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Tween Dream, dreamt this AM, twixt 6 AM and finally getting out of bed at 8 AM (that's sleeping in way late for me):
Marge and I are watching a CGI-heavy fantasy film from a theater seating area that is our bed. The movie is tedious, and I have a hard time staying awake, especially with Tuco (our tabby cat) purring next to me. I barely make it to the end, in which an oddly-pitched camera angle of a 19th-Century flying contraption and a closeup of the film's nominal villain with a ridiculous wig akimbo fill the screen before the end titles. At this point, a red-haired Marlboro College professor wearing glasses plunks himself into the bed at my end, and announces he's speaking at the Center for Cartoon Studies, and asks if I can get him there. So Marge, Tuco and I head out, walking down Lower Dover Road [in Marlboro, where Marlene, Maia, Danny and I used to live] toward our house. Tuco uncharacteristically allows me to carry him, content to just look around.
En route down the tree-lined dirt road with this chatty professor, we pass a small roughhewn barn on the left I've always noticed was there, but didn't know was a bookstore. The proprietor, a middle-aged woman who seems to know all of us, places a book in my hand saying, "You told me if I found a copy of The Lost World, you'd do a dinosaur sketch in it for me!" At first glance, though, I can see this isn't Conan Doyle's book: it's something unusual, a hand-colored (very nicely done!) comic-form parody of The Lost World, drawn by an unknown and uncredited cartoonist very much in the E.C. Segar school, featuring Dr. Seuss-like faux-dinosaurs. I offer to trade a copy of the genuine Lost World for this book, and she seems interested, though I also offer to buy the book if that doesn't seem fair. Tuco gets restless on my shoulders with all this banter, and it's really time to go -- we still have to scrounge up lunch for ourselves and the unexpected visitor.
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ChiChi (on the right), next to my sis Kathie
This just in:
A photo of my younger sister Kathie with her hubby Jim Szeredy, retired U.S. Army officer and active Shriner clown, in his "new ChiChi face" -- yep, my sister married a clown!
Mucho love to Kathie, Jim and ChiChi!
Joe & Steve's Big Adventure
So, Joe Citro and I stole away from our respective homes for a two-day jaunt into the wilds and not-so-wilds of New Hampshire this past Sunday and Monday. We went with a tuned car, full tank, overnight packs and no fucking clue where we would head to or why, though we gravitated toward a few long-discussed destinations before the days were out.
Fronchie drove and drove fearlessly, at one point even spilling into Maine, ontil heez Fronchmon radar brod us to da Roude 125 Modor Een, w'ere fella Fronchmon Paquette servt us weel! Mon dieu!



We visited her grave at Gilmanton's Smith Meeting House Cemetery, where Joe snapped this photo. I was hoping to find out why the 1957 feature film was filmed in Camden, Maine instead of Gilmanton, and that questions was indeed answered!

The fact that Tilton shared its name with a fellow I was in court with a couple of years ago only sweetened the stopover (he lost in court, BTW), though Joe hadn't made that associative link.
[This July 5th caption is dedicated to addled Bush supporters everywhere]
Labels: ChiChi, dreams, Gilmanton NH, Grace Metalious, HH Holmes, Joe Citro, Tilton NH
2 Comments:
Road trip!! Great stuff!
Have I ever told you about the pagan temple in a certain southern state that sits on a little-traveled backroad? There it is, in all of its polished granite glory. The thing is...very few realize that it's a pagan temple. It's cleverly disguised and most people assume it's a "christian" temple. I'd love to point out to one and all its true nature, but that would surely mean its destruction at the hands of christians. Instead, I laugh at the clever way the builder was able to place this pagan temple right out in the open in one of the most hideous of christian strongholds. It's quite hilarious! (These are the odd things one can discover on a road trip.)
I miss seeing those neat white-clad New England houses. I'll be up in Maine/New Hampshire oh-so-briefly in August. Just to fly in, go to climb Mount Washington, then return to North Carolina. My wife and I are going to be traveling with another couple--the husband is a die-hard Bushzi, and I can only hope to keep the conversation away from politics, else I'll roast his neo-fascist, Bush-loving ears. I've hiked with him before, so I know he can be made to avoid political discourse.
Pagan temple in the Bible Belt -- score! My personal fave inappropriate regional landmark is the statue of fascist leader Benito Mussolini that still stands (I think -- I saw it in the mid-'90s) in a Chicago neighborhood. Bush may yet get his own statue somewhere!
Good luck with the hike, Bob, and hope to see you sometime. Keep your cool with your hiking amigo, and happy trails!
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