was no future as far as he could see, he packed up with no notice and hit the open trail.
The going got rough somewhere around South Texas or ... Hell, it could've even been Arizona. It was hard to tell. One thing was for certain - this frontier wasn't what he read about in those silly adventure pamphlets.
His vices ate at him like a cancer and soon realized that if the desire was strong enough, nothing can stop them, whatever your poison...
Be it the sinful flesh of a woman ...
The sweet high of the opium plant ...
Or that fresh aroma of burning tobacco.
He swooshed his match against his aged, weather-beaten saddle and as he licked the tip of his cigarette, only one thought ran through his mind.
"What I wouldn't do right now for a shot of White Lightnin'..." Flapjack used the last of his stash - stolen from the distillery, of course - midway through Texas and he was starting to get the shakes.
At sundown and amid tumbleweeds, he made camp and burned a can of beans over a small fire. He was starting to wonder if he'd ever see an Apache on the godforsaken goose chase.
# # #
The next morning, Flapjack's horse Anchor was gone. Vanished into the dust of the plains. The cowboy was now stranded and had no choice but to forge ahead on foot.
Not two miles up the trail he saw one. The red skin and long silky black hair glistened in the Western sunlight. But with no horse, Flapjack was at a tactical disadvantage.
The Apache saw him and after thinking twice about the white stranger, made a friendly gesture. Flapjack smiled.
As the cowboy approached, all the Indian wanted to know was if he had any coffee.
Flapjack gripped his knife and answered, "I do..."
# # #
That night, under a moonlit sky, Flapjack's new horse - Sanuye - couldn't relax and twitched about while the cowboy unrolled his sleep sack. The Apache told him that the horse's name meant "Red Cloud at Sundown" and if Flapjack wasn't damned to see a crimson glow in the night sky.
But Sanuye stood on his hind legs, fussing.
"Dang animal ... Makin' a ruckus since dinner..." Flapjack searched his knapsack for a sugar cube and gave it to the fidgety horse. "'Whatsa matter, girl? You looked stronger than a Kentucky flagpole earlier today."
A smarter fella than Flapjack would perhaps raise an eyebrow as to why the Indian only wanted a measly bag of coffee for this cursed horse.
Flapjack just figured Sanuye was ornery because he watched his master die.
Flapjack found out quickly that he was no good at scalping and realized it took a certain kind of man - and strength for the matter - to eloquently extract a significant of one's hair. So he did the next best thing - shot the Apache with his six shooter and hacked off his head. Hell, it was still a bounty and as far as he saw, a perfectly portable proof of trophy. He was getting his fifty no matter what.
Sanuye was calm now and Flapjack noticed a bulge in the saddle bag that certainly wasn't there before.
"What in the blazes?" It was an unlabeled bottle of hooch filled to the brim. Flapjack bit off the cork and spit it to the ground.
He sucked it down and smiled. The bourbon tasted as if it were aged in a special oak casks reserved only for millionaires. And by golly, it went down easy. Flapjack knew his hooch and this was pure gold.
But then he started to choke. As he stumbled to the ground, Flapjack soon started to hear voices in his head. They sounded ancient and powerful and told him to get his gun and sit beside his new horse.
Cocking the trigger, the last thing Flapjack saw was the dead Apache's head in the dirt smiling at him.
After the gunshot, Flapjack drifted towards death and it finally dawned on him: You never mess with an Apache shaman in the middle of the Arizona desert.
Music: Native American Flute & Drum "Allah Humah" Track 6 from the "Sacred Space." Download it HERE. Art: Oldwesternboy1 at Flickr and Wikipedia.
Seriously, how can you not love the above pic of Tina Fey?
Vargas girl pose -- check
Vintage typewriter -- check
Adorable mojo with with just enough sex appeal -- check
... And just in case, you need another excuse to realize that writer-comedienne-actress Tina Fey is the cat's pajamas, she's just been given the Mark Twain Award for American Humor.
Awarded by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts annually since 1998, it's presented to an individual who has made a significant contribution to American humor.
Fey's in great company. Past recipients include:
1998 - Richard Pryor 1999 - Jonathan Winters 2000 - Carl Reiner 2001 - Whoopi Goldberg 2002 - Bob Newhart 2003 - Lily Tomlin 2004 - Lorne Michaels 2005 - Steve Martin 2006 - Neil Simon 2007 - Billy Crystal 2008 - George Carlin 2009 - Bill Cosby
Fey has won seven Emmy Awards, three Golden Globe Awards, four Screen Actors Guild Awards and four trophies from Writers Guild of America Awards. What's more, she was singled out as the performer who had the greatest impact on culture and entertainment in 2008 by the Associated Press, who also gave her its AP Entertainer of the Year award.
Sunday's episode of "Boardwalk Empire" was written by Meg Jackson and directed by Brian Kirk. Most of the episode took place in Chicago and had Nucky Thompson wheeling and dealing prior to the 1920 Republican National Convention.
Some key events:
• While visiting Chicago during the Republican National Convention, Nucky Thompson (Steve Buscemi) meets Warren Harding's charming campaign manager Harry Daugherty (Christopher McDonald). Nucky's new acquaintance just may have soured him on the once-promising prospect of backing New Jersey Senator Walter Edge.
• Sheriff Eli Thompson (Shea Whigham) is gravely injured and Nucky goes into panic mode as a result. Out of his element and so far away from his base of operations, Nucky turns to the only two people he can trust -- Jimmy Darmody (Michael Pitt) and Margaret Schoeder (Kelly Macdonald).
• As speculation continues to build around him, gambler and "businessman" Arnold Rothstein (Michael Stuhlbarg) prepares for his testimony in the Black Sox Scandal.
• Straight arrow agent Nelson Van Alden (Michael Shannon) bristles at his wife's request for an unorthodox child bearing procedure and urges her to follow "God's will."
• Jimmy's mom Gillian Darmody (Gretchen Mol) urges his common-law wife Angela to get a job when the money begins to run out.
But possibly, the water-cooler moment in the show had to be the confrontation between Nucky's former flame Lucy Danziger (Paz de la Huerta) and his new gal pal Margaret Schroeder. In short, it was the bitch-slap heard 'round Atlantic City. And one that was a long time comin'...
For my full annotated recap, historical footnotes, episode videos, tunes from the era and other thoughts, click HERE.
"Bob Wills Boogie" by Bob Wills and The Playboys. It can be downloaded HERE.
Who knew where we were?
Me and Linky had a job in Philly, did the deed, and were on our way back to Chicago by way of Bumblefuck, America.
Shoulda known better than to let Linky drive but I had a little too much hooch in me so I leaned back in the seat as some cat named Bob Wills on the radio sang me to sleep.
A few hours later, I saw we were buried deep in West Virgina. Wills wasn't singing anymore. In fact, the gospel told me we weren't where we were supposed to be.
I rubbed the sand out of my eyes. "Why the fuck aren't we home?"
Linky stared and stumbled. "Shade, I just kept driving..."
" --- YOU JUST KEPT DRIVING. Didn't you see signs for Ohio?"
"Shade -- " he said pleading, "-- The trip down felt like a straight run."
"Straight run my prick, Linky!" I calmed myself down before I shot the fucking moron. In my brain, all I heard was my wife wanting to know what happened to her stupid brother and me making up some half-assed story she'd see right through.
"Pull into the next flophouse. We'll start fresh in the morning." I said, staring at nothing out the window.
Minutes later, in the pitch black of the roadside night, we pulled into Roy's Motel Cafe and set up camp. At check-in, we found out there was no Roy but for an extra finske, Doogan behind the counter threw in a pint of Jim Beam on account of there being no liquor stores in town.
* * *
The next morning, I woke up to the room's blasting transitor with some yahoo named Spade Cooley crooning a tune. He was no Sinatra, but the guy wasn't bad.
In the corner of the room, Linky was shaving and said that he heard on the radio there was a county fair not five minutes away.
"Link, don't get any ideas. Do you realize how many diamonds we have to deliver? We don't need any distractions," I told him.
"Don't be a crumb-bum, Shade," he snapped. "If you had the sense of a billygoat, you'd win my sister a stuffed bear. I'm getting one for Ingrid."
I burped up some bourbon. I killed that bottle the second we got into the room and passed out in my clothes. Catching a glimpse of myself in the mirror, it was obvious. We looked like fucking criminals in the middle of America's apple pie and this fucker wants to stroll a county fair like we're on a goddamn date.
"Fine, Link..." I said. "Whatever. We'll win the girls a stuffed toy."
* * *
The fairgrounds were airy and open with all sorts of townfolk trickling in. I was hungover and the cotton candy and hot dog carts weren't doing me any favors.
Linky was like a kid at the candy store and found the amusement stands before the bulk of the children. This is what I was dealing with.
Twenty minutes and three dollars later, we had our stuffed animals. Linky had to settle for an alligator since I took the last teddy bear.
"Happy? Let's get the fuck outta here," I said, knowing it was going to be a chore.
It wasn't that easy. Some little dish at the stand wanted Linky to escort her onto the Ferris wheel because of her fear of heights.
As he bought their tickets, I grabbed his shoulder. "You ride this fucking Ferris wheel and we're outta here. I don't care if she wants to taste you in the back of her throat afterwards, we're gone. Got me?"
"Yeah, yeah, yeah..." was the last thing he said before I saw them. And they were staring at me and Linky like meat.
"What the fuck..." I whispered. "Whatsa matter, boys?" the dish said. "Don't be scared. We'll be nice..."
My blood ran cold. "Linky?" I asked. "Got your gun on you?"
He shook his head. "It's in my bag." Always an idiot.
"But we ain't colored," he said to the dish who was just laughing.
I looked at her. "We don't have to be. We ain't white to them."
I pulled out my gun from the holster. "Run... "
The stuffed toys were history and by time we got to the entrance gate, a few of the sheets were getting off. Funny, it's hard to run in that ridiculous garb.
The gravel smoke was furious as the Buick dovetailed onto the highway.
Thirty miles out of town, I pulled over and told Linky to get out of the car. This time, I couldn't contain myself and worked him over pretty well.
"Get in that fucking back seat," I ordered. "And don't you say one goddamn word the whole rest of this trip." He was bloody and moaning but I didn't care. He'd live. Linky maybe had a broken nose, if that.
By the time we arrived in Chicago, I had no worries about what I was going to tell the little lady about her idiot brother. And why she doesn't have that stuffed bear...
So much to say about this one. Don't know where to begin. The ugly ties... The "show her it's a man's world" or the simple fact that she's kneeling in front of her husband serving him his breakfast...
Dig it "Mad Men" fans... The book that ad man John Slattery's character Roger Sterling was claiming to pen during this past season on AMC's "Mad Men" is actually coming out.
Yup, Grove Atlantic will release "Sterling’s Gold: Wit and Wisdom of an Ad Man." In the show's Sterling's books poignantly arrived as the defeated, washed-up ad man lost the coveted Lucky Strike account.
This stroke of genius came about when Grove Atlantic publisher Morgan Entrekin, a fan of "Mad Men," struck a deal directly with creator Matt Weiner.
On the book jacket: Advertising pioneer and visionary Roger Sterling, Jr., served with distinction in the Navy during World War II, and joined Sterling Cooper Advertising as a junior account executive in 1947. He worked his way up to managing partner before leaving to found his own agency, Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, in 1963. During his long and illustrious career, Sterling has come into contact with all the luminaries and would-be luminaries of the advertising world, and he has acquired quite a reputation among his colleagues for his quips, barbs, and witticisms. Taken as a whole, Roger Sterling’s pithy comments and observations amount to a unique window on the advertising world—a world that few among us are privileged to witness first—hand—as well as a commentary on life in New York City in the middle of the twentieth century.
From the back cover:
* When a man gets to a point in his life when his name’s on the building, he can get an unnatural sense of entitlement.
* The day you sign a client is the day you start losing him.
* Being with a client is like being in a marriage. Sometimes you get into it for the wrong reasons, and eventually they hit you in the face.
* When God closes a door, he opens a dress.
"Sterling’s Gold" covers it all: business, marriage, and the taste of success made sweeter with a glass of something strong.
Look for "Sterling’s Gold" Nov. 16 which clocks in at a svelte 176 pages for $16.95.
UPDATE: STUPENDOUS piece about Jack Huston, the character actor who took the quirky role of RICHARD HARROW and turned him into a breakout character... (w/ VIDEOS) ----> CLICK HERE
~ ~ ~
Last night's episode of "Boardwalk Empire," -- "Home" -- explored the notion of personal demons both inward and outward -- especially Nucky Thompson's (Steve Buscemi). Seems as though he may have some daddy issues especially after his father Ethan Thompson is injured in a fall. Nucky uses the opportunity to refurbish his childhood home and finds out how he really feels about the place he grew up.
Also:
• Chalky White (Michael Kenneth Williams) may or may not consider a liquor proposition from a mysterious stranger. • Creepy prohibition Agent Nelson Van Alden (Michael Shannon) gets a valuable lead on the woods massacre. Uh-oh ... jimmy better watch out.
• Lucky Luciano (Vincent Piazza) and a "new friend" cut a deal with the bumbling D'Alessio brothers from Philly.
• Courtesy of a hot tip from Al Capone (Stephen Graham), Jimmy Darmody (Michael Pitt) eyes payback against one of Sheridan's thugs for the slashing his ex-girlfriend's face.
Jimmy also makes a new acquaintance at a Veteran's Hospital in the form of a disfigured man named Richard Harrow. The two are there for a psychological evaluation and become buddies.
Harrow asks if Jimmy is there for the test.
"The nutcase test? Yeah..." Jimmy answers
"And then they'll tell us if we're normal or not," Harrow says. "They're interested in what's in our heads so next time, we'll fight better."
Harrow turns to his leather duffel and pulls out a German sniper mask. He tells Jimmy that if he doesn't have it on him at all times, he becomes anxious.
A marksman in the war, Harrow says that he watched the same German soldier for three days straight and when he lifted the mask to scratch his nose he put "a bullet one inch below his eye."
The more he talks with the disfigured vet, he realizes that Harrow's sharp eye just may prove invaluable.
Find out how in my full recap HERE chock full of historical footnotes, episode videos, tunes from the era and other thoughts.
The version of this post that I published last year was so popular that it warrants an update. And honestly, what a difference a year ...
BUKOWSKI'S BASEMENT
Welcome to Bukowski's Basement and the blog of Anthony Venutolo. It's primarily a showcase for nuggets that can range from anywhere from Skid Row to the Savoy in the form of poems, flash fiction, noir or pop culture musings.
Feel free to pour some cheap hooch and settle in because this is a place to celebrate all things wondrous in the whiskey-soaked literary landscape of Chuck Buk, Jack Kerouac, Tom Waits and Raymond Carver.
To view my complete profile, click HERE and feel free to follow me from any of the links above.
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concentration camp.
e'd tell audiences he learned his trade from a Sioux on the South Dakota plains when in fact Uncle Snippy taught pop everything he knew in the back alley of a Baltimore liquor store. His mentor in the Art of Stupidity...
Truth be told, I more relieved than bereaved. What I find funny, though, is that while they were fuck ups, their entire lives, someone had the forethought to draft a last will and testament.
plains. The cowboy was now stranded and had no choice but to forge ahead on foot.
"Whatsa matter, boys?" the dish said. "Don't be scared. We'll be nice..."
