American History

Memories of the Pulps

Category: Nostalgia

This story was written by my long time friend Terry Barker who lives with his wife Connie in Sechelt British Columbia.

Terry is a multi-talented individual who amongst many things has been a teacher, a stage director, an ambulance driver, a published author , a sketch artist and now a photographer.

Enjoy!

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Her real name was Mrs. Hannah, I think, but I used to call her Mrs. Henna in my mind be­cause she had such sensational fake jap-orange hair. I wonder what ever happened to her.

She hung out in a shabby little shop not much bigger than a hallway on Helmken Street, just off Granville. She must have weighed in the neighbourhood of three hundred pounds, making it troublesome for her to move about between the piles of old magazines. Her wrinkled dress advertised what she'd had for lunch. I thought she was the ugliest old hag I'd ever seen, but she possessed the keys to heaven.

I used to drop in there on my way to the YMCA in downtown Vancouver. Initially I was attracted by her minute window display, which always, in all the years I went there, had the same decaying pulp magazine on view. Even after I'd read it, even when the window be­came so grimy that you could barely see through it, that magazine had the power to stop me in my tracks.

It was the November 1940 issue of Fantastic Novels. The feature story was A. Merritt's The Snake Mother. On the blinding cover was a Virgil Finlay painting of a woman naked to the waist, at which point her body turned into -- coils! Yep, neighbours, that's the way the pulp authors used to write: they'd start the sentence with a hook ("She was naked to the waist"): then tease you with a mysterious connector ("where her body turned into"): and fi­nally hit you with an em dash and a topper, usually in italics (" --- "coils!"). The penulti­mate word or phrase was always followed by an exclamation point. My parents called it "trashy pulp fiction", so I learned to smuggle the stuff home and read it under the covers with a flashlight. God, how I loved it.

I discovered the pulps in 1940, on a paper drive. I was in Grade Seven at Point Grey Junior High School. I'd been made a Junior Air Raid Warden, which gave me the power to stay up late and have my own special flashlight with black sticky electricians tape across the lens, leaving a small slit to peer down back lanes and check my neighbours' curtains. It also gave me the authority to manage my class's paper drive. My first memory of the pulps was one afternoon after school, sitting atop an enormous pile of newspapers and magazines, root­ing through the bundles and pulling out copies of Astonishing Tales of Super Science. That was the night my mother called the police to report a missing child, and they found me there, reading Ray Bradbury's yarns about Mars by the light of my ARP flashlight.

The pulps usually cost a dime (later, during the war, they went up to 12 cents). They were about seven by nine inches, usually a quarter to half-inch thick. They had untrimmed edges. The paper was fat and porous and when you got too excited about Captain Future your sweaty fingers smeared the ink. They smelled old, even when you'd just plunked down the dime that you'd been saving up for a package of Players Plain but bought Galaxy with instead. They smelled old -- even before you bought them!

They covered a range of interests: romances. confessions, westerns, crime, adventure, and the new kid on the block, science-fiction. You could get away with reading a Zane Grey Western or Black Mask or Doc Savage -- and even educated folks read The Shadow some­times -- but you had to be tough to read science-fiction. If you were caught with a copy of Astounding Stories, you were in for an hour of ragging about Buck Rogers and space travel and all that crap. It didn't do you any good to protest that Buck Rogers was a comic strip whereas what you were reading was serious stuff, the literature of ideas, specula­tive fiction -- all those literary terms that precocious teen-aged fans like Isaac Asimov used to write about in the Letters to the Editor column, and boy, didn't you write lots of letters yourself and then haunt future issues to see if you got printed? But it didn't do you any good at all because they didn't want to hear your viewpoint, what they wanted to do was make you run home in tears.

At thirteen, though, the rewards were sweet enough to allow one to endure the social pun­ishment. Where else, for example, could you read about a potion that would shrink one to the world of the infinitely small? Ray Cummings "Golden Atom" series followed the ad­ventures of an intrepid explorer into the microscopic, then sub-atomic, universe where our electrons and protons were actually their planets and suns -- and then on and beyond, into the infinite! Atoms made up of yet smaller atoms, and those of even smaller ones. Could we be -- part of a giant's eyelash on an infinitely larger world! Which may in turn perhaps be only a part of -- who can say! I remember writing an essay about this idea for Mr. Lewis, my Grade Eight Science teacher, complete with much-erased pencil drawings of solar systems (which are really atoms, eh?) and galaxies (nothing but molecules, dig?) -- and his look of pitying amusement as he asked me, "Have you been reading those crazy pulps?" (Who, me? No, no sir, not me!) The memory hangs on after fifty years, and even today I'd like the chance to take Mr. Lewis by his meager neck and throw him through -- the Time Gate!

The Frank A. Munsey Company had a hammerlock on most of the really terrific science-fiction yarns that had appeared since the beginning of the century. Science-fiction maga­zines, per se, came into existence only in 1927, when Hugo Gernsbach published his semi­nal Amazing Stories. Twelve years later, when I started reading the field, there was a handful of s-f pulps struggling along: Planet Stories, Startling Stories, Thrilling Wonder Stories, Astounding Stories. But the Munsey Company started a new magazine in 1939 to cull their enormous backlog of pre-1927 stories from their old Argosy All-Story Magazine. They named it Famous Fantastic Mysteries (FFM to those of us who loved it). And the first issue featured A. Merritt's classic The Moon Pool, a tale of a mysterious land be­neath the Pacific Ocean, a place where super-science and ancient occult power wedded in a unholy mix that produced the vampirous being called The Dweller. Then their compan­ion magazine, Fantastic Novels, published the sequel, The Conquest of the Moon Pool. Later they published Merritt's great yarns about a lost civilization buried behind the ramparts of Yu-Atlanchi, deep in the Andes. The Face in the Abyss and The Snake Mother. That last one is the one that sat for years in Mrs. Henna's grungy window, the one with the half-naked snake woman on the cover. Teen-aged boys noticed stuff like that. The Munsey company published all of his work eventually. Who could resist such alluring bait?

Mrs. Henna -- Hannah! -- displayed all these wonderful magazine, with their garish sun­bursts and Bug-Eyed Monsters threatening Half-Naked Languishing Women, and Heroes threatening the Bug Eyed Monsters. But in her back room she kept the really good stuff: Unknown and Astounding Science-Fiction , rare pulps that had to be smuggled across the border. By this, time, in 1941, we were deep into the war, and the Canadian government decided to ban the import of all pulp magazines. Why? Who will ever know? But we ad­dicts had had our supply stopped, and we were perfectly willing to pay whatever it took. She charged fifty cents reading fee for an illegal copy, and another fifty cents deposit. A lot of money in those days. You got the deposit back when you returned her treasure. She once leaned over the rutted counter and confided in me: "I'm an old woman, and I don't have much in this world, but as long as I got me mags -- and young men like you who want to read them -- I'll get by." Her jap orange hair blazed in the dim light. I felt deliciously part of some kind of adult conspir­acy.

Well, I drifted away from the Grey Lensman and Giles Habibula of the Space Patrol and Northwest Smith and Conan and Asimov's unbearably brilliant transfer of the fall of Rome to the galactic scene. I grew up, graduated from high school, started UBC. I discov­ered Ariel and Caliban, the ghost of Hamlet's father, MacBeth's witches -- much the same stuff, actually, but at a much different level. The pulps, in the meantime, disappeared. In the brave new post-war world, who would be caught dead reading anything so outdated as -- a pulp mag!

Some years later, when I was 26, I found myself teaching high school English. And in­cluded in the anthologies of literature that I was supposed to be introducing my young charges to were -- Ray Bradbury's Martian Chronicles, which I had read in Planet Sto­ries! And Zenna Henderson's "People" yarns in A Mess of Pottage, that I had devoured in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction ten years before! No need now to smuggle garish covers home under my coat and read fusty-smelling pulps under the covers! No, sir! Now all was approved by the British Columbia Department of Education! (When I showed this to my mother she sniffed and said, "Well, as far as I'm concerned it was trash then and it's still trash today.")

And Mrs. Hannah? That summer I sought her out. But she, like the pulps, had disap­peared. Her old hole-in-the-wall on Helmken Street was gone. The whole building was transformed. Where once I had pressed my two hard-saved quarters into those fat hands for the read of a lifetime, now was the back of a restaurant.

Did she fall victim to changing times? Like the old shoemakers of Galsworthy's Quality, did she fail to adapt? When the young men stopped coming for Unknown and Astounding, did she starve rather than bring in Colliers and The SatEvePost and Liberty and Pageant?

Did she end her days living with her bitchy daughter in a rambling old apartment building on Thurlow Street? Did she harangue her about the faithless young men who used to come in for "good reading" and then abandoned her for CanLit?

My memory ends in 1953. All that remains is a picture of a sad, fat old drab with her hand out for my quarters -- and in return, renting out excursions to space and time. I got the better bargain.

Holy Nomenclature Batman

Category: Humour

I read an article in the Ottawa Citizen where the ‘F’ word was used unabashedly. How refreshing, I thought. After all, this is the way people talk.

It amazes me the contortions Christians go through to alter language in an attempt to be spared being smitten or having venial sins tallied against them.

Take for instance the number of ways God and Jesus’ names are modified:

- Gosh
- Jeez
- Gosh darn
- Gall darn it
- Jeepers Creepers
- Gawd-a-mighty
- Cripes
- Criminy

There is inequity in the language. Heaven is usually left alone but words relating to hell and damnation abound:

- Darn
- Dang
- Blasted
- Heck
- Blazes

There also aren’t that many expressions where Mary's name is invoked in a sentence unless it is used in the 'Mother of God' context.

For instance one never says ‘Mary I hit my finger with a hammer!’. Whereas one often hears things like ‘Mother of God I swear I'll leave you two by the side of the road if you don't SHUT UP!’

Mary must be thinking: ‘What am I? Chopped liver!’

It also seems that Mary cannot appear in a sentence without including the rest of her family. Take for instance the sentence ‘Jesus, Mary, Joseph and Donkey[1] what are you doing with that blow torch son?’.

Then there are all the expressions denoting Jesus ‘on’ something:

- Jesus on a sidecar
- Jesus on a crutch
- Jesus on a kangaroo
- Jesus on a pogo stick

I think it is high time we say it like it is! Gall darn right!’


[1] Rare

Cough-a-teria

Category: Humour

Years ago, when I was working at Bell Canada, I was in line in the Bell cafeteria. In front of me was a man advancing towards the cash register.

The lady serving lunch that day was a sweet woman who always giggled nervously at anything anyone said. As I was eyeing the lunch fare I couldn't help but notice that the vegetable of the day was spinach. I thought this was unusual for a cafeteria where one is used to a fairly bland fare of peas and carrots.

I said to the lady "Oh! I see you have spinach today". To which, unsure how to respond to my comment, she responded by fidgeting and giggling. Then I said "I guess you weren't expecting 'The Spinach Inquisition!'".

Suddenly, coming from the man next to me, I hear a low guttural 'hungh!' of pain.

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Note: The story was inspired by a Monthy Python episode entitled ‘The Spanish Inquisition’.

Rollerbladers

Category: Humour

It never ceases to amaze me how I can be passed by rollerbladers when I bike down a path. I see these young girls of seventeen or eighteen zip by me, and for the life of me, I cannot keep up with them let alone pass them.

I observed one such girl while I was biking to see what the magic was. Was it the sound waves from the i-Pod headset that sent her floating effortlessly by me? Was it a hidden motor in the rollerblades?

I conjectured that it must be that back and forth swinging of the arms and the scissor like crisscrossing of the rollerblades – left foot to the right then right foot to the left. Back-and-forth. Back-and-forth.

"Ah!" says I (and this is where things turn ugly) as I attempted to switch pedals between the left and the right by sticking my legs through the bike frame.

This, as the staff at the Montfort Hospital will attest , is not a good idea. Just ask the nurses about the patient in rooms 3 and 7.

Apart from the tire tracks running down the middle of my face - as I lunged onto the front tire making those playing cards stuck in the wheel spokes sounds with my lips - my legs were crossed in such a way that would turn yogis green with envy and make sopranos yield the floor.

3 and 7 were, incidentally, also the settings of the high and low gears on my 21 speed bike at the time. 3 and 7 and I still couldn’t pass the girl.

Ah! Ah! That’s it. Next time I’ll try rollerblades myself then I’ll be able to pass them.

I don’t know if it is an after effect of my failed experiment, or the morphine drip running into my veins but, as I slowly fade away, I hear distant (warning?) bells ringing in my head. Dring-dring! Dring-dring! Dring-dring! … In my dream a young lad on a tricycle, overtakes my bicycle even as I roar down a hill.

Adventures in San Francisco

Category: Humour

In the year 2000 when I was working for a Swiss company called - Nexus Telecom - a sales colleague and I went to San Francisco and decided to visit a contact at The Bank of America.

We had been walking for a while and we were getting tired. We were also getting a bit frustrated because we couldn't figure out from the oddball street numbering system where The Bank of America was. It was also very hot.

I said to my colleague “Maybe we should hail a cab”. Twenty seconds later he sees a car with the tell-tale Taxi cab sign on the roof go by, and he shouts “There's one!”.

As my colleague was a few years older than me and a bit heavyset, I figured I could run faster, so I charged after the Taxi as it was slowing down for a traffic light. I pulled open the passenger door and said to the driver “Are you available?” to which he responded angrily “For what?” to which I replied, with the worst timing possible (as I am slowly realizing that not all is well here) “to go down ...” (and here the devil makes me pause 3 seconds as I turn my head to look at my colleague) ...”the road” I continued.

Then I said meekly, “This is not a Taxi cab is it?”. Again, angrily he says “ No! ”.

At this time I see that my soon to be dead (in a manner of speaking) colleague is doubled over on the sidewalk with his hands on his knees. His face is purple with laughter. He can't breathe he’s laughing so hard.


Postscript

As you can guess, I didn't get shot by the driver, nor I did I kill my colleague.

Bulk mail

Category: Humour

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Of Mice and Men

Category: Newspaper Article

I sent this story to 'The Ottawa Citizen' in Dec 2005
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I read the shocking news that scientists are injecting Human brain cells into mice. Eek!!

I worry that one day some of these rodents will appear in three-piece suits and run for office, maybe even run in the Federal elections. People will say ‘Aw! Aren’t they cute!’

Beware though, because the next thing you know they’ll be nibbling holes in your pockets and handing out Government cheese.

The Picture of Dorian Gray

Category: Newspaper article

I wrote this for 'The Ottawa Citizen' in July 2005

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I was thinking how odd it must feel for Citizen columnists to see their old pictures in the papers day in and day out. Unlike Dorian Gray their pictures stay young while they themselves get older and wiser (some of them anyway).

It would be nice to see how some of your columnists look after years of slogging it at The Ottawa Citizen. Take for instance John Robson who has that ‘awshucks you don’t want to put my picture in the paper’ look or Randall Denly who seems to be saying ‘I’m here Chiarelli. Come and get me!’

And take David Warren (please), surely David Warren must be sporting a visible halo and be flanked by a few disciples given his articles lately.

Time to bring out the new pictures folks.

Emerald City

Category: Newspaper Article

I submitted this story to 'The Ottawa Citizen' in Nov 2006 following the results of the Ottawa municipal elections.
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I returned from Washington D.C. to my home in Ottawa only to find out that I was accidentally dropped off in a place called Emerald City where apparently against all odds, a grand wizard by the name of Larry O’Brien has been elected mayor.

The outgoing mayor lies crushed in Oz and can still be heard crying “Oh! What a world! What a world!”.

One of the natives, a munchkin by the name of Alex who also ran against O’Brien, tells me that it’s not too late to escape. Apparently the new mayor is on leave studying ‘Mayoralty For Dummies’.

Alex tells me to click my heels three times and repeat: “There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home…”

The age of innocence

Category: Reminiscense

Back in February 2005 a co-worker forwarded a story to me that his ex-wife had sent him. Her article was called ‘To all the kids who survided the 50’s.

In response to her story I sent her the following letter:


There aren't many days when I don't think similar thoughts. I think I was eight years old when I first saw a television broadcast. The broadcast was from CJOH which, to my recollection, was the first broadcaster in the Ottawa area. For me this meant that my early childhood years were spent outside playing in the traffic (as my dad was wont to say).

Sure we watched the ‘Carol Burnett Show’ and The Twilight Zone and Shock Theater and a few other favorites but I don’t recall that television was ever a big part of my childhood.

I grew up in a village in Hull Quebec (Hull is now called Gatineau) just this side of the Gatineau Parkway and I was playing in the Gatineau hills long before the roads leading through the parkway were built.

Yes I fell from trees. Yes I cut myself. And yes I probably drove my poor mother to distraction. I have six brothers (no sisters) and we all got into all kinds of scrapes, some serious, some not so serious. I count seven visits to the emergency ward just for myself.

My wife and I have no children but I observe other people's children as they walk to school with their heavy backpacks and their slow gait. I don't see much jump and joy in their walk.

One morning I commented to my wife how kids walk with their backs to traffic instead of facing traffic like we were taught. You never see a child turn around to see if there is danger. It's like they don't care if something happens. It's a shame and it's not the kid’s fault. Children inherit what is handed down by adults.

When I was a boy I was always running. I always had the wind in my hair.

Sometimes, on the way home from school in winter, I would lie on my back in a field of hard-packed snow and ice, using my leather backpack as a sled, and I would push myself across the field with my big boots as I mused at the cloud patterns overhead.

I was a lucky boy.

Worm Coke

Category: Humour

On one of our trips many years ago , I had put a foam container containing worms covered by moss in a safe corner of our food cooler separated from some other goods in the cooler. Although my goal was to keep the worms cool you would be justified in thinking that this was a) yucky and b) probably not a good idea.

At some point during the trip we stopped at a convenience store to get a few things along with a bag of potato chips and a can of Coke for myself. Before we got on the road again, I popped the trunk of the car to put some of the things we bought in the cooler, and found that the lid on the foam container that had the worms in it had come off and worms were floating around the ice water. Gross!!!

After cleaning the cooler I moved the foam container to a shady area behind my seat .

We continued on our trip and I drove with the open bag of chips between my legs, and the can of Coke in the coffee holder.

We were driving along and a few minutes passed before I took another sip of Coke. As soon as I took the drink I felt something slimy in my mouth. My eyes suddenly grew three times their normal size and my mind screamed ‘Oh Shit! there’s a worm in my mouth! Eject! Eject!’

Sitting next to me, my wife Rita who didn’t know what was about to happen, sees me suddenly, and inexplicably, spew out a mouthful of Coke on the windshield of the car and some in her direction too. Then, just as quickly, I start laughing like a madman. Rita understandably is pissed off and thinks I’ve gone completely bananas.

What had happened (and I realized this as soon as I spewed my Coke) was that a piece of potato chips had fallen in the opening of my can of Coke and, left to sit there for a few minutes, had expanded and acquired all the characteristics of a slimy worm.

I can laugh about it now but I can’t help wondering if someone on the outside who might have seen this said ‘Looks like someone found a worm in his Coke!’ .

Probably not.

Hot fudge sundae. Hold the nuts.

Category: Humour

One day in the summer of 1992 my wife and I took a drive down to our local Dairy Queen. This despite my pleas that we would perhaps be happier staying at home and pulling our nails out with pliers.

“Alright! Alright!” I conceded. “We’ll go but I’m not going to enjoy it!”.

Flashback to that fateful day now…We have arrived at the Daity Queen and are waiting in line…

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“Ha! Ha!”. I look around the room. As I predicted, the D.Q. has twenty six patrons and just four waitresses. This fits in exactly with my ‘6.5 patrons per server waiting in line theory’ of fast food franchises.

The line-ups are shuffling slowly forward like the cast of a George Romero film waiting to reach the counter to devour the succulent Ice Milk. Yummm!

After ten minutes of this, I’ve had it. I notice that one of the waitrons (One Waitron = One unit of waiter’ing) is gone. There are now only three waitresses. I look behind and sure enough there are19.5 people in line.

We leave.

Gosh Darn, I say (or words to that effect), let’s go to McDonald's, they have sundaes there and they're much cheaper.

I remember, though, as I am driving there, that they will ask me if I want nuts on the sundaes. I hate nuts so I resolve to not let this happen. I just won't give them an opportunity to say it, that's all.

We get there and I go in. There are two lines of six people each already so I figure it doesn't matter which one I get in, the other one is going to move faster and I'll just have to put up with it. Let's see…, I make a quick calculation, as the other line moves forward, 13 people and 2 servers equals...you guessed it – 6.5 people per server.

"Two Hot Fudge Sundaes with nothing on them" I ask when I finally get to the counter. "Do you mean no Hot Fudge?" says the young girl behind the counter. "No. I mean no NUTS!" I raise my voice. "I was sure you were going to ask if I wanted nuts, and I don't want nuts that's why I said NOTHING ON IT. I DON'T WANT ANY NUTS O.K?!" I don't say this in a nasty way you understand, just a deranged psychotic way.

Anyway, by this time I can't help myself, I keep going....

“When I go to Wendy's and ask for a Coke the girl there says “Will that be a large Coke, sir?”. "What the heck I say, it's warm out and I brought my swimming trunks. I can just dive in to the LARGE COKE and cool myself off in the ICE CUBES that I didn't ask for that you're going to put in anyway with the ONE STRAW'S WORTH of COKE! No! A SMALL COKE please!" By now I'm on a roll. I can't stop myself.

“When I go to the Cineplex-Odeon Theaters and ask for a Coke there, I am confronted with three sizes: Drum size, Oil Tanker size and Mediterranean Sea size”. "Small Coke." I say, having foolishly heeded the sign outside that requests that “Patrons will kindly refrain from bringing food and drinks into the Cinemas”. “And give me a small popcorn with that” I add.

“Would you like some topping on that?”. “You mean butter?” I say. “No I mean topping, sir”. “PLAIN!” I shout. “For just 25¢ more you can get a large popcorn sir.”

OK! Here we go again... “Why don't you have it delivered. I'll be sitting right at the back listening for the beeping sound when the truck backs up. Just dump it in the aisle and while you're at it why don't you hose it down with some of that TOPPING!”.

“SMALL!” I snarl.

“That'll be $32 sir”. “For what?” I say. “The small Coke and popcorn” she says”. “Oh! of course” I mutter as I empty my wallet.

Poor girl, I think to myslef, my spleen now fully vented. I'm such a jerk. I finally calm down. Now I feel I should order something else and not complain. “I'm sorry.” I say, “rough day”. “Give me a Cheeseburger O.K?”. “O.K.” she says. “Would you like fries with that?”

Postscript

They don't let me use sharp instruments such as pens and pencils here at the 'Room for Rent Mental Institute Inc.' I have been given a computer with a shatter proof screen so that I can write though.

They used to call my condition Paranoid-Schizophrenia. They say that I am getting better, but secretely, I believe that they still think I'm paranoid.

I finish writing a nice little story about nice things, all calm and peaceful inside now. I press a button to SAVE my story then I press the EXIT key on the word processor. A message pops up - 'Are you sure you want to Exit?' . I explode!

Didn’t I just press the EXIT key? Why is it asking me if I’m sure. Yes I’m sure goddammit! Why would I press the EXIT key if I wasn’t sure?!!!!!

Outside of the room, an orderly taking a smoke break is looking in on me through a porthole in the door. He cannot hear me, but he can read my lips as I utter the words ‘AM I SURE!?’ over and over again and proceed to throw the computer across the room.

I think I'll be staying here for a little while.

Sincerely yours,
Napoleon Bonaparte
Emperor of France

Snakes Alive

Category: Newspaper article

The following article was published in 'The Ottawa Citizen' in July 2006.


Having just read about the serious ongoing developments in Lebanon I turned the page to a World News headline that read ‘Snake Swallows Electric Blanket’. With apologies to snake lovers and herpetologists everywhere, I just about spewed my coffee.

I bless the god of inadvertent juxtaposition for bringing a little humour in a sometimes grim world.

I couldn’t have laughed more had I been shown a grinning Python next to a nervous looking miniature poodle wearing a wedding veil, where the headline read ‘Python Weds Poodle!’

Carpet Scientist

Category: Newspaper article

This is an article I sent to 'The Ottawa Citizen' in year 2005.

An article aptly called ‘Yeah…This could work’, published in the Saturday Citizen’s Business section killed me (with laughter). The photo (see below) showed a tubular shaped clock covered in shag carpet with a wheel sticking out at one end.



The idea behind this contraption is that the clock would roll to the floor after hitting the snooze button, forcing one to get up when the alarm went off again.

This is an obvious experiment in robotics disguised in shag clothing. After I stopped laughing, and once I saw that this came from the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology, I thought to myself – what would be wrong with:

a) not building such a device or...
b) if you must, designing the clock in such a way that one would have to hold the snooze button progressively longer with each press or...
c) getting up when the alarm goes off.

I wonder how long it took this Carpet Scientist’s mom to ask ‘Eeeek! What happened to my carpet?!!!’.

Rye Humour

Category: Newspaper article

I sent this letter to 'The Ottawa Citizen' in April 2005.


Some people will do anything to make a quick buck on e-bay.

First we heard of the ‘Virgin Mary appearing on a slice of cheese toast’ and more recently there was the ‘Virgin Mary potato holding the likeness of the baby Jesus’.

Later a man from Kingston Ontario tried to sell a fish stick that he cooked a year ago claiming that it shows the likeness of Jesus Christ.

Now a stripper by the name of Tawny Peaks is selling her breast implants on e-bay and someone else is selling ‘alien grass’. Alien grass is grass that aliens have supposedly walked on (more likely grass that this man puts in his pipe).

Say!… I have a sad looking slice of leftover rye bread in my freezer, maybe I can put the likeness of Brooklyn Dodgers Hall of Fame catcher Roy Campanella on it and call it ‘The Catcher in the Rye’.

I could sit back and watch the dough roll in.

King Korn

Category: Humour

In Iowa, there was a farmer by the name of Joey King. Joey and his wife Myrna ran the biggest corn farm in the county. The towering silos proudly displayed the name "King Korn".
Amongst her many chores Myrna tended a large garden patch where she grew first rate vegetables that she hoped to present at the local fair every fall.
After years at trying her hand at growing giant beets she had finally succeeded. Myrna however, was forever fretful that an unexpected frost would come down from the plains and damage her prized creations.
As word got around of Myrna’s upcoming offerings for the upcoming fall fair, a local newspaper columnist covering the agricultural beat called one day and asked if he could get a preview of the beet patch as a lead in for the upcoming contest. A meeting was setup and he came over the very next day.
After viewing Mrs. King’s exceptional creations Myrna and the newspaper columnist sat by the garden and chatted about the upcoming fair over some freshly brewed tea.
Soon Joey King showed up wiping a dirty rag over his hands and plunking himself in a chair after shaking hands with the reporter. The conversation soon changed from gardening, to farming, and then to the Iowa Cubs. In the meantime Myrna King took the opportunity to pull some dry sheets from the clotheslines all the while joining in the conversation.
As the afternoon wore on, and the consversation wound down, Mrs. King showed her guest to the door while Joey set about straightening out the back yard and bringing the tea set indoors. He looked up at the plains rising up behind their property, and considered for a moment covering the beet patch in case a frost came down overnight, but then decided that the evening was warm enough.
As he eyed the empty teapot standing on the serving tray by the garden, he decided on a whim to empty the dregs into his wife’s prized garden thinking that the added nutrients would do no harm.
The next day the newspaper columnist returned to the King household excusing himself and explaining that he might have dropped a prized gold pen in the yard. Mrs. King led the writer to the yard where they soon found the object gleaming in the morning sun.
Standing by the beet patch, a sheepish looking Joey, stood wringer his hands. Myrna approached the garden and to her horror saw that her prized beets had all shriveled up and died. "My God! What happened here? Was it a frost from the plains?" The reporter too looked in amazement.
Pen in hand, the newspaper columnist recorded what was to become the most infamous remark ever to echo from the farms of King Korn as Joey said: ‘No dear, it wasn't the plains. It was brewed tea that killed the beets.’


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Note: King Korn is a reference to the movie King Kong. The movie ends with Carl Denham talking to a police lieutenant and uttering the famous line ‘it wasn't the airplanes. It was beauty killed the beast...